Trust in Philanthropy

Hello and welcome to the Philanthropy Impact Podcast. Listen on for insights into philanthropy, impact investing and sustainability. Hey everyone and welcome to Philanthropy Impact's Walk in My Shoes series for members where today our CEO John Pepin will be discussing trust in philanthropy with our expert. My name is Sophia Sahanik and I'm the Director of Membership and Development here at Philanthropy Impact and your moderator for this series.

We know that the first steps into an individual's impact journey can be really daunting and so clients are now looking to their trusted professional advisors more than ever before to support them in their first steps into philanthropy and establishing values-driven wealth strategies. This series has been established to support you, their trusted advisor, in giving your clients best practice advice in this area and to understand when to sign posts to trusted partners.

I'm also the person to talk to you if you'd like to know more about philanthropy impact certified training sessions, which I am proud to say are now endorsed by the Chartered Institute for Securities Investments.

And I'm also on hand to help you make the most of your membership with us. We you can reach me in the chat or an email is shared at the end if you're watching on the Rydyn ni'n gweithio, mae'n gweithio, mae'n gweithio, mae'n gweithio, mae'n gweithio, mae'n gweithio, mae'n gweithio, mae'n gweithio, mae'n gweithio, mae'n gweithio, mae'n gweithio, mae'n gweithio, mae'n gweithio, mae'n gweithio, mae'n gweithio.

This leads me to introduce our panel for today. Joining John, we welcome Russell Pryor, who's the Regional Head of Family Governance, Family Office, Advisory and Philanthropy for EMEA and Wealth Planning and Advisory Private Banking at HSBC UK. We also welcome Rena Grifinga, who is the managing director of Maverick Collective, and Derek Bardowell, who's the CEO at 10 Years Time. Thank you all for joining today and I'll hand over to you now, John, to make a start.

Does that mean I can only stay for thirty minutes? Yes.

Oh, this is no fun. Okay, welcome everyone. I just asked each uh of the panelists to give us a quick overview of who they are. uh why they're doing what they're doing and then uh we'll start on a discussion. So uh Derek. Thanks, John. My name's Derek Bardwell. I'm the CEO of 10 Years Time and we very much take uh philanthropist charitable trust through a learning journey to of honest reflection and radical action. to resource racial and economic justice with confidence and care.

I'm also the author of a new book called Giving Back, which is around reimagining philanthropy through a reparative lens. And I've been working in the funding sector since 2009. Great. Thank you very much. Uh Russell. Hi, uh John. Uh good to be with you this afternoon. So Russell Pryor from HSB C Private Banking where

I'm a philanthropy advisor working with clients on um all aspects of their philanthropic journey. I'm also the chair of trustees of the London Community Foundation. Great, thank you. Rena, where are you where are you calling from now? Hi everyone, I'm Rena Greifinger calling in from Washington, DC in the US. I'm the managing director of the Maverick Collective by PSI.

We are a community of women philanthropists making catalytic investments in health and reproductive rights to elevate women and girls everywhere. And PSI is a 50-year-old international global health organization working in almost 50 countries. Issues of our time.

Great, thank you. Um The uh what we're trying to do through uh these walk in my shoes and webinars and stuff, and now live ones, yay, um, is to increase the fall of capital uh for good. So purpose-driven wealth strategies so that people can uh live their values and uh look at both impact investing and philanthropy as a way of achieving that. We also feel very strongly that professional advisors have a key role to play in encouraging their clients along this approach.

The other aspect of this has got to do with trust-based philanthropy. There's m multiple words for that, but I'll just use that term as a generic term because we're talking to a certain extent about that today. And it can play a central role in uh what's uh in uh value-driven uh philanthropy and and social investment. So it's it uh and it's also important that we address issues related to it around the imbalance of power and distribution of power.

There's a r a real a lot of discussion going on now about how um uh uh uh power uh can be addressed because of course if you're a funder with money. And uh you have power, whether it's formal or informal, um, and so you have the uh uh people receiving the uh money and stuff and so there's a real issue. So Isa Bosch and Transformative Philanthropy has been doing some wonderful things.

Dave Stephanie Shirley's been looking at this from her perspective and stuff. So uh maybe we could take it away. So Rena, can I ask you, could you please um um

Tell us a bit about your new model of giving, uh uh what it is, uh why you've done this, and if you have any sense of how impactful it's been already. Sure. Thanks so much. And it really is a pleasure to be here and to be with you, Derek and Russell.

