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Making an impact with high-net-worth philanthropists: understanding their attributes and engagement preferences at nonprofit organizations
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Making an impact with high-net-worth philanthropists: understanding their attributes and engagement preferences at nonprofit organizations
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Content
Making an Impact with High-Net-Worth Philanthropists:
Understanding Their Attributes and Engagement Preferences at Nonprofit Organizations
By
Muna Kaddo Deriane
A Dissertation Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE USC SOL PRICE SCHOOL OF PUBLIC POLICY
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
DOCTOR OF POLICY, PLANNING, AND DEVELOPMENT
December 2019
Advisory Committee:
Dr. Deborah J. Natoli
Dr. Peter J. Robertson
Dr. Katharine Sieck
ii
Dedication
I dedicate this doctoral dissertation to my parents James and Souad Kaddo. Thank you for your
never-ending support and unconditional love which has sustained me for so long. I don’t know
where I’d be without you. By the way, I think there’s a typo–it’s just Dr. Muna Kaddo, right?
Mom and Dad, this one’s for you!
I also dedicate this dissertation to my two favorite people on the planet, my children Raquel and
Georges Deriane. None of this means a thing without you! To Georges, my research assistant,
thank you for your scholarly efforts, erudite counsel, and for being there when I needed you.
There isn’t anything you can’t do! To my Raquel, you are the star of this party called life! Thank
you for letting me share in the fun and reminding me to enjoy and celebrate every day—
especially when I think I don’t have the time! Raq & Geo, you are the yin and yang that makes
my world complete. Get ready. Our adventure is just beginning!
iii
Acknowledgments
This effort took a village of operatives, partners and supporters who for reasons still
unfathomable to me, elected to join me in this wild ride to doctorhood. All of you are the biggest
and best takeaways from this work and more than anything else I learned how lucky I am to have
so many special people in my life. I am honored and grateful to be able to acknowledge and
thank each one of you.
To one of the most benevolent and caring people I know, my fantastical friend and accomplice,
Barbara Lazaroff, who could never be deterred from her vision – or the one she scoped out for
me. Without your drive, tenacity, and generosity of spirit, this dissertation would not have
happened. You earned this degree too, Dr. Lazaroff!
It’s my turn to raise the pom-poms to my constant companion and cheerleader Ginger Mayerson,
whose inspired outlook, regular check-ins and stubborn faith in me were a driving force behind
completion of this work. You made it clear, there was no other option!
To my sister Emily Kaddo, there aren’t enough ways to thank you. You’ve been there for me
since day one not only as a sister but also a friend in this journey through life. Thank you for all
your advice and for always leading the way! I can hear the music—must be time for us to finally
start dancing!!!
iv
To my dearest friend Sondra Scerca, you are a kindred spirit who is evidence that the impossible
can be realized and miracles happen every day! With you nearby, I can always reach out and find
goodness and light!
I would like to acknowledge my committee members’ efforts to make this dissertation happen
especially Peter Robertson for sticking with me and staying connected from Brazil, Costa Rica or
wherever else your travels took you.
To Katie Sieck, I don’t think I can find the words to express my deep gratitude for your kindness,
grace and awe-inspiring insights! Your door was always open to me even before you joined my
dissertation committee. Thank you for your ever positive and big picture outlook—the world is a
better place because you’re in it.
Thank you to my paragons of extraordinary thinking Anita Chandra, Gery W. Ryan and Robert J.
Lempert. You each championed this work in your own way! It has been my privilege to be in
your company. To my beloved RAND Corporation and its corps, your strict adherence to quality,
objectivity and integrity were a guiding light to this work.
To my sisters in the DPPD program, Dr. Arlene W. Williams and Dr. Claudia Avendaño, we
share a special bond. I thank you for your friendship and wise counsel. We did it!
v
Abstract
With an increased demand for services and a decrease in access to government funding,
nonprofit organizations need additional money to remain viable and high-net-worth individuals
provide a practical option. To understand the charitable behavior of individuals, the literature
largely focuses on the drivers or motivations underlying their giving. Through 20 semistructured
interviews with high-net-worth philanthropists, this study looked at the reasons behind their
giving based on the concept of making an impact. This study found that high-net-worth
individuals exhibit a “giving style” that defines a favored approach to making an impact through
philanthropic giving as well as specific attributes and engagement preferences for interacting
with a nonprofit. This study identified four giving styles: a) transformational, deep systemic
change style; b) seed funding / multiplier style; c) feeling the impact style; and d) collaborating
partners style, although there are others. The attributes and engagement preferences outline
experiential and personal predilections such as preferences about how and when to fund, the type
and complexity of activities; and level of engagement with staff, beneficiaries and others.
Through conversation and research, nonprofit staff can determine a high-net-worth individual’s
general giving style, attributes and engagement preferences, provide complementary activities
and engender greater satisfaction and interest with the ultimate aim of generating greater funding
from high-net-worth philanthropists. Based on these findings, future research can expand on
understanding the activities and communications nonprofits can offer to better align with high-
net-worth philanthropists’ attributes, engagement and giving preferences to strengthen
relationships and increase personal and financial investments in nonprofit organizations.
vi
Table of Contents
Dedication ....................................................................................................................................... ii
Acknowledgments.......................................................................................................................... iii
List of Figures and Tables.............................................................................................................. ix
Chapter 1: Introduction ................................................................................................................... 1
Background ............................................................................................................................... 1
Statement of the Problem .......................................................................................................... 5
Theoretical Framework ............................................................................................................. 6
Research Purpose ...................................................................................................................... 7
Rationale for the Study ........................................................................................................... 10
Research Question .................................................................................................................. 14
Summary ................................................................................................................................. 14
Terminology ............................................................................................................................ 15
Philanthropy ...................................................................................................................... 15
Nonprofit Sector................................................................................................................ 18
Glossary of Terms ................................................................................................................... 20
Chapter 2: Literature Review ........................................................................................................ 23
Introduction ............................................................................................................................. 23
Drivers Influencing Philanthropic Giving of High-Net-Worth Individuals ........................... 24
Overarching Theory of Human Motivation ...................................................................... 24
Prosocial Behavior as a Driver of Giving ......................................................................... 25
Demographic Factors Affecting Philanthropic Giving ..................................................... 27
Theories of Philanthropic Motivations ............................................................................. 28
Literature Reviews on Philanthropic Drivers ................................................................... 35
Making an Impact through Philanthropic Giving ................................................................... 38
Defining Impact ................................................................................................................ 38
Measuring Impact ............................................................................................................. 40
Philanthropy and Making an Impact ................................................................................. 42
Theories on Donor Perception and Impact through Philanthropic Giving ....................... 48
Summary ................................................................................................................................. 53
Chapter 3: Methodology ............................................................................................................... 54
Introduction ............................................................................................................................. 54
Methodology ........................................................................................................................... 54
Phenomenology................................................................................................................. 55
The Role of the Researcher ............................................................................................... 56
Study Participants ................................................................................................................... 57
Sampling Technique ......................................................................................................... 58
Target Population 1: Giving Pledge Signers ..................................................................... 60
Target Population 2: High-Net-Worth Philanthropists ..................................................... 62
Interview Process .............................................................................................................. 65
Transcription Process ........................................................................................................ 66
Coding Process.................................................................................................................. 66
Participation and Anonymity ............................................................................................ 68
Institutional Review Board ............................................................................................... 69
Summary ................................................................................................................................. 69
vii
Chapter 4: Findings ....................................................................................................................... 70
Defining Impact ...................................................................................................................... 70
Defining Impact Can Change Depending on Use ............................................................. 70
Defining Impact through Stories ....................................................................................... 71
Defining Impact as Making a Difference or Change ........................................................ 73
Defining Impact Quantitatively ........................................................................................ 76
Measuring Impact and Metrics ............................................................................................... 77
Are Metrics on Impact Important? .................................................................................... 78
Are Metrics Integral to Philanthropic Funding? ............................................................... 81
Variations and Issues with Metrics and Measuring Impact .............................................. 84
Metrics Used to Support a Business-Like Approach to Impact ........................................ 86
Obstacles to Making an Impact ............................................................................................... 87
Tax Laws and Government Policies as Obstacles ............................................................ 88
Bureaucracies and Process Issues as Obstacles ................................................................ 89
Relationships and Others as Obstacles ............................................................................. 91
Limited Resources as an Obstacle .................................................................................... 94
Development’s Role in Making an Impact ............................................................................. 96
Development is Important................................................................................................. 97
Development is a Tough Job............................................................................................. 98
Development Should Build Relationships and Get to Know Donors Better .................. 100
Negative Experiences and Opinions about Development ............................................... 102
Motivations for Philanthropic Giving ................................................................................... 106
Personal Passion or Interest as a Motivation .................................................................. 107
Obligation or a Desire to Give Back as a Motivation ..................................................... 109
Upbringing and Beliefs as Motivation ............................................................................ 110
Feeling Good or Warm Glow as a Motivation ................................................................ 111
Business as a Motivator .................................................................................................. 112
Social and Family Associations as Motivation ............................................................... 113
Hyperagency as a Driver of Philanthropic Giving .......................................................... 114
Philanthropic Giving Styles for Making an Impact .............................................................. 119
Transformational, Deep, and Systemic Change Style .................................................... 120
Seed Funding / Multiplier Style ...................................................................................... 122
Feeling the Impact Style ................................................................................................. 124
Collaborating Partners Style ........................................................................................... 126
Summary ............................................................................................................................... 128
Chapter 5: Conclusion................................................................................................................. 129
Discussion of Findings in Relation to Literature Review ..................................................... 129
Discussion of Findings in Relation to the Theorical Framework ......................................... 130
Contribution to Practice ........................................................................................................ 136
A Theory for Gaining Support from High-Net-Worth Philanthropists .......................... 136
Nonprofit Considerations ................................................................................................ 144
Limitations of the Study........................................................................................................ 144
Suggestions for Future Research .......................................................................................... 145
Summary ............................................................................................................................... 146
References ................................................................................................................................... 148
Appendix A: Email Request for Participation in Study .............................................................. 176
viii
Appendix B: Consent Form ........................................................................................................ 178
Appendix C: Interview Protocol ................................................................................................. 181
Appendix D: Codes Generated in Dedoose ................................................................................ 185
Appendix E: Codes Created in Excel Workbooks ...................................................................... 186
Appendix F: Institutional Review Board Approval .................................................................... 187
ix
List of Figures and Tables
Figure 1. Participants Using the Words “Making a Difference” or “Change” to Define Impact . 73
Figure 2. Participants Using the Words “Difference” or “Change” to Define Impact ................. 74
Table 1. Participant Responses that Defined Impact as Making a Difference or Change ............ 74
Table 2. Participant Responses Representative of Quantitatively Defining Impact ..................... 76
Figure 3. Percent of Participants Who Consider Metrics Important to Giving ............................ 79
Figure 4. Percent of Participants Who Give Without Metrics on Impact ..................................... 82
Table 3. Responses that Reflect Giving Despite a Lack of Metrics ............................................. 82
Figure 5. Obstacles to Giving Cited in Percentages ..................................................................... 88
Table 4. Responses Reflecting the Role of Development in Making an Impact .......................... 96
Table 5. Participant Responses Noting that Development is Important ....................................... 97
Table 6. Participant Responses Noting that Development is a Tough Job. .................................. 98
Table 7. Participant Responses signifying Fundraising Difficulties Apart from Development ... 99
Table 8. Responses Noting that Development Should Build Better Relationships with Donors 100
Table 9. Responses on the Ineffectiveness and Inabilities of Development ............................... 103
Table 10. Responses Highlighting Negative Experiences with Development ........................... 105
Figure 6. Percentage of Participants Noting a Motivational Factor for Giving .......................... 107
Table 11. Comparison of Bekkers and Wiepking Mechanisms to Study Motivations ............... 131
Table 12. Criteria to Determine Philanthropists’ Attributes and Preferences ............................ 141
Figure 7. Process to Engaging High-Net-Worth Philanthropists to Obtain Financial Support .. 142
1
Chapter 1: Introduction
The purpose of this qualitative study was to determine how making an impact affects the
philanthropic giving of high-net-worth individuals. The results from this study are aimed at
improving a nonprofit’s ability to generate funding from prospects and donors.
Background
Almost 180 years ago, Alexis de Tocqueville recognized the nonprofit sector as one of
the most compelling parts of the American experience. He commended nonprofits as a pathway
to participate in and shape civic life as well as a vehicle to solve problems and ensure well-being
and equity among its citizenry, citing them as critical to the success of American democracy
(Tocqueville, Nolla, & Schleifer, 2012).
Since that time, scholars have dedicated considerable effort toward understanding the role
of nonprofits in society (Anheier, 2013; Ben-Ner & Van Hoomissen, 1992; Corbin, 1999; Dighe,
2002; Grønbjerg & Paarlberg, 2001; Saxton & Benson, 2005; Twombly, 2003). Robert L.
Payton, a founder in the field of philanthropic studies, and sociologist Michael P. Moody make
the assertion that, “It is not possible for a democracy to thrive without a healthy philanthropic
sector” (2008, p. 156). Lester Salamon (2012), director of the Center for Civil Society Studies at
the Johns Hopkins Institute for Health and Social Policy Studies, considered the nonprofit sector
to be “one of the most important components of American life” (p. 7). Ultimately, the nonprofit
sector is credited with meeting individual and societal needs that are left unfulfilled by the public
and private sectors (Acs, 2013; Hansmann, 1987; Luksetich, 2008; Kim & Kim, 2018; Payton &
Moody, 2008; Salamon, 1994; University Library, n.d.; Young, 2000).
Sargeant, Lee, and Jay (2002) noted that, “No other nation in the world has as
large a number or as great a diversity of not-for-profit organisations – including hospitals,
2
religious organisations, universities, colleges, social service agencies and cultural
organisations” (p. 12).
