Let’s Smash the Overhead Myth

When you’re a grant writer, rejection is nothing new. Like actors, it is a routine part of the job. But last year, I received a rejection phone call from a foundation that left me truly astonished. “We loved your project, and think you’re making a long-term impact in our community,” our representative said, “but we only want to support the cost of the project– not salaries, equipment, or materials.” Huh?!

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Pour lire en français, cliquez ici. 

Thinking about Becoming a “Flat” Organization? Here are 5 things to think about.

This summer, COCo collaborated on a workshop at the World Social Forum (WSF) called “Putting our values into practice through non-hierarchical management”, with Inter Pares and the Réseau Québécois des Groupes Écologistes (RQGE), two other community organizations who also use a horizontal management structure. The workshop was standing-room only, and attracted more than 50 participants of all horizons. Together, we used our own histories and motivations for moving towards a flat structure, to navigate a wide variety of audience questions about governance, human resources, salary equity, and meeting facilitation.  

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CWP Launches Constitutional Challenge Against Political Activities Cap for Charities

Insofar as things get exciting in charity law, they’ve recently been getting… well, pretty exciting.

Last week, Canada Without Poverty launched a constitutional challenge of the “10% rule”– a regulation that stipulates that (most) charitable organizations can spend no more (generally) than 10% of their budget on “political activities”. CWP charitable mission is to relieve poverty, but their Executive Director, Leilani Farha, writes that “effective strategies to relieve poverty will rely on the active participation of people living in poverty to identify barriers that prevent them from escaping poverty and to propose necessary changes to laws and policies”. Those kinds of activities, Farha says, are currently not ones they can undertake. “We have been granted charitable status to relieve poverty but when we try to do that, this legislation restricts what we can say, how often we can say it, and to whom we can say it.”

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Free Online Course on Embodying Change with Organization Unbound

In a “tiny online course” this October, Organization Unbound and the Barefoot Guide Connection are tackling one of our  favourite topics: how change in ourselves is key to creating change in the world.

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COCo is hiring a Community Technology and Web Development Intern!

COCo is looking for a Community Technology and Web Development Intern under the Young Intern program, coordinated by Communautique.

COCo is hiring a Community Technology and Web Development Intern. This is a 6 month position at 30 hours/week, starting October 2016 and ending March 2017. Occasional evening and weekend work may be required. Salary: $19.91/hour, with the benefits of working in a flexible, creative, non-traditional work environment. COCo will provide training and support to develop the skills and capacity of the intern in ICT.

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