Reflection on 5 Week GAC Course

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JN Clarke Consulting recently wrapped up a five-week, comprehensive training on government relations with Global Affairs Canada (GAC), that ran between March 5th to April 4th. A customized training for working professionals in the international development sector in Canada, over 30 participants participated, spanning a number of Canadian international non-governmental organizations (INGOs),including Canadian Foodgrains Bank and the Adventist Development and Relief Agency International (ADRA).

The training provided participants with crucial foundational knowledge and best practices on how to effectively and strategically engage with GAC, framed within Jesse Clarke’s flagship approach to government relations, the Strategic Empathy Approach. The first few weeks of the training focused on understanding GAC within the wider Federal Government, breaking down the department and its various branches, the mandate of each branch, as well as the strict hierarchies in place when it comes to decision making.

What followed was a breakdown of the federal budget process, and key moments for INGOs to engage,including the importance of participating in the pre-budget consultation process; a valuable advocacy opportunity for INGOs. Participants were able to apply all their learning into the drafting of their organization’s very own GAC pre-positioning strategy, to guide their work after the course.

“We had four staff representing two different departments of the Canadian Foodgrains Bank participating in the “Engaging with Global Affairs Canada” course, and we all appreciated the individual and collective learning we took from it. Doing the training with our network colleagues was an added
bonus!  The strategic empathy approach was particularly insightful as we continue to foster positive relationships with our GAC counterparts.  The training was a great mix of theoretical learning andmpractical tools and approaches and we’re looking forward to further developing our internal strategy for GAC engagement. We highly recommend other Canadian international NGOs connect with Jesse and Diana if they want to improve their own approaches to working with GAC.”

Figure 2: Quote from Matthew Van Geest, Senior Manager, Program and Network Services with Canadian Foodgrains Bank

JN Clarke Consulting holds trainings throughout the year, that are open to the public, as well as customized for individual organizations and/or membership organizations working within the international development sector in Canada. Check our website for updates on when we are holding future trainings or reach out to us directly if you’re interested in having us develop a customized training for your organization!

-Written by Diana Apostolides

Budget Season

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Why should you care about the federal budget?​

We are now deep into government budget season in Canada. All provincial budgets have been tabled in recent months. The federal budget tabling is anticipated for April 16th , 2024. Why should your organization care about the federal budget? And how can you maximize your impact and engagement? Read on to learn more!

For many political nerds and policy wonks, the federal budget is the highlight of the annual political calendar. And for many Canadians, it may be the one event on the political calendar that they pay any attention to, particularly because there are often several announcements that can impact personal finances. For the Government, the budget represents a welcome opportunity to lay out a clear and compelling narrative with a collection of funding announcements and other policy pronouncements. This can be a welcome opportunity to create positive buzz, or to re-set their public agenda and shift public attention towards their achievements. The budget speech is a communication moment.

If you are a social impact organization, charity, or non-profit, why should you care about the federal budget?

1) It’s an easy way to try out some advocacy. 

The government actively encourages organizations to submit policy recommendations in advance of the budget. The Finance Committee even provides a template. If you craft a strong submission, you can post it in your website, share it with supporters, and use it as the basis for a response to the budget. Imagine Canada has a fantastic toolkit available here.

2) It can contain important insights both on what the government says it is
prioritizing and also on what its spending shows it is actually prioritizing—not always the same thing!

3) It can create new opportunities for advocacy by allowing you to identify issues that are of interest to Canadians as well as identify potential allies and collaborators.

4) It can contain clues about upcoming funding opportunities and programs. If you hear something of interest in the budget, this can give you a great opening to follow up with the government to seek further details.


Many public affairs firms in Canada publish excellent free newsletters and free budget analyses. Imagine Canada and Cooperation Canada will also publish responses. There are lots of great sources of information and analysis available.

 

Imagine Canada has also created a helpful infographic that guides you through the federal budget cycle:

 

Unveiling Success: A Case Study by JN Clarke Consulting

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At JN Clarke Consulting, our mission is to empower social impact organizations to achieve their goals with government. One of the ways we do this is through our training programs. Read about Maria Carmona, Program Coordinator at Presbyterian World Service & Development, and her experience when she attended one of our government relations trainings last year, and the impact this had on her organization’s engagement with  government.

We run a number of training programs throughout the year, and also design and deliver custom trainings for organizations. Feel free to reach out if you’d like more information.