According to the Urban Institute’s National Center for Charitable Statistics, more than 1.5
million nonprofits were registered with the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) in 2015 (McKeever,
2019). This broad range of private entities generally receives federal, state, and local tax-exempt
status in consideration of the public benefits they provide (IRS, n.d.; Reich, 2019; Worth, 2016).
According to Eugene Tempel (2003):
We can identify at least seven significant roles that nonprofit organizations and
philanthropy play in civil society: They reduce human suffering, enhance human
potential, promote private equity and justice, build community, provide human
fulfillment, support experimentation and change, and foster pluralism. (p. 304)
From fighting injustice, lifting people out of poverty, advancing medical breakthroughs,
and promoting religious activities to supporting the arts, education, animals, or the environment,
the nonprofit sector covers a wide array of areas and bridges critical gaps in our society.
The nonprofit sector also provides social and economic contributions to society (Anheier
& List, 2005). The Bureau of Economic Analysis estimated that in 2015, the nonprofit sector
contributed more than $985 billion to the economy, or roughly 5.4% of the U.S. gross domestic
product (McKeever, 2018). The Bureau of Labor Statistics attributed 12.3 million jobs to the
nonprofit sector in 2016, representing 10.2% of private-sector employment in the United States
(Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2018). Acs and Dana (2001) credited philanthropy with making a
major contribution to American economic growth.
As important as nonprofits may be to our society (Andreoni, 2006; Boulding, 1962), they
are currently facing serious issues (Salamon & Sokolowski, 2015). Fiscal distress is a major
3
challenge in the nonprofit sector, especially as government funding tightens (Grace & Wedroff,
2001). In a 2018 survey of 216 nonprofit organizations, 23% said that government funding has
decreased, causing them to dip into endowment or reserve funds or delay major new initiatives
(Marks Paneth, LLP, 2018). The government has cut contracts and grants to parts of the
nonprofit sector and has changed compensation structures. As an example, the government has
switched from using a traditional contracts-and-grants process in which funding went directly to
nonprofits for services to providing reimbursement vouchers to nonprofit clientele through
Medicare and Medicaid (Salamon, 2012).
Increasing competition for government dollars is exacerbating the situation. In the past,
the government saw the nonprofit sector as the automatic choice for managing certain issues and
almost automatically directed funding to nonprofit organizations. Today, that view has changed.
The government is increasingly outsourcing work to for-profit organizations rather than
nonprofits (Ryan, 2002; Salamon & Sokolowski, 2015). At the same time, additional pressures
are caused by greater expectations for accountability (Sloan, 2009) and the burden of trying to
remain current on rapidly changing technology (Salamon, 2012).
These many challenges are negatively affecting nonprofits and calling into question their
existence (Ryan, 2002; Salamon, 2012). A recent report based on data from GuideStar, a premier
reporting service for U.S. nonprofits, has confirmed many issues. This report, created by Morris,
Roberts, MacIntosh, and Bardone (2018), found that liabilities exceed assets for 7% to 8% of
nonprofits; 30% do not have cash reserves to cover potential liquidity issues; roughly 50% claim
to have less than 1 month of operating reserves; and 30% have lost money during the last several
years. (It should be noted that these indicators are consistent geographically, but not across
subsectors when considering size.)
4
As nonprofits experience financial issues, they are also seeing an increase in demand for
their services. In a Marks Paneth, LLP 2018 survey of 216 nonprofit organizations, 45% cited an
uptick in demand for their services. Nonprofit Finance Funds (2018) conducted a survey of
nonprofit leaders from across the country. Of the 3,400 nonprofit leaders surveyed, 86% said that
demand for services is continuing to rise but only 43% expected to be able to meet that demand.
With a tight funding environment, nonprofits are under increasing pressure to
demonstrate their effectiveness, efficiency, and ability to make an impact (Ebrahim & Rangan,
2014; Hwang & Powell, 2009). Many funders expect nonprofits to report overhead costs,
outcomes, and impact (Brest & Harvey, 2008; Crutchfield & Grant, 2008; Hwang & Powell,
2009; Monitor Institute, 2009) and often base future support on their ability to do so (Ebrahim &
Rangan, 2014; Gregory & Howard, 2009).
More recently, the focus has been on showing impact (Brest & Harvey, 2008; Crutchfield
& Grant, 2008; Monitor Institute, 2009). As Grace and Wedroff (2001) noted, “Expectations for
the impact of philanthropy in the twenty-first century are high” (p. 11). According to Ebrahim
and Rangan (2014), “This attention to impact, following on the heels of accountability, is mainly
driven by funders who want to know whether their funds are making a difference or might be
better spent elsewhere” (p. 118). Philanthropic funders such as foundations and high-net-worth
individuals have expectations that their support, especially larger donations, will make an
impact.
The academic literature shows that making an impact is a motivating factor for individual
donors (Bekkers & Wiepking, 2011), but there is little additional research to explain how they
view the concept of making an impact and how it might influence their philanthropic giving.
With the concept of making an impact identified as an important driver for high-net-worth
5
donors, nonprofits could benefit from a deeper understanding of the relationship between impact
and giving from the individual donor’s perspective.
Because there is no general agreement in the field on how to account for or report impact
(Ebrahim & Rangan, 2014; Hewlett Foundation & McKinsey and Co., 2008; Maas & Liket,
2011; Sargeant & Shang, 2011), nonprofits have leeway in how they communicate impact to
their donors. A better understanding of impact could help improve communication and
relationships between nonprofits and high-net-worth philanthropists with the end goal of
bringing in additional support (Sargeant, Ford, & West, 2006; Waters, 2011; Zhuang, Saxton, &
Wu, 2014).
Statement of the Problem
Given the decline in funding to nonprofits and increased demand for their services,
nonprofits need to protect existing streams of funding and grow new ones to stay viable.
Nonprofit revenue is mainly derived from three sources—government, fees from services, and
philanthropy—but philanthropy is the most reasonable and viable avenue to pursue. Nonprofits
do not have command to increase government funding to support their cause. Fees for services
rendered could increase revenue but would also likely increase expenses such as for staff.
Nonprofits, especially those that are already struggling, may not have the wherewithal to expand
their services, so increasing revenue through fees may not be a workable solution. Although
competition for donors is increasing among nonprofit organizations (Waters, 2008),
philanthropic funding has the potential to boost revenue to nonprofits without major drawbacks
such as a significant increase in expenses. Therefore, a study investigating ways to encourage
additional philanthropic funding could be important to the livelihood of nonprofit organizations.
6
There are three main sources of major philanthropic support to nonprofits—namely,
corporations, foundations, and individuals, especially high-net-worth individuals who have the
capacity to make large gifts (List, 2011). Corporations and foundations are focused on fulfilling
their goals and missions and are accountable to others in their use of funds. For their
philanthropic giving, corporations often look for opportunities to advance their bottom line either
monetarily or through improved brand recognition, whereas institutional foundations generally
follow a prescribed strategy with predetermined areas for funding. Philanthropic giving by
individuals, however, does not include these constraints. Individual donors have greater control
over their money and are often the final decision makers for determining what to fund. As
individuals, they are also more susceptible to factors that a nonprofit can utilize to help build
better relationships with them and influence their philanthropic giving. “Building relationships
between the institution and its current and prospective donors is arguably the most important
aspect of successful solicitation of the largest or (leadership) gifts” (Drezner, 2011a, p. 53).
In the United States, individuals are the main source of charitable dollars (Giving USA,
2018). This study focused on factors that affect monetary giving to nonprofit organizations by
this majority—namely, individuals. In-kind donations, volunteering, blood and organ donations,
and charitable giving from individuals based in other countries were excluded. Although
business entities can act in a prosocial manner (Batson, 1996), especially through corporate
social responsibility programs (Carroll, 1999; Porter & Kramer, 2006), private sector
organizations and institutional foundations were also excluded from this study.
Theoretical Framework
The drivers behind the philanthropic giving of high-net-worth donors are important to
examine when a nonprofit organization aims to gain additional funding. Motivations for giving
7
are often categorized as extrinsic, i.e., featuring a materialistic or external benefit, or intrinsic, in
which the benefit is internal to the donor (Bennett, 2003; Sargeant, 1999; Schlegelmilch,
Diamantopoulos, & Love, 1997). These and other motivations can be viewed through the lens of
Abraham Maslow’s (1954) hierarchy of needs and theory of motivation. The various levels of
motivation Maslow offered, particularly elevated levels of belonging and love needs, esteem
needs, and self-actualization, lend themselves to explaining why people help others or exhibit
prosocial behavior. Prosocial behavior is activity taken voluntarily to benefit another (Drezner,
2011b; Schwartz & Bilsky, 1990). Philanthropic giving is one form of prosocial behavior and
can be directed to one person or many.
Prosocial behavior on a grand scale, when intended to benefit many people, can be found
in social movements and social change activity. Researchers have recognized that the nonprofit
sector is home to social movements, advocacy, and confrontation or challenge-based
organizations (Jenkins, 2006; McCarthy, Britt, & Wolfson, 1991; Salamon, 1994) that among
other things, help advance equity, liberty, and justice for all people. Through their support of
nonprofit organizations, philanthropists have the capacity to effect change in society.
Research Purpose
The purpose of this research is to better understand how high-net-worth donors view the
concept of gifting and if making an impact affects philanthropic giving. Nonprofits are facing
real issues that are challenging their very existence (Ryan, 2002; Salamon, 2012), and raising
additional philanthropic support is one source of revenue. “Understanding charitable giving is a
crucial element in attracting and retaining private donors” (Verhaert & Van den Poel, 2011, p.
1288).
8
The concept of impact is important to high-net-worth donor giving. According to Grace
and Wedroff (2001):
The bottom line is that increasing numbers of major donors are looking for more
satisfaction than just helping nonprofits reach their financial goals. They are looking for
tangible evidence that their gifts are making a difference, and they want to know from the
outset what the potential impact is. (p. 11)
This study could provide a better understanding of impact-based fundraising strategies
that will help nonprofits gain more philanthropic support. Increased revenue from philanthropists
would help offset the risks nonprofits are currently facing, allowing them to continue to meet the
needs of vulnerable populations and advance our society through third-sector activity (Fredricks,
2001).
Nonprofits bring tremendous value to society, and fundraising is known to be a critical
component to ensuring a successful and robust nonprofit sector (Mack, Kelly, & Wilson, 2016;
Payton & Moody, 2008). Individual donors have been selected as the source of data for this
study because they provide the lion’s share of support to the nonprofit sector. It is estimated that
giving by individual donors in the United States accounts for at least 70% of all contributions
made to charity (Drezner, 2011a; Giving USA, 2018; List, 2011; Worth, 2016). Sargeant et al.
(2002) noted:
Nearly all Americans believe it is their obligation to support charitable causes. This
altruistic philosophy stands in marked contrast to that of many other countries where
philanthropic giving is often exclusively a government responsibility. The democratic
ideal that each person should do his or her fair share, combined with the more prosaic
9
notion of income-tax incentives, has encouraged a wide range of Americans to become
philanthropists. (p. 12)
John F. Kennedy (n.d.) also acknowledged this great American tradition:
The raising of extraordinarily large sums of money, given voluntarily and freely by
millions of our fellow Americans, is a unique American tradition. … Philanthropy,
charity, giving voluntarily and freely. … Call it what you like, but it is truly a jewel of an
American tradition.
It is estimated that roughly 90% of the giving to nonprofits by individuals is generated
from 10% of donors (Cook, 1996; Fredricks, 2001; Sargeant et al., 2002). Therefore, most of the
funds raised for nonprofits come from high-net-worth individuals making major gifts (Mack et
al., 2016). Major gifts are larger donations that are distinguished from what is referred to in the
industry as annual fund gifts, which are voluminous in number but small in dollar amount. Each
nonprofit determines the threshold for what it considers to be a major gift, so there is no standard
for what constitutes a major gift (Sargeant & Shang, 2010; Worth, 2016).
Aside from a focus on major gifts, an improved strategy for fundraising can help
nonprofits bring in more revenue. Leading fundraising scholar Adrian Sargeant (2001) looked at
elements affecting nonprofit fundraising strategies. His research found that nonprofits could save
both time and money by creating a fundraising strategy that builds donor loyalty and aims to
bring in new gifts from the current donor base. “Further understanding donors’ motivations and
successful fundraising strategies from a theoretical standpoint, philanthropy and fundraising
research allows practitioners to enhance their development programs, expanding them to new
prospect pools by better understanding how donors choose to participate” (Drezner, 2011b, p.
15).
10
Rationale for the Study
This qualitative study is important and needed for several reasons. First, a gap exists in
the scholarly literature on philanthropy, fundraising, and the significant and pervasive concept of
making an impact. According to Ebrahim and Rangan (2014), the academic literature on
philanthropy, fundraising, and nonprofit studies is weak in providing theoretical and analytic
insights, and scholarly research on the topic of fundraising is thin (Pasic, 2016). According to
Michael J. Worth (2016) fundraising is ill-defined as an area of study and as a profession and
consequently research on fundraising is limited. Amir Pasic (2016), the Eugene R. Tempel Dean
of the Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy, acknowledged a plethora of
leading-edge research and reports on fundraising produced by nonacademics such as
practitioners that are the result of social issues, but these unvetted works are not filling the
knowledge gaps in scholarly writings on philanthropy, nor are they driven by disciplinary
traditions. It should be noted that the Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy,
established in 2012, is the first school whose faculty is dedicated to the topic of philanthropy,
and along with a few other institutions, it is helping to produce the first generation of PhD
students trained to teach and advance research on philanthropy (Lilly Family School of
Philanthropy, n.d.; Pasic, 2016).
