Business Commons^™

Improving Impact: Collaborative Multi-Party, Multi-Sector Engagement (2011), Marcy Murninghan

New England Journal of Public Policy

Most people do not realize the full implications of the fact that we live now in an era marked more by networks than hierarchies. Nowadays, power is distributed across boundaries and borders, rather than concentrated in one place—be it a physical setting, demographic group, industrial sector, or professional discipline. Thanks to systems thinking and the ubiquity of digital tools and platforms, there are many more opportunities for lawmakers, policymakers, and economic institutions to collaborate with concerned citizens on critical public issues, thereby breaking the grip of lobbyists, third-party intermediaries, and the power elite. On top of that are recent breakthroughs …

Young Professionals And Philanthropy, Patricia Neilson

Emerging Leaders Program Team Projects

Seven teams of young professionals presented what they learned from their projects with 7 organizations from the nonprofit and donor sector over the past year. Their experiences and insights address two related questions:

• What is the role of philanthropy in retaining young professionals in the Boston region?

• How can young professionals leverage their leadership skills, and their organization’s resources, to create successful partnerships in philanthropy to serve the Boston region?