Family Office Philanthropy: Lessons for the Joyful Giver

Video transcript

Assessing family office philanthropy one of the most challenging yet rewarding aspects of family office work often comes from philanthropy part of this challenge is the difficulty in assessing the overall effectiveness of a giving program giving should be joyful but when uncertainty and doubt creep in the work can often feel more like a burden tfoa's recent white paper entitled lessons for the joyful giver outlines four different metrics to help assess a family office's giving practice and also describe some basic principles to help bring your practice in alignment with these metrics the first metric is fluidity the concept of fluidity assesses the overall speed of your giving how easy is it for you to give and how long does it take for you to get comfortable with a new philanthropic organization your success as a giver is secured through trust and knowledge both of which require time and patience as a general principle the more you trust the individual or organization the more you know the details of the organization as well as their mission the more quickly and fluidly your giving can be the second metric is transparency there are two lenses through which one can analyze transparency authenticity and integrity authenticity captures the extent to which claims line up with actions and intentions integrity speaks to how the practices of the organization fit within a larger social and economic setting the third metric is efficiency efficiency broadly speaks to all the forces that either accelerate the flow of capital or are a drag on the use of capital drag is both quantitative and qualitative there are ways to measure the efficiency of the gift but one must also reflect on the other forces that are causing one to drag one's feet is the gift outside of your comfort zone do you have reservations about the organization do you question the larger impact and purpose of the gift are there competing interests that make an equally strong case for another kind of organization all of these questions will need to be addressed if your goal is to improve the efficiency of your giving our final metric is joy difficult to write about joy in a rigorous way but it may be the most foundational and important metric on our list by joy we're not referring to the rush one experiences when one makes a large gift making informed choices and knowing that your actions are making a real and significant long-term impact in the world create a foundation for becoming a joyful giver if you're thinking about ways to improve your philanthropy program based on these four metrics here are a few practical tips to get you started first curate your portfolio pick a few organizations to get seriously involved with organizing around specific theme is a great place to start second become a subject matter expert build a knowledge base around your theme expert writers and thinkers and major organizations and efforts third identify opportunities for outsized impact large gifts can seem small when given to massive foundations alternatively local organizations or more niche programs may allow you to make a massive difference in your area of interest finally become engaged with the community get to know the groups you're most active with and look for opportunities to be a board member or advisor if you'd like to learn more you can read our full white paper at tfoa.info publications thank you