s a backdrop to our client assignments, we seek to increase intellectual capital in the field of strategic thinking about non-profit institutions. We invest in advancing the field both because we believe it will help us add significant value to our client work and because we want to contribute to improved understanding of this increasingly important and vibrant sector. Anthony Knerr, Managing Director of the firm, speaks frequently on a variety of strategic topics to both client and other groups. Among the issues that we are currently thinking about and working on are the following: What are the necessary and sufficient conditions for institutional effectiveness in a rapidly changing world? What common characteristics do effective non-profit institutions share? What is the link between clarity of mission and institutional effectiveness? What are the most significant issues and trends currently confronting and influencing leading nonprofit institutions? What differences are there in such issues and trends between European and US-based institutions? What differences may there be, if any, in such issues and trends a decade from now? What factors are most critical in successful institutional mergers, affiliations and associations and why? How can a nonprofit institution with limited ability to alter its underlying financial architecture successfully undertake significant strategic transformation? Will the broad field of philanthropy coalesce into a more significant and widely recognized area of human endeavor, with a critical mass of research, undergraduate and advanced higher education, policy formulation and media attention – much as the environment did several decades ago? What is the relationship between the broad field of philanthropy and that of nonprofit management? What is involved in a national nonprofit institution becoming truly global in perspective, attitude, culture and activities? Please contact us if you would like to receive our working papers as they become available. Copyright © 2010, All rights reserved.