relationships

The End of the Road We Know

By December 20, 2021

It’s hard to believe that we’re at the end of 2021 and that The Whitman Institute will be closing down in a matter of months. This last stretch of the road is certainly not what we originally envisioned when we decided to spend out a decade ago. We closed the office a year earlier than…

Read more

The Urgency of Trust-Based Philanthropy

By April 1, 2020

This post was originally published at the Center for Effective Philanthropy’s blog. “It was so important just to be treated like a human being.” “As a woman of color, I can’t tell you what it meant to be approached by a funder I didn’t know who saw me and trusted me.” “DO SOMETHING!” These comments…

Read more

Funder Spotlight: Durfee Foundation

By November 15, 2017

Since its inception in 1960, the Durfee Foundation in Los Angeles has been investing in extraordinary leaders through an almost hard-wired approach to trust-based philanthropy. As a place-based family foundation devoted to leadership, relationships, and constant learning, Durfee is seeing some incredible long-term results. As part of our series on trust-in-practice, we sat down with…

Read more

Privilege and Power in Funding Dynamics

By October 21, 2015

Trust-based relationships. Grantee-centric philanthropy. True partnerships that advance impact for communities. How do we together improve the efficiency, respectfulness, and outcomes of our sector?   Recently Jane Leu (previous Peery Foundation grantee, founder of several social ventures and prolific fund raiser), and I hosted a workshop for funders and fund raisers to discuss the funding/fund raising interaction…

Read more

To Listen Much More Closely

By September 4, 2015

I appreciated Paul Shoemaker’s recent article in the Chronicle of Philanthropy entitled “How to Rebuild Philanthropy’s Ability to Change the World” so much that I stole one of the subtitles – Listen Much More Closely to Nonprofits. One of the first of many lessons I learned as a grant-maker from my Co-Executive Director, John, is…

Read more