Participatory Grantmaking

Funders are increasingly looking to engage the communities they serve in the grantmaking process, but there are few resources about how to do so. This suite of GrantCraft resources addresses this gap by exploring the what, how, and why of participatory grantmaking—an approach to philanthropy that cedes decision-making authority to the very communities affected by funding decisions. The guide, Deciding Together: Shifting Power and Resources Through Participatory Grantmaking, features insight from a variety of participatory grantmakers and shares the benefits, challenges, and strategies for engaging in this practice. To complement the guide, we’ve collected detailed descriptions of how a few funders are engaging in this practice (the ‘mechanics’), videos of practitioners answering commonly asked questions, a collection of other online media produced on this topic, and blog posts. For published resources on participatory grantmaking, visit the collection on IssueLab at participatorygrantmaking.issuelab.org. Learn from funders that have shifted power about strategies to consider, the right questions to ask, and how this approach has opened doors to greater impact.

This is a living, growing suite of resources—so if you have something to add to the conversation, whether it be a blog post, report, video, or another form of insight, reach out to us at [email protected].

Follow the conversation on Twitter using the hashtag #ShiftThePower. You can also read our press release here.

Blueprint Series

The Blueprint series is a collection of annual industry forecasts about the ways we use private resources for public benefit written by Lucy Bernholz. Each year, Blueprint provides an overview of the current landscape of philanthropy and the social economy, points to major trends, and directs your attention to horizons where you can expect some important breakthroughs in the coming year.

Some ways you might consider using this series include:

  • With colleagues at your organization, these publications can open conversations about the context for your work and any thoughts on expanding your strategic framework.
  • With grantees, these publications can foster conversations outside of specific funding conversations that might also lend context or theory to their approaches.
  • With peers and other foundations, these publications can lead to dialogue about how we as a collective sector may contribute to or challenge the predictions for the year, and if we're tuned into current trends and buzzwords.

Advocacy Funder Collaboratives

For this suite of resources, we captured the wisdom of philanthropic leaders who have participated in multi-party advocacy collaboratives and conducted a literature scan of how foundations talk about advocacy-focused collaborative work. Drawing on additional themes and ideas explored in earlier GrantCraft pieces about funding advocacy and donor collaboratives, we synthesized new information to dig deeper and understand the pain points and levers of success. Examples have been anonymized to ensure candor and clarity, as well as to broaden the appeal and applicability of wisdom derived from a specific collaborative example. The bite-sized articles are intended to make this work easy to reference and share, and to read either as a full body of work or in shorter spurts as is helpful and relevant to your work.

The guide, Teaming Up For Advocacy, brings the knowledge found in every blog post in one place. Browse the content as individual blogs or through the guide depending on what works best for you!

This project is supported by The Atlantic Philanthropies and the Center for Evaluation Innovation, and is part of the Atlas Learning Project. The Atlas Learning Project is an initiative coordinated by the Center for Evaluation Innovation to synthesize and share lessons from advocacy and policy change efforts that The Atlantic Philanthropies and other funders have supported in the U.S. The project aims to help push philanthropy and advocacy in bolder and more effective directions. To learn more, go to atlaslearning.org.

All articles in this series are licensed for sharing and reprinting, with attribution to GrantCraft, a service of Foundation Center. Research was conducted by Cynthia Gibson, Ph.D., and reviewed by Jen Bokoff. For questions, please email [email protected].

 

Funding Innovation

This series explores funding practices and trends at the intersection of problem-solving, technology, and design. Please contribute your comments on each post and share the series using #fundinginnovation. 

Produced by Foundation Center's Glasspockets and GrantCraft, and underwritten by the Vodafone Foundation.

 

Making Change by Spending Down

In September 2013, the Andrea and Charles Bronfman Philanthropies (ACBP) and GrantCraft partnered to tell the story of the ACBP spend down. Few stories of foundation spend downs—that is, spending all of a foundation’s endowment deliberately with the intent of closing—have been publicly told, and none to our knowledge using a primary medium of a blog series. ACBP’s goal was to build on GrantCraft’s strength of sharing funder wisdom by highlighting more than 20 voices connected with the spend down over the 28-month period until it closed its doors. Please contribute your comments on each post and discuss the series using #spenddown.

A project of GrantCraft and the Andrea and Charles Bronfman Philanthropies (ACBP)

 

Storylines in Pittsburgh Philanthropy

We developed five companion pieces to stories shared through the Pittsburgh Philanthropy Project. The Pittsburgh Philanthropy Project, in association with the University of Pittsburgh, showcases the rich and varied narratives of giving in the region through comprehensive storytelling techniques, giving insight to the philanthropy landscape and approach for residents, researchers, and practitioners. We wanted to amplify these stories for the field to learn from, and to inspire other cities to tell their philanthropy stories.