So the Maver Collective has been around about eight years, just to give you a little context. We were co-founded by PSI, the global health organization I mentioned, with Melinda French Gates and the Crown Princess of Norway. And the idea was to build a space.

for women philanthropists to go beyond the check and to really engage deeply in the work that they were funding so that they could become more informed and strategic and empathetic champions for women and girls, for gender equity, but also to really use their philanthropy as risk capital.

Which is what our co-founders really believe philanthropy should be used for. So Maverick members, regardless of the program that they come in, come into PSI with, they are making highly flexible, highly risk tolerant. investments in PSI's work in order to help our organization really innovate, try new things, new approaches, new technologies in order to push the global health community forward and to really go where won't. That has always been the kind of founding principles of NARA collective.

Two years ago, particularly in light of and inspired by what was happening with the global pandemic, with um social justice and racial justice movements here in the US, and an overall conversation really amplified in the philanthropic. shifting the need to shift power, the need to really change and also some feedback we were getting from our members that they wanted to invest and collaborate with us in

Way. We started to design a new giving vehicle called the Maverick Portfolio, which we were really excited to launch a few weeks ago publicly at the School World. The Maverick Portfolio is a pooled philanthropic fund where we will pool investments from donors, hopefully from all over the world and hopefully more and more from the UK. Hint hint.

Um, but the idea is to bring donors together into a collaborative giving model where their money will be deployed across, we're gonna start in three countries. They're providing highly flexible capital where once the money goes in, they seed control. And the three country teams, Malawi, Cote d'Ivoire, and Uganda.

Our PSI country teams working in partnership with grassroots feminist movements to really break down systemic barriers that stand in the way of women and girls achieving sexual and reproductive. The idea is that the money is highly flexible. All decision making about what impact means, where the money goes, how it's spent, how long it's spent, all those decisions are being made by those at the grassroots who are delivering the work.

And together, they are making decisions about what systemic barriers they want to try and break down. And again, go where other funders will. So already we raised an angel round from several Maverick Collective members, as well as a million-dollar gift from Susan Wujiski, the CEO of YouTube, to really kind of kickstart this portfolio. And our teams on the ground have already made a very big strategic decision together.

to work for the next five to ten years on transforming the role of men and boys. and really looking at tackling harmful gender norms and toxic masculinity masculinity in the countries and cultures where they work in order to advance reproductive rights for women and We've partnered with this incredible organization called FOS Feminista, which is a global alliance of feminist movements, gender equity players, sexual and reproductive rights activists from all across the global south.

And so what we're really seeing is what we're trying to do is to tackle multiple problems at once with this portfolio. The first is that we know is that funding, particularly from individuals, is often siloed. It's short term, it's small, so we can never get to root causes. So by building a pooled fund where money will continue to flow in, you know, kind of an evergreen fund over several years, we can make multi-year grants to these teams.

and keep them highly flexible in order for them to get to root causes and work on those systems change solutions. The second issue we're trying to break down is that we know that control and power about where money goes, how it flows, even what impact means is usually in the hands of donors who are not proximate often to the issues that they're trying to.

This model really shifts that power from what we say donors to doers and having the doers of the work, the people who are closest to the impact, who have lived expertise, but who are also delivering work on the ground are making decisions. Doesn't mean that our donors are completely hands-off and walking away, but rather than than making decisions, they're coming in with curiosity as learners. And so just like we do with all of our Maverick programs, they're learning alongside us.

They're joining project calls. They're like listening in as we problem solve and tackle different issues, but they're coming more with their curiosity as their capital rather than their capital as condition.

I have too many questions to ask. Oh, that's wonderful what you're doing. I I have a couple of questions. So your model in the past was was a version of venture philanthropy, which meant that the daughters got heavily involved in the projects and stuff. So have you moved away from that or is it still just uh are you doing

It's a both and for us, John. So we've got several different programs that Maverick members join through. Our Maverick Venture program is our most what we would call venture-like philanthropy model. Where a single investor is investing in one project and then engaging deeply on that project. We also have Maverick Next, which is our next gen program, a cohort model for. rising gen, kind of emerging philanthropists to co-invest together in projects. And then we have the portfolio.

I will say though, while our members engage in the work, we have really moved away from members making many decisions for the work. And it's much more again coming in as learners. As thought partners.

um and and really kind of rolling up up their sleeves and getting to experience the work firsthand because we know that those real life experiences and getting really proximate with the communities that they're supporting is transformational, not only for us as an organization, but also That's why we call what we do experience. Okay. It'll be interesting. I think what we'll have to do is because it's such a complex area, and I would like to get over to Derek and Russell.

but I think it would be really neat to have a full webinar on this where we can go into more detail. Because one of the questions I have, if you don't mind, Derek and Russell stress is one question and I'll come to come to you both. Um, you talk about funders, you talk about doers, but what about the recipients of the service? Um, because uh uh from what I understand um in transactional philanthropy that Isa Bosch does.

