Monday, December 17, 2012

Picks of the Week: December 16 - 22, 2012

Website of the Week --  Louisiana Association of Nonprofit Organizations (LANO)LANO is a statewide member organization that advocates for the nonprofit community and strengthens the effectiveness of those committed to improving Louisiana. LANO's mission is to be Louisiana’s "go-to” source for:
·         High quality information, tools, resources and member benefits that deepen the impact of Louisiana nonprofits
·         Engaging multi-sector network—both virtual and physical—convening year round to leverage the shared goals and resources of Louisiana’s nonprofits and other stakeholders
·         Written and spoken voice of advocacy for and about Louisiana’s nonprofit sector

For more information, go to: www.lano.org

Publication of the Week -- Social Media in the Public Sector Field Guide: Designing and Implementing Strategies and Policies by Ines Mergel and Bill Greeves
From the publisher: Stocked with real-life examples and case studies, this book explores myriad social media tools and provides step-by-step guidance on how to implement them based on mission, goals, and strategy. Written in a jargon-free and accessible style, the book is a go-to resource for anyone in government who wants to put the power of social media to work for their organization. Ines Mergel is assistant professor of public administration at the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs and the School of Information Studies (iSchool) at Syracuse University. Bill Greeves is the chief information officer for Wake County, North Carolina and has over 12 years of experience in government technology leadership. 
 


Trend of the Week – Trends in Corporate Giving
Developed by the Committee Encouraging Corporate Philanthropy in association with The Conference Board, Giving in Numbers: 2012 Edition is based on data from 214 companies, including 62 of the top 100 companies in the Fortune 500. The sum of contributions across all respondents of the 2011 Corporate Giving Survey (CGS), from which the data is pulled, totaled more than $19.9 billion in cash and product giving. This report not only presents a profile of corporate philanthropy in 2011, but also pinpoints how corporate giving is evolving and becoming more focused. Key findings include:
·         Median total giving in the report sample was $21.02 million
·         60% of companies gave more in 2011 than in 2009
·         83% of companies offered at least one matching gift program
·         85% of companies had a formal domestic employee volunteer program; 47% had a formal international volunteer program
·         82% of companies reported having a corporate foundation
·         Health, education, and community and economic development were top priorities for the typical company
·         46% of total giving was through direct cash

To download the full report, go to: http://www.corporatephilanthropy.org/download/pdfs/giving_in_numbers/GIN2012_finalweb.pdf


Resource of the Week – Calculating The Economic Impact Of Volunteers
How does one put an economic value on the time volunteers give to an organization? The Economic Impact Of Volunteers Calculator created by the Points of Light Foundation estimates the appropriate wage rate for volunteer time based on what the person does, the value of specific tasks according to market conditions as reported by the US Department of Labor. Organizations can use the Calculator to determine the value of the time their volunteers give doing a wide variety of volunteer jobs. http://www.handsonnetwork.org/tools/volunteercalculator

Tech Tip of the Week -- Using IF Functions in Excel
The Excel IF function is a great tool that can be used when the information you want in a cell is conditional. It’s particularly handy if you need to specify two or more different responses for a cell based on specified conditions.  The format for this function is:

=IF("if the condition stated here is true", "then enter this value", "else enter this value")

For example, to see at who passed or failed an exam an IF function could be used. Let’s assume the pass mark is 75 and the marks are in column B, starting from row 5. the formula would look like this:

=IF(B5>75, "Pass", "Fail")

No comments: