Australia’s Most Reputable Charity Revealed

Australia’s Royal Flying Doctor Service has again been named the country’s most reputable Not for Profit organisation, ranking highest in the 2013 AMR Charity Reputation Index.

It is the third year running that the organisation has ranked first in the annual Index, which surveys Australians to measure the reputation of the country’s top 40 charities on a range of dimensions including Innovation, Workplace, Citizenship, Governance, Leadership and Cost Management, and ranks them accordingly. As part of the research, 2217 Australians were surveyed.

Coming in a close second in this year’s Index is the McGrath Foundation – which rose eight places from 2012 to come second in 2013.  The charity was also viewed as having the strongest leadership and demonstrating the most outstanding citizenship among the individual charity attributes measured.

Other charities to fare well this year include the Guide Dogs (fourth), National Breast Cancer Foundation (fifth), Fred Hollows Foundation (sixth), Starlight Children’s Foundation (seventh), beyondblue (eighth), the RSPCA (ninth) and The Salvation Army (10th).

AMR’s Managing Director Oliver Freedman said all charities in the top 10, but in particular the Royal Flying Doctors, had built a strong reputations “across a broad base”.

“The research demonstrates that for a charity to have a strong reputation, it is not enough simply to be supporting a good cause,” he explained.  

“These organisations also need to be innovative, strong community leaders, demonstrate appropriate cost management, be transparent in their governance and provide a good workplace for employees.  The Royal Flying Doctors came up well in all these dimensions, and their overall reputation ranking reflects this community view.”

Freedman also said the improvement shown by the McGrath Foundation could not only be attributed to their leadership and citizenship, but also because they showed great improvement in how Australians view the service they provide.

“The Foundation communicates clearly about what it is raising money for, and where it will go,” he said.  

“This has contributed to its overall reputation in the eyes of Australians because they understand what the charity stands for and can see the work it is undertaking out in the community.”

Freedman said the 2013 Index also showed that environmentally linked charities generally have lower scores than other sectors, particularly those seen as activists.  Greenpeace ranked last in this year’s Index, coming in 40th.  WWF ranked highest among the “green” charities this year, ranking 25th overall.

He said there were also generally lower scores for  global charities such as CARE (37th), Oxfam (34th), Amnesty (30th), World Vision (29th) and UNICEF (26th).

“According to our measurement however, the top 22 charities measured all score well above the highest Corporate Reputation rankings, which shows that Australians still view the Not for Profit sector as a trusted community voice,” Freedman said.

The Charity Reputation Index is produced each year by research consultants AMR, which also produces the annual Corporate Reputation Index, Country Reputation Index and City Reputation Index.

AMR says the Charity Reputation Index collates insight directly from consumers, and does not rely on any information provided by the organisations being studied.