The recipients play a significant role and have a control position. But you've just talked about doers so far. So uh could you just do a quick 30-second thing and address that? I'm really glad you asked that, John. So PSI is, as I mentioned, a 50-year-old organization. We've been in the countr in almost 50 countries around the world for that time. So we're deeply, deeply rooted in the communities and countries where we work.

And ninety-nine percent of our staff are local to the countries or regions where we work. So our entire philosophy as our organization is to be what we consumer powered and consumer centered. We call the people we serve consumers, not beneficiaries, because that upholds their dignity and doesn't imply that they're passive recipients, but actually that they choose. our services and products and um and behavior change interventions. So the people that PSI serve.

Are always at the center of our design. They're always brought very deeply into the design, the delivery, and the evaluation of our programs. So that is very inherent to PSI and also therefore makes them very deeply kind of centered as important stakeholders. Co-designers and co-inputters on the work that Mavericks are funding. But I appreciate that you asking for that clarification. Okay, thank you very much. Derek, I have some questions for you. Um the um uh

Maverick has moved quite a ways away from very traditional philanthropy and traditional philanthropists and stuff. And there's still a lot of traditional philanthropists. around. And can you talk a bit about uh your ideas, your new book about uh what you're trying to do, reimagine philanthropy? Uh Whether this, what we just doing fits with all that, um, what's going to be the role of traditional philanthropy? Is that going to continue, et cetera, et cetera.

Um so so one, just huge respect for Rena's work um always. Um and even I wouldn't even classify anything that Maverick had been doing as in that. traditional mode at all because it's always been very, very progressive. You know, um I hate to imply that. That's not what I was saying, but anyway, go ahead. Okay. Where where I really Where we really align is just around how you center um philanthropy around the needs of the most harmed.

um communities. And I guess one of my frustrations working with in philanthropy for a number of years was you would see unbelievable projects, unbelievable people. with these unbelievable um, you know, principles of collective care. community standing in solidarity. They might be working with particular community, but the work that they were doing because they were very much the canaries in the mine were very much going to benefit people more widely.

And it would be hugely underinvested in. Um and you can see that statistically. I think the funders for race equality alliance recently did a report where their analysis said that only 5% of grants was going towards black and brown lead. organizations in the UK. And of that, only 3% was around campaigning. And I think only 3% was towards research and policy.

So what we have is a system, a very traditional system that really favors service delivery. The bulk of the money goes to service delivery. And you still have power holders who are speaking on behalf of communities. So I really located the book giving back um, yes, in some of those issues of tr uh traditional philanthropy, but I actually really wanted to just highlight just some of the good work that's going on across the globe.

And just to imagine what would happen if we were able to resource this type of work across the globe. you know, in a very hearty manner, in the way that lots of huge um charities benefit from that. So this very much presents visions um from people and activists and you know people who are uh with great imaginations but rooted in reality.

It presents visions that are better than our world. And I think that for me is really, really important because we need to kind of bring a more human-centered way of looking at ph philanthropy that is less around. being transactional, less around being um sort of bureaucratic, um, less around creating a facade that none of this is political, because most of it is because of who makes the decision.

Um, but really just saying, you know what, sometimes, you know, you might want to get that, I don't know, Amazon package because it's a bit easier and a bit more convenient, but there might be a Small bookshop around the corner that is doing absolutely impactful work and is really rooted in community. So it's very much emphasized. This is it uh so it's looking at a redistribution of resources and the mechanisms or models then? Yeah, so uh I wouldn't say it's Uh design.

just that um charitable trusts and foundations are high net worth individuals. It's actually for for people to really look at that notion that we have of traditional philanthropy of giving. To giving back. And that idea that if you look at industrial capitalism, which was built off the exploitation and extraction of indigenous black and brown bodies,

Right. And where this money, the infrastructure of European money has come from, is really looking at that as a lens and not divorcing philanthropy from that historical and structural lens. and looking at things from the basis of what would it look like to give back? What would it look like to base philanthropy around the practices and the cultural practices of those most harmed communities? And would that be a fairer distribution of wealth? So I look at redistribution of wealth.

rebalancing of power, but often through a reparative lens. And as I said, we've seen some really good examples like Black Thrive in in Lambeth in the UK. did a recent fund that was very much rooted in community, deeply rooted in community, and very much their practices was a care-centered lens. They took this care-centered lens to philanthropy that Their practices.

you know, this was the first fund that they did and it was like a lot more advanced than some of the funders that I've been working with for years and years and years because they really listened to communities and the way they built that fund. And I think we have so many good examples of that, that people just need to hear a bit more and that needs to be visualized, visibilized a lot more.