Leading scholar Kathleen Kelly (1998) agreed that the wide gaps in the literature are a
result of fundraising’s development outside of academia. Like Pasic, she acknowledged that the
issue is further complicated by fundraising’s multidisciplinary structure of being housed under
four different academic disciplines: public relations, marketing, nonprofit management, and
higher education administration. This mixed-bag approach has stymied the advancement of
11
theory, empirical investigation of fundraising, and education of fundraisers (Callahan, 2016;
Mack et al., 2016; Payton & Moody, 2008; Worth, 2016).
My interview-based qualitative study adds to the current academic research available on
individual philanthropists and fundraising. Wiepking and Bekkers (2012) suggested the need for
more research on philanthropic behavior and noted that “the majority of articles we reviewed [in
their 500 article literature review] are not based on solid theoretical foundations” (pp. 944–945).
In their 2008 white paper, “The Nonprofit Marketplace, Bridging the Information Gap in
Philanthropy,” the Hewlett Foundation and McKinsey and Co. cited the need for research that
focuses on the motivations, needs, and decision-making criteria of donors.
Research has also suggested that attracting subsequent gifts from high-net-worth donors
often rests on a nonprofit’s ability to show impact from the use of the initial gift (Hewlett
Foundation & McKinsey and Co., 2008). Making an impact is often cited as a leading
motivational factor for charitable giving in general and is especially the case for high-net-worth
individuals (Bekkers & Wiepking, 2011; U.S. Trust & Lilly Family School of Philanthropy,
2018). As an example of how philanthropists view the concept of making an impact, in a letter
on their foundation’s website, Bill and Melinda Gates wrote that Warren Buffett advised them to
“take on the really tough problems” with their philanthropic work. They noted their approach to
making the greatest impact is to focus on a few key issues that they think can help people have
better lives (Gates & Gates, n.d.). In their letter for the Giving Pledge, they add, “The idea of the
pledge came out of discussions we had with other givers about what they were doing, about what
had worked in philanthropy and what had not worked” (Giving Pledge, n.d.b). While
philanthropists focus on impact, Wiepking and Bekkers (2012) note the research limitations for
the concept of making an impact or what they term “efficacy,” by saying, “Although efficacy has
12
been studied extensively in the helping behavior literature, we have been unable to locate any
experimental studies on philanthropy that manipulated efficacy” (p. 942).
According to James Lord (1983), “The fact is that people give in order to get. They don’t
want to feel that they are ‘giving away’ their money. They want to feel they are investing it and
getting something in return” (p. 5). Kent Dove (1988) noted that major donors “view giving as an
investment, and through their investments they desire to solve a problem or issue, seek ways to
express themselves (self-actualization), and expect to see and understand the ‘return on the
investment’” (p. 91). These references to investment and returns in philanthropic giving are
synonymous with the concept of making an impact.
Although impact is of high importance to donors, a recent study found that more than half
of the wealthy donor participants said that they did not know if their giving was having the
impact they intended (U.S. Trust & Lilly Family School of Philanthropy, 2018). Beyond the
acknowledgement of ignorance on the part of donors, the survey did not provide additional detail
on donor responses to or feelings about this phenomenon. Nor did it investigate whether there
was a resulting effect on giving. More detailed data on impact could provide valuable
information to nonprofits, enhancing their ability to communicate impact to donors and receive
more funding.
Not only do donors not know if their gifts are having the intended impact, but nonprofits
can also struggle to demonstrate impact, especially in light of complex, “wicked” problems that
have been irresolvable, such as the interminable challenge to end poverty, injustice, and
homelessness (Weber & Khademian, 2008). Philanthropically funded projects that have fallen
short of overcoming an issue or achieving the intended impact are prevalent (Ebrahim & Rangan,
2014; Maas & Liket, 2011). One grand example of how philanthropy can fail to make an impact
13
despite the best of intentions, resources, and government support is the widely publicized $100
million investment in education made by Mark Zuckerberg and his wife Priscilla Chan. At the
outset, the project held the promise of transforming education in some of Newark, New Jersey’s
worst schools and developing a model that could be scaled nationally. In a few short years,
however, the community, teacher groups, media, and the nation at large criticized the effort for
its ineffectiveness and lack of impact (Garfield, 2018). Nonprofits can suffer greatly when
projects fail, and they would benefit from having a better understanding of how philanthropists
want to make an impact.
This educational experiment demonstrates that despite the best of efforts, the impact of
philanthropy can be negative, leaving many to live with the consequences, such as with the yet
unknown outcomes for these students in the New Jersey school system. Criticism of major
philanthropic efforts is growing, as evidenced by the opinions of researchers such as William
Shambra, director of the Hudson Institute’s Bradley Center for Philanthropy and Civic Renewal
(Hudson Institute, n.d.), and former consultant at McKinsey & Co. turned writer Anand
Giridharadas, who cautioned that the elitist attitude of major philanthropists and foundations may
be undermining our democracy and benefiting the rich under the guise of changing the world.
These concerns around the potential for philanthropists to upend systems and cause great change
warrant additional research on potential problem areas such as an unbalanced approach to power
and accountability in the field and the backing of nondemocratic institutions at the expense of
democratic ones (Rogers, 2015). Understanding the philanthropic perspective of high-net-worth
donors and their thoughts on impact would begin to fill this gap.
An additional reason for this study was summarized by Payton and Moody (2008), who
argued for the value of philanthropy to society and noted, “The study and practice of
14
philanthropy should help people develop morally and socially. Our conviction is that the study of
philanthropy, linked to its practice, will help us find meaning, purpose and hope in our lives” (p.
26). Advancing meaning, purpose, and hope are hallmarks of why nonprofits exist and why
philanthropists give.
Research Question
The central research questions that this study aimed to answer are: What does making an
impact through philanthropic giving mean to high-net-worth philanthropists? How does making
an impact motivate the philanthropic giving of high-net-worth individuals?
A qualitative methodology was selected to answer these questions. Creswell (2014)
defined qualitative research as “an approach for exploring and understanding the meaning
individuals or groups ascribe to a social or human problem” (p. 4). The research questions were
addressed via semistructured interviews with high-net-worth philanthropists. Through this
phenomenological approach, participants enjoyed more latitude to explain their experiences and
provide an understanding of their thoughts, feelings, and behaviors than would have been
possible using other methods.
Summary
This chapter illustrated the importance of the nonprofit sector to our society and
especially in meeting human needs that are left unfulfilled by government and business. It
detailed current fiscal challenges threating the existence of many nonprofits and noted the need
for additional research on motivations of high-net-worth donors, fundraising, and philanthropy to
help raise additional funding. This study aimed to discover how high-net-worth philanthropists
view the concept of making an impact and how it affects their philanthropic giving.
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Chapter 2 presents a review of the academic literature on the drivers, impact, and other
factors behind philanthropic giving. Chapter 3 discusses the methodology and data collection
methods used in this qualitative study, including the design of the semistructured interviews and
the role and background of the researcher. The fourth chapter highlights the results garnered
from the interviews. Chapter 5 presents an interpretation of the results of the study and
implications for future study.
Terminology
Philanthropy
Although Dryden (1698/1990) claimed that “we have not a proper word in English to
express” (p. 21) what the ancient Greeks called philanthrôpía, a generally accepted translation is
the “love of mankind” (Sulek, 2010). Today, however, there is no consensus on the definition or
meaning of the term (Frumkin, 2008; Harrow, 2010; Payton & Moody, 2008; Sulek, 2010;
Taylor, Strom, & Renz, 2014). In their book Understanding Philanthropy: Its Meaning and
Mission, Payton and Moody (2008) examined this issue and determined that philanthropy is what
British philosopher Gallie referred to as a “contested concept” (p. 29). According to Gallie,
“essentially contested concepts” are cases where “there is no one clearly definable general use …
which can be set up as the correct or standard use,” and because there are “groups of people
disagreeing about the proper use of the concepts … [they] inevitably involve endless disputes
about their proper uses” (Gallie, 1956, p. 168). The term philanthropy shares these qualities, and
its meaning changes depending on how it is being used.
E. F. Miller (2006) recognizes the importance of defining the term philanthropy by
noting:
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Clear thinking about philanthropy requires us to define it – to specify the boundaries
between motives, means, and objectives that are truly philanthropic and those that are
not. Any proper definition must pay attention to how the term “philanthropy” has been
applied in practice, and yet, description alone cannot suffice. (p. 52).
In On the Modern Meaning of Philanthropy, Sulek (2010) synthesized various and
contradictory definitions of the word philanthropy into a framework that includes early modern,
contemporary, and academic perspectives. He offered seven related definitions based on
perspective or use of the word philanthropy:
• Literal: Encompassing references to the literal meaning of philanthropy in ancient
Greek as the love of mankind.
• Archaic: For usages now considered largely obsolete, such as those referring to
philanthropy as the “love of God for humankind” or as being synonymous with
“humanity.”
• Ideal: To describe the attainment of ideal aims, goals, outcomes, or objectives in
terms of meeting a need, attaining a good, and/or advancing human happiness and
well-being.
• Ontological: To describe an innate desire, moral sentiment, psychological
predisposition, or other such aspect of human nature that impels people to want to
help others.
• Volitional: To describe the good will, intent, or readiness to voluntarily help others.
• Actual: To describe an objective act, such as giving of money, time, or effort, to a
charitable cause or public purpose.
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• Social: To describe a relation, movement, organization, or other such social entity
larger than the individual that embodies an explicitly defined charitable cause or
good. (p. 204).
Payton and Moody (2008) considered philanthropy to encompass the nonprofit sector and
offered five roles for philanthropy that help delimit this term:
• Service role: Providing services (especially when the other sectors fail to provide
them) and meeting needs.
• Advocacy role: Advocating for reform, for particular interests, for particular
populations, or for particular views of the public good.
• Cultural role: Providing a vehicle for expressing and preserving cherished values,
traditions, identities, and other aspects of culture.
• Civic role: Building community, generating “social capital,” and promoting and
increasing civic engagement.
• Vanguard role: Serving as the site for social innovation, experimentation, and
entrepreneurial invention. (pp. 34-35)
They ultimately defined philanthropy as “voluntary action for the public good” (Payton &
Moody, 2008, p. xi). Jon Van Til (1990) defined it as “the voluntary giving and receiving of time
and money aimed (however imperfectly) toward the needs of charity and the interests of all in a
better quality of life” (p. 34). Schervish (1998) argued it is “a social relation governed by a moral
obligation that matches a supply of private resources to a demand of unfulfilled needs and
desires that are communicated by entreaty” (p. 600). According to Salamon and Anheier (1992),
philanthropy “is the giving of gifts of time or valuables (money, securities, property) for public
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purposes (p. 130), whereas Bremner (2017) defined philanthropy as “contributions of money to a
variety of causes intended to benefit all classes of society” (p. xii).
Philanthropy is an expansive term with many definitions and meanings. For the purposes
of this study, philanthropy refers to the use of private financial resources for public good, largely
through social and environmental causes. This definition refers to fiscal support and excludes
volunteer activities and organ and blood donations (Bremmer, 1960; Burlingame, 2004;
Salamon, 2014). Philanthropy is one avenue for nonprofits to acquire funding and has been
shown to influence social, religious, economic, political, scientific, and technological issues
(Payton & Moody, 2008).
Nonprofit Sector
Modern social life is often segmented into two broad categories—namely, the market and
the state. The market category is composed of for-profit businesses and is generally referred to as
the private or for-profit sector. The state category is inclusive of entities representing and
affiliated with local, state, or federal government and is often referred to as the public sector. A
third category of tax-exempt organizations that fill needs left unmet by the other two sectors is
known as the nonprofit sector (Salamon & Anheier, 1997). Other names for this sector include
the voluntary sector, third sector, civil society, and independent sector (Salamon & Anheier,
1992).
A distinctive characteristic is that organizations in the nonprofit sector are generally tax-
exempt under Internal Revenue Code Section 501(c). There are 29 types of nonprofit
organizations with exempt IRS status, but this study focuses exclusively on 501(c)(3) public
charities, which were formed to provide a public benefit (IRS, n.d.; National Council of
Nonprofits, n.d.). There are two types of 501(c)(3) organizations: private foundations, which are
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grant making organizations, and public charities also known as charitable nonprofits. These
charitable nonprofits are the only ones that can provide donors with a tax-deductible receipt for
their contribution and are the focus of this study.
As with philanthropy, the study of the nonprofit sector suffers from “weakness and
limitations of the concepts that are used to define and describe it” (Salamon & Anheier, 1992, p.
125). Salamon and Anheier (1992) offered what they refer to as a structural or operational
definition of organizations in the nonprofit sector, describing them as sharing the characteristics
of being “formal, private, non-profit-distributing, self-governing and voluntary” (p. 125). Some
focus areas for public nonprofits include arts and culture, education, environment, animals,
health, human services, international and foreign affairs, and religion (National Council of
Nonprofits, n.d.).
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Glossary of Terms
Unless otherwise specified, the following terms were defined by the researcher.
Charitable Organization: A tax-exempt organization in the nonprofit sector that provides a
public benefit.
Charitable organizations include religious or non-profit organizations that help those in
need or that serve and support the public interests. They range in size from national
organizations like the United Way and the American Red Cross down to local community
organizations. They serve a variety of purposes such as religious activity, helping people
in need, health care and medical research, education, arts, environment, and international
aid. Our definition of charity does not include political contributions. (Lilly Family
School of Philanthropy, 2003, p. 126)
Charitable organization is used interchangeably with “nonprofit” or “nonprofit organization.”
Contribution or Charitable Contribution: A tax-deductible donation of money given to a
charity for specific or unrestricted use. Used interchangeably with “gift.”
