If there were a huge amount of money waiting for you to dispense in urban community development, what would you do? It’s always more exited to imagine assumption like that. However, it’s a little bit hard for most people to think about that in a professional way. The mindset could be very different from how you would spend your personal lottery winnings. However, the mindsets at the back of money disposition could give us some inspiration.
Money can be used in several major directions when speaking of institutions: the external impact like marketing institute’s brand, internal maintenance like promoting the existed system and archives, or financial investment. The cost depends on the length, width and scale of the projects. Also, the attribute of the money determines how people dispense it. It means that the investors, who look for the best return financially, probably have more interest on improving the visible and invisible impact of the institutes they invest, and also themselves. In a more philanthropic view, the return of investment is not too financially required. So that more practical or even experimental choices can be considered. So let’s see how different amount of money can go in different presets.
$1,000 vs. $10,000
Since 10,000 to an institute cannot equal to 10,000 to an individual, let’s reduce the imaginary lottery winning to 1,000 in order to reach the similar impact. The subsequent analogies also follow the same multiple rule.
1,000 is not a small amount, but also not big enough to render big change. So as an individual with 1,000, I’ll probably spend the money on upgrading some daily expense. But if I want to make some recognizable and standing improvement of my life, I’ll choose to invest in one or two equipment which function indispensably in my daily life, such as a phone. For institute who own the 10,000 donation, they can choose to spend it on internal maintenance like daily supply, or invest it to upgrade one of their rigid demand, such as their preservation system of their collections and archives.
$10,000 vs. $100,000
With 10,000, I’ll think about doing some relatively long-term investment to myself for positive future return. Learning a skill, applying for some classes can help improve my capability, so as to broaden my future career path. For institutes, personal skill development can go to building a good public relationship team, which is the most efficient way to increase impact. Investing in cultivating future qualified professionals also helps improve institute’s strength. Cooperating with colleges by giving scholarship to outstanding students with the obligation of being future staff for a certain years can be a good way to reserve talents.
$100,000 vs. $1,000,000
Now it turns to the number that I can do some long-term investment for future. With 100,000, I can transfer money into social impact. Attention now is quite valuable because of the potential behind those audiences. I can also start my own business (with partners or just myself, probably small business based on the Internet) with the 100,000 if I have a good idea, and let it incubate. The 1,000,000 enable institutes to start new projects. Projects with artists help build external impact with artistic approach; projects or programs with educational institutes have both educational meaning and branding function. If these projects are good enough to become long-term serial projects, which can nourish themselves after depending on donation at the initial stage, they will grow into branches and extend the tree.
$1,000,000 vs. $10,000,000
The more money, the more possibility. When I have 1,000,000 in hand, as a conservative Taurus, financing is a secure way to save money for future utilization. But instead of financing the money, it could be more pragmatic to transfer money into other stable but functional property, such as real estate. Same with institutes, “functional property” could be works of art. Still, I can start a bigger business that needs more upfront investment. For institutes, they can develop projects for wider ranges with more budgets. With bigger capability, it’ll be nice to think about social responsibility as their goal. They can contribute more special exhibitions for the purpose of cultural exchange, not just build the awareness of their brand, but also deepen the brand into ideologies that brings some differences to people’s lifestyle.
100% of the SBD rewards from this #explore1918 post will support the Philadelphia History Initiative 