The skills needed between conservation funding and conservation work

Woman at laptop in office

Conservation funding moves through proposals, and the budget attached to each one decides how much of the work gets paid for. Two Conservation Futures Academy courses, built with Conservation International, cover both halves of that job.

At many conservation organizations, the person making the case for a project is the person costing it out. Funders read those two documents together, and the budget is where a program officer checks whether the plan has been tested.

That job runs on financial fluency: activity-based costing, cost allocation across partners, and the overhead line that decides how much of a grant reaches the field. Most practitioners meet that line for the first time on a live award, under deadline.

“A strong proposal with a strong activity based budget can still under-recover with an unsupported indirect-cost valuation. Aligning project indirect costs to your organizational indirect cost structure is vital for the financial health of the organization,” said Jonathan Mahlie-Scheller, senior finance manager at Conservation International.

Ecology and conservation science degrees build field expertise. These courses add the financial side of delivery.

What the courses cover

Building and Managing Conservation Budgets teaches activity-based costing, cost allocation across partners and risk planning, closing with a complete project budget. Fundraising for Conservation Organizations covers the full cycle from donor research through stewardship, closing with a concept note ready for a live donor.

Both run five hours, self-paced, at $125, and stack toward the Designing and Managing Conservation Projects Certificate, four courses and 20 hours for $400. Instruction comes from Conservation International finance and delivery leadership, including Mahlie-Scheller and Jos Williams, vice president of finance and operations, global programs. The Academy is the professional learning arm of the Rob Walton School of Conservation Futures, and its catalog now carries over 20 programs.

Read the full piece

The six budget decisions funders check, including the direct and indirect cost distinction that moves the most money, are on the Conservation Futures Academy newsroom.