Development Officer: A professional who works to acquire tax-deductible gifts from donors on
behalf of a nonprofit organization. Used interchangeably with “fundraiser.”
Development: Activities taken by nonprofit organizations to obtain philanthropic support.
This function includes all the programs and activities by which the [nonprofit
organization] seeks gifts and grants from private sources to support its programs and to
build long-term strength through improvements to its facilities and additions to its
endowment. The term “development” is usually used interchangeably with “fund
raising.” (Worth, 2002, p. 6)
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Donor: A donor is an individual, organization, corporation or foundation giving money or other
resources (Anheier & List, 2005). Used interchangeably with “philanthropist.” “Donors range
from everyday citizens of modest means to those of high net worth” (Siegel & Yancey, 2016, p.
8). For the purposes of this study, donors refer only to those who make monetary gifts. This
study excludes gifts of blood, organs, and similar donations.
Fundraiser: A professional who works to acquire tax-deductible gifts from donors on behalf of
a nonprofit organization. Used interchangeably with “development officer.”
Fundraising: Activities taken by nonprofit organizations to obtain philanthropic support.
According to Kelly (1998), “Fundraising predominantly involves a social exchange relationship
between a charitable organization and a donor, in which the power of each relative to the other
determines the outcome of the exchange” (p. 199). Lasher and Cook (1996) built on Kelly’s
(1991) work in the context of higher education. Fundraising is used interchangeably with
“development.”
Gift or Charitable Gift: A tax-deductible donation of money given to a charity for specific or
unrestricted use. Used interchangeably with “contribution.”
High-Net-Worth Individual or Donor: The Routledge Dictionary of Economics defines a high-
net-worth individual as “a rich person” (Rutherford, 2013). This study used the classification in
the Stanford Center on Philanthropy and Civil Society’s Data for Donor Impact of high-net-
worth donor (Joshi, 2018), which is based on the 2018 U.S. Trust Study of High Net Worth
Philanthropy. The U.S. Trust defines high-net-worth as “households with a net worth of $1
million or more (excluding the value of their primary home) and/or an annual household income
of $200,000 or more” (U.S. Trust & Lilly Family School of Philanthropy, 2018, p. 58).
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Impact: Impact refers to the change in public good as a result of activities conducted by a
nonprofit. This definition of impact is inclusive of the term “outcome” (Osborne, Bovaird,
Martin, Tricker, & Waterston, 1995; Wainwright, 2003). Nonprofits generally aim to make an
impact or public benefit in accordance with their IRS classification as a 501(c)(3) (IRS, n.d.)
When philanthropists aim to make an impact, they generally do so by financially supporting a
nonprofit so it can carry out its mission.
Major Gift: A large tax-deductible philanthropic donation made to a nonprofit organization. The
dollar amount that classifies a donation as a major gift is determined by the individual charitable
organization. There is no standard amount that qualifies a gift as a major gift. It is at the
discretion of the nonprofit.
Nonprofit Sector: The nonprofit sector is composed of tax-exempt public charities that provide
a public benefit in areas such as education, human services, the environment, religion, arts and
culture, health, and international development (IRS, n.d.; National Council of Nonprofits, n.d.).
Philanthropist: An individual who makes philanthropic gifts to nonprofit organizations. Used
interchangeably with “donor.”
Philanthropy: Philanthropy refers to tax-deductible financial contributions made to nonprofit
organizations for the benefit of society (Bremner, 2017; IRS, n.d.).
Private Sector: The private sector consists of for-profit or business organizations, as compared
to the nonprofit or government sectors.
Public Sector: The public sector refers to government-related organizations, as compared to the
nonprofit or for-profit sectors.
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Chapter 2: Literature Review
How do you motivate donors? You bring them into the dream. You make them a part of
the vision. You make them a part of something bigger than themselves, which is what
these wonderful places [nonprofits] are. And you not only help them understand it, but
you allow them a way to identify with it. If you don’t bring them into the center and they
don’t feel a part of it, then you will not have a very large donor. (Cook, 1994, p. 420).
Introduction
Trends reported in a 2016 Independent Sector report on “Giving and Volunteering in the
US” indicated that the need for nonprofit services will continue to increase significantly into the
future, even as political, social, and economic changes will cause a decrease in government
funding to the nonprofit sector (Bendapudi, Singh, & Bendapudi, 1996; Grace & Griffin, 2006).
Increasing competition among charitable organizations vying for the same donor dollars
(Bendapudi et al., 1996; Guy & Patton, 1989) will add to the challenges facing nonprofits. Given
these circumstances, nonprofits will need to generate additional streams of revenue such as
philanthropic funding to survive.
Charitable behavior has been explored in a plethora of academic disciplines, including
economics, psychology, anthropology, sociology, public administration, political science, and
marketing scholarship and research (Drezner & Huehls, 2015; James, 2017; Sargeant &
Woodliffe, 2007). This chapter reviews the literature related to charitable behavior and draws
mainly from economics, psychology, sociology, and marketing to provide theoretical
underpinnings.
The chapter is divided into three sections. The first section explores the literature on
drivers behind philanthropic giving, including Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, prosocial behavior,
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and other theories of philanthropic motivating factors from various disciplines. The second
section examines the concept of making an impact through the philanthropic giving of wealthy
donors. The last section summarizes the chapter and identifies the need for this study.
Drivers Influencing Philanthropic Giving of High-Net-Worth Individuals
To generate additional streams of revenue from high-net-worth individuals, nonprofits
need to understand the drivers behind philanthropic funding and their view on making an impact.
These drivers and the concept of impact can inform fundraising activities, attract and retain
funders (Green & Webb, 1997; Nathan & Hallam, 2009), and ultimately bring in more support.
“The questions of why donors give freely and how to encourage them to make annual and major
financial contributions are the basis of building good fundraising strategy” (Drezner & Huehls,
2015, Chapter 1, Section 1, para. 1).
Overarching Theory of Human Motivation
Many factors influence individuals and their activities. An overarching theory of human
motivation and one of the most well-known is Abraham Maslow’s (1943) theory of human
motivation. Maslow’s theory included a progressive hierarchy of human needs. The five stages
of needs from lowest to highest are: physiological, safety, love and belonging, esteem, and self-
actualization. Through this layered hierarchy of needs, Maslow suggested that once basic needs
are met, people are motivated by higher desires such as love, esteem, and self-actualization.
These higher levels of the hierarchy are compatible with philanthropic giving and may provide
an explanation for why donors are motivated to give; namely, that philanthropic giving
engenders love, esteem from self and others, and inner meaning and purpose (Maslow, 1943;
Stannard-Stockton, 2008).
25
In 1969, Maslow updated his hierarchy and added self-transcendence as an additional
motivation beyond self-actualization:
The fully developed (and very fortunate) human being working under the best conditions
tends to be motivated by values which transcend his self. They are not selfish anymore in
the old sense of that term. Beauty is not within one’s skin nor is justice or order. One can
hardly class these desires as selfish in the sense that my desire for food might be. My
satisfaction with achieving or allowing justice is not within my own skin. … It is equally
outside and inside: therefore, it has transcended the geographical limitations of the self.
Thus one begins to talk about transhumanistic psychology. (p. 4)
In an unpublished paper, Maslow added: “the good of other people must be invoked”
(Maslow, 1996, p. 31). Maslow suggested that when other baser human needs are met, people are
motivated to do good to and for others. Philanthropic giving is one way to meet these
transcendent needs.
Prosocial Behavior as a Driver of Giving
How selfish soever man may be supposed, there are evidently some principles in his
nature, which interest him in the fortunes of others, and render their happiness necessary
to him, though he derives nothing from it, except the pleasure of seeing it. (Smith, 1797,
pp. 1-2)
Prosocial behavior theory provides a conceptual basis for discovering how nonprofits can
understand their donors and influence their future giving (Drezner, 2009). Prosocial or helping
behaviors are recognized as important human values (Bendapudi et al., 1996) that are needed in
society (Futamura, 2018). These are positive human activities conducted for the welfare and
benefit of others (Schwartz & Bilsky, 1990). Prosocial behavior produces well-being, goodwill,
26
and integrity through activities such as sharing, cooperating, helping, volunteering, and donating
(Brief & Motowidlo, 1986). This expansive category includes acts such as providing shelter for a
friend who needs a place to stay, helping a stranger who is experiencing an emergency situation
related to a fire or natural disaster (Latané & Darley, 1970), and being an organ donor (Schwartz
& Howard, 1980).
Prosocial behavior is a central focus in the social psychology field (Kidd, 1996). Studies
in that field have focused broadly on prosocial behavior and the concept of helping another
person (Batson, 1998; Piliavin & Charng, 1990; Schroeder, Dovidio, Penner, & Piliavin, 1995;
Schwartz, 1975). “Prosocial behavior with its psychological foundation is an important
conceptual framework for the understanding of philanthropic actions” (Drezner, 2011, p. 58).
Philanthropy, or the act of donating money to a nonprofit organization to help others, is a
specific form of prosocial behavior that is both prevalent and reoccurring in our society
(Drezner, 2011; Wiepking & Maas, 2009).
Academic research specifically on philanthropy started in the 1960s, but it was not until
the 1980s that it surfaced in the social sciences and economics as a new multidisciplinary area
(Andreoni, 2006; Katz, 1999). Since that time, scholarly interest in philanthropic giving has been
widespread (Bennett, 2003; Body & Breeze, 2016; Friedman & McGarvie, 2003; Kolm &
Ythier, 2006; Konrath & Handy, 2018; Payton & Moody, 2008; Seiler & Williams, 2001;
Wiepking & Handy, 2015).
One key difference in charitable giving compared to many other types of helping
behavior is the absence of the recipient. Unlike with volunteering, for example, the beneficiary
of a charitable gift is generally not present when a donation is made (Bekkers & Wiepking,
2011). Empirical studies in both psychology and economics have found that people have a
27
propensity to help others even at their own expense (Batson, 2011; Gintis, Bowles, Boyd, &
Fehr, 2005; Guy & Patton, 1989; Henrich et al., 2004).
The concept of making monetary gifts to charity has been studied as a category of
prosocial behavior. The social psychological literature on charitable giving provides myriad
reasons explaining why people give (Drezner & Huehls, 2015). Demographic and motivational
factors are drivers behind philanthropic giving that can be used to enhance a nonprofit’s
fundraising efforts.
Demographic Factors Affecting Philanthropic Giving
Although this study did not focus on demographic factors behind philanthropic giving, it
should be mentioned that nonprofits often look to these indicators to inform and enhance their
ability to get funding from individual donors to support their causes. As in the private sector,
when successfully marketing to donors, nonprofits seek to understand their target audience
through their underlying demographic makeup (Guy & Patton, 1989). The marketing literature
offers individual demographic factors that, whether individually or in combination, can suggest
keys to donor giving (Schortgen, 2006; Yao, 2015). These elements include a donor’s gender,
marital status, age, religious preference, wealth or income, education, and race (Bennett, 2003;
Havens, O’Herlihy, & Schervish, 2006; Schortgen, 2006; Taniguchi & Marshall, 2014; Yao,
2015).
The demographics affecting philanthropy are beginning to change. Schortgen (2006)
found that traditionally and historically, most giving was done by White, educated, and older
men. Drezner and Huehls (2015) noted “that most of the theories that currently exist to explain
philanthropic motivations were created using research that almost exclusively looked at the
giving of wealthy White men” (Chapter 1, Section 1, para. 3) and generally, do not account for
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behavior and motivations of minorities, women, or other classifications. However, with the
advancement of women and minorities in terms of education, income, and social standing,
historical patterns may be shifting (Drezner & Huehls, 2015; Mesch, 2010; Mesch et al., 2019).
Financial resources are a primary indicator of a person’s ability to give. Based on wealth transfer
estimates, women and millennials are expected to inherit trillions of dollars in the near term
(Havens & Schervish, 2003; Joslyn, 2018). With strategic pushes for more diversity in nonprofit
representation and funding, it is expected that the role of minorities is on the rise (Drezner &
Huehls, 2015; Rovner, 2015). Donor coordination, through vehicles such as giving circles, in
which individual donors pool their money and jointly make decisions on which nonprofits to
fund, is another development that will bring the voice of underrepresented groups to the support
of charitable causes (Held, 2014).
Theories of Philanthropic Motivations
Separate from demographic factors, motivational factors also drive charitable giving.
Understanding the underlying motivations of giving has been an interest area for many scholars
(Bekkers & Wiepking, 2007; Duncan, 1999; Guy & Patton, 1989; Wiepking & Bekkers, 2012;
Wiepking & Maas, 2009); however, given the extensive literature on motivations affecting
philanthropic giving, there are variations and inconsistencies (Lee & Chang, 2007; Webb, Green,
& Brashear, 2000).
Justice motivation theory, social movements, and social change. Motivation derived
from a need to fix a wrong or injustice falls under justice motivation theory (Drezner, 2011;
Drezner & Garvey, 2016; Silber, 2012). The justice motive or idea that people are motived by a
desire to live in a just world was postulated by Lerner (1975) and D. T. Miller (1977) and later
applied to philanthropy by Warren and Walker (1991). They suggested that people are motivated
29
to give to restore justice and their faith in a just world, but only if the donor thinks they can make
a real or lasting impact (Warren & Walker, 1991). The justice motive also can be a factor behind
religious-based giving (Gasman, Drezner, Epstein, Freeman, & Avery, 2011).
According to Lester Salamon (1994), “Virtually all America’s major social movements,
for example, whether civil rights, environmental, consumer, women’s or conservative, have had
their roots in the nonprofit sector” (p. 109). He added that nonprofits arose out of the state’s
inability to effectively respond to human needs, and their continued growth has been fostered by
governmental policies, public and private institutions, and ordinary citizens wanting to make a
change (Salamon, 1994). The nonprofit sector is also home to social movements, advocacy, and
confrontation- or challenge-based organizations (Jenkins, 1987; McCarthy et al., 1991) that
among other things, help advance equity, liberty, and justice for all people.
