Florida Blue Foundation

Mission and Guiding Principles

Mission Statement of the Florida Blue Foundation

Help people and communities achieve better health

Vision
A leading innovator enabling healthy communities

Values

Respect, Integrity, Imagination, Courage, Excellence

Guiding Principles and Priorities
The following core principles and priorities inform the Florida Blue Foundation’s mission and help guide its actions, including its grant decisions.

Improved Access

We value accessible, quality health-related services for the people of Florida, with a particular emphasis on strategies that improve access to underserved and uninsured populations.

Focus

We believe in enhancing the capacity of programs deemed to have lasting impact more than investing in approaches that may have high numbers served with little or no sustained impact. Similarly, we believe that it is better for an applicant to have a clear focus rather than try to use funds in numerous ways that rapidly diffuse the impact of limited financial, human and other resources.

We value programs that directly address improving the access and quality of health care for racial and ethnic minorities and those with low-income, thereby reducing the disparity of health care reaching these populations.

We value community-based solutions, including local health clinics, public health outreach efforts and well-defined programs that assist underserved and uninsured populations. Where it may be particularly beneficial, we seek to bring formal recognition to outstanding or highly promising programs to catalyze greater attention and leverage additional resources.

Impact

We value the extent to which a program shows promise of lasting community benefit and measurable impact.

We value initiatives that seek to use our financial and other resources in ways that provide leverage, helping magnify impact and sustainability.

Diversity
We value organizational approaches that are well-informed about populations being served by having appropriate representation within the organization, including advisory boards, where reasonable. We view healthy diversity as including numerous elements germane to the community and the organization’s mission. It involves, in part, an appropriate mix of both backgrounds and skills that maximize the organization’s potential for success, including the agency’s credibility in the community. Further, we recognize the value of being a good listener to members of target populations by virtue of strong and mutually respectful relationships.

Relationships
We value strong, respectful, and lasting relationships, between applying agencies and the institutions with which they partner in serving the community.

We respect the autonomy of the local community in taking responsibility for its future, and recognize the need to obtain the community’s commitment to embrace solutions to achieve and sustain successful programs.

Planning

We respect the diligence behind well-thought-out written plans. Such plans articulate action steps and division of responsibilities, leading to defined and measurable goals, and strategies to sustain programs.

We are keenly aware that there are often many daunting challenges that may stand in the way of success. Rather than attempt to present a “rosy” face in order to obtain support, we value plans that candidly identify possible challenges, analyze obstacles and identify reasonable steps to address them, and likewise admit to limitations. We emphasize this point to assure applicants that candid assessments will help, not hurt, their chances in obtaining support. 

Leadership and Accountability

We value quality leadership, including, in part: how well the staff and organization are respected by the community and population they serve; established processes to attract, train, and sustain effective staff, board members, and program volunteers; low staff turnover to ensure program continuity and minimum frustration to the community being served (or plans to reduce turnover); succession planning that ensures programs will not be hurt if key staff members leave the organization; examples of functional partnerships with other organizations; and, transparent financial accountability for use of grant dollars and the broader budget.

Learning

We value programs from which we can learn and better inform other programs as well as our future grant making decisions. As long as programs are well-documented, then even “failed” efforts will provide useful information from which to refine and improve future programs.

Innovation

We humbly recognize that the issues faced by those we seek to assist are often remarkably complex and vexing, and that a solution for one area or population may not be appropriate for others. Therefore, we value the innovation, thoughtfulness and diligence of applicants to make the best use of pertinent information and experience to create innovative approaches toward realizing their particular health-related goals. We ask that the information and methods behind the proposed program be clearly articulated in measurable terms so that we can evaluate the logic behind selected strategies.

FOR INFORMATION:

Call: 1-800-477-3736, ext. 63215
Email: floridabluefoundation@floridablue.com

Florida Blue Foundation
4800 Deerwood Campus Parkway, DC3-4
Jacksonville, FL  32246