Corporate Partner Brochure: Fill & Download for Free

Are you creating a pitch deck for a specific fundraising campaign or a nonprofit start-up? As you might imagine, the first step is knowing your audience.Some funders prefer a more corporate approach to soliciting support, in which case you’ll want to include sections that are much like a standard pitch (the problem, your product/program description, team and partners involved, timing, anticipated outcomes, funding model, budget, organization financials). In this case, you can use corporate examples but adjust your terminology, like using “impact” instead of “outcomes.”For potential funders that are more emotion-driven, consider making the pitch more of a story that uses a real world or fictional example to connect the pieces. And when it comes to design, think about warmth (compelling photos, well-designed infographics) rather than throwing in lots of charts and data analysis.I think the campaign brochure (PDF) that the Smithsonian is using right now can give you some ideas, although it lacks the financial information that some donors might prefer. Try searching for nonprofit capital campaign brochures for additional inspiration.

Most large, highly profitable firms—assuming they set billable targets—will require 2,000–2,100 billable hours as the minimum to stay in good standing, i.e., to receive a full year-end bonus and remain on track for partnership. The firms that don’t set targets generally aren’t doing so because they’re cool with associates billing 1,500 hours; rather, the hours at such shops are often so high that setting a floor would discourage people from doing more work. For example, if the stated minimum was 2,100 hours and you and several of your fellow associates were already at 2,600 in October, everyone might start looking at travel brochures, and there’s nothing that makes a partner sadder than idle associates (I’m tearing up just thinking about it). It’s therefore better to say that there is no minimum and hope that a few people try to hit 3,000.But let’s assume a stated minimum of 2,000 billable hours at an elite firm. That means 40 billable hours per week assuming 2 weeks of vacation. Not bad, right? Sadly, it’s not that simple. First off, just doing the same number of hours as everyone else is not going to establish you as a partner-in-the-making (unless you’ve got insane credentials or connections relative to your fellow associates), so you’ll probably want to bill closer to 2400 hours in order to establish yourself as a hard worker. That’s 48 billable hours per week. And of course, no one can (honestly) bill for every second they’re in the office: even an ultra-productive 10-hour day likely includes some time eating and screwing around on the internet, so let’s assume 80% efficiency, i.e., 10 hours of face time to yield 8 billable hours. That means that you’ve got to put in (at least) 3,000 hours (60 hours per week) in the office to hit 2,400 in billables. And realistically, just to visit family around the holidays, attend the occasional wedding/funeral/graduation, and take at least one trip to recharge your batteries, you’re likely to take more than 2 weeks of vacation, meaning that the number will creep even higher.Next, your work is unlikely to be a never-ending stream of 10-hour days Monday-Friday. Corporate work is more all-or-nothing than litigation, but still, litigation has peaks and valleys, as well. There will be 16-hour days and weeks where you work 30 hours straight. There will also be days when you’ve got literally nothing to do after a major case is resolved, or you’re twiddling your thumbs waiting for a partner to get back to you with edits on your work. There will be weeks where you bill 2 hours on a Tuesday, but have to come in and bill 6 hours on a Sunday. In sum, the work is unpredictable: over the course of a year where you bill 2,400 hours, you may have weeks where you bill 15 hours, and others where you bill 90, and unfortunately, as an associate, you have little control over your schedule, as you are at the mercy of both clients and the partners you work for. So bottom line, elite firm associates make top dollar because they are asked to work very hard and endure unpredictable schedules.

