It's Time for Community Foundations to Complete the CF Insights Survey

It is time for community foundations to complete CF Insights' annual data collection survey. Results are used to help community foundations across the country make more informed, effective decisions about their operating models, leading to greater financial sustainability and community impact. Your timely contribution makes all of this possible. 

Log in or register for a free user account to share your FY 2021 data by July 29.

Items to Keep in Mind

• If you don’t have figures on some of the questions, you can leave them blank and submit what you do know. Key figures include total assets, operating budget, grantmaking, and assets broken down by fund type. 
• Include interns in the total FTE numbers.
• Provide asset, gift, and grant numbers as if you were preparing your 990, net of any supporting organizations. 
  • If you have supporting organizations, we ask that you provide their asset, gift, and grant information in the separately labeled fields.
• When reporting core operating budget, include all administrative expenses for the foundation (excluding grant dollars). 
  • There are separate lines for personnel and non-personnel expenses.
  • Special initiative expenses should be entered in their separate labeled field.
• For instant online help or a look at term definitions, hover over the question mark icon next to any survey question.
• Report the total number of scholarship awards and total scholarship grant dollars on the Product Composition page. This will allow us to see how scholarship programs are changing across the state.

Use of Unaudited Financials 

We understand some foundations will not have official year-end financials by the survey's deadline. To ensure the timely publication of survey results, please use your internal financials to complete the GIFT Survey.

How the Data is Used

Data from CF Insights survey is a critical component of our GIFT Snapshot Report for Indiana Community Foundations. Not only is the report a powerful tool for board members to see, it's used to benchmark your community foundation among peers in terms of operating costs, asset growth, fund mix, trends and more. The data also allows GIFT to know—and report to our key stakeholders like Lilly Endowment and elected officials—the total assets and grantmaking in the field.   

Questions

If you require assistance accessing the database or have any questions about the survey itself, email cfinsights@candid.org or contact IPA's VP Community Foundation Programs Amy Haacker at ahaacker@inphilanthropy.org.

We look forward to reporting back to the Indiana field with the 2021 Snapshot report.