buckmaster

Anonymous asked: Hey! Great post on IC's finances. I hope you're not getting bombarded with this information, but google Jedediah's interview on GOOD magazine for a mention about travel expenses. Every year they fly a bunch of people (Ugandans and Americans) back and forth, the Ugandans to go on tour and speak, etc. Each year they twice send out 10-17 teams of "roadies," on tour for a month or two, each time driving a big van around the country to screen films and raise money. Expensive, but brings money in.

Awesome! Thanks for that info. That was my assumption, and it further shows that these guys are on the up and up.

Invisible Children and #KONY2012, the Tim Tebow of charities.

Today I watched the new Invisible Children video (their 11th) with great interest. It’s inspiring for sure, but the collective internet-rage-face-backlash by some over the practices of the organization has really stirred something in me.

I’m not an expert, but I do work in this sector. So I’d love to try and clear up some misconceptions about the industry, and about how non-profits actually work:

I work for a very large non-profit doing administrative analysis, so I won’t speak to the programmatic side of what Invisible Children does. These are complicated issues, in which reams of very talented people give their whole careers to find solutions. Speaking without doing your research can make you look ridiculous (cough cough, Rush).

That said, it’s safe to say that they shouldn’t be posing with armies and weapons, or using “By any Means Necessary” style phrases in their appeals. We can all agree that lasting change won’t happen by propping up some bad guys while you try to get rid of other bad guys. Here’s a good example of how that can go wrong. Fortunately, Invisible Children has a much more holistic strategy than that, but it’s hard to fit everything into a 30 minute video.

Since much of the criticism of Invisible Children has been focused on their finances, here’s some things to consider:

A common misconception about evaluating non-profits is to look only at expense ratios. For example, Charity A gets $10 in donations dropped into a bucket on the side of the highway, and only spent $1 in fundraising supplies (the bucket). That’s 90% of funds going to the cause!

Charity B gets $100,000 in donations, but spends $50,000 developing a gala event. Since this is a 50% ratio, we should look at Charity B as being less effective, right?

Probably not. Charity B could likely trim that expense ratio down for the next event, but they still raised $49,991 more than Charity A for the cause. So which one of these really had the greater impact?

A lot of the hullabaloo is that Invisible Children only spent like 37% of funds on direct African program causes. What this criticism misses is that Invisible Children, as a matter of mission, has as a main focus that they are an advocacy organization. If you included advocacy, they had 80% of their funds go to their mission, which is exactly the normal ratio for non-profit organizations.

So if you invested in Invisible Children and are now upset that they spent half of their programmatic money on advocacy, you might be guilty of what tech support guys call “user error”. This is a euphemistic way of saying you screwed up and didn’t evaluate your donation properly. Each non-profit has a different methodology, or “product mix” if you prefer. Invisible Children makes it pretty clear on their website how they seek to affect change. If you disagree with their methods, there’s plenty of other charities out there that would love to have your donation.

And it looks like they pulled off these numbers WITHOUT gifts-in-kind (these are physical donations like school supplies), corporate matching, or other revenue streams that most non-profits love because they can use them to inflate the favorability in their expense ratios. These items represent real value on their books, offset other administrative expenses, and often don’t require much overhead to manage, because companies just need to dump the product for a tax write off and some good PR. These things are a win for everyone, and it’s why you can hear organizations say things like “for every dollar you donate, a dollar forty goes out into the field.”

Another point made against Invisible Children is that these guys are “lining their pockets” with the funds. Really? Google their IRS 990 form, which most non-profits must submit annually. The three guys in charge each took home less than $90,000 for the year in 2011. This is what a larger non-profit organization pays its middle managers. Further, consider that their revenue jumped nearly 50% in one year. In a flat economy. If these guys were in it for the money, they could get snatched up by any organization or any for profit company they wanted to at any time and make a lot more.

That said, I would like info on their large travel expenses and some clarification on who audited their books. But financially, I really don’t think there is much to worry about here.

The real question is, are they making an impact? Well, if you went anywhere near the internets today, you know the answer. Your Twitter and Facebook exploded with #KONY2012 fever. Consider that two-thirds of Americans can’t name a single supreme court justice. (Rick Perry can name two, and is working on a third). Because of Invisible Children, millions of young people can now find Uganda on a map, and they now know something about the plight of people outside of their own newsfeeds.

So yes, advocacy, when combined with more mature programs run by organizations with greater resources, can all work together to do something amazing. There’s no reason Invisible Children can’t serve as a very effective marketing arm for those PhD’s in other organizations whose white papers are frankly, just not engaging and won’t capture people’s hearts, minds, and hands. We can all be on the same team.

So what if Invisible Children is the Tim Tebow of charities? Even if it basically has one move and stumbles awkwardly at times, its passion has inspired an entire industry. No one expects Tim to be the next Tom Brady, and no one expects Invisible Children to be the next World Vision. But they fill a HUGE niche, so let’s all cheer them on. Seriously, if in ten years my now three year old daughter is making YouTube videos like Invisible Children has inspired these kids to do, I’ll be the proudest dad on my block.

They’ve only been around for like 8 years. Give them a break. And don’t begrudge others for getting excited about social causes. There’s enough cynicism out there already, and we don’t have time for that anymore.

