Looking Back and Moving Forward

The end of one year and the start of another is a great time to reflect and set new intentions. ITBOM LLC heads into 2022 after participating in some transformational work with clients in 2021. Starting my consulting practice was truly a case of taking the first step in faith and the stairway appearing. I could not see where the journey would take me, but I knew I wanted to start on the road. Reflecting on 2021 I am humbled to be a part of the work to move racial equity forward. I feel the connection to those who have come before me and I desire to be a bridge to those who will come after me. I am proud of all the work I was honored to co-create with my clients in 2021 however I would like to highlight two projects that I hope helped move systems, culture, and equity forward.

ITBOM LLC was chosen as one of the few outside consultants to work with Microsoft Philanthropies. ITBOM LLC helped to launch?a digital skilling grant initiative that will invest $15 million dollars over three years in Black/African-American-led non-profits that are working to advance technology skilling for Black/African American communities. This project is rooted in "Trust-Based Philanthropy" (TBP) which seeks to re-shape the power dynamics inherent in donor/funder relationships with nonprofits. TBP is about power, decision-making, and equity in funding. While the elements of TBP are not new, the attempt to promote and organize an ecosystem that seeks to shift philanthropy along these lines is new. One of the earliest adopters of TBP was The Whitman Institute (TWI). Later, Robert Sterling Clark Foundation and the?Headwaters Foundation formally joined TWI to "co-conceptualize a collaborative effort that invites others in the sector to embody trust-based principles. Together they developed the Trust-Based Philanthropy Project (TBPP), and [s]oon after, trust-based leaders from General Service Foundation, Durfee Foundation, and Satterberg Foundation came on board to help get the project off the ground."[1]

According to the TBPP, they seek to realign grantmaking to:

• Center equity, humility, and transparency
• Recognize the power imbalance between funders and grantees, and work to actively rebalance it
• Deeply value the quality of relationships, and honor how we treat others on the path to winning on our issues, as much as the act of winning itself.[2]

ITBOM also designed and facilitated the "community of practice" for the 50 non-profits organizations that received the funds. For me personally, participation in the project is the cumulation of several themes that have been close to my heart. I have strived to bring to the forefront, funders investing in "non-traditional" pathways into technology education and Trust-Based Philanthropy. During my time as the CEO of a non-profit, I helped launch and design a tech skilling program for low-income adult women. I believed then and believe now that it is through these types of programs that we can open opportunities for those excluded from lucrative employment and impact in the tech field. This project also gave me the opportunity to help design a program that is solidly rooted in Trust-Based Philantrophy, another long-time passion of mine. As the former VP of a foundation that was created as a part of the former Atlantic Philantrophy Foundation, I was "raised" in philanthropy on the TB model. ITBOM LLC is extremely proud to be a part of the project and the leap forward it represents for Black/African-American-led non-profits and communities.

This focus is rooted in research and data. In 2020 the National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy (NCRP) analyzed data from community foundations around the country to determine how funders were or were not investing in the Black community and Black-led organizations. NCRP found when examining community foundations, "only 1% of grantmaking by some of the largest local community foundations is explicitly designated for Black communities."[3] This finding was supported by another 2020 report from Bridgespan and Echoing Green, two organizations that support and invest in leaders of emerging social enterprises. "The authors analyzed three years of informational tax returns of 164 U.S. groups that were winners, finalists, or semifinalists in Echoing Green's highly competitive fellowship program. They examined three years of funding data for each group that applied from 2012 to 2015 to determine funding levels and other available information. The authors found that white-led groups had budgets that were 24 percent larger than those led by people of color. It also found that groups led by black women received less money than those led by black men or white women."[4]

ITBOM LLC is grateful for the opportunity to be a part of this project.

Also in 2021 ITBOM LLC was proud to work with Worksystem Inc, and facilitate a Child Care Taskforce. Workystems is a 501(c)3 non-profit organization that pursues and invests resources to improve the quality of the workforce in the City of Portland, Multnomah, and Washington Counties. Worksystems develops policies and designs workforce development programs and services delivered through a network of local partners to help people get the skills, training, and education they need to go to work or to advance in their careers. Their mission is to coordinate a regional workforce system that supports individual prosperity and business competitiveness. They ensure that the public workforce system serves the business by developing qualified employees and giving current and future workers the skills and support they need to successfully engage, advance, and succeed in the labor market.

The Child Care Taskforce was led by our grounding statement that “child care is the profession that makes all professions possible,” shared with us by Child Care Cooperative Task Force member Karen Henkemeyer, Child Care Resource & Referral Manager at Community Action Washington County. Yet as we examine the landscape in the United States, Oregon, and Multnomah, and Washington counties, we have not historically seen that grounding statement expressed in action, legislation, or support.

Again in 2021, I was given the opportunity to work on an issue close to my heart, child care.

