Limited-Run Charities Rely on Strong Partnerships and Candid Leaders
worldwide who lack safe water
and basic sanitation. The group
created links among nonprofit
organizations working on similar issues, infusing them with
fresh capital and new avenues
of cooperation.
Realizing Rights: The Ethical Globalization Initiative, was
founded in 2002 by Ms. Robinson to promote global human-rights issues. The decision to
be time-bound began with Ms.
Robinson, because it fit into her
personal plans: She wanted to
return home to Ireland, and
2010 was set as an end date.
When Ms. Robinson served as
United Nations High Commissioner for human rights from
1997 to 2002, she and others often discussed the need to advocate a rights-based approach to
global food, water, health, and
education. “But I saw few examples of how it could work on the
ground,” she says.
To advance women’s rights,
fair trade, health, and the
rights of migrant workers and
the poor, her group has worked
to change the minds of officials
and the objectives of programs
in many countries.
The group’s limited life span
encourages a direct approach: A
You Tube video from November
2009 shows a Realizing Rights
staff member and Ms. Robinson
interviewing street vendors in
Monrovia, Liberia, and then negotiating with government officials for improved work policies
in that country—there was no
time for studies and reports in-between.
For those considering a time-
limited model, Ms. Robinson ad-
vises: “You have to be more in-
terested in getting results than
credit.”
When the group brought a
delegation of Africa’s women
leaders to speak at the United
Nations this fall, Ms. Robinson
chose not to take the stage but
to have a woman from the Afri-
can group speak instead.
“We purposely let our partners take the stage—they are
the ones who will be carrying on
the work,” Ms. Robinson says.
Continued from Page 1
COURTESY OF REALIZING RIGH TS
Mary Robinson (second from left), founder of Realizing Rights,
says her organization made a point of spotlighting its collaborators
because “they are the ones who will be carrying on the work.”
ed to Waterlines, a New Mexico
nonprofit.
“Time-limited groups may be
perceived as less threatening
to partners because they aren’t
seen as long-term competitors
for funding,” says Tosca Bruno-
van Vijfeijken, of the Maxwell
School of Citizenship and Public
Affairs at Syracuse University.
With David Berlan, a colleague
University researchers, limit-
ed-run charities may work best
when built around a strong, pos-
sibly irreplaceable leader (such
as Ms. Robinson). Too many
charities, they say, find it hard
to continue after their founder
leaves.
New York. “When you start out
knowing that you’re going to
end, and actually put a date on
it, there is a real difference in
how you approach your work.”
Mr. Kruse also says that Re-
alizing Rights was compelling
from his group’s perspective be-
cause its entire mission was cen-
tered on developing programs
that would empower others.
“The ethos and rather brave
challenge of Realizing Rights
from day one was to focus on
creating solutions that didn’t
depend on their being part of
that equation,” he says. “This
requires both guts and matu-
rity.”
smoothly, communicate its ac-
complishments, pass on unfin-
ished projects to other organi-
zations, and provide career help
to the departing staff. Ms. Rob-
inson wrote letters of reference
for even the most junior associ-
ates.
The path taken by
Realizing Rights,
says one grant
maker, “requires both
guts and maturity.”
“You have
to be more
interested
in getting results
than credit.”
Few Personnel Tasks
Realizing Rights and Water Advocates were both connected to existing nonprofit
groups, which solved many organizational problems. Realizing Rights collaborated with the
Aspen Institute, Columbia University, and the International
Council on Human Rights Policy. Everyone hired by Realizing
Rights became an employee of
one of those three groups.
“We never had to set up a
pension or a health-insurance
plan, and without a lot of personnel tasks, I could focus on
creative and innovative programs instead of policies and
procedures,” says Ms. Grady, of
Realizing Rights.
Water Advocates is connect-
at the public-affairs school, she
has been studying Realizing
Rights as a model for time-lim-
ited organizations.
‘Seen as Neutral’
Water Advocates, which operated on a $740,000 budget in
its final year, was supported by
foundations and individuals before it started its work five years
ago, says Mr. Douglas, a situation that enabled it to focus on
its mission right away and added to its credibility with other
water organizations, because it
wasn’t competing with them for
donations.
“What I didn’t see five years
ago is the value of being an independent organization—you
are seen as neutral,” he says.
Realizing Rights, which ran
on $6-million in its last year,
had a harder road at first. “It
was difficult to get funding
for the very reason that it was
time-bound,” Ms. Robinson says.
Then she found several “angel
partners,” as she called them,
including the Atlantic Philanthropies, and others soon followed.
Some foundations liked the
fact that the group was time-limited and wasn’t seeking money indefinitely.
“Many nonprofits talk about
their ultimate goal of ‘putting
themselves out of existence,’ but
it rarely happens,” says Tom
Kruse, a program officer at the
Rockefeller Brothers Fund, in
Winding Down
Planning for the end of a lim-
ited-run organization is just as
critical as planning for a good
start, the Syracuse University
researchers say. The last year is
potentially one of the most diffi-
cult for such groups, Ms. Bruno-
van Vijfeijken says: “It’s a bal-
ancing act. At the same time
you are winding down, you want
to end in a memorable way.”
When organizations merge,
the group that is being ab-
sorbed might take lessons from
Realizing Rights in how to
make a meaningful, meticu-
lously planned final year, the
researchers said.
Realizing Rights told its supporters that as much money was
needed for the last year as earlier years, because it had an accelerated calendar of events as
it wound up its work.
The budget included con-
sultants to help the group end
cates, advises charities look-
ing to set their own ending date
to communicate from the start
with groups that will eventually
take over the work.