The founding of nonprofit organizations is often based on personal experiences that
motivated people to organize to help others. The Big Issue Foundation, a charity in the United
Kingdom, is one such case. By his own account, the founder of the Big Issue Foundation, John
Bird, was poor and homeless in his youth, so when he was able, he started the foundation to help
eradicate poverty, homelessness, and other social injustices. For the past 25 years, his foundation
has housed the homeless, secured jobs for the unemployed, and helped lift people out of poverty
(Bird, 2018). On a grander scale, Clara Barton’s founding of the Red Cross was influenced by
her experiences helping wounded soldiers on the battleground during the Civil War. She
recognized the importance of participating in the Red Cross network, which had agreements
around the world to remain neutral and provide aid to the injured regardless of their affiliation.
Based on these principles and her experiences, Barton founded the American Red Cross in 1881
(American Red Cross, n.d.).
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Like nonprofit founders, philanthropists seek to affect people on a large scale, and their
desire to make an impact has implications for social change and social movements. Individuals
who want to make a big impact often band together to form a social movement and utilize the
movement to try to create social change and correct injustices. According to Jenkins (1983),
“Social movements are traditionally seen as extensions of more elementary forms of collective
behavior and as encompassing both movements of personal change (e.g. religious sects, cults,
and communes) and those focused on institutional changes (e.g. legal reforms and changes in
political power)” (p. 529), whereas Mukherji (1977) defined a social movement as “an agent of
change” that “has a target on which it operates” (p. 38).
Resource mobilization theorists see social movements as collective attempts focused on
bringing about change to social institutions. They theorize that social movements are focused on
change via “elements of social structure and/or the reward distribution of society” (McCarthy &
Zald, 1977, pp. 1216-1217). Resource mobilization theory includes advocating for the
underrepresented (Jenkins & Perrow, 1977; Tilly, 1979) and organizing institutional elites
(Gamson, 1975). This theory notes the importance of various resources including expertise,
laborers, land, dedication, and trust (McCarthy & Zald, 1977; Oberschall, 1973). Social
movements utilize most of these resources to advance their causes, but they are especially
dependent on money (McCarthy, Shields, & Hall, 1997; Silver, 1998). Philanthropists,
particularly those motivated by injustice or who want to make an impact or social change, are a
natural source for this funding.
As previously mentioned, philanthropists can be motivated to correct injustice through
their giving (Drezner, 2011; Drezner & Garvey, 2016; Silber, 2012), and social movements often
arise to correct an injustice. Thomas and McCarthy (2017) referred to these social movement
31
donors as “benevolent supporters [who] engage in efforts to alleviate suffering through the
transfer of money or provision of goods (‘giving’)” (p. 189).
Philanthropic funding can be especially useful in today’s world. Contemporary social
movements have become professionalized and are often run by a well-paid staff rather than
grassroots supporters (McCarthy & Zald, 1987). “‘Conscience constituents’ in the sense of
sympathetic bystanders, wealthy patrons, and institutional sponsors are the major contributors to
these movements. ‘Speaking for’ rather than mobilizing the aggrieved, grassroots grievances are
seen as secondary if not irrelevant to these movements” (Jenkins, 2001, p. 4369). These types of
professionalized social movements are especially prevalent in the areas of the environment,
women’s issues, human rights, and peace promotion (Berry, 1997) and are in part supported
through the philanthropic funding of individual donors (Thomas & McCarthy, 2017).
Heather Joslyn (2017) presented a recent example of philanthropic funding alleviating
injustice in her “Chronicle of Philanthropy” article on philanthropist Ric Weiland, who donated
almost $68 million to support nonprofits fighting for LGBT rights. The article and LGBT
advocates credit Weiland with strengthening LGBT organizations, allowing them to make
significant progress toward their cause, including antibullying initiatives, the repeal of
discriminatory practices against gays in the military, and the right to gay marriage. Weiland’s
thoughtful and generous support demonstrates the impact philanthropic giving can have on social
movements or social change initiatives (Joslyn, 2017).
Weiland was not purely motivated by altruism. He strategically selected these causes
because he wanted to correct injustices that he had personally experienced (Joslyn, 2017).
“Similar to other marginalized populations, LGBTQ donors tend to want to support those like
themselves and organizations that are affirming to their community” (Drezner & Garvey, 2016,
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p. 665). A personal understanding of an issue or enhanced empathy for a predicament can be a
motivator for philanthropists who aspire to create social change.
As another example, women’s causes have long been advanced due to the support of
philanthropic funding (Clift, 2005; Walton, 2005). During the past several decades, working
women carried on this philanthropic tradition but have moved away from conventional areas of
support and are “driven by social change as the perceived goal of giving” (Clift, 2005, p.3).
According to Mesch (2009), through their philanthropic giving, “women are transforming
society around the world” (p. 1).
Torres-Gil (2007) and Harrow and Jung (2016) found that philanthropy has been robust
in supporting community and societal needs. Torres-Gil (2007) specifically noted that
philanthropists are still in “an ideal position to create social change” (p. 37). Drezner also noted
that philanthropic giving can bring about social change (Gasman et al., 2011). Through their
support of nonprofit organizations, philanthropists can effect large-scale societal change and
make an impact.
Intrinsic and extrinsic motivating factors: A psychology viewpoint. Earlier studies
sorted motivational factors into separate categories to explain similarities and differences. For
many scholars, especially those in the field of psychology, determinants of charitable giving fell
in both extrinsic and intrinsic categories (Bennett, 2003; Sargeant, 1999; Schlegelmilch et al.,
1997). Intrinsic motivations are personal and internally experienced, such as prosocial
preferences or altruism. An individual is considered to be “intrinsically motivated to perform an
activity when one receives no apparent reward except the activity itself” (Deci, 1971, p. 105).
Extrinsic or external motivators are benefits or material rewards gained by the donor for giving,
33
such as a tax deduction, public acknowledgement, or access to people, events, or information
(Fehr & Schmidt, 2003; Meier, 2007).
The idea that people give out of pure altruism has been debated. Most scholarly research
has found that prosocial behavior and its subset of philanthropic giving are not a result of pure
altruism but rather a blend of altruistic and selfish motivations (Drezner & Huehls, 2015). In
such cases, donors are motivated by both intrinsic and extrinsic factors. Even in the case of
anonymous giving, scholars find that there are benefits to the donor. In his economically based
theory, Andreoni (1989) posited that donors derive a personal benefit of good feelings or
improved sense of self, which he termed “warm glow,” from making philanthropic donations.
This effect can be present for anonymous and named giving.
Public good model vs. private consumption model: An economic viewpoint. Similar
to intrinsic and extrinsic factors, some scholars, mainly in economics, have created two
categories for understanding donor giving: public good and private consumption (Andreoni,
1990; Glazer & Konrad, 1996; Piliavin & Charng, 1990). As previously mentioned, the desire to
help others or altruism is one of the main reasons people exhibit prosocial behavior. Roberts
(1984) offered an economic perspective in defining altruism as “the case where the level of
consumption of one individual enters the utility function of the other” (p. 137). Despite the
incompatibility of altruistic behavior with the underpinning of self-interest in economics,
economic analysis starts with the assumption that altruism is the basis for charitable giving
(Andreoni, 2006). With altruism, donors aim to maximize a utility, such as positive benefits to
society, through their giving. Research has posited other explanations, such as charitable giving
is not selfless but provides a benefit to donors such as protecting institutions or practices that
34
might provide potential future use or enjoyment to the donor or as already mentioned, the “warm
glow” effect (Andreoni, 1990).
According to Duncan (1999), donors who desire to create more public good through their
contributions fall into the public good category, whereas those motivated purely by the act of
giving are part of the private consumption model. In the private consumption model, giving to
charity is always of value to donors because it is linked to how they feel. In the public good
model, the value is variable because it is tied to the amount of public good created in society
(Duncan, 1999). Duncan went on to note that a combination of both models may be a more
realistic approach to understanding donor giving.
Leading motivations for philanthropic giving. In the taxonomy of these many studies,
altruism or a desire to help others (Andreoni, 1990; Guy & Patton, 1989; Piliavin & Charng,
1990) and social pressure (Akerlof & Kranton, 2000) are the most common reasons for giving
(Bachke, Alfnes, & Wik, 2014). Other elements such as monetary, reputational, and values-
enhancing factors; trust; and making an impact are also noted as top motivating factors in the
literature on charitable giving behavior (Bekkers & Wiepking, 2011; James, 2017; Sargeant &
Woodliffe, 2007).
As research continues, scholars have found nuances and variations in motivations behind
philanthropic giving. For example, Ariely, Bracha, and Meier (2007) posited that image
considerations or the perception and opinion of others is a motivating factor. They find that when
benefits gained through prosocial decisions are publicly known, the donor’s image-value can be
diminished, and therefore, he or she may be less inclined to give (Ariely et al., 2007). In a
separate study, Verhaert and Van den Poel (2011) found that empathy is a contributing factor to
charitable giving, along with traditional predictors.
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Literature Reviews on Philanthropic Drivers
Sargeant and Woodliffe’s (2007) literature review on the motivations underlying
philanthropic giving provides specific insights on drivers of monetary giving from their vantage
point. Their 2007 “Gift Giving: An Interdisciplinary Review” synthesized the literature from
various disciplines to develop a composite model of giving behavior to inform fundraising
practices. The dimensions of the model are motives, external influences, individual donor
characteristics, inhibitors, sources of information, perceptual reaction, and processing
determinants, which lead to outputs in the form of gifts followed by feedback such as recognition
of these gifts (Sargeant & Woodliffe, 2007).
In a comprehensive and systematic review of all motivating factors, Bekkers and
Wiepking (2011) produced an overview of the academic literature on the determinants of
philanthropic giving by individuals and households from all disciplines. This review of more
than 500 articles united previous studies and opinions on philanthropic giving and understanding
of why people givs. The authors focused on why people donate money to charitable
organizations and noted that philanthropic giving deviates from findings in early studies on
helping behavior. Those earlier studies emphasized the importance of motivational factors and
social dynamics as a consequence of having beneficiaries in attendance during the helping
action. Philanthropic giving is atypical in that recipients are generally not present when a gift is
made. Bekkers and Wiepking (2011) confirmed the findings of previous research on the
motivating factors that drive charitable giving. Their study also found limited evidence of
theoretical progress in the study of philanthropy, with economic articles having the strongest
theoretical foundations (Bekkers & Wiepking, 2011).
36
Through their review, Bekkers and Wiepking (2011) provided a theoretical framework to
explain charitable giving and identified eight mechanisms as predictors of philanthropic giving:
awareness of need, solicitation, costs and benefits, altruism, reputation, psychological benefits,
values, and efficacy; however, they remained unclear on the relative influence of each
mechanism on giving. Their classification of these eight mechanisms is based on four
dimensions that essentially cover the questions of “Who?” What?” and Where?” The first of
these four dimensions addresses the physical form of the mechanism and revolves around the
question of “What?” It considers the physical form of tangible versus intangible properties of
each mechanism. For example, the mechanisms of reputation, psychological costs and benefits,
and values would be considered intangible, whereas the mechanisms of altruism and costs and
benefits are tangible. The location dimension examines the question of “Where?’ and addresses
the location of relationships among involved parties such as a donor, beneficiaries, and nonprofit
staff. Looking at where activity is unfolding, whether “within, outside, or between” individuals,
influenced the authors’ categorization of the eight mechanisms. From this perspective, the
mechanism of values, for example, occurs within a person, whereas the mechanism of
solicitation happens between people. The mechanism of need falls in all three areas, because it
can happen within, outside, and between people. The question of “Who?” is considered from two
perspectives: those of the actor and the target. For the mechanism of solicitation, the actors can
be the organization or beneficiaries and the target is the donor, whereas the mechanism of
altruism has the donors and organization as the actors with the beneficiaries as the target
(Bekkers & Wiepking, 2011).
The mechanism of efficacy can be defined in terms of all four dimensions to further
illustrate the authors’ approach. They defined efficacy as “the perception of donors that their
37
contribution makes a difference to the cause they are supporting” (Bekkers & Wiepking, 2011, p.
942). Efficacy, or the perception of impact by donors, is an intangible property that happens
within a person. The actors of efficacy are the nonprofit organizations and the targets are the
beneficiaries. This literature review offered the concept of making an impact or efficacy as one
of the most important factors driving charitable giving (Bekkers & Wiepking, 2011). They noted
that this concept is a newer addition to the list of motivating factors and posited that nonprofits
that are perceived as being able to make the biggest impact will tend to yield higher levels of
philanthropic giving.
In a more recent study, Konrath and Handy (2018) developed and validated a
comprehensive scale of giving motivations. In keeping with prior research on the benefits of
volunteering (Handy et al., 2000) and utilizing terminology from psychology of internal or
external drivers (Konrath, Fuhrel-Forbis, Lou, & Brown, 2012; Stukas, Hoye, Nicholson, Brown,
& Aisbett, 2016), Konrath and Handy (2018) returned to earlier classifications of these
motivations as private or public benefits and included overlap. They limited the number of donor
motivations to six main categories of altruism, egoism, social, tax benefits, trust, and constraints.
The public benefits, or benefits oriented toward others rather than the self, are altruism and trust.
The private benefits are tax benefits, financial constraints, and egoism or reputational benefits.
Social motives such as giving because of participation in a network overlaps both areas (Konrath
& Handy, 2018).