3 thing you can do to advocate for true-cost funding

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3 thing you can do to advocate for true-cost funding

In the summer of 2023, the Ontario Nonprofit Network (ONN) conducted their fourth annual sector wide survey, to gain data and insights on the state of the non-profit sector in Ontario. Ontario Nonprofit Network’s 2023 State of the Sector report paints a grim picture of the long-term health of non-profits in the province.

The report emphasizes that the nonprofit sector in Ontario is under considerable strain. Costs are rising, funding is stagnant or dropping, and the workforce is burnt out. All of this amidst an undeniable growth in community need due to the affordability crisis and rising calls for justice and equity.

A key takeaway from the report is that government and funders must come together to support Ontario’s social infrastructure. But how can nonprofits use the data from the ONN’s report to tell their story, influence government and funders, and win more sustainable funding?

In this post, we’ll take you through key data from the State of the Sector report and outline three ways you can use this data to advocate for true-cost funding. 

1. Advocate for true-cost funding through demonstrating high demand

A true-cost of a service or program includes both the direct and indirect costs of delivery. Indirect costs are costs incurred that cannot be easily and wholly attributed to a specific service or program. This includes organisational costs like:

  • Staff

  • Human resources

  • IT

  • Finance

  • Learning and Development

  • Building costs

True-cost funding is when the amount funded includes both the direct and indirect costs of service or program delivery.

According to the ONN report “nonprofit financial situations are on a downward spiral” (5).  

  • Demand for nonprofit services is at an all-time high over the four year survey period. Since 2020 alone, demand has grown 29% (8). 

  • Yet in the same four year period, only half the sector reported marginal increases in revenue, while 90% of respondents reported an increase in expenditures (11-12). 

What you can do:

  • Paint this picture for your own organisation. Clearly demonstrate growing need for your services against existing and forecasted funding sources and growing expenditure. 

  • If you have not already, develop and communicate clear metrics to demonstrate growing demand.

Image caption: Example of a graph that can be used to communicate growing demand, increasing costs and inadequate forecasted funding.

2. Advocate for true-cost funding through highlighting staff as a benefit, not an overhead

It’s no surprise that the pressure of delivering much needed services with dwindling resources has an impact on staff. Over the last two years, survey respondents have signalled a growing HR crisis in the nonprofit sector due to burnout, stress and calls for wage parity. 

  • Over the last two years, 65 per cent of respondents have reported experiencing staffing challenges with recruitment and retention (17).

In order to retain staff, nonprofits have been investing more in flexible working hours, raising salaries, and signing bonuses – but this has contributed to rising organisational costs. 

  • 46 per cent of respondents reported their largest source of expense as salaries/benefits (12). 

Staff are not an overhead. Staff are essential to deliver effective social services. 

ONN note that some parts of the sector have been able to advocate successfully for base-funding and wage increases in government funding for some of their workers (20). While systematic changes are needed, these conversations must continue at the funder level. 

To shift the dial from funding programs alone, proposals should highlight staff as critical to program success and advocate for funding to cover these costs.

What you can do:

  • Invest in, and highlight staff as part of your program delivery success

  • If you have been investing in your staff, do you have data to show the positive impacts on retention? Use this in funding proposals to highlight the stability and skillset of your team as a key factor in program delivery.

  • If you don’t have internal data to understand staff well-being and retention, take steps to build this data set. 

3. Advocate for true-cost funding through emphasizing disproportionate impacts

Some communities, organisations, and sectors are harder hit than others. Vulnerable communities, already disproportionately impacted by the pandemic, are again more adversely impacted by subsequent crises in affordability and basic needs. For example:

  • Over the past two year, Black and Indigenous nonprofits have reported consistently high levels of demand for their programs and services (9).

  • Similarly, organisations in the Peel region, still recovering from being one of the hardest hit during the pandemic, are also experiencing high demand as communities also navigate the current affordability crisis (10). 

What you can do

  • When using the wider data points from ONN’s survey to describe the current crisis, call out the impacts on your community specifically.  
  • Use quantitative and qualitative data to tell the story of how your communities are adversely impacted, and why demand is stronger.

Bringing it all together – do you have the data you need?

The report confirms what many in the sector have known for a long time. Nonprofits nationwide are struggling to operate under increasingly difficult circumstances. 

ONN’s research in this area is invaluable. Both ONN and Imagine Canada are actively advocating for sustainable funding, systemic change and government recognition of the vital nature of the sector as a whole. 

