Engaged Philanthropy

by Coke Buchanan

George Ellis was frustrated in his early endeavors with nonprofit organizations. As a businessman wanting to drive the organizations to higher levels of achievement, the daily challenges to simply meet operational demands severely limited progress. Then, Ellis learned to marry business principles with community service and helped introduce venture philanthropy to Dallas.

Ellis is Chief Financial Officer of Global 360 Inc., a global leader in providing business process management (BPM) and analysis solutions, and Chairman of SoftBrands, Inc., a global supplier of enterprise-wide software. A licensed CPA and attorney, he received his bachelor’s degree in accounting from Texas Tech University and a J.D. from Southern Methodist University’s Dedman School of Law.

As an Eagle Scout, Ellis developed an appreciation for helping others, but once he entered college, his focus was on work. Thirty successful years later, Ellis took a sabbatical from the business world to earn a law degree and served with Court Appointed Special Advocate (CASA). Seeing the pain of abused children relit his spark for community service. Then, after a divorce and a period of self-reflection, he arrived at the beginning of a new frontier for social philanthropy.

“After law school, I decided to spend half my time making a buck and the other half finding a way to give back.” After joining the board of Dallas Children’s Theater, he saw the conundrum of the nonprofit business strategies: nonprofits needed to maintain their caring mindset while adopting new strategies to ensure their survival. And they needed to incorporate the more advanced organizational capacity and funding infrastructure typically found in the business world.

Charles J. Wyly Jr., chairman of Communities Foundation of Texas, asked Ellis if he would like to get involved with that organization. “Inspired by Will Caruth’s generosity to the Foundation and meeting people who cared so much about nurturing missions, I committed to help the Foundation through a strategic planning process to focus on where it wanted to grow. I ended up working as the organization’s Chief Operating Officer.

“As I applied my business experience to help transform a nonprofit organization, I was also transformed by it. After Enron, the dot.com blow-up, the push for ethics, and the realization that we will not live forever, I met other businesspeople who I thought would benefit from such a transformation.

I met Bob Wright through the Dallas Foundation. Like me, Bob is a venture capital, technology-oriented guy, and a lawyer. We shared the vision of bridging the business and nonprofit worlds — a concept now known as Venture Philanthropy. Bob had started Dallas Social Venture Partners (DSVP), which engages entrepreneurs in community work. It was along the same lines I was moving with the Communities Foundation and the starting of the Entrepreneurs Foundation of North Texas.” The Entrepreneurs Foundation assists emerging companies in building community involvement and philanthropy into their business plans by leveraging their equity to generate resources for charity and build relationships between employees and their communities.

“In venture philanthropy,” Ellis says, “with enough folks alongside you to help identify short-term goals which, if implemented, can raise the level of the organization and position it so that it can be sustained, magic happens! The key is finding an organization that has a scalable service model and an Executive Director who understands you can’t spend money before you have it, and who will work to build a strategic board of advisors.”

After leaving Communities Foundation to launch a new business, Ellis joined the board of DSVP and helped take them through the venture philanthropy process. The result is a dynamic entrepreneurial force that affects social change through intellectual investment that extends beyond the grant process.

These venture philanthropy teams have benefited many organizations. Among them is Educational First Steps, incubated from Communities Foundation with local philanthropist David Munson, whose mission is to enhance the critical first years of learning. The organization works with preschools and childcare centers by providing assistance in staff training, special programs administration, finances, and facilities.

The Transition Resource Action Center (TRAC), headed by program director Evy Kay Ritzen, is another community program Ellis applauds. Under the auspices of Central Dallas Ministries, TRAC bridges adults and youth in “a one-stop center that offers access to affordable housing, livable-wage jobs, and a safety net for young adults transitioning out of substitute care.”

DFW International, a network of over 1,600 North Texas internationally focused civic, community, and educational organizations, delivers a cavalcade of events and international enrichment to our community.

George Ellis loves what he is doing. “This is fun. If everybody understands the positive impact he can have on a community organization and at the same time receive tremendous joy from the experience, it becomes a major force for positive and holistic change.”