NEW ON THE JOB: Norman Rice, CEO, of the Seattle Foundation

As mayor of Seattle in the 1990s, Norman B. Rice learned how to serve a diverse constituency, trim a budget, and form creative partnerships with businesses and others to fix local problems. He says he will rely on those skills in his new job as chief executive of the Seattle Foundation.

While a political career may not be the usual prelude to a role in philanthropy, Mr. Rice sees the two as complementary.

For example, the fund is focusing its efforts on seven qualities, or “community indicators,” that make a place vibrant and healthy. The foundation “has identified the elements that are necessary to make a community strong,” says Mr. Rice, “and those are some of the same elements that a mayor has to deal with — basic needs, health and wellness, education, the economy, arts and culture, neighborhoods and community, and the environment.”

Bill Lewis, a Seattle businessman who is chairman of the organization’s Board of Trustees, says that the foundation wanted Mr. Rice not only for his political background but also for his work outside government, like leading the Federal Home Loan Bank of Seattle. “His continued involvement in our community clearly demonstrates his commitment to our mission and building the health of this region,” says Mr. Lewis.

Mr. Rice, 66, says he will push the organization to look at the entire region when it makes grants and collaborate more with government and companies in job training, early childhood education, and other efforts. With the recession sapping resources, partnership is key, he says.

The Seattle Foundation lost about 30 percent of its wealth in 2008 and held $500-million in assets at the end of last year. Mr. Rice says that it’s too early to tell if 2009 fund-raising results will improve on last year’s.

While Mr. Rice is new to the community-foundation world, he has experience raising money for charity. In 2006 he and his wife, Constance, led the local United Way’s fund-raising drive, and he helped his alma mater, the University of Washington, with a multibillion-dollar capital campaign.

“I know what works, I know what doesn’t work,” he says about raising money.

Mr. Rice, who will be earning $200,000 in his new job, says he was in part inspired to join the Seattle fund by President Obama’s call to service.

“It’s really an interesting time with the new president who has challenged us to think differently,” he says. “The core of my involvement has always been civic engagement: How do you bring issues to the community and ascertain from the community their aspirations?”

In an interview, Mr. Rice, who was the first black mayor of Seattle, discussed his new role and how philanthropy should respond to the continuing economic downturn.

What attracted you to the foundation?

The cutting-edge work it’s done to identify community indicators, and challenging donors and others to look at that differently. Number two, the opportunity to start to deal with some of the new areas of philanthropy, such as social networking, and using some of those tools to attract new donors. And then, last but not least, the idea that we could make things better than we have seen before.

How should the foundation and other grant makers respond to the needs created by the recession?

What we have to do is be more nimble. We clearly can’t just send the money out the door. We’ve got to grow the foundation and we’ve got to make sure we’re good stewards of the donors who are a part of our family.

But at the same time, we’ve got to look at new collaborations. The best way that the foundation can work is to make sure we are seeding new ideas, challenging those who may come to us for grants to look at innovation and where they could make changes and reward those who are making the types of changes that can economize and reduce costs and at the same time deliver services.

Are you looking forward to raising money for the organization?

I’m challenged by it. We have a perspective that is compelling and we know how to develop strategic giving. The community foundations that are able to innovate and show donors new ways of making investments and give them a return will be successful. If we can’t tell our story, if we can’t give a perspective or a layout of where we should go, we may suffer.

How do you make sure an organization is serving a diverse population?

Develop your values as an organization, as a city, as an individual, and make sure they’re in line with those who don’t have as much as those who do.

If you do that, diversity and the base of the organization change. If you try to be too narrow and forget about that, then you have problems.

Clearly Seattle is a majority-white city, but when you think about economic opportunity, social equity, and environmental stewardship, you build your framing of the community around bringing everyone along and showing everyone how they can play a role in that context.

If it’s environmental stewardship and green communities, those green jobs are jobs you would train minorities to do. The trouble sometimes is that we silo so much and we don’t look at the overlap.