Designing a New Approach to Corporate Philanthropy

by Nathaniel Whittemore · 2010-02-22 06:43:00 UTC
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San Francisco Bay Area design firm ZURB loves nonprofits, but they're just not that compelled by the typical style of corporate philanthropy. Accordingly, they've developed their own unique style of giving: For the last three years, they've been holding 24-hour design marathons to help nonprofits achieve some marketing-related goal, and open sourcing the process so others can learn.

The way it works is that each year, the ZURBwired program selects one mission to accomplish for a nonprofit. It can be a new website, publicity for a new fundraising campaign or something else entirely. For 24 caffeine-fueled hours, ZURB, the nonprofit and participating partners rethink the project from the ground up. At the end of it, the nonprofit participant is left with both valuable outputs, as well as a new approach to the design process they can employ every day.

There are a bunch of things I love about this:

1) Putting creativity and human capacity at the center of the equation. I think a shift's taking place, in which people are beginning to recognize that the supremacy of human capacity -- rather than just financial resources -- lies at the heart of any endeavor's success. ZURBwired puts that fact right at the center of their process.

2) Tangible results. I love that their process actually produces something, even though it's over such a short period. Most "pro-bono" work drags out over months and never gets really complete because of the lack of hard deadlines.

3) Open-sourcing the process. ZURB's work isn't meant to be a closed process, in which it's only the nonprofit in question that benefits. Instead, they put everything online for all to see. For the ZURB team, this is a chance to introduce groups to a process of design as much as it is about applying that process in one specific instance.

To learn more about ZURBwired, check out this page about the event or look at their work last year with Pie Ranch. If you're an interested nonprofit, you can apply to ZURB between March 4th and 18th.

Photo Credit: ZURBinc

Nathaniel Whittemore is the founder of Assetmap. Previously he was the founding director of the Northwestern University Center for Global Engagement.
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