Two weeks in! #Seattle

I’ve been here two weeks, which means I’m an expert on Seattle. That said, here’s some expert sweeping generalizations about the area:

• My first few days I stood out like an ascetic in a hair-shirt, which is funny because Kurt Cobain.
• They like to “nosh” things. Example: “Hey man, let’s nosh some burritos”. I’ve heard this used twice, so I assume it’s a standard part of the NW lexicon for all people all the time.
• The thugs are Asian. Not the real thugs, which I have yet to see, but the kids who wear purple New Era Yankees hats and wait for their moms to pick them up after the movies. Also, almost every group is Asian. There are just a lot of Asians here in general, so much so that…
• I can’t understand like 20% of the signs in my neighborhood. There’s a Wal Mart sized Asian grocery store around the corner. I’m not complaining at all.
• How many generations would it take for us to evolve into Asians out here? I don’t really understand science.
• They like to protest. The #Occupy thing is big time here. My landlord, who is 60 or so and about as threatening as a Belk model, was designing her signs when I turned in my keys a couple days ago.
• Speaking of protests:

• See what I mean? I took this at the exact spot as the worst destruction of the Battle for Seattle WTO protests in the 1990s.
• I got called a “white devil”. It was awesome.
• I learned that I have a southern accent. What do y’all think?
• I can’t say that before two weeks ago I had ever looked at a Suburu or a puffer vest and thought “Hey, I could pull that off”. Oh, how things change.
• I’d rather drive in a category 3 hurricane than slightly icy roads. It’s the worst.
• The talk radio is a totally different flavor than in Florida, but it’s still just the informational equivalent of whatever a Kardashian does (OOOOO, a Kardashian joke!)
• They totally exaggerate their weather woes to keep people out. Yeah, it rains. NBD. But it doesn’t get much colder than Florida, it’s just for longer stretches.
• The people are really fun. And they’re almost creepily nice. Not in a genteel, southern way, but more of a “Hey stranger in Wal-Mart, tell me your deepest hopes and dreams”. I’ve had more people come up to me and start random conversations than ever, but yet my best friend here might be the lunch lady at work. That changes this week!
• I went downtown to Chinatown. The line at my restaurant of choice was long, so I ate my duck and rice standing in a nearby doorway and avoiding the cold. You know, like a homeless person.
• According to the Google and Yelp, there is a Chick-fil-a Express (what is that?) on the way to Canada at Western Washington University. I’d take a chance on that drive.
• The scenery is gorgeous. I can’t wait until the summer until we can explore it a little. This time of year it gets dark at 4:30, so it’s entirely possible that if I eat lunch at work I would only see daylight on the weekends.
• EVERYONE is impressed if you know someone who wrestles alligators. I have no idea why this subject comes up so often.
• The radio still plays too much Adele.

Moving!

What’s going on now? You’re moving?
Yep, to Seattle. More specifically, we’re moving to Federal Way, which is just south of Seattle. Even more specifically, we’re moving to a neighborhood called Lakeland. God has a ridiculous sense of humor like that.

Why?
To work for this company. Its been a dream of mine for the last five years, and I’ve been working really hard towards it. This is an exciting, logical step in my career progression, and I hope to be there a long time.

You think that’s a good reason?
I’m also concerned that Florida’s sunshine is giving me too much Vitamin D, and I have this whole collection of mohair sweaters just sitting here not getting used. And I need to buy a new rain jacket anyway.

So what will you be doing?
I’ll let Liz Lemon explain:

Liz: Cross-promotional… deal mechanics… revenue streams… jargon… synergy.

Jack: That’s the best presentation I’ve ever heard.

I’ll be a Compensation Analyst. It’s exciting to me. And yes, my last name is Buckmaster and I will be working in Compensation. I suppose it was meant to be. Note to self, change my name is David Mcprofessionalmexicanfoodeater.
 
I’ve heard that Seattle is just rain and tech nerds. Is that true?
Well they’ve heard that Florida is just Disney World and meth labs. Way to generalize, champ.

But the weather!
Let’s talk about this again in August, Florida friends.

When is this happening?
December 5th for David, and sometime in January for Kallie and Tova. Figured we would start them off with a smaller, less overwhelming sense of Buckmaster energy. Remember, these people created Starbucks. You have to ease them into things. 

Will you start saying the phrase “Best Coast”?
No way. At least not until it’s littered with Chick-fil-a restaurants, which my inside source tells me will be about seven years from now (really).

How will your sports allegiances change?
We’re moving to Pac-10 country, and I think their efforts to be taken seriously are adorable! But my Gators, Bucs, Rays, Lightning, and Magic loyalties will go unquestioned. However, since its been a decade since my beloved Tampa Bay Mutiny folded, I will now become a wholehearted Seattle Sounders fan. Deal with it.

Won’t you miss us?
Of course, dearly so. Especially our church. Earlier this year a big prayer of mine was to develop close friendships in Lakeland, which at the time I didn’t feel like I had. Now I feel like I’m leaving family (beyond the actual family that will still be in Florida).

We’re leaving a region known for its hospitality to a city deemed so unwelcoming that they have a term called the “Seattle Freeze”. I will counteract this by using Kallie and Tova as friend bait.

Can you leave Kallie and Tova with us?
No, see the previous answer.
 
When can we visit?
Always and whenever. But only if you bring gifts from the south, specifically sunshine, hospitality, and vats of Sonny’s BBQ mild sauce.

Can we buy your house in Lakeland?
Of course, and you can do it quickly and for a lot of money.

What do I do if I have more questions?
Treat me to lunch and ask away. Or just hit the “Ask” button up top or call or tweet or throw something at me to get my attention.

Am I done reading this now?
Only if you want to be. Committed folks would start again at the top.

xkcd: Duty Calls