As those who attended the Committee on Foundations' eighth annual meeting in San Francisco this past spring or our prior weekend retreats can attest, psychoanalysis comes absolutely alive at such gatherings. Community members — the heart, soul, and future of psychoanalysis — and analysts, all representing foundations from cities across the country, meet and discuss creative programs, fundraising, development, public information, and organizational problems.
This year our theme, “From Institute, Society, and Foundation to Psychoanalytic Center,” organized our large group discussion. Lee Shershow reported on the recently created Portland Psychoanalytic Center. Are psychoanalysts, institutes, societies, and communities better served by reorganizing our current structures — which separate these entities, often creating duplication of programs and ideas, over-extended and exhausted members, and inefficient use of time, energy, and finances in our respective goals and missions? Would a psychoanalytic center with different arms (i.e., Education, Outreach, Fundraising, Clinic, Development, Society, etc.), but all under one CEO and one executive board of analysts and community members, work more effectively and strengthen our profession? Portland is committed to finding out.
This idea was also considered when our hosts for the weekend, the San Francisco Institute, Society, and Foundation, described in detail the successes and problems of a large established institute, society, and foundation. Erik Gann, Director of the institute, and David Glotzer, president of the San Francisco Psychoanalytic Foundation, described successful programs out in the community. They also discussed current and future concerns about the financial viability of these programs amidst current structures. Glotzer, an experienced fundraiser and expert in non-profit organizations, discussed the discomfort of analysts when, for example, the idea of strategic planning is introduced. “Blank looks,” he said.
Photo by Larry Duckler
Most of the forty COF participants agreed that community members of foundations, many of whom have years of expertise and success in business and on other boards, are severely underutilized by institutes for their potential contributions to strategic planning, management of money, board development, liaison programs, and fundraising.
Marvin Margolis, past president of the American, spoke of the foundation movement from an historical perspective. He reminded attendees of the success of the movement. It includes psychoanalysis in the community, engaging non-affiliated institutes with the American through participation in psychoanalytic foundations, and providing an opportunity for community members and analysts to talk their respective discomforts through and get to know each other better. The potential is enormous. The programs of the Michigan Psychoanalytic Foundation (which sent its new director of development to the meeting) — whether fundraising or film programs in the African American or South Asian–American communities — continue to be successful. There is much we can learn from the Michigan organization.
Harvey Rich, founder and former chair of the COF and president of the American Psychoanalytic Foundation, gave a workshop on fundraising. Other workshops topics included board development; program development, given by Selma Duckler, COF co-chair; and media and public relations, given by Dottie Jeffries, public information consultant to the American, and Mark Smaller, who runs public information committees for both the Chicago Institute for Psychoanalysis and the American. The committee thanks Andra Lichtenstein of the San Francisco Psychoanalytic Foundation for organizing the meeting, Myrna and Tom Frankel for their warm hospitality on Friday evening, and all participants. Richard Fox, the American's new president, attended, and his input and support were valuable and appreciated. Like San Francisco itself, the COF annual meeting remains a very special and enjoyable experience.
Our 2001 meeting theme will be “Spending Money to Raise Money: Issues of Development,” and will take place in Seattle the weekend of March 23, 2001. See you there!
Mark D. Smaller, Ph.D., is co-chair of the Committee on Foundations and chair of the Social Issues Committee.