At an individual nonprofit level this data is also valuable in, shifting funding conversations to include true costs. 

Organisations need to tell the story of these true-costs effectively. Ensuring your organisation has the data it needs to paint the picture of rising demand, rising costs, and staff retention will help show funders the true costs of program delivery.

We hope this post has been helpful to you!

 

-Jesse Clarke

Tackling anti-racism, diversity, equity, and inclusion in the non-profit sector in Canada

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An issue that has been pre-occupying those in the non-profit sector in Canada are the now substantiated and discouraging allegations of racism and racist incidents, that have occurred amongst the Association of Fundraising Professionals (AFP), GTA. There has been incredible work done by many colleagues, especialy black colleagues, who have been the subject of these experiences, and who have done a huge service to the community here in Canada, by taking leadership on these issues.  Mide Akerewusi is someone who comes to mind in this respect, and who has agreed to take on the role of the chair of the Association of Fundraising Professionals, Toronto Chapter. Under Mide’s leadership, there have already been a number of steps made towards apologies, downgrading the chapter status, and beginning to re-engage with the sector with a very strong anti-racist lens.

Relatedly, a report recently came out from Imagine Canada, that is based on a survey that involved 1,500 non-profit leaders across Canada, that dug deep into organizational commitments to equity, diversity and inclusion, and the extent to which changes have been made in the sector. A key finding of the report is that the degree of deep commitment and transformation taking place in organizations is much greater in organizations that are led by people of color or by other people who face some kind of marginalization or under-representation, as compared to white-led organizations, who are often the slowest to move on these issues and have made the least progress in terms of deep changes.

The report highlights that while non-profit leaders generally support equity, diversity, and inclusion, far fewer pursue it with deep intentionality, and that the success of leadership and management structures, such as equity working groups, are often dependent on where these groups are positioned and who they’re accountable to. Those that involve senior leadership and senior managers, that have really made a commitment at the organizational level, are the ones who’ve seen the most transformation.

Another important issue that is highlighted in the report is that funders themselves have a key role to play in advancing equity, diversity, and inclusion, by specifically supporting and funding black, indigenous and other racialized led organizations, as well as other organizations committed to advancing diversity, equity, and inclusion. 

Reflecting on her years working in the federal service, Jesse reflects on the kind of transformation seen in the sector when the government of Canada announced the Feminist International Assistance Policy, which was a really transformational moment for the international cooperation sector, in terms of taking issues of gender equality and underrepresentation seriously. 

This highlights a really important lesson for this moment in Canada, vis-a-vis reconciliation, anti-racism, and anti-black racism particularly. There is a real opportunity for the government to take more leadership and action in  ensuring that organizations that work with them meet certain standards. That if the government is going to be funding organizations, these organizations reflect key equity and diversity standards, and that funding is targeted to building the capacity of the sector in those areas. 

As a firm, JN Clarke Consulting has been doing a lot of reflection on DEI, and are very committed to  following a strong framework for our own work in this area, cross cutting these considerations strongly in our ‘Building Equity” training series for example, in the context of fundraising. 

At JN Clarke Consulting, we are happy to support you by conducting this search, analysing the results and presenting it to you in a readable and clear format.

Would you or your team benefit from having our support to improve your government relationships? We offer strategic assessments, monthly support, workshops and training, depending on your needs.


Get in Touch Here!

Tools to Support Your Government Relations Work

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A relatively new government of Canada tool, developed by the Treasury Board Secretariat, is a data visualization tool that allows Canadians access to key metrics on government departments, how they spend their money, deliver on their programs, the impact of their programming, and information related to their human resources. This tool is the GC InfoBase, and is a great resource to inform organizations’ government relations strategy development. There is a bit of a learning curve to using this tool, but it’s always encouraging to see new transparency initiatives. As always, JN Clarke Consulting is available to support organizations in navigating this and other tools to inform their government relations work, and for many of the firm’s retainer clients, regulator monitoring of the tool is a service that we will be providing.  

A tool that is not new, but that many people don’t know about or use, is a public database of all of the projects that the federal government has funded, available on Canada.gc.ca. This resource is excellent to explore all of the different funding commitments made over the last 15 years from different departments in different sectors; another great tool to get a sense of what is going on out there, what is the government working on, what have they funded, and a resource to use when conducting your own homework on potential funders for your organization.

At JN Clarke Consulting, we are happy to support you by conducting this search, analysing the results and presenting it to you in a readable and clear format.

