CEO PIETA house yearly Salary ?

One eyed Jack wrote: »

That’s most peoples understanding of the meaning of charity -

The practice of charity means the voluntary giving of help to those in need, as a humanitarian act.

Your definition and understanding of charity is skewed.

Dictionary defines charity as an organization set up to provide help and raise money for those in need.

or

the voluntary giving of help, typically in the form of money, to those in need.

Neither of these define charity as working for them for free.

The idea of charity is that it does not make profits and retain them and give to shareholders.

Famous places in Ireland such as Dublin Zoo or St Vincent's Hospitals operate as charities.

They are major operations do you expect them to have staff on a voluntary basis only?

Can you not grasp that a charity that requires thousands of people to run successfully therefore need structures such as finance, HR, operations, IT etc just like any other large organisation and therefore need professional people on a full time basis.

It's not just about answering the phone in Pieta House or The Samaratans or giving a food parcel to famine victims in Africa.

They do much more than that and need quality people to run them. They must compete within the normal job market to attract these people .

If the people weren't paid as they are then they would not be able to provide the services they provide and those that need the care would therefore suffer.

I don't understand why people do not grasp this.

Of course there's bad cases such as the lady in Rehab etc but that does not mean they're all like that and all good charities will offer clear transparency on their finances on their websites.

murpho999 wrote: »

Your definition and understanding of charity is skewed.

Dictionary defines charity as an organization set up to provide help and raise money for those in need.

or

the voluntary giving of help, typically in the form of money, to those in need.

Neither of these define charity as working for them for free.

The idea of charity is that it does not make profits and retain them and give to shareholders.

Famous places in Ireland such as Dublin Zoo or St Vincent's Hospitals operate as charities.

They are major operations do you expect them to have staff on a voluntary basis only?

I do, and I expect them to operate on donations received from the public as most charity organisations do. The largest charities operate on funding from the public, funding from private donors and funding from Government on a not for profit basis meaning they’re swimming in cash and still run like an amateur organisation. They would still be smaller organisations if they were solely dependent upon charity from the public.

murpho999 wrote: »

Can you not grasp that a charity that requires thousands of people to run successfully therefore need structures such as finance, HR, operations, IT etc just like any other large organisation and therefore need professional people on a full time basis.

It's not just about answering the phone in Pieta House or The Samaratans or giving a food parcel to famine victims in Africa.

They do much more than that and need quality people to run them. They must compete within the normal job market to attract these people .

If the people weren't paid as they are then they would not be able to provide the services they provide and those that need the care would therefore suffer.

I don't understand why people do not grasp this.

People don’t grasp it, because it’s simply not true. I’ve explained this numerous times in this thread already - the larger charities are staffed mainly with volunteers, people who are willing to provide their labour for free. A charity organisation with hundreds of thousands of volunteers could easily be run efficiently on public donations alone. They would undoubtedly still be able to provide the services they provide and be staffed by professionals who are willing to give their time and labour for free. Instead, they are more interested in gaining funding for the organisation than providing charity themselves.

Various religious denominations have been providing charity since their founding relying solely on donations from the public and people’s good will, and they are run professionally. They’re just better run than an organisation which the management feel they can’t run without providing generously for themselves before they spare a thought for the people they claim to be providing care for.

murpho999 wrote: »

Of course there's bad cases such as the lady in Rehab etc but that does not mean they're all like that and all good charities will offer clear transparency on their finances on their websites.

I don’t judge whether a charity organisation is good or bad based upon their book keeping ability, that’s what they have fund managers and accountants for. I judge charity organisations based upon whether they provide for the people they claim to be providing for, based upon whether they operate on a fully voluntary basis, and whether they could operate without receiving Government funding.

It’s a fact that the larger charity organisations which receive the majority of their funding from Government wouldn’t be as large as they are if they didn’t receive funding from Government, because they wouldn’t be able to attract people in management roles without providing a generous remuneration package. That’s not charity, it’s a business, run by people who are only doing it for the money. I completely understand how that would be hard to grasp if your understanding of charity means getting paid for your labour as opposed to providing your labour on a voluntary basis.

I mentioned earlier that I’ve worked with a few of these charities in various roles so I’m familiar with how they operate, a few outstanding memories are people with intellectual disabilities being paid £3 a week, and when I questioned it, it was explained to me that they don’t know any better, it’s all the one to them and they are provided with bed and board. If these people were actually paid a fair wage for their labour, they could pay for their own accommodation. I suppose this was 20 years ago though when the idea of people with intellectual disabilities living independently as opposed to being institutionalised was unheard of.

I’ve worked with charity organisations providing care for people who are homeless because having been homeless myself at one point in my life, I thought this was a way of supporting people who are homeless. As you can imagine, I wasn’t fond of their business model. They seemed to be more interested in expanding their operations to apply for more funding from the HSE. I used do the sleep outs which are now sponsored by utility companies, turned me right off the idea as before it was a way of publicising the work of the charity and asking the public for donations. The idea of utility companies which have no problem cutting people off who can’t afford to pay their bills and leaving them destitute, sponsoring an activity which was about providing for people who are destitute, somehow didn’t sit right with me.

I could give plenty more examples of my experiences and the experiences of others, but I won’t, we’d be here all night, but suffice to say that the PR managers in these charity organisations are playing a blinder. I don’t think it would be possible to attract people who have no morals to these roles without paying them generously. People with morals willing to volunteer their skills and time just aren’t attracted to larger charity organisations, but that doesn’t mean they don’t provide charity to people in need. The bigger organisations appear to be more interested in using people in need to justify funding their continued existence and expansion, and you’re right - they most certainly do have a different understanding of charity than most people, in that their idea of people in need is themselves, as opposed to the people they claim to be advocating for.

The CEO Elaine Austin was on RTE Drivetime yesterday. Available by podcast

She could give government ministers lessons on how to duck and dodge

Didn’t answer one single question directly. Even when asked a question 3 times in a row she would deflect

I know less about their financing now than before the interview

I am also slow to donate to charities with the lax rules and laws around them. There are good ones setup for the general good and there are slush funds set up for the benefit of the top guys. Problem is, it’s very hard to discern the difference and outlandish salaries just raises suspicion. I don’t expect people to work for free, but given that charities are not subject to normal vat tax etc and then you see huge salaries for the top brass and others paid really badly, you wonder who the ultimate recipients are of the charity.