Funder Partnerships

We engage with funders in powerful partnerships that serve to both strengthen infrastructure and anchor movements, while providing vital services to grantees. We often develop multi-year partnerships in which we apply our deep engagement approach to capacity building through regular evaluation of strategy, financials, content, tactics, and impact—and make responsive adjustments accordingly. In that spirit, we want to express our gratitude to Borealis, The California Endowment, Hewlett Foundation, Kellogg Foundation, Color Congress, and Ms. Foundation for their general operating support to RoadMap.

Below are some common ways we work directly with foundation partners.

• Cohort programming: Your foundation could form a cohort of grantees that would receive our capacity-building support. We support cohorts of any size by matching your grantees with consultants from our network that have the skills, experience, and particular expertise needed.
• Tailored support: Program officers often contact us because they have a small number of grantees that need tailored, long-term support (e.g., leadership transition, board development, sustainability, resource development) and the foundation has decided to make a significant investment in a few organizations experiencing a moment of growth or opportunity. We work closely with the foundation to resource that work, and also work with the client to support a defined project that will help them through their most challenging or transformative capacity-building project.
• Coaching: Foundations often ask us for coaching support. Our robust network of seasoned coaches are available to work with grantees as well as foundation staff.
• Internal capacity building: While we are often asked to partner with foundations to support their grantees, RoadMap also has a long history of directly providing them with capacity-building support. We have a number of consultants in our network who specialize in providing foundations with a range of capacity-building services.

And here are some additional benefits of our capacity-building initiatives for grantee organizations:

• Efficiency: We offer funders the ability to provide in-depth capacity-building services to their grantees without the high cost and staffing time required to develop an in-house program.
• Customization: We help each funder design a one-stop capacity-building program tailored to meet grantee needs. Our program includes conducting organizational assessments, full-scale implementation of capacity-building services, vetting, and matching consultants to grantees and conducting quality assurance and evaluation.
• Assessments: Our assessment tools, My Healthy Organization and Our Healthy Alliance, provide an overall picture of performance, enabling us to develop a customized capacity-building program to address an organization, alliance, or cohort’s needs.
• Value-added services: We provide value-added services, such as ongoing e-learning activities to continually build grantee capacity.
  Movement strengthening: Our field building approach promotes regular peer-to-peer learning exchanges among social justice groups, thereby providing greater return on investment.