The Philanthropic Giving Index

Summary:

IU's Center on Philanthropy calculates an index of the confidence of fund-raising executives.

Answer:

The latest report on the Philanthropic Giving Index is posted every
six months to the Center on Philanthropy's website at
http://www.philanthropy.iupui.edu/announce.htm#PhilGivIndex

By way of background, Kathy Keirouz, Ph.D.,
Assistant Director,
Indiana University Center on Philanthropy ( kkeirouz@iupui.edu) wrote to ARNOVA-L in January 1999:
The Indiana University Center on Philanthropy conducts a semi-annual
survey,
known as the Philanthropic Giving Index (PGI), on the climate for
philanthropic gifts and fund raising in the United States. The PGI
measures
the climate for philanthropic giving in much the same way that the
Consumer
Confidence Index assesses the environment for consumer purchases.
We hope
that the PGI will make an important contribution to the field by
focusing on
current and expected donor behavior. Other available major sources
of
information on giving focus on past donations, involve significant
time
lags, and do not attempt to tie donative behavior to solicitation
strategies.

While the Consumer Confidence Index directly surveys consumers, the
PGI is
based on a national panel of development professionals deemed to be
fund
raising experts. The panel is chosen to represent a cross-section
of the
nonprofit sector in terms of industry, revenue size, and geographic
region.
Two rounds of the survey have been conducted so far. Results were
released
in the summer and in December of 1998. In the December round, 310
fund
raising executives were surveyed, with 168 returning their
questionnaires,
for a response rate of 54.2%

As with the Consumer Confidence Index, the PGI produces several
indexes.
These indexes range from 0.0 to 100.0, with higher scores indicating
more
positive or optimistic attitudes about the climate for fund raising
in the
United States. The indexes for the first two rounds of the survey
are as
follows:

	Summer'98		Dec'98
Philanthropic Giving Index	88.8		87.1
Change -1.9%
Present Situation Index	87.2		86.2
Change -1.1%C
Expectations Index	90.4		87.9
Change -2.8%

Thus, although fund raising executive continue to hold positive
attitudes in
general about the climate for fund raising in the United States, the
attitudes in Dec'98 were significantly more pessimistic than they
were in
the Summer'98 survey. This corresponds to the general slowdown in
the U.S.
economy in the second half of 1998. Fund raisers were surveyed at a
time
when the economy was roiled by roller coaster stock markets at home
and
concern about economic crises in Asia and Russia.

In addition to assessing opinion on the nation's philanthropic
climate, the
PGI survey also details attitudes on specific fund raising tools and
strategies. In the December survey, development professionals
ranked major
gifts as the most successful fund raising technique, followed by
direct
mail, foundation grants and planned gifts. As in the summer PGI,
telephone
solicitation and corporate gifts continued to be viewed as less
successful
techniques. (Special events were ranked somewhere in the middle.)
Development executives reported significantly higher levels of
success for
phone solicitation than had been predicted in the summer survey.
Planned
giving showed a statistical trend toward being less successful than
predicted.

The survey also shows how fund raising preferences and attitudes
vary among
nonprofit organizations based on annual revenue size, industry, and
donor
base. Surprisingly, there were no significant differences in
attitudes on
any question in either round of the survey based on geographic
region.
Results from the Dec'98 survey specific to the arts industry are as
follows:

Development professionals from arts, culture, and humanities
organizations
reported optimism about current and future success of corporate
giving as a
fund raising technique, and pessimism about the success of planned
giving.
Their attitudes about the success of special events were neutral to
positive. The Summer'98 survey showed a similar pattern, but at
that time
panel members from this industry group were also optimistic about
telephone
solicitation and foundation grants.

Other results relating to special events:
In the Summer'98 survey, there were no differences in opinion based
on
industry group, but revenue size did make a difference. Respondents
from
organizations with revenues in the $5-10 million range were
optimistic about
special events, whereas those from very large organizations (>$100
million
in revenue) were more pessimistic.
In the Dec'98 survey, there were no differences in opinion based on
revenue
size or donor base, but industry did make a difference. In this
round,
respondents from health organizations were optimistic about special
events,
but respondents from education and religious organizations were
pessimistic
about this technique. (Those from arts organizations were in the
middle,
relative to their peers.)

For further information on the Philanthropic Giving Index, please
contact me.

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Posted 1/20/99 -- PB