April 29, 2022

If funders talked like Elon Musk

Imagine pitching to the CEO of SpaceX and the new owner of Twitter.

2 min read

1

When you tell your funders that the programmes they are currently supporting are unlikely to survive unless they start applying both a climate and a gender lens to their work.

2

Your six donors @ their individual, detailed, reporting format, all of which ask for the same information, but each of which you are required to submit separately.

3

Two months after your reporting is done, when you’re waiting for the grant to be disbursed, and you follow up for the nth time.

4

Trying to tell an EdTech funder that while computers in classrooms are important, they can’t alone solve for student admission and retention.

5

Looking at a foundation’s website to try and understand what kinds of programmes they actually fund and what their funding philosophy is.

6

When you provide concrete data about how investing in organisational overheads and team well-being actually leads to more social impact.

When you try to tell your funders that their suggestions for your programme are too ambitious and cannot be implemented at the scale they want.

8

Every conference season. (Because we all know it doesn’t matter what the moderator asks, each panelist will be taking the opportunity to spotlight their ‘thought leadership’.)

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ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Devanshi Vaid-Image
Devanshi Vaid

Devanshi is co-founder and director at IDR, where she oversees audience growth, dissemination, global partnerships, and talent.In six years since IDR's launch, she grew the organisation's digital audience 82X times to 10 million people monthly, making it the largest independent media platform in Asia.

Elisha Vermani-Image
Elisha Vermani

Elisha Vermani is a digital communications analyst at IDR. She is responsible for developing strategies to enhance audience engagement and develop IDR’s digital identity. Elisha has previously written for The Hindu, Ungender, and IndianFolk Opinion.

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