I am from one of the smallest villages in Maharashtra and pursuing my MBA from one of the old IIMs. I did my engineering from a government engineering college of Maharashtra at nearly free of cost and then I got admitted to IIM as a fresher. I did my full schooling in vernacular medium. As my village did not have any high school, I had to move to Nagpur to pursue my 11th & 12th (Again in vernacular medium). None of my family members knows anything about IIMs. I was the first engineering graduate in my family.My undergraduate college did not have a good placement record. So I started preparing for the government exams such as RBI B Grade and SSC CGL. But later, I thought I should go for an MBA or I should at least give it a try. So I started preparing for CAT, XAT, and IIFT too along with those exams. During my preparation, I got in touch with lots of Top B School Grads and I got influenced by their personality traits and a strong display of their confidence. My initial goal was to get into the Institute of Rural Management (IRMA) as I had a rural background. I had the benefit of OBC reservation also while appearing for the CAT as my father passed away when I was 12 and our family was part of non-creamy-layer.But as time went by, I did extremely well in Mocks. I started reading newspapers and novels and my reading comprehension skills became extremely well. Although, I was still lagging in terms of communication skills. I appeared for CAT 2016 and cracked it with 99.xx percentile. I received calls from all the IIMs despite not having a very impressive academic record (10–80s, 12–80s, B.Tech. - 7.xx) because of my reservation.Unexpectedly, I secured admission to one of the old IIMs and I decided to join it. I took an academic loan of 18 Lakh INR from SBI and started my MBA. Now, comes the real part of the answer. I thought people who got selected or at least half of my future batchmates would be just like me coming from a not-so-popular college in India to get out from the lower middle class. But I was wrong, even people who get into IIMs through reservations are super-rich. Especially SC/ST people, since they do not have even creamy layer rules.When I joined the college, summer placements were close and there I was a guy who did not even appear for a single corporate interview in my life. There were students from IITs, NITs, DU, BITS, and many other prestigious colleges and they were speaking extremely fluent English. I had a bit of an accent, and that is why I had a callous time being part of their social circle. Most of them were super rich and coming from well-to-do families belong to either tier 1 or metro cities. While on the contrary, I was a sober guy who did not even know how to dress formally and crack jokes in English. There was so much gap between our mindsets and upbringing that I could not fake anything further. I stopped talking to people and they were not interested anyway to talk to a guy like me. I was simply the odd one out in the batch.Then summer placements got started. All the guys and girls who got placed in consulting and investment banking/private equity or corporate finance roles were hotshots and everyone wanted to befriend them. I got selected in one of the not-so-known domestic banks with the lower stipend and that is why I was a loser for most of my batch. At IIMs, you will be judged based on the company where you get placed, not based on your inherent nature or character.No one will make you partner in corporate competitions and group projects if you are not good at elocuting your ideas (and why would they?). They talk about “Peer to Peer Learning” and “Diversity” in the corporate brochures of IIMs. Now, here I am probably one of the most diverse candidates of my batch who has survived through the real-life rural issues but where are those peers who want to learn from me about it? How will I learn from my peers about the urban lifestyle if they do not want to accept me as their friend? I have been so humble and respectful to everyone but still, my batchmates will not accept me because of my background.No one helps anyone here during the course as everyone is competing with each other for placements and grading is also relative. Here I am completely fighting on my own. My life at engineering college was completely different. I had true friends who will do anything for me. I was very convivial by nature back then but now I am a socially depressed lonely introvert here at IIM. I always feel insecure about my final placements as I am one of the most average and the simple guy of my batch who does not know how to throw jargons in extremely fluent English. I am still working on my accent and communication skills but I don't see myself anywhere close to my classmates during class participation.Today, I believe I was never a good cultural fit for this program from the very start. I realized this at a very early stage and tried very hard to change the reality. But somehow I failed. Undoubtedly IIMs as institutions are the best b schools in India, but they are not friendly places for an average Indian Joe who has made his way out through financial struggles. Now, I do not desperately try to be part of any group and I am simply hoping to finish off my PGP as soon as I can. I want to get out of this place and again want to be friends with the common people of my native hometown with whom I can laugh freely without caring about what others will think of me. Now, I feel that it was a wrong step to take such a high burden of academic fees. I will have to work my ass off for 3–4 important years of my life to pay up the loan. Sometimes I think, I should have gotten into one of the stable government jobs. At least I would have gotten the much-needed respect that I deserve from society. Some of you might have heard about suicides in IIT/IIMs because of academic pressure but trust me, it is not academic pressure, it is basically peer pressure which is the main reason behind all such incidents. It is the fear of being left out that leads to such ruinous steps.My only advice to all the management aspirants is that if you are coming from a rural and financially poor background, then think twice before joining an old IIM. All the people who have studied in the expensive private English medium schools in metro cities will not be ready to accept your existence in the vicinity of IIMs. They will treat you as a burden to the college because according to them you will be the one who will drag down the average salary of the institution.If you think, at least