So you talk about uh uh change in wanting to have more radical giving with the with a focus, with a uh gender focus, a racial focus and and uh in effect an income uh issue focus. Or is it inequality or is it sort of a combination of all that? Well, it's it's racial justice through an intersectional lens. That that's where we would look at, but it would also be saying look.

You know, it's not enough to turn around and say, because of the murder of George Floyd, we're going to try and up the amount of money towards black and brown led organizations. Who are the type of organizations that you are funding and how? Is it around um and and again it's it's about yes.

Being flexible with funding, being long-term with funding, unrestricted funding, but is the proportion of, for example, Black women-led organizations as much as Black male-led organizations that you are funding? Are you putting your assets into community wealth building? And again, not just service delivery. Are you giving organizations that have been historically underfunded enough flexibility and capacity?

To be able to build infrastructure. So when I talk about radical, I don't view it actually as radical in my my view, in my lens. But when you look at traditional funders, there is still a fear and still a lack of trust. in our communities and in investing in ways that are very, very different. And that's where I use the word radical. To say, you know what, we should be looking at

20-year grants. We should be looking at releasing um money from endowments. We should be looking at resourcing in a very different way if we really want to tackle the root causes of some. Great. Thank you, Derek, for that explanation. Um, Russell, sorry to take so long to get to you and we've only got a few minutes left, but

Um, can you talk a bit about um the implications of what Rena is doing and what Derek's talking about in terms of your experience with family governments and family offices? Sure. Uh look, I think really, really great uh discussions and points being made and and I'm glad the time was spent on on hearing those points.

I think when I think about governance and philanthropy, I guess one of the big things is exactly the points that Rena and Derek a sut yw'n gwneud hynny'n gwneud hynny'n gwneud hynny'n gwneud hynny'n gwneud hynny'n gwneud hynny'n gwneud hynny'n gwneud hynny Rydyn ni'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd

And I can see some some uh some of what Rena was saying and some of the uh the work that uh is going on at Maverick Collective and I'm sure some of the people you know that you're working with through Maverick Collective, you're having precisely these discussions with them.

So I guess two parts. The first one is that if you like that good governance of the philanthropy itself, but then the second is Within families, as families organise themselves around their philanthropy, how do you get some of these

uh approaches, some of this messaging right into the heart of what's going on. And and if I just stand back from it at that those key points for just one minute and I think about, you know, how can governance of philanthropy inside families, how can that be beneficial? Well there's A handful of things going on. So there's families sitting down together and discussing these issues. So the first is about their values and motivations.

that can lead right through to the formality of these discussions, say at the board meetings of the philanthropy uh operations they have. It also can be kind of a key focus at family meetings when they're talking about these sorts of issues. It can flow in through into their investment strategies. So you know that whether that's impact investing, right through to

full blown investing. Um bringing these uh sorts of issues out in the way decisions are made, making this sort of information and thinking available in the way that families make decisions. again, is a is a really great way to move this forward. And particularly I think Derek, you know, the intergenerational point. We're seeing these issues uh quite differently through the generations. And then as we think about how

how that operational operationalizes itself. Some families, the way they organize they the giving that they give, some of the practices they use, a lot of this thinking could be could be built into that. But right through then to the way in which you know family discussions take place. ymwneud â phobl sy'n ymwneud â phobl sy'n ymwneud â phobl sy'n ymwneud â phobl sy'n ymwneud â phobl sy'n ymwneud â phobl.

So um what role does do the professional advisors to the families play around this? Because a lot of the information that's coming out that Derek's talking about. Um not does not necessarily get through to families because it you know. Uh they're living in a a slightly different environment.

Um, so how how can professional advisors who, you know, private banks, lawyers, tax people, investment managers, et cetera, actually play a role in getting these messages across? Because Rena's doing really great work. looking at in in his terms radical change. Um so what role does professional do professional advisors play? Yeah, look, so I think uh it's a good question. So I think you know the professional advisors have

you know a couple of really critical roles. One is um they are there managing or involved in the management of the client's affairs or their wealth or legal or or whatever it is.

