Begging for Change: The Dollars and Sense of Making Nonprofits Responsive, Efficient, and Rewarding for All

By Robert Egger

Book Overview

You are a good person. You are one of the 84 million Americans who volunteer with a charity. You are part of a national donor pool that contributes nearly $200 billion to good causes every year. But you wonder: Why don't your efforts seem to make a difference?

Fifteen years ago, Robert Egger asked himself this same question as he reluctantly climbed aboard a food service truck for a night of volunteering to help serve meals to the homeless. He wondered why there were still people waiting in line for soup in this day and age. Where were the drug counselors, the job trainers, and the support team to help these men and women get off the streets? Why were volunteers buying supplies from grocery stores when restaurants were throwing away unused fresh food every night? Why had politicians, citizens, and local businesses allowed charity to become an end in itself? Why wasn't there an efficient way to solve the problem?

Robert knew there had to be a better way. In 1989, he started the D.C. Central Kitchen by collecting unused food from local restaurants, caterers, and hotels and bringing it back to a central location where hot, nutritious meals were prepared and distributed to agencies around the city. Since then, the D.C. Central Kitchen has been named one of President Bush Sr.'s Thousand Points of Light and has become one of the most respected and emulated nonprofit agencies in the world, producing and distributing more than 4,000 meals a day. Its highly successful 12-week job-training program equips former homeless transients and drug addicts with culinary and life skills to gain employment in the restaurant business.

In Begging for Change, Robert Egger looks back on his experience and exposes the startling lack of logic, waste, and ineffectiveness he has encountered during his years in the nonprofit sector, and calls for reform of this $800 billion industry from the inside out. In his entertaining and inimitable way, he weaves stories from his days in music, when he encountered legends such as Sarah Vaughan, Mel Torme, and Iggy Pop, together with stories from his experiences in the hunger movement -- and recently as volunteer interim director to help clean up the beleaguered United Way National Capital Area. He asks for nonprofits to be more innovative and results-driven, for corporate and nonprofit leaders to be more focused and responsible, and for citizens who contribute their time and money to be smarter and more demanding of nonprofits and what they provide in return. Robert's appeal to common sense will resonate with readers who are tired of hearing the same nonprofit fund-raising appeals and pity-based messages. Instead of asking the "who" and "what" of giving, he leads the way in asking the "how" and "why" in order to move beyond our 19th-century concept of charity, and usher in a 21st-century model of change and reform for nonprofits.

Enlightening and provocative, engaging and moving, this book is essential reading for nonprofit managers, corporate leaders, and, most of all, any citizen who has ever cared enough to give of themselves to a worthy cause.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0060541717
• ISBN13: 9780060541712
• Release Date: February 2004
• Publisher: Harper Business
• Length: 240 Pages
• Weight: 1.05 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 6.0" x 9.0"

Customer Reviews

Good Background and Ideas!

Eighty-four Americans volunteer with a charity, and $200 billion is contributed every year. "Begging for Change" summarizes Robert Egger looking back on his experiences (first running successful night clubs, then a non-profit kitchen and training program) and offering his critique of the $800 billion non-profit world in general. A key Egger point is that non-profits need to ask: "Are you perpetuating a cycle of need and dependency?" Today charity is governed by innumerable individuals and their egos, many of which are "business-as-usual" career do-gooders who've never run their own company. Many duplicate each others' services and fight each other for funding. They talk of how many were fed or sheltered, but not about how many got out of dependency. There now are more than 1.5 million non-profits, and their latest evolution is to "realize" that they have to pay those at the top well to attract good people. Thus, in D.C. there are about 25,000 non-profits, requiring over $1.5 billion just for CEO and executive director salaries! Yet, over 70% have revenues less than $500,000/year, and neither government nor Adam Smith's "Invisible Hand" act to make those that are ineffective go away. Many should. In addition, there is the needless complexity added by multiple funding sources and their frequent "strings." One non-profit gets its $20 million from 161 sources - think of all the attention required to mind all those masters! Egger started a training program for cooks, food-handlers, and servers - thus, both offering them a "hand-up" (instead of just a "hand-out") and substantially reducing the need for full-time assistants. Many fail, but many more succeed; even a substantial number of those that fail initially (drug tests, absences) reform, come back, and later complete the program. Another important Egger point is that companies interested in helping the poor should first focus on paying their own employees well enough so that they can succeed, rather than paying them so little that they cannot succeed and then wondering how to help others that are downtrodden. Another Egger innovation was to realize that local catering services were always being leaned on by non-profits to provide deeply discounted services. Egger offered to take that business over with his staff in training - and thus relieved them of a burden while providing his trainees with an important opportunity to demonstrate their talents first-hand to society's higher-ups. He also briefly illustrates examples where organizations provide for-profit services while focusing on hiring those with checkered or limited backgrounds. Egger points out that the aging Baby Boom will soon provide a test of our social services as they move into old age and increasingly require more services. Finally, Egger suggests that "more" is not always "better." For example, if his organization held a fund-raiser to renovate or acquire new facilities, that would deplete resources available in t

Reasoned giving, creativity, and a systems approach

Mr. Egger disputes the convention wisdom about why people should make charitable gifts and how those gifts should be used by the recipient organizations. As an attorney who represents non-profit boards and individuals contemplating major charitable donations, I have given Robert Egger's book "Begging for Change" to both groups of clients. The universal response has been extremely positive. Mr. Egger not only encourages donors to think through the goals and directions of their largesse but also challenges non-profit executives to use their creativity and a systems approach to improve the delivery and multiplier effect of their charitable services. Too often donors just write a check to feel good and non-profit executives do the "same old, same old" with no effect. Random acts of kindness are good, but reasoned giving coupled with creativity and a systems approach are better.

It's about time

This is an excellent book. The author has great expertise in his field and has a wealth of knowledge to share. I also work in the non-profit world and I learned a great deal from this book. Mr. Egger is honest, straight forward and has "been there" and has fifteen years of experience to support his opinions and solutions to very difficult social problems. Mr. Egger's writing style is clear and very easy to follow. This man knows of what he speaks. An excellent book for anyone working or planning to work in the social justice field. At last, someone who is not afraid to stand up and tell the truth. Don't miss it!

It's about time

This is an excellent book. The author has great expertise in his field and has a wealth of knowledge to share. I also work in the non-profit world and I learned a great deal from this book. Mr. Egger is honest, straight forward and has "been there" and has fifteen years of experience to support his opinions and solutions to very difficult social problems.

Pulls no punches...

Deceptively simple, Eggers basically offers a challenge for businesses, foundations, individuals, governments, and yes, nonprofits to stop thinking of the nonprofit community as merely the recipients of our charity and start seeing them as real - and accountable - agents for social change.This is the kind of book I normally avoid like the plague, a book purporting to offer a solution for social issues in 200 pages or less. But Egger's pugnacious prose makes sure that we understand that he knows he doesn't have all the answers, but that sitting back bemoaning the complexity of the issues is letting someone else set the agenda for what our society looks like. Innovate or die, he challenges the nonprofit community. Don't start throwing millions of dollars into "charity work," he challenges the business community, if you aren't paying your own employees a living wage. Ask what impact your work is having, he challenges volunteers, and focus your efforts on making something happen, not just making yourself feel good. Egger's book is thoughtful and engaging...and you get the feeling that he finds out you're not doing as you should, he would have no reservations calling you out at high noon, guns drawn.