reserved category people would be having a similar background like yours, then again you are wrong. The Indian reservation system is a joke as there is no real background check on the candidates who apply under the reserved quota. How can a guy who has spent his whole life in Delhi and studied at DPS RK Puram plus St. Stephens college be counted as a part of the scheduled tribe category? This is just one example. There are many such examples in my batch. But the bitter truth is our most deserving OBC/SC/ST brothers and sisters are living happily somewhere in far small villages of India and they are mostly clueless about the benefits which are given to them in the Indian constitution. It will take years to uplift them out of poverty because they are still not part of this system yet.Thank you for reading.Edit: All those people who are commenting after reading my answer that “it doesn't seem like I am poor in communication skills” need to understand the difference between written and oral communication. In Quora, we draft our opinions carefully in written form and there are very fewer chances of misunderstanding. Before transmitting my opinion, I can revise or rewrite it in an organized way. I have enough time here to think it through and make changes. But the Presentations, Class Participation, Group Discussions, and Personal Interviews of IIMs is an altogether different ball game where you face questions and arguments of some of the smartest people of this country. Everything happens very fast. Obviously, the words once uttered there cannot be reversed.Edit 2 (Feb 2021, after close to 2.5 years):Thanks a lot for all the love in the comments. I have read all of them. Some people have generously put a big effort to guide and motivate me. It has been very emotional to see that there are so many people who have left very positive notes for me. Some also have raised suspicions on the credibility of this answer or criticized it. But, I love you all irrespective of your judgment and want to express my gratitude for taking out time and reading the whole thing line by line and putting your honest views in the comments.Coming back to the present, I graduated in 2019. During the final placements, I received an offer from one of the top global beverage MNCs. I have been working in this company for almost 2 years. I was also entrusted with the responsibility of “Rural Marketing and Branding” for my organization due to my background. The company has been super generous in terms of paying hefty annual bonuses and sending me to international destinations such as Europe for short training stints during the Management Training period.I consider myself now an expert user of English, both in Verbal as well as Written communication. I am a fairly confident individual now, far from being a lonely introvert like I was in past. Meanwhile, I have also paid a significant chunk of my education loan already and will be foreclosing my loan account in the next 4–5 months.In short, life could not have been better. My mom is very proud of me. I have grown a lot wiser with the time, maybe a little smarter. I have learned how to roll my R’s and use concrete fancy words during regular conversations at parties. I have inherited all the corporate business etiquette and manners. People respect me for my position and listen to my thoughts. Last year, in fact, A Delhi-based reputed B School invited me for student interaction over a Zoom session during the lockdown.Today, when I read my answer once again after close to 2.5 years, only to be surprised that how things can change drastically in a very short time span.A word of wisdom to the candidates of IIMs:Please never underestimate yourself because you are not good at a thing or two. Everyone is unique and we all have got different strengths. Always remember to be confident and resilient during tough times. While bad times may seem to last forever, they always give way to good times. If you've been feeling like the bad time you're stuck in just won't end, then I can tell you my experience that they are just a few bad days or months and not a bad life. Also, please be kind to your fellow batchmates. I know the grading is relative and there are super high expectations to get placed at Day 0 or Day 1. But those short-term rat races will not yield you anything in long term. However, being a better and kind person will definitely make you a good leader at some point of time in the future.Communication Skills Dilemma:Many of the students have shared the dilemma in the comments about survival in IIMs with average communication skills and how to improve them. I believe one can survive in IIMs with average communication skills if they are ready to put in enough hard work to improve them over time. I struggled during the 1st year, however, participating in corporate competitions and case studies helped me a lot. I used to have an accent/stutter sometimes during the class participation/presentations, however, that did not deter my confidence. Today, I hardly face that problem. Because I have improved a lot by constantly participating in-class discussions with confidence without really thinking about what others have to say about my speech delivery.If you live in a place where most people speak the language you are learning, you may use the language for several hours each day. So, it may become part of your “inner speech.” In other words, you start thinking in that language. Your mind stops trying to translate things from your native language into a second language. The same thing has happened to me in the last 3–4 years.But, the majority of us are living in either tier 2/non metro or rural area where English is very unheard of on day to day basis. So, you may not have many chances to practice English. But, you can be self-taught in today’s time. When you speak, your speech might be slower than you would like. This is because your mind is still translating from your first language, which can also sound unnatural. And let me tell you, that is totally okay. That is how I used to speak until the end of my 1st year at IIM. But, the good news is that thinking in English can bring you a huge step closer to fluency! It is not very difficult, but what it does take is a conscious effort and constant practice at your end. I can not reveal my identity here for obvious reasons, but should you have any queries, then please mention your email ID in the comments, and I shall get in touch with you to help you out. Mind you, I read every comment added in this answer carefully.