U.S. community foundations use more than five hundred different "philanthropy-serving organizations" across the country to help them with their work, a report from CFLeads and Foundation Center finds.

Based on a survey of nearly a hundred and forty-two community foundations and forty-six philanthropy-serving organizations, the report, Assessing Community Foundation Needs and Envisioning the Future (41 pages, PDF), found that while three organizations dominate the PSO field — the Council on Foundations, CFLeads, and Foundation Center, particularly regarding its CF Insights team — community foundations also rely on regional associations for a majority of the seventeen primary services the foundations require, such as staff development, legal services, collaboration, peer learning, and donor prospecting, which were noted as the top needs. PSOs that specifically serve community foundations reported that they believed the top needs are strategic planning, community leadership, donor prospecting, and issue advocacy.

Recommendations from community foundation leaders for infrastructure groups included listening to what community foundations are asking for and respond accordingly; being entrepreneurial and evolving their offerings to meet new and more complex needs; and capitalizing on strengths to improve efficiency.