Would you or your team benefit from having our support to improve your government relationships? We offer strategic assessments, monthly support, workshops and training, depending on your needs.

Get in Touch Here!

Cabinet Shuffle-what does it mean for you?

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July may be winding down, and we may be heading into the dog days of summer, but that didn’t stop the Prime Minister from announcing a major cabinet shuffle on Wednesday July 26th . What does this mean for Canadian charities and non-profits?

A few thoughts:
 This is a major cabinet shuffle—23 out of 38 people are now occupying new positions in Trudeau’s cabinet. Some commentators are interpreting this as a clear pre-election signal, and that is certainly possible.
 7 ministers, including some fairly powerful ones, have been dropped from cabinet. 7 bright shiny new faces have joined.
 With new ministers, we can anticipate refreshed mandate letters arriving soon as well—keep an eye out for these always useful documents!
 Have any of your lead federal ministers changed? What about MPs local to your community or your programs? This is where you should focus your attention.
 A shuffle is a good opportunity to re-engage. Reach out to new Ministers to welcome them to their role, introduce your organization, and ask for a meeting.
 A shuffle means that many political staffers will also be moving jobs—pay attention to your key contacts and whether they are going or staying.

I also wanted to take a moment to announce an exciting change here within JN Clarke Consulting! Diana Apostolides, our Senior Associate, who has been with us for almost a year, has accepted the position of Vice-President Operations and Strategy. We are so excited to have someone of Diana’s experience and calibre stepping into this leadership role. With her 10+ years of experience in Canada’s international development sector, she brings wisdom, insights, dedication and enthusiasm to this new role! Welcome aboard!

At JN Clarke Consulting, we are happy to support you by conducting this search, analysing the results and presenting it to you in a readable and clear format.

Would you or your team benefit from having our support to improve your government relationships? We offer strategic assessments, monthly support, workshops and training, depending on your needs.

Get in Touch Here!

Special Edition Newsletter written by Diana Apostolides

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Issue 1 of the “Canadian Chronicles of Charitable Innovation” series

New Research on Enablers and Barriers to Social Finance and a $755 million investment into the Social Finance Eco-System

JN Clarke Consulting was the content creator of the “Building Equity: Mobilization for Impact” training series, an initiative of the  Spur Change Program, that ran between March to June of this year. This past April, the third online unit of the training was launched, titled ‘Exploring Innovations,’ which provided participants with an introduction to the state of the social finance market in Canada. The unit explored different funding sources and models, including within the context of legally registered charities and the pursuit of earned revenue, to the range of regulated social enterprise models across Canada, and finally, the innovative finance market within the international development sector; the leveraging of Official Development Assistance (ODA) to catalyze private sector financing for sustainable development.

One of the resources that was consulted as part of the Unit’s development was Imagine Canada’s 2020 research report, “Are Charities Ready for Social Finance?, developed in support of the Government of Canada’s Investment Readiness Program.

Social finance, as defined by Imagine Canada, is “an investment that seeks a measurable social, cultural, and/or environmental impact as well as a financial return for the investor(s),” and is positioned in the report as a promising potential source of capital for charitable organizations, that could provide more financial resiliency in a funding environment that is largely grants-based. Findings from the report showed that the majority of charities have a low awareness of social finance, and many perceive there to be a number of barriers to its uptake, including risk-averse Boards.

As a follow-up to the 2020 study, Imagine Canada recently completed a second study, that sought to dig deeper into these perceived barriers as well as enablers to social finance adoption by the charitable sector, and presented initial findings in an online webinar last month. 22 case studies were developed, 9 of which included Investment Readiness Program participants. Enablers that came out in the research included an interest or need for scalability and sustainability; measuring and reporting impact; legal and regulatory compliance and maturity; and a growth strategy and business model to name a few. Barriers that were highlighted included having a limited financial track record; legal and regulatory constraints; high transaction costs; and limited capacity and resources.

The announcement on May 29th, 2023 by the Government of Canada of a 16 year, $755 million investment into the Social Finance Fund, a foundational element of the Social Innovation and Social Finance Strategy and the Investment Readiness Program, opens up new, potential funding opportunities for charitable organizations across Canada. As the latest research from Imagine Canada shows however, there are still a number of challenges and opportunities charitable organizations need to grapple with before being able to take advantage of this significant funding opportunity. Support in policy and advocacy, impact measurement and evaluation, as well as market research and analysis are some of the capabilities charitable organizations would need to invest their time and energy in, but few charitable organizations have the time and human capital to spare. JN Clarke Consulting can support you in this endeavour, and offer services in organizational strategy development, research, monitoring and evaluation, grant application development and much more. 