Some of our findings include:

????????Oregon and much of the country suffer from “child care deserts,”[5] and COVID-19?has both expanded the need for child care and reduced its availability, but also, paradoxically, provided one of the first opportunities since World War II to center child care. Now is the time to secure public-private partnerships, take advantage of expanded federal-level support, and acknowledge that the care of children is central to our success as a nation.

????????Child care is rising as a primary issue for business and industry as they look to return to in-person working and expand employee shifts.

????????Child care is front and center in both racial and gender equity as the impact on providing and seeking services has disproportionally impacted women and, specifically, women of color.

????????Oregon’s statewide child care capacity has declined by about 22 percent since March 2020, roughly the start of the COVID-19 quarantine protocols. The largest decline occurred in the highest quality settings; availability dropped by over 45 percent during the first six months of 2020.

????????In 2018, the average cost of child care in Oregon for one year was $14,160. Oregon Progress Board adopted a benchmark that families should pay no more than 10 percent of their income for child care, while Child Care Aware of America states families, regardless of income, should pay no more than 7 percent.

????????There is innovative work going on in Oregon around child care:

-??The Shared Services Alliance seeks to provide support, business coaching, and “front of the house” digital support (Wonder School) for small- to medium-sized providers.

-??Employment Related Daycare program (ERDC) announced significant changes to the formula for ERDC payments. Under the new formula, no family qualifying for the program would pay more than 7 percent of their gross income for child care, a key recommendation of this task force and Child Care Aware of America.

-??Boardman Foods in Marrow County has launched Families First Childcare Center to address the needs of both their employees and the public for quality child care.

-??Multnomah County Preschool for All will be available to all three- and four-year-olds in the county within 10 years. The program offers a wide range of choices for families and will pay living wages to all classroom staff, including teaching assistants.

-??The Child Care Workgroup of the South Coast Regional Early Learning Hub Steering Committee brought together a variety of partners from nonprofit and industry to address how to expand child care services in the southern coastal region. They created a report that identified three elements as being critical to this effort: securing a backbone, securing space, and securing funding.

-??Early Learning Washington County: The United Way of the Columbia-Willamette and Washington County Health and Human Services serve as the backbone organizations driving the collaborative work of the hub. Early Learning Washington County is governed by a steering committee which is advised by several other committees.

Our Recommendations include:

????????Shift thinking in Oregon and in the country from the idea that child care is solely an issue for individual families to the reality, which is that we as a society benefit from coordinated, quality, and affordable child care whether we use child care or not.

????????Coordinate and centralize to better connect parents to providers. For example, connect the pilot that has come from this work to the Shared Services Alliance pilot (SSA). The SSA aims to “centralize and automate as many business functions as possible to support member organizations to increase profit, stabilize their business model, and spend more time working directly with staff and children.”

????????Expand culturally competent care and reduce barriers for diverse providers to receive training and certification.

????????Invest in translation services of educational materials.

????????Expand qualifications for those teaching and certifying child care providers to include those with a combination of education, bachelor’s degrees, and experience.

????????Expand Wonder School, the online platform to connect providers and users of the child care system.

????????Expand culturally competent navigation support for low-income families and those seeking employment.

????????Expand the SSA and Early Learning Washington County.

????????Centralize the payment process, akin to the health care exchanges, for all child care. This could be coordinated through a nonprofit or governmental agency. Funders of the system would include families, state and federal funds, employers’ subsidies, and philanthropy.

????????Private companies should expand and contribute to a child care “subsidies” pool for their employees and a percentage of the community.

????????Private employers in rural and exurban communities should look to the Boardman Foods model, and the state should invest in those models.

????????Oregon must look not only to incentives and tax credits to woo employers but also to incentives to woo increasingly geographically unmoored employees. Child care is an important incentive for these digital nomads.

Turning my attention towards the sun of 2022 ITBOM LLC is very excited to announce that we will soon be launching a new e-learning product that will allow current and future clients to license training modules, get coaching, support, and additional bespoke content. Also in 2022 look for more engagement on LinkedIn. I'm going to take it all the way back to my days as a news anchor and will be posting videos on topics that I feel compelled to speak about. These topics will include why DEI should not be housed solely in HR and how "competency checking" of Black executives is preventing Black leaders from getting hired, advancing, and working in an inclusive culture and on that topic, what does an "inclusive" culture actually look, sound and feel like?

These are exciting developments and designed to reach more individuals and organizations to help them reframe diversity equity and inclusion, advance important conversations and continue to make an impact that resonates now and in the future. Happy New Year!

[1] https://blogs.microsoft.com/blog/2020/06/23/addressing-racial-injustice/

[2] Ibid

[3] https://www.ncrp.org/news/ncrp-report-too-many-local-community-foundations-still-underinvesting-in-black-communities

[4] https://racetolead.org/nonprofits-led-by-people-of-color-win-less-grant-money-with-more-strings-study/

[5] https://www.opb.org/article/2021/06/08/think-out-loud-child-care-deserts/