aikyam Fund

Abundance of good people doing great work...

1. Right to information(RTI), Forest Rights Act - FRA, Protection of  Children from sexual Offences (POCSO) Act, Juvenile Justice Act, Right to Education, Internet Freedom, Digital Personal Protection Act, 2023(DPDP Act) are a reality because of Civil Society in India.
2. 15L-20L Active For Impact , Not For Loss orgs(NGOs) a decade ago(~130-150NGOs/1L Citizens) & the teams working in them.
3. More Giving. Private philanthropy at 1.3 lakh crore in FY24 (1.05 lakh crore in FY22)

But, scarcity of resilience

1. Today around 4.1L active NGOs listed on DARPAN. The ratio of NGOs to citizens in India is approximately 28 NGOs per 1L citizens, compared to 186 in Brazil, 64 in China, and 200 in Russia. 
2. 6/10 early-stage impactful NGOs do not receive crucial early stage funding due to challenges with compliance, outreach, an ecosystem.
3. 3/10 mid sized NGOs do not receive repeat funding from trusts and foundations due to compliance burdens, program and monitoring frameworks, and capacity.
4. 5/10 NGOs (all sizes, stages) have just 3-month cash runway.
5. 8/10 NGOs (all sizes, stages) struggle to obtain indirect costs funding (capacity building, technology, operational infrastructure) leading to organisation stunting
6. Indian Trusts & Foundations estimate that number of fundable (1 Cr/year) organisations in India is less than 4000. 
   

Components of resilience for NGOs - key functions

Mostly Internal	External
👩🏼‍💻 Psychologically Safe Workspaces, Teams	🏛️ Compliance
🏛️ Efficient Operations
🌍 Measurable, Impactful Programs
💰 Diverse, Predictable fundraising streams

(Estimated) Current state of Key components

 

TEST: Tiny Experiments for Social Transformation

We didnt have all the answers so we ran 200+ Tiny Experiments with partner NGOs to solve for parts of the above challenges and learnt from each experiment. A few are listed here:

> Can workshops around listening enhance team work and org vision? 🔗

> Can we make high quality Compliance Content accessible & discoverable? 🔗

> Can online forums encourage finance teams to ask questions to experts? 🔗

> NotebookLM's podcast tool make complex laws accessibel to gig workers? 🔗

> NotebookLM's podcast tool make complex laws accessibel to gig workers? 🔗

> Vulnerability centered program design leads to better fundraising request? 🔗

> psychologically safe physical spaces helps team reflect, collaborate better? 🔗

> Scarcity of safe spaces to bring like minded folks together? 🔗

> How can we make vulnerable art/music more accessible to everyone? 🔗

> How to nurture a highly engaged community of practitioners from NGOs? 🔗

> Can zero code tools like Ghost be used by NGOs to amplify reach? 🔗

> Can high quality job descriptions help talent find right social impact jobs? 🔗

> Monthly fellowship income to chage-makers makes their ideas resilient?

..and many more. This approach by running experiments on actual problems and creating live solutions with feedback helped us to create a first draft framework for solving.

aikyam fund - "Y Combinator for Changemakers in India"

1. 12 month program unlocking impact in 4 levels
2. Goal is to enable early stage non profits/Ideas & at risk non profits become resilient.
3. Resilient means compliant & efficient, sustainable operations, mission aligned teams in a psychologically safe workspace, impactful (measurable) programs delivered to vulnerable communities, diverse, predictable and reliable fundraising streams.
4. We also support selected Ideas, NGOs with INR 5L-15L as seed funding/support

L1	Regulatory Compliances, Filings, Audits	Leadership on Vision, Mission, Values, Hiring	Vulnerability/Planet centered Program(s) Designing	Storytelling, Theory of Change
L2	Policies, Processes & Practices	Capacity & Team Building, Growth, Training	Program Workflows, Monitoring Frameworks	Engagement & Outreach, Fundraising Plans
L3	System Implementing Processes	Systems aiding in Team/Feild Work, Collaboration	Systems for Monitoring & Last mile delivery	Systems for Discoverability, Fundraising
L4	Compliant & Efficient Operations	Psychologically Safe Workspace, Teams	Impactful Programs delivered effectively	Diverse, Predictable fundraising streams

How do we do it?

1. Structured guidance through curriculum focused on building resilience one step at a time across Compliance, Operations, Program, Impact, Fundraising, People.
2. Office hours with aikyam fellows
3. Collective Wisdom sharing with other Founders, Frontline workers, Teams
4. and most importantly - Nurturing an eco-system of "infrastructure" for NGOs through public resources/projects/alliances like:
   

aikyam space - Convening, Co-working, Reflective spaces for NGOs

aikyam jobs - Hand curated jobs in social impact

aikyam school (WIP) - Courses, Workshops for Capacity Building

aikyam fellows - Program, Design, Tech, Strategy help for NGOs

Our Alliances:

PATTIC - Community, resources for statutory & regulatory matters

OASIS (Partner) - Making Open Source Software accessible to NGOs

PoSH (WIP) - Resources for gender neutral safe workspaces