Examination of the Fund's Partner Program in a National Context: Benefits to Small, Social Entrepreneurial Partners and Recommendations to Strengthen These Projects

Non-profits are struggling all over the country to meet payroll and operational expenses. Part of The Fund for the City of New York’s mission is to enable non-profits to achieve excellence, and therefore it created the Incubator/Partner Project Program in the early 1990’s. The goal of this program is to provide fiscal management, legal coaching, and human resources support to start-up and established non-profit organizations. The Fund’s incubator services allow non-profits to concentrate their energy and resources on programs and fundraising, while the Fund acts as a fiscal sponsor and handles timeconsuming back office operations. The objective of this SIPA Capstone project is to provide the Fund with a comprehensive final report that describes the history and current status of the Partner Program, analyzes the factors that have contributed to its success, and recommends improvements to the program.

The Team used several methods for collecting data from a variety of sources, including primary Fund documents, best practices research, interviews, in-depth case reports and an online survey. The Team gathered qualitative data through targeted interviews with select Partner Projects and Fund staff. Two in-depth case analyses of SWAN and College Initiative, both Partner Projects, was included in the final report. The Team distributed a comprehensive survey to a sample of the Partner Projects in order to collect and analyze their fiscal, fundraising, and administrative capacities. Finally, the Team made recommendations on how to improve and strengthen existing and future Partner Projects and how to measure community impact.