At JN Clarke Consulting, we are happy to support you by conducting this search, analysing the results and presenting it to you in a readable and clear format.

Would you or your team benefit from having our support to improve your government relationships? We offer strategic assessments, monthly support, workshops and training, depending on your needs.

Get in Touch Here!

Adventures in Cross-Canada Travel and Training

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In May and June 2023, I had the wonderful opportunity to travel across Canada and lead workshops on fundraising, equity, ethics, and decolonization for international cooperation organizations. These workshops part of the Building Equity series, which my team and I offered with Spur Change, the Global Affairs Canada-funded program focused on building capacity of small and medium-sized organizations working in the international cooperation sector across Canada. Each individual workshop was offered in partnership with regional or provincial councils for international cooperation, who organized the venue and logistics, invited participants and co-hosted workshops in their communities.

The in-person workshops began in Charlottetown on May 17th , continued in Toronto and Winnipeg on May 24th and 26th , and wrapped up in Edmonton and Saskatoon on June 4th and 6th . The workshops took place in a variety of venues, from community centres to business incubators. It was incredible to be facilitating in-person learning again! These workshops were followed by 2 sets of online workshops en francais and in English, which sparked meaningful and thought-provoking conversations.
In each location, I was deeply appreciative of the engagement and enthusiasm of the participants, all of whom are working hard to make change for communities in Canada and around the world. Participants represented a diverse group of organizations, everyone from financial literacy to youth leadership to women’s rights focused groups. We had engaging conversations on how to integrate principles of community-centric fundraising, localization & decolonization and ethical storytelling with effective tactics and practical strategies. We explored the challenges of communicating clearly about complex and nuanced international issues, while centering the voice, leadership and impact of local communities. We explored how to thoroughly and thoughtfully integrate anti-racist and decolonizing principles into our fundraising work. We practiced giving elevator pitches on our organizations and presenting a compelling case to different donor audiences. And we had lots of fun—laughing, learning and pushing ourselves to do better in all our work.
I love facilitating trainings and engaging with participants. At JN Clarke Consulting, we are increasing our training and workshop offerings focused on government relations strategy and content. We are also happy to create custom trainings for your team or organization based on your specific needs!

Feel free to reach out to learn more!

At JN Clarke Consulting, we are happy to support you by conducting this search, analysing the results and presenting it to you in a readable and clear format.

Would you or your team benefit from having our support to improve your government relationships? We offer strategic assessments, monthly support, workshops and training, depending on your needs.

Get in Touch Here!

Podcast Recap: The Small Non-profit

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Our founder, Jesse Clarke, recently had the wonderful opportunity to be a guest on Cindy Wagman’s long-standing non-profit and fundraising podcast, The Small Non-Profit.  

Here are a few highlights from that conversation:

Key Takeaways:

  • The parallels between donor and government relations
  • The significance of government investment in the non-profit sector
  • Strategies to sustain and enhance funding from government sources
  • The importance of relationships in dealing with government funding
  • Navigating through the bureaucratic systems for effective government relations

Some Key Quotes from Jesse:

” Who is the person that I am getting emails from or I’m dealing with on a regular basis? Where are my reports going to? So start with that person. Right? And then what you want to try and do is find out, okay, so where do they fit into this system? What’s their job and what’s their role? What motivates them? How are they seen as successful by their bosses? Right? And I think that’s like, getting a really strong picture of all of that is really important. And I think that there are some fundamentals for many government officials that I think are relevant. I think often you want to be someone who is not creating headaches for anybody higher up the chain from you. Kind of a joke in Ottawa is that and I think it’s similar anywhere else is, you don’t want to land on the front page of the Globe and Mail. I mean, you don’t want your program to be high profile for the wrong reasons.” -Jesse Clarke

Make sure to check out the podcast and transcript for all the government relations tips and tricks! You don’t want to miss this chat between Cindy Wagman and Jesse Clarke.

At JN Clarke Consulting, we are happy to support you by conducting this search, analysing the results and presenting it to you in a readable and clear format.

Would you or your team benefit from having our support to improve your government relationships? We offer strategic assessments, monthly support, workshops and training, depending on your needs.

Get in Touch Here!