A business management consulting firm in the Seattle area has developed a pretty novel way to give back to their community: they’re teaching local non-profit organizations how to fish.
Well, not literally. As Brett Alston, Co-Founder and Managing Partner of Revel Consulting explained to me, Revel has developed a philanthropy program called “Sustainable Giving” that reflects that oft-repeated axiom about how if you give a man a fish, you can feed him for a day, but if you teach a man to fish, “you have fed him for life.” That’s the idea for the program: contributing funds to a charity sustains them for a set period of time; but if you help them to spend that money more efficiently, streamline their operations and teach them how to raise even more money in the future, it will sustain these organizations in the long-run.
That’s the unique approach Revel has developed. As a management consulting firm, Revel’s 100-plus consultants spend much of their day applying their “Pure Consulting” model to their clients’ businesses, creating efficiencies in their operations, saving them money, and finding new ways to increase their revenue. Already providing monetary support to a variety of local non-profits and charities in the Pacific Northwest, Revel was looking for a way to help sustain those same organizations beyond traditional financial donations. So this creative firm decided to start donating the same services they provide to their for-profit clients: professional consulting services leading to cut costs, more effective operations, and increased revenue down the road.
So far, so good. Revel has already put their Sustainable Giving program into practice by partnering with Foster Kids 5K, an annual run and walk race held in August in the Seattle area, which raised more than $4,000 to support Royal Family Kids Camps – a cause that provides a safe environment for King County foster kids with a history of abuse and neglect. When Foster Kids 5K initially approached Revel for a donation, members of the company offered to work closely with the event founders and met on a weekly basis to work toward reducing overhead, reducing event production costs, and marketing the event more effectively. The result was that a larger portion of the proceeds went toward a worthy cause rather than toward producing the event.
This seems to be a good situation for everyone involved: good for the company and their consultants, as it allows them to stay involved in their community (consultants can choose to work with non-profits they personally believe in); good for Revel’s non-profit partners, who are often understaffed and in need of expert advice; and, above all, good for the cause.
