Charity Execs think like Coke (or model their behaviour and aims on those of Cokish people) because they believe it's their duty to maximise income for the charity. Oxfam doesn't exist to sell books cheaply or to look after the book market in general - it exists to alleviate the effects of famine and poverty in the developing world. If selling books in a cutthroat sort of way to people in the UK that can afford to buy them and do so willingly helps Oxfam to get money to do good works then, the argument goes, it's surely worth it.
I think sometimes the perception of charities is that they should be extra good in all directions, where actually what they're required to do is do the best they can toward their aims. Hence loads of charities have rubbish employment practices, are badly run, are incredibly opportunistic in terms of mergers and contract grabbing etc and get away with it for along time because a.) they operate under the invisible blanket of nice and b.) in the grand scheme of things it doesn't matter all that much as long as they're delivering - just as with business, public sector agencies etc.
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Date: 2010-02-22 09:57 am (UTC)I think sometimes the perception of charities is that they should be extra good in all directions, where actually what they're required to do is do the best they can toward their aims. Hence loads of charities have rubbish employment practices, are badly run, are incredibly opportunistic in terms of mergers and contract grabbing etc and get away with it for along time because a.) they operate under the invisible blanket of nice and b.) in the grand scheme of things it doesn't matter all that much as long as they're delivering - just as with business, public sector agencies etc.