Lay the Groundwork for Collaboration and Growth
Arabella’s staff work with donors and projects to design, implement, and evaluate governance models to set organizations, boards, and projects up for success. No matter what your initiative’s size, culture, and legal structure, we help right-size all the components of governance to suit the practical reality of your work, setting you up to achieve goals.
Governance is woven into every aspect of philanthropic giving. The long-term success of any initiative rests upon a governance structure that has been designed to support its present and future programmatic goals and the changing needs of its stakeholders. But setting up all the components of governance—from decision-making structures to bylaws to succession plans—can be complex and burdensome. It can also be expensive, if your legal counsel has limited experience with complex philanthropic initiatives. And the best-laid plans can break down without thoughtful ongoing implementation, as needs evolve.
Arabella helps you navigate these challenges by serving as an expert and neutral third-party advisor, delivering best-in-class governance strategic planning and management so that you are free to dedicate your time to activities you find most rewarding and impactful. We help you set up the pillars of your governance—policies, procedures, roles, and governing and advisory bodies—and then ensure that they function smoothly, adapting when necessary to family, project, or personnel changes. Our staff knows which questions to ask at every point of your project or organization’s lifecycle to ensure that your infrastructure supports your mission. Our role as a neutral outsider, as well as our expertise in facilitation, helps to mitigate the power dynamics that often accompany collaborative decision making.
We do this for a range of philanthropic organizations—from family foundations navigating the joys and challenges of giving together to donors pooling their resources to achieve common goals to incubated projects guided by expert advisors. We evaluate programs and organizations with an eye to the role their structure and staffing play in achieving their goals. With support from our in-house legal counsel, we also manage multiple nonprofit entities and work closely with their staff members to ensure their boards, policies, and personnel support their program work and growth.
How Arabella Can Help
- Quickly set up new incubated projects and begin receiving tax-deductible grants on their behalf
- Rapidly execute domestic and international grants
- Host and facilitate donor collaboratives
- Manage advocacy and lobbying campaigns, including compliance oversight
- Manage tandem 501(c)(3) and 501(c)(4) campaigns to make the most of advocacy resources
- Conduct rapid due diligence on potential grantees
- Design and manage RFP processes
- Provide human resources for project employees
- Provide full financial management and donor reporting for hosted projects
- Spin off hosted projects into independent entities