Corresponding attributes exist among the six donor motives of Konrath and Handy
(2018) and eight mechanisms of Bekkers and Wiepking (2011); however, Konrath and Handy
did not explicitly note making an impact as a donor motivation. Their scale does not assess all
donor motives, and the status of “making an impact” was not clarified. The public benefit of trust
38
in organizations could include a donor’s desire to make an impact; however, the authors did not
provide enough detail to make that assertion.
In summary, motivational factors behind charitable giving have been explored in many
academic disciplines. Although altruism and social factors are the most widely cited, making an
impact is prevalent as a top driver. Bekkers & Wiepking’s (2011) thorough review of the
literature confirmed that the ability to make an impact is an important consideration to
philanthropists in their funding decisions.
Making an Impact through Philanthropic Giving
Defining Impact
In the philanthropic realm, the nomenclature for “making an impact” is varied and often
inconsistently defined. As an international organization consisting of 34 market-based
democratic countries, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD)
has attempted to clarify concepts, terms, and a definition (Woerrlein & Scheck, 2016). In the
glossary of its Evaluation and Aid Effectiveness series, the OECD’s Development Assistance
Committee defined impacts as “positive and negative, primary and secondary long-term effects
produced by a development intervention, directly or indirectly, intended or unintended” (OECD,
2002, p. 24).
Woerrlein and Scheck (2016) included this OECD definition in their attempt to
standardize definitions used both by practitioners and academics. In their literature-based
analysis of terms and definitions for the third sector, they defined impacts as “long-term changes
occurring during the lifetime of one project and/or after the project … [that] go beyond the target
group and therefore can be viewed as a change in society as a whole” (p. 233). Because they
found other definitions to lack applicability to actual practice, Woerrlein and Scheck (2016)
39
disagreed with others in the field such as William Rosenzweig, who defined impact as “the
portion of the total outcome that happened as a result of the activity of the venture, above and
beyond what would have happened anyway” (Rosenzweig, 2004, p. 7).
Brian Duncan’s (2004) “Theory of Impact Philanthropy” is predicated on his definition of
impact from a philanthropic perspective. He defines an impact philanthropist as a donor who
personally wants “to make a difference.” Although this definition seems simple and
advantageous to the nonprofit sector, this theory has the potential to create negative effects in the
field. When impact philanthropists narrowly define impact from their personal perspective,
aggregate giving can decline, as in cases where philanthropists pull their support if they are not
the sole source of the nonprofit’s impact or have to share the spotlight with other funders. This
theory’s focus on the narrow definition of impact from the philanthropist’s viewpoint has the
potential to engender an unhealthy dependence between donors and recipients that may extend
the amount of time beneficiaries remain in needy situations. It also leaves open the possibility for
disagreement between philanthropists and nonprofit organizations when deciding how to allocate
gifts in part because how they define impact leads to differ goals. These features suggest that a
donor’s definition of impact will influence his or her giving behavior (Drezner & Huehls, 2015).
Depending on its application, impact can be defined in many ways (Izzo, 2013; Osborne
et al., 1995; Wainwright, 2003). Individual philanthropists and organizations may vary in how
they define impact. In this study, impact refers to the positive change a philanthropist aims to
achieve through philanthropic giving. This approach to the definition of impact is inclusive of
the term “outcome” (Osborne et al., 1995; Wainwright, 2003).
In the case of charitable organizations, impact considers the results gained from a
program compared to what might have happened without implementation of the program.
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Ultimately, impact refers to a nonprofit’s contributions to the public good and how these changes
are calculated and communicated to donors (C. Robinson & Billingsley, 2016), but there is no
single agreed upon definition.
Measuring Impact
Peter Frumkin (2000) described the idea of making an impact as one of the oldest
philanthropic principles, citing the proverb, “Give a man a fish and he will be hungry tomorrow.
Teach a man to fish and he will feed himself for life.” From the funder’s perspective, Frumkin
defined this philanthropic leverage “as a way of maximizing the impact of their contributions” or
getting “the biggest bang for each philanthropic buck” (p. 40).
The process of measuring the impact of philanthropic giving can be complicated (Berg &
Mansson, 2011), but it allows organizations and donors to know whether or not they are making
a difference (Epstein & Yuthas, 2014). Accountability in the nonprofit sector is on the upswing
and measuring impact can alleviate some of the pressure on organizations to demonstrate change
to their constituents (Arvidson & Lyon, 2014; Bachke et al., 2013; Ebrahim & Rangan, 2014).
Measuring impact in the nonprofit sector is not straightforward. As in the for-profit and
public sectors, there is no agreement on the specific criteria needed to measure performance
(Moxham, 2009); however, determining how to define success and when it has been achieved is
a good start. These decisions are the foundation for being able to evaluate progress and make
appropriate adjustments to boost performance (Epstein & Yuthas, 2014).
Measuring impact may be fraught with limitations. Feasibility can be one such constraint,
such as when there is a desire to measure items that cannot be measured or achieved (Ridzi,
2012). Performance measurements can also be limited by an organization’s selection of what to
measure (Arvidson & Lyon, 2014). A charity can make decisions that shape the measurement
41
process and place the organization in a positive light when reporting to donors (Arvidson &
Lyon, 2014). It should also be noted that when measurement processes are extensive and
involved, nonprofits can be drained of time, money, and focus on their core mission (Moxham,
2009).
Ridzi (2012) provided a layered structure for how to measure impact. For him, the scale
of the action frames how impact should be measured. Ridzi’s framing has four levels: (a) the
individual level measures outcomes of programs for individuals; (b) the organizational level
measures an organization’s capacity changes; (c) the interorganizational level measures
collaborations among organizations; and (d) the community level measures impact on the
broader community. Individual and organizational measurements are the most widely used
(Ridzi, 2012, p. 101).
Measurements of impact are also important in the business world. Based on an analysis
of the business literature, Rawhouser, Cummings, and Newbert (2019) recognized the
amorphous nature of social impact as a concept and the subsequent difficulties in measuring it.
Clarification of what exactly is being measured and validity of data to appropriately measure
social impact are among their recommendations for improving measurement (Rawhouser et al.,
2019).
Measuring impact has implications beyond metrics. Communication of impact can
engender trust of the charity with its donor base (Berg & Mansson, 2011). It is a way to help
manage donor relations and expectations (Ridzi, 2012; Woerrlein & Scheck, 2016). Woerrlein
and Scheck (2016) further posited that measuring impact triggers “positive effects on the quality
of work” (p. 221). Therefore, impact measurement can optimize an organization’s output,
thereby encouraging donors to increase their contributions.
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Philanthropy and Making an Impact
The scholarly literature has found that making an impact is a key motivating factor
behind philanthropic giving. As previously cited, Bekkers and Wiepking (2011) found making an
impact, or efficacy, to be one of main mechanisms of donor giving that emerged from their
comprehensive literature review of more than 500 articles. They also noted that making an
impact is a recent addition to the list of motivating factors.
Duncan’s theory of impact philanthropy. The concept of making a difference is
especially pronounced in Brian Duncan’s (2004) “A Theory of Impact Philanthropy.” Along
with the public goods and private consumption models found in the economic literature on donor
motivation, Duncan added a third category that he referred to as impact philanthropy. Motivated
by a desire to personally “make a difference” (Duncan, 2004, p. 2159), in this philanthropic
theory, donors give because they derive enjoyment from personally increasing the output of a
good in society (Drezner & Huehls, 2015).
In this theory, the inner workings of philanthropic motivation are viewed differently from
the public goods and private consumption models (Duncan, 2004). As previously stated, the total
amount of public good in society is the motivating factor in the public goods model. Because the
driving motivation is the overall level of public good in society or what a gift accomplished,
philanthropic gifts have a positive relational value to the giving of others. In this scenario,
anyone can gain enjoyment from anyone else’s gift, because they all serve the same goal of
increasing the public good. This model allows for free riding off the donations of others. In the
private consumption model, the motivating factor is the enjoyment of making the gift itself. In
this case, there is no relationship with gifts made by other donors, because the enjoyment from
giving is not shared (Duncan, 2004).
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In Duncan’s theory of impact philanthropy, philanthropists give because they enjoy
personally “increasing the output of a good” (p. 2160). This goal of personally making an impact
has a negative relational value to the gifts of others. Impact philanthropists do not free-ride and
enjoy the gifts of others. In fact, the gifts of others reduce the personal enjoyment a donor gets
when credit for impact is shared. For example, the donations of other supporters can decrease an
impact of a philanthropist’s charitable enjoyment by decreasing the amount of impact the
philanthropist can produce. As a result, coordination of giving among impact philanthropists can
reduce aggregate giving. To contrast Duncan’s theory of impact philanthropy and the public
goods model, the former is concerned with the direct changes a philanthropist personally makes,
whereas the latter is concerned with the overall level of public good in society (Duncan, 2004).
Although the motive to make an impact seems straightforward, the ramifications can vary
significantly from behavior produced through other models (Duncan, 2004).
Duncan suggested that impact philanthropy can result in a codependent relationship
between donors and recipients, because the donor enjoys or derives benefit from the recipient’s
needs (Drezner, 2011). The recipient’s needs are intrinsic to the donor’s goal, and without them
there is no benefit. In this scenario, philanthropists cannot make an impact without a need, so
there appears to be a benefit from the donor’s perspective if the recipient remains dependent on
philanthropic support. By contrast, in the public goods model, the donor benefits from the
recipient becoming independent. Under the public goods model, a philanthropist could derive a
benefit from the higher level of social good in society, such as a beneficiary’s advancement
beyond the need for services, while not having to personally pay for it (Duncan, 2004).
Finally, this theory features the potential for disagreement between a donor and a
nonprofit regarding the allocation of philanthropic gifts. Whereas a charitable organization
44
would generally prefer to distribute a charitable gift across many goods, an impact philanthropist
would prefer to allocate contributions to a specific good to produce the biggest impact (Duncan,
2004). For this reason, impact philanthropists often target their gifts to increase the perceived
impact on the cause or recipient (Duncan, 2004). For example, some philanthropists may prefer
giving directly to a homeless person, rather than giving to a charity for homelessness (Sargeant
& Woodliffe, 2007), or they might designate a gift that excludes the nonprofit’s overhead
expenses because the perceived impact would be low. In this model, there is a direct relationship
between the perception of making a difference and the level of philanthropic giving. By
application, gifts from wealthy donors would be expected to make a substantial impact.
Consequently, if funding by governments or other sources decreases the donor’s perception of
his or her ability to make an impact, the philanthropist may opt out of donating (Duncan, 2004).
Philanthropic giving by the wealthy and making an impact. Wealthy individuals have
a long history of giving in America, with many important benefactors and achievements
(Bremner, 1988). Havens, O’Herlihy, and Schervish (2006) summed up the effect of
demographic factors on giving by the wealthy, finding that, “Decades of research indicate that
higher levels of charitable giving are positively associated with higher income, higher wealth,
greater religious participation, volunteerism, age, marriage, higher educational attainment, U.S.
citizenship, higher proportion of earned wealth versus inherited wealth, and a greater level of
financial security” (p. 9). In their 1988 study, Schervish and Herman interviewed 130 individuals
with a net worth of $1 million each to discover the motivations underlying their charitable
giving. In keeping with past work on motivational drivers of philanthropic giving, they identified
intrinsic and extrinsic rewards; demographic characteristics; experiences from youth; invitations
to participate; discretionary resources; the donor’s participation in social networks; values, goals,
45
and beliefs; and urgency or effectiveness. Urgency or effectiveness is the desire to make a
difference (Schervish & Herman, 1988).
Desire to make an impact. The desire to make an impact among the wealthy has also
been identified in a national survey year after year. Since 2006, U.S. Trust (formerly Bank of
America) in conjunction with the Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy has
been publishing The Study of High Net Worth Philanthropy. This biennial report provides
insights into the motivations, priorities, and strategies for giving and volunteering of high-net-
worth donors in the United States. The latest edition, published in 2018, suggested that
philanthropic giving remains strong and is highly influenced by the donor’s values, areas of
personal interest, and knowledge of the organization and the need (U.S. Trust & Lilly Family
School of Philanthropy, 2018). Echoing previous work, a key finding of the study is that making
an impact matters to high-net-worth individuals. It further identified charitable giving as the
primary method for making an impact, according to participants. Despite a strong belief that their
giving can have a great impact, 54% of survey participants did not know if their giving had the
impact they intended, and 30% of respondents noted that they find it challenging to monitor
nonprofit organizations to ensure their gift is making the intended impact (U.S. Trust & Lilly
Family School of Philanthropy, 2018).
Hyperagency. In his 2005 publication “Major Donors, Major Motives: The People and
Purposes Behind Major Gifts,” Schervish found the desire to have an impact to be especially
pronounced among the wealthy. A donor’s desire to make an impact has been established in the
literature. In their comprehensive and summative review, Bekkers and Wiepking (2011) found
efficacy to be one of eight mechanism driving charitable giving. The term efficacy describes a
donor’s desire to have an impact. Brian Duncan (2004) noted this same desire to make an impact
46
as the driving force behind charitable giving for impact philanthropists. Characteristics of an
impact philanthropist are in keeping with the qualities of a high-net-worth philanthropist.
According to Schervish (2005), this predilection for making an impact among the
wealthy is at least partly due to what he called “hyperagency.” “Hyperagency refers to the
enhanced capacity of wealthy individuals to establish or control substantially the conditions
under which they and others carry out their agency” (Schervish, 2005, p. 21). In other words, a
wealthy person’s ability to control and shape his or her environment far exceeds the agency of
nonwealthy individuals. As Schervish (2005) described it, “What is different for wealth holders
is that they can be more legitimately confident about actualizing their expectations and
aspirations because they are able to directly effect the fulfillment of their desires” (p. 12). They
can use their resources to circumvent constraints and more easily get what they want. For
example, the wealthy have greater options and choices in how they spend their time as compared
to a nonwealthy person, whose choices can be constrained by the conditions under which he or
she lives. This ability encourages the wealthy to expect to set their own agenda and shape
situations according to their own specifications. This concept of hyperagency carries over to the
philanthropic giving of the wealthy, who want to do more than just make a gift. In Schervish’s
(2005) words, “Hyperagency in the field of philanthropy assigns financial resources to
fashioning major outcomes” (p. 13). Due to this hyperagency, the wealthy will often try to shape
a cause and make a big impact because they think or know they can.