Um but the other thing is they're very close to the family. And I think, you know, John, you've talked a lot about trusted advisor status. And I think particularly where advisors are moving into that that more of a sort of you know, position of trust, then they have a huge opportunity to bring these sorts of issues, to bring these sorts of discussions into the family.

Um and I think the challenge for the professional advisors is actually to be as sort of in the know and up to speed on the the discussions and the debates that are taking place because Otherwise they're not going to be bringing these issues to the family. So yeah, I think they do have a role and they do have an opportunity. But you know, I think that's why if I can say Mae'n rhaid i'n gweithio'r ymwneud â'r ymwneud ymwneud â'r ymwneud â'r ymwneud â'r ymwneud â'r ymwneud â'r ymwneud â'r ymwneud.

We spend a lot of time training advisors around how to support their clients on their donor journey. And certainly the messages that Rena and Derek are giving are an integral part, part of that. Plus our events are ways of educating and informing advisors. Okay, so we only have three minutes left. So maybe what I'll do, and I have like 6,000 questions. So we will organize a follow-up webinar, one hour or live event if we can talk Rena into coming to the UK.

I I I'm gonna ask each one of you sort of to give a minute of final words of wisdom that people can take away from this. I'm sorry that we haven't got into the kind of depth that I think is really important, but uh we can follow up. So final words of wisdom. So um Derek, could we start with you? What do you want people to take away from this short session? For me it's always that there is absolutely fantastic um work that's going on um across the globe that is really severely under resourced.

And the role of advisors, the work that all of us do around here is to to help people sort of reduce the proximity between the financial wealth and the community wealth and being able to do that, as I said, with confidence and with care. but also just to realise that sometimes you will have to challenge yourself and your own lens and your own truth.

to really be able to get to that point to really see fantastic work. But it is for some some people a life-altering journey once they've gone on that. So yeah, that would be my final Can I ask you a quick question before I move on then? Um uh one of the issues that I see.

is that advisors and families and wealthy people don't necessarily have a way of learning about these things acr across the world. I mean, you have Virus Organization that is set up to do that and they've been practicing it for a long time. But are there some exemplars out there that maybe people can look at and try to emulate?

Our model at 10 years' time is to facilitate that relationship between the financial wealth and community wealth. And when I say wealth, I mean uh community knowledge. We don't mediate the relationship between the two. We provide community insight days and various ways that people can get involved and try to create safe spaces for that to happen. And again, for me.

The book is very much an extension of just opening the door for people to learn a bit more, but there's plenty of people, really good advisors, really good people that are doing this work. um to to make people aware of, as I said, that small independent bookshop that sits in the community that's doing fantastic work that doesn't have the money to to do adverts on national television.

Okay, it'd be really great if you could forward a whole bunch of resources to us. We'll put them on our website so people can learn from them. Russell, uh final words of wisdom. I'll be very quick because I I want want Rena to say something. Um I just think the the whole issue of the the power balance, the power imbalance, that's that's the one thing I'd highlight at the end. It needs everybody needs to think harder. Great, thank you. Brita, final word to you.

And definitely what Derek and Russell both said. You couldn't have put it better. And I'll just add, like speaking directly to you as advisors, you know, um

We talk a lot about engaging the donors in our work because the trust gets built that way. You don't just trust overnight, you know, we don't we don't just wake up suddenly trusting organizations to give away all of our money to. So but advisors as well like We're very committed to building close relationships and creating that proximity to our work for the advisors in our network because you need to trust us first.

And it's your clients that trust you. So for us, when we think about trust-based philanthropy, you're an incredibly important part of that ecosystem. So I would just encourage you to please reach out and get to know us, get to know Derek. get to know Russell, the people that are really trying to transform and reimagine philanthropy, insert yourself in there and build that trust yourself with us and us with you because that accountability is so important to these relationships.

Thank you. And to take the training so that you'll know how to talk to your clients about values and stuff, which seems to always be an issue. Um, okay, great. Not not to put any plugs in, but Derek did, so I thought I could prefer training. Um, Zophia, thank you very much, uh Rina, Derek, and Russell. That was brilliant.

Thank you. Yeah, thank you all. Um I just want to say quickly that we will now be doing the walk in my shoes every other Monday um and sharing recorded ones so you don't have to be here every Monday to see them. But thank you all for attending today. And it was a really great discussion. And I hope that we can put on a longer event in the the near future on this, because it certainly needs more discussion. All right. Have a great week, everybody. Bye. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much.