Philanthropy

How We Help Clients

Helping private and corporate foundations, family offices, and individual philanthropists amplify their social impact and drive system-level change

Philanthropy is a uniquely flexible, risk-taking, and innovative part of the social change ecosystem that can inspire breakthroughs to help solve challenging societal problems. We help private and corporate foundations, family offices, philanthropic LLCs, and high-net-worth individuals improve effectiveness and efficiency of philanthropy.

We draw on deep expertise across our global firm on topics including public health, gender and racial equity, education, environmental sustainability, economic development, arts and culture, financial inclusion, agriculture, infrastructure, and urban development. We leverage insights from our work in the private, public, and social sectors to help clients deliver according to their philanthropic aspirations and generate lasting results to improve the lives of millions globally.

What we do

Design and launch new philanthropic organizations – Working with philanthropists to determine their vision and design new initiatives that support all aspects of strategy development and deliver on their social impact goals.

Create signature initiatives for foundations – Developing the strategy and implementation plans for major philanthropic initiatives that deploy significant capital for a targeted problem or issue area.

Refresh philanthropic strategies – Collaborating with established foundations and philanthropies to help develop their overall and issue area-specific theories of change and theories of action, designing new or refreshed strategies for investment portfolios or program areas.

Design operations, organizational structures, and governance models – Strengthening the efficiency of back-office functions to increase organizational health and performance.

Ensure success of high-priority grantees – Working directly with the grantees of our foundation partners to help them design and deploy major initiatives from strategy through to implementation.

Launch multi-donor initiatives – Bringing together multiple donors or investors and supporting them in designing philanthropic partnerships that pool and deploy capital or facilitate the strategic alignment of grant-making to magnify impact.

Evaluate impact – Establishing processes for measurement and evaluation, centering community voices and lived experiences and determining impact through a clear understanding of what’s working and what’s not.

Examples of our work

Designing a 10-year, $1 billion program on equity in the United States

We supported a foundation with developing a strategic framework and roadmap for a multi-sector, long-term initiative to accelerate equity in the United States. This included deep dive strategy sprints to identify investment opportunities, building a new strategic partnerships function, designing a mission-aligned philanthropic investment strategy, strengthening financial planning systems, and launching a new philanthropic prize competition.

Holistic transformation of a private foundation

We supported a large private foundation with defining and transitioning into a new operating model to deliver on an ambitious new strategy focused on job creation and employment transitions for youth. Over the course of two years, the organization’s annual spending program tripled, headcount increased fourfold and they opened offices in five countries, and helped create two million jobs.

Advancing racial equity in corporate America

We supported a US-based philanthropic foundation to develop a transformational program that helps companies advance racial equity in their organizations. Together, we developed workshop curriculum, built racial equity tools and knowledge, and coached participants on how to develop and implement diversity, equity and inclusion (DE&I) strategies. Nearly 100 companies and 500 leaders have gone through the program and are taking actions that will have a measurable positive impact.

Designing and launching a new major family foundation

We partnered with a high-net-worth family to establish a new philanthropic foundation. This included exploring a wide range of potential thematic focus areas and engaging with other leading family philanthropies to help inspire and shape their approach. We developed the foundation’s vision, mission, values, geographic focus areas, governance approach, and brand posture.

Launching a global decarbonization initiative in developing countries

We supported a coalition of philanthropies, multilaterals, and nongovernmental organizations (NGO) to launch a new organization focused on accelerating an equitable energy transition in developing countries. We identified the major pillars of the strategy, supported the recruitment of key funders and partners, and laid the groundwork for a portfolio of country-level projects across Africa and Asia. These projects are collectively expanding access to electricity, accelerating the growth of renewables, creating jobs, and helping under-resourced economies transition away from high-emitting fossil fuels.

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Examining philanthropic funding for racial equity across the United States

December 12, 2023 -

Philanthropic capital can help communities achieve more racially equitable outcomes. Our interactive maps reveal where the funds are going and where they are needed.