The factors underlying hyperagency were detailed in Gospels of Wealth (Schervish,
Coutsoukis, and Lewis, 1994). In it they:
described three interrelated components of the capacities that constitute the genetic
resources which hyperagents draw on in exercising their productive agency. These are
47
(1) psychological empowerment—the disposition of great expectations, the
legitimacy of those expectations, and the confidence to achieve them;
(2) spatial empowerment—the capacity to establish a protective wall from
intrusion and to extend one’s influence geographically beyond one’s immediate personal
presence; and
(3) temporal empowerment—the ability to reshape the past, forge the present, and
bind the future. (as cited in Schervish, 2005, p. 10)
In addition, Schervish et al. (1994) noted three “normative and existential frameworks”
that influence how these resources are used:
(1) the daily exercise of what is conceived to be virtue or strength of character
that directs how hyperagents work with the opportunities and obstacles of the hand that
life has dealt them;
(2) the special exercise of character that is required to face tests of moral fiber that
occur as individuals move through formative life-course transitions from one social status
and personal identity to another; and
(3) the impulse to make the big and small events of biography a redemptive
process of life, death, and rebirth in the quest for healing, learning, forgiveness, and
union. (as cited in Schervish, 2005, p. 11)
The quality that most distinguishes the hyperagency available to the wealthy from the
agency applicable to any or all people is the generative rather than mere participatory efforts they
are afforded (Schervish, 2005). The wealthy take an active, empowered, or can-do approach to
utilizing and engaging the aforementioned resources and influences. Whether in the physical
48
world or from a psychological perspective, the wealthy have agency beyond that of lower-
income people; however, this effect is not necessarily utilized or obvious to all.
Theories on Donor Perception and Impact through Philanthropic Giving
In general, perception affects thinking and behavior because it frames an individual’s
worldview. By extension, a donor’s perception affects philanthropic giving in various ways.
Understanding how perception affects giving and the elements involved will add to the
conversation on the motivational drivers behind charitable giving. For this study, perception is
based on the donor’s perspective and may not be in keeping with reality or the viewpoint of
others.
Different aspects of perception affect donor giving. One object of a donor’s perception is
the charitable organization. The nonprofit organization can affect a donor’s perception and by
extension, the donor’s giving. As an example, a donor’s perception can be affected by the
nonprofit’s brand (Bennett, 2003). If a supporter identifies with the perceived image of the
charity, the likelihood of giving increases (Frisch & Gerrard, 1981). Compatibility between a
donor’s values and the values of the nonprofit or other similarities shared between donors and
beneficiaries can encourage giving (Bennett, 2003).
The study of perception in marketing, especially as it relates to consumer behavior, can
extend to philanthropy. Although the application of private-sector marketing principles to
nonbusiness sectors is complex (Rothschild, 1979), some early studies synthesized the marketing
literature and posited complex models for giving behavior (Bendapudi et al., 1996; Burnett &
Wood, 1988; Guy & Patton, 1989). Drawing on this work, Adrian Sargeant (1999) created a
model that focused on a category of “perceptual determinants” that can affect charitable giving.
These determinants include perceptions about reputation and performance, perceptions of the
49
benefits accruing from an exchange, and in cases where applicable, perceptions around the
quality of services provided by the nonprofit. (Sargeant, 1999).
Further expounding on the extensive literature underpinning nonprofit marketing,
Sargeant et al. (2006) created the first empirically based marketing model for donor perception
and the resulting impact on donations. They also considered how donor perceptions of the
recipient organization might influence giving behavior and confirmed that trust improves
relationships and ultimately, giving. A donor’s perception of a nonprofit can be based on
elements such as organizational performance, responsiveness, communication, and ability to
achieve goals.
Perception and trust are especially important as motivating factors in philanthropy, and
the nonprofit is integral to influencing these dimensions in its donor base (Sargeant et al., 2006).
Specifically, “trust is created when a nonprofit is perceived to have had an impact on the cause
and by maintaining appropriate communications with the donor” (Sargeant et al., 2006, p. 162).
Donor trust in an organization is unrelated to the direct benefits the donor receives. Instead, trust
is based on both the donor’s perception of the benefits or impact provided by the organization
and the organization’s communications of this impact to the donors regarding the beneficiaries of
the philanthropic gift (Sargeant et al., 2006).
The nature of philanthropic giving implies a need for trust on the side of supporters.
Philanthropic support is intangible and often lacks objective evidence to evaluate performance
(Coleman, 1990; Sargeant et al., 2006). This issue is particularly relevant in the nonprofit sector,
where philanthropic giving is highly intangible (Polonsky & Macdonald, 2000). Donors
generally lack concrete detail regarding the services provided to the recipients and the impact
50
being made. Philanthropists depend on charities to make good on implicit and explicit promises
to benefit society and must trust they will be successful (Hansmann, 1980).
Other factors that affect donor giving behavior include donors’ perception of the benefits
they might receive from giving (Amos, 1982; Krebs, 1982). Perceived benefits can be
economically based, such as when a donor may have used the services in the past or expects to
have a need in the future (Amos, 1982). Socially related benefits can support people and
activities in the donor’s network (Bruce, 1998; Sargeant, 1999), and a donor’s perception of the
prestige or reputation enhancement of giving is another motivating factor (Stroebe & Frey,
1982).
Engel and Weber (2007) posited that decisions are driven by three psychological
mechanisms: heart or affect based, book or recognition based, and head or calculation based
(also see Weber & Lindemann, 2007). These mechanisms can be applied to helping situations to
understand why individuals help others (Ames, Flynn, & Weber, 2004; Erlandsson, Björklund, &
Bäckström, 2015).
For the affect-based decision mechanism, people help from the heart. As an example,
emergency situations such as the destruction caused in the wake of a hurricane or tsunami can
elicit intense emotions from others and drive them to “help with the heart.” When “helping by
the book” or utilizing recognition-based decision making, people are driven to help when they
recognize their personal responsibility or moral obligation or duty, such as when people feel a
need to give back because of what they have attained. “Helping with the head” involves
calculation-based decisions whereby people estimate the value of helping by calculating the costs
and benefits. Calculation-based situations involve analytic thought and are best suited to
maximizing material consequences. In these conditions, people are more likely to help when
51
their subsequent impact is perceived to be high (Engel & Weber, 2007; Erlandsson et al., 2015;
Weber & Lindemann, 2007).
Although the heart-based and book-based mechanisms drive funding decisions, the
calculation-based scenario most closely aligns with the desire to make an impact. This perceived
impact or decision mechanism that moves people to help others is also known as perceived
efficacy or perceived utility. A direct relationship exists between the donor’s perceived impact of
a contribution and the likelihood of helping. The perception of impact will be higher for projects
that demand equal resources but generate larger amounts of goods or benefits.
The higher the expected impact from a donation, the more inclined donors are to give
(Engel & Weber, 1998; Erlandsson et al., 2015; Weber & Lindemann, 2007). Fundraising
campaigns can take advantage of this effect because donors perceive their campaign gift as
making a larger impact during a campaign (Cryder, Loewenstein, & Seltman, 2013). Conversely,
when donors perceive that overhead costs are high, their motivation for helping plummets
(Sargeant & Woodliffe, 2007).
Similarly, the drop-in-the-bucket effect, also known as the reference-group effect or the
proportion dominance effect, is another example of how giving is affected by calculations and
perceptions. In this case, the percentage of people being helped is the influencing factor. If the
total number of people that can be helped is constant, people will lean toward helping a high
number of people from a smaller group rather than from a larger group because the proportion is
higher. For example, the preference is to help 10 people out of 13 rather than 10 out of 200.
(Baron, 1997; Bartels, 2006; Fetherstonhaugh, Slovic, Johnson, & Friedrich, 1997). By
inference, the perception of making an impact is greater in this scenario.
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Calculations are also a factor in Brian Duncan’s (2004) theory of impact philanthropy.
Donors estimate the impact of their giving based on the change in the level of public goods in
society resulting from their donation. A donor’s perception of the impact he or she can make
fluctuates with this calculation and the tracking of other gifts. Impact philanthropists may
decrease their giving when others step up because they perceive they will make less of an
impact, and they may specifically target a gift to increase perceived impact (Duncan, 2004).
Another contributor to donor perception is the quality of the relationship between the
nonprofit and the donor. A model put forth by Shabbir, Palihawadana, and Thwaites (2007)
suggests that various factors in combination are useful in building strong relationships that
engender goodwill and that relationship quality is dynamic and changing. According to the
authors, “donor-perceived quality relationships” are built by appealing to both the head and the
heart. The key factors involved are quality of service, trust, benefits stemming from the
relationship, satisfaction, and commitment; however, the combination of these elements most
affects donors’ perception of the relationship (Shabbir et al., 2007).
In “A Method for Research and Practice: Using a Developmentally Informed Interview to
Increase Donor Engagement,” Jones and Daniel (2018) address donor perception and thinking
from a psychological perspective and offer a theoretical framework and assessment technique for
researchers and fundraisers to increase donor engagement. The framework, based on Robert
Kegan’s constructive development approach, involves an in-depth interview of donors to identify
how rather than what a donor is thinking, because understanding how donors think is the key to
understanding how they will fund, especially on complex topic areas. “The goal here is to
develop a stronger relationship and, eventually, help the donor to understand the mission in
increasingly complex ways” (Jones & Daniel, 2018, p. 190).
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This method involves subjecting donors to a probing Subject-Object Interview and then
categorizing them into one of Kegan’s three developmental levels. The first adult stage or the
Socialized Mind is associated with the ability to change your own behavior because of an
internalization of what others are thinking or feeling. In this stage, a donor would tend to go
along with ideas that have been proposed by others, whereas in the next stage or the Self-
Authoring Mind stage, the donor stays focused on his or her own ideas and viewpoints over
those of others. Few people attain the third stage or the Self-Transforming Mind stage. In this
stage the donor has independent ideas but is open to having his or her assumptions and
viewpoints questioned (Jones & Daniel, 2018).
In practice this theory poses some issues. It makes the assumption that donors would be
willing to participate in specialized and in-depth interviews and that nonprofit staff would have
the time and ability to glean personal data, assess the developmental stage and translate that
information into appropriate donor engagement strategies. Nonprofits and their staff are limited
in their resources so focusing on the intricacies and assessment techniques required may be
prohibitive. Although donor interviews may provide helpful information, the stages do not
appear to encompass many of the considerations most important to fundraisers such as those
identified in the section on motivation.
Summary
This chapter examined the academic literature on drivers behind philanthropic giving and
use of the concept of making an impact for philanthropic giving. Although major theories and
research have been presented, a gap remains in understanding how high-net-worth individuals
view the concept of making an impact and how it affects their philanthropic giving.
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Chapter 3: Methodology
Introduction
This chapter describes the research design utilized to answer the proposed research
questions through data collection. To gather data on how high-net-worth philanthropists describe
their experiences of giving, this qualitative study utilized semistructured interviews. Divided into
three main sections, this chapter discusses the methodology; study participants; and data
collection, coding, and ethical concerns.
Methodology
Qualitative research has been defined by Strauss and Corbin (1998) as “any type of
research that produces findings not arrived at by statistical procedures or other means of
quantification. It can refer to research about persons’ lives, lived experiences, behaviors,
emotions, and feelings as well as about organizational functioning, social movements, cultural
phenomena, and interactions between nations” (pp. 10–11). They suggested benefits to using a
qualitative approach when seeking a better understanding of a phenomenon and when
quantitative measures would not appropriately convey or interpret the scenario to meet research
purposes (Strauss & Corbin, 1998).
Qualitative research is an inductive approach to discovering meaning and understanding
phenomenon based on the detailed descriptions of study participants (Creswell, 2014; Merriam,
2002). To understand the decision making and perceptions of high-net-worth individuals, this
qualitative study was designed around semistructured interviews (Creswell, 2014). A qualitative
design with one-on-one interviews allows the researcher to explore the meaning behind people’s
experiences and activities (Creswell, 2014; Willing, 2013). Semistructured interviews are
designed to elicit valid data from participants (Harrison, 2005) and gain unfound knowledge and
55
rich details (Rubin & Rubin, 2011). According to DiCicco-Bloom and Crabtree (2006), these
types of interviews are an opportunity to learn from the participant. They are organized around
predetermined open-ended questions but are not limited to them. Additional questions can be
asked during the interview process to glean more information and get a better understanding of
the participants’ experiences and thoughts.
Phenomenology
Because this study is focused on the perceptions, meaning, and experiences of high-net-
worth philanthropists from their perspective, a phenomenological approach was taken.
According to Stan Lester (1999):
The purpose of the phenomenological approach is to illuminate the specific, to identify
phenomena through how they are perceived by the actors in a situation. …
Epistemologically, phenomenological approaches are based in a paradigm of personal
knowledge and subjectivity, and emphasise the importance of personal perspective and
interpretation. As such they are powerful for understanding subjective experience,
gaining insights into people’s motivations and actions, and cutting through the clutter of
taken-for-granted assumptions and conventional wisdom. (p. 1)
This viewpoint is supported by Kvale’s (1996) finding that “the important reality is what people
perceive it to be” (p. 52). Willig (2013) described interpretive phenomenology, a subset of
phenomenology, as having the aim of gaining “a better understanding of the nature and quality of
phenomena” (p. 86). She noted:
Phenomenological research, including interpretative phenomenological analysis focuses
on perceptions. It aims to gain a better understanding of how the world appears to
participants, of how participants perceive and experience the world, from their own
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perspectives. … Phenomenological research is concerned with how the world presents
itself to people as they engage with it in particular contexts and with particular intentions.
… As a result, while it is able to generate detailed, rich descriptions of participants’
experiences of situations and events … and documents the lived experience of
participants, it does not attempt to explain it. (p. 68)
In this scenario, the researcher utilizes both description and interpretation to make meaning from
the research.
The Role of the Researcher
In phenomenology, the researcher can play a key role in the inquiry, because his or her
life experiences influence the study. The researcher’s life experiences affect the questions posed
and the interpretation of the data. As Moran (2002) noted in his Introduction to Phenomenology
in describing the work of one of the leading philosophers behind the concept of phenomenology,
Martin Heidegger,
Heidegger has strongly insisted that all questioning carries certain presumptions which
govern the enquiry and even predetermine to a certain extent what can be discovered. We
therefore disclose the answer in the light of what we already know. … Heidegger is very
aware that our understanding grows or decays according to the kind of lives we are
leading and the kind of cultural situation we inhabit. (p. 237)
According to Patricia Adler and Peter Adler (1987), the researcher’s personal
involvement as an observer influences how data are perceived, documented, and coded. The
researcher in this study is a development officer who has worked in the nonprofit sector for more
than a decade. She earned a Certificate of Fundraising from UCLA Extension and her work
involves asking prospects to make philanthropic donations to support causes, programs, centers,
57
and individuals. These proficiencies informed her understanding and perspective on philanthropy
and giving. Her firsthand experience working with donors and prospects influenced the in-depth
conversations on these topics. Given her familiarity and experience with philanthropy, this study
relied on interviews. In accordance with Dexter’s (2006) assertion that when interviewers have
enough of a background in the topic area to understand and interpret the data, it is reasonable to
rely solely on interviews.
Study Participants
In his four-point approach to qualitative interview research sampling, Oliver Robinson
(2013) listed the following important steps:
(1) Defining a sample universe, by way of specifying inclusion and exclusion criteria for
potential participation; (2) deciding upon a sample size, through the conjoint
consideration of epistemological and practical concerns; (3) selecting a sampling
strategy, such as random sampling, convenience sampling, stratified sampling, cell
sampling, quota sampling or a single-case selection strategy; and (4) sample sourcing,
which includes matters of advertising, incentivising, avoidance of bias, and ethical
concerns pertaining to informed consent. The extent to which these four concerns are met
and made explicit in a qualitative study has implications for its coherence, transparency,
impact and trustworthiness. (p. 25)
These four points are addressed throughout this chapter as they pertain to sampling for
this study. In terms of broadly categorizing the sample universe, it should be noted that
philanthropic giving by large foundations was excluded from this study. Although philanthropic
gifts are often made by large foundations, this study is focused on giving by individual
philanthropists. A distinction has been made whereby individual philanthropists who have their
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own foundation, such as a family foundation, were included as part of the target population.
These individuals materially participate in the decision- and grant-making processes. Private
nonoperating grantmaking foundations that are mainly run by a staff following a mandate such as
a mission and orientation determined by a long-deceased donor were excluded.
Also excluded were corporate and institutional funders for whom the driving force behind
philanthropic contributions mainly involves corporate goals, such as in the areas of profit
making, sustainability, and public and external relations. This study was inclusive of the private
sector givings that is tied to the individual philanthropist’s personal desires and decision making.
Sampling Technique
A two-stage purposive sampling technique was used to recruit participants to this study.
Maxwell (1996) described purposive sampling as “a strategy in which particular settings,
persons, or events are selected deliberately in order to provide important information that can’t
be gotten as well from other choices” (p. 70). According to Kate Gerrish and Anne Lacey (2010),
“A purposive sample is one where people from a specified group are purposely sought out and
sampled” (p. 149).
Martyn Denscombe (2014) noted that the benefit to using purposive sampling is that the
research can focus on a specific group of people and events. He further explained that this form
of sampling is nonprobability sampling, which can be helpful in situations where random
selection sampling is not being used or is not appropriate or where the researcher lacks adequate
information about the entire population (Denscombe, 2014). Ritchie, Lewis, Nicholls, &
Ormston (2013) noted many benefits to using nonprobability samples in qualitative research,
especially when a sample is purposely selected to learn more about a specific group.
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Earl Babbie (2015) suggested that purposive sampling, also known as judgmental
sampling, is advantageous when the researcher has knowledge about a population and its
characteristics. The researcher can use personal judgment to determine who and what are
important to the study (Denscombe, 2014) and select participants based on study criteria and
specific qualities the prospective informants may possess (Tongco, 2007).
This approach to devising a sampling strategy was appropriate because the goal was to
understand the viewpoint of philanthropists on their giving either directly from them or from a
representative. Signers of the Giving Pledge have publicly acknowledged that they met the
criteria and have pledged to make or already made some of the largest contributions to charity
(Giving Pledge, n.d.a); thus, they were purposefully selected as a population for this study.
Once a contact was secured with at least one philanthropist, the intention was to ask
participants if they could recommend potential interviewees and help make other connections.
This technique is known as the snowball effect. According to Harsh Suri (2011), “snowball
sampling involves seeking information from key informants about details of other information-
rich cases in the field” (p. 69). Snowball sampling proved to be helpful because it would have
been difficult to make these connections otherwise. Not all interviews were gained through key
contacts and snowballing. Several interviews were conducted with philanthropists known to the
researcher. The email request to potential participants can be found in Appendix A.
Initially, this study intended to interview philanthropists who had signed up for the
Giving Pledge; however, that population proved difficult to reach and time became a constraint.
Access was a limitation in this study. When unable to secure interviews with additional Giving
Pledge signers, high-net-worth individual philanthropists were selected. The next sections
discuss attempts to access these two populations.
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Target Population 1: Giving Pledge Signers
As stated, the initial target population was signers of the Giving Pledge. The Giving
Pledge is an association of the world’s wealthiest individuals and families who have made a
public commitment to give away more than half of their wealth to philanthropic and charitable
causes with the goal of addressing the most pressing societal issues (Giving Pledge, n.d.a). As of
2017, membership in the Giving Pledge required a net worth of at least $100 million (Candid,
n.d.).
This population was selected because each member or couple had been publicly
identified as meeting the criteria of high-net-worth coupled with philanthropic aspirations and
giving. The signers of the Giving Pledge represent a population that had self-identified as
meeting the criteria, and so they were a natural selection.
Having the population identified, the next step was to determine a sample. Because
philanthropic giving across countries is affected by differences in governmental, legal, and fiscal
environments, for comparative purposes, non-U.S. signers were eliminated from the sample
(Barton & Baguley, 2017). Specifically, the target population was high-net-worth donors or a
representative. Through online research, a department in the Gates Foundation that is tasked with
managing relations with Giving Pledge signers and managing an annual event that many of them
attend, was identified. An email was sent to the lead contact at the Gates Foundation in this area
to determine her ability and interest in collaborating and to ascertain her willingness to serve as a
liaison to Giving Pledge signers. Although the contact had expressed an interest in the work and
followed up on several occasions over several months, ultimately, she said she was unable to
help.
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Having exhausted the Gates Foundation connection, the process started over. The next
attempt to determine the population sample was based on the researcher’s ability to connect with
Giving Pledge signers. Proximity was the first criterion. For this purpose, connectivity or
proximity included direct access to a signer or utilization of a contact who had direct contact.
Either personally or through contacts, the researcher had acquired some email addresses for
signers of the Giving Pledge. She also had contacts who could potentially put requests for an
interview in front of these philanthropists.
By chance, the researcher happened to be at the same event as one of the Giving Pledge
signers. Although they did not know each other, he agreed to be interviewed after learning about
the study. He provided his email address but did not respond to any of the email attempts over
several months. Additional email addresses were discovered for this donor through online
research, but no response was received to the six email requests.
The researcher attempted to contact 14 other people who had signed the Giving Pledge
but was not able to secure any interviews. Five email addresses were rendered undeliverable per
Gmail. One declined and there was no response from the other eight, despite several attempts.
Simultaneously, the researcher connected with three personal contacts who had direct
access to a signer of the Giving Pledge or their staff. Five Giving Pledge signers or their staff
were contacted directly through these individuals. One declined, noting the need for privacy in
his philanthropic giving. He also declined help connect to other signers of the Giving Pledge,
again noting the need for privacy around their philanthropic giving. No response was received
from two others. One contact never provided a definitive response either way, and so was still in
process of determining viability of participation. The researcher stopped following up. Another
contact was very enthusiastic about participating and about the subject matter, but the staff was
62
never able to advance the effort. This request is still pending; however, the researcher stopped
following up. It should be noted that the researcher expressed the need for quick responses due to
impending deadlines and time constraints. Although staff members and connectors seemed
willing to accommodate the request, they were unsuccessful in making it a priority.
Two affirmative responses from staff representatives to signers of the Giving Pledge were
obtained through a personal contact who became later became the key informant to the study.
These two were the only signers of the Giving Pledge who were ultimately interviewed for this
study.
Target Population 2: High-Net-Worth Philanthropists
Key Informant. A close personal contact offered to help secure interviews with the new
sample population of high-worth-philanthropists when she saw the difficulty in trying to connect
with Giving Pledge signers. This person had already secured the interviews with the two staff
members of the Giving Pledge signers. This personal contact fit the study’s criteria, as did many
of her friends and acquaintances. Over decades of donating and volunteering, she had firsthand
knowledge about many philanthropists, particularly those based in Southern California, and
knew specifics about their giving including if they fit the criteria.
This contact served as a key informant to this study. According to John Poggie, Jr.
(1972), key informants have knowledge of and a position in a setting that is useful to the study.
They are selected for their ability and willingness to serve as commentators, mentors, or in other
capacities that aid the researcher in gathering data.
This contact proved to be a great resource not only in making the initial contact with
appropriate targets, but also in following up to ensure responses were received and that
interviews were conducted. Requests for interviews came directly from her as a personal request
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with assurances that the interviews were for legitimate research and not a ploy to ask for funding
or obtain personal information that would be released publicly. The key informant exerted a
great deal of time, effort, and information and contributed greatly to the research enterprise.
Study Participants. Twenty high-net-worth philanthropists participated in this study.
This new population target included individuals who were worth a minimum of $7 million and
are known for giving to charity in significant amounts. Most participating philanthropists far
exceeded the minimum wealth threshold, having made gifts in the six- and seven-figure range.
Cumulative lifetime giving for these individual philanthropists ranged from the millions to
hundreds of millions. This discrepancy was a function of several factors, including wealth and
age. In general, demographic information related to this population was deemed not relevant to
the findings of this study and was not included, except as noted.
This study included interviews with appropriate staff members or other representatives
deemed knowledgeable and able to address the interview questions on behalf of the
philanthropist. This knowledge of philanthropic activity was discovered through various outlets,
including the key informant, staff members or other representatives, the philanthropist, the
researcher, and public disclosures of gift amounts or ranges such as through online searches.
Four participants based their responses on both their individual giving patterns and
experiences and their parents’ or family’s giving, because they regularly participated in both.
Three participants were foundation staff members speaking on behalf of their founder
philanthropists. In these three cases, the representatives were either closely related to the
philanthropists or had worked closely with them at their foundation for a minimum of 9 years.
All were versed enough in the philanthropists’ histories, thinking, strategies, and aims to
adequately respond to the interview questions. In two cases, staff members were responding on
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behalf of a longtime married couple rather than an individual philanthropist. The other individual
philanthropists interviewed may have been speaking on behalf of their spouse as well but were
personally and significantly engaged in the respective couple’s philanthropic giving.
All participants were major gift donors to the Southern California region, and all but one
lived in Southern California, at least for much of the year. Some of the participants appeared to
know one another at least to some degree and had donated to some of the same organizations.
They mentioned similar nonprofits, associations, events, or organizations and in some instances,
mentioned another philanthropist by name. Overall, this group was fairly homogeneous and
included four men and 16 women whose ages ranged from the 40s to the 70s. All participants
were Caucasian except for one Asian woman, and at least 15 were of the Jewish faith. At least
half of the participants referenced the rich Jewish tradition of giving as a reason for their
philanthropic upbringing and generosity.
Limitations of sample population. The sample size of 20 high-net-worth donors may be
too small to generalize to the larger population. Because these interviews were gained mainly
through the key informant, there may be a selection bias, meaning the sample does not accurately
represent a cross-section of the total high-net-worth donor population. There may be response
bias in this targeted group, because participants may have been reluctant to share more due to
trust and privacy concerns or may have embellished to enhance their responses and appearance.
There is also a geographical bias, because participants were predominately from the Southern
California region.
Data Collection, Coding, and Ethical Concerns. Participants had been advised of the
basic purpose of the study either by the researcher or the key informant. Most interaction was
done electronically, but there were some instances in which preliminary conversations were
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conducted by telephone. Some concerns of prospective participants that required attention in
advance of the interview included issues such as confidentiality, anonymity, privacy, potential
use of the information in the public domain, time constraints, preparation requirements, hidden
agenda of the researcher, and scheduling issues.
Twenty interviews were conducted with high-net-worth philanthropists or their staff
representatives. Staff were selected based on their ability to respond accurately on behalf of the
philanthropists. No couples were interviewed, only individuals. Three staff members, however,
responded on behalf of married couples who were the founder philanthropists of their respective
foundations. Eighteen were conducted via telephone and two were conducted in person. The
interviews ranged from 35 minutes to 1 hour and 10 minutes, with an average of 49 minutes.
Signatures were obtained on the consent form in person or were scanned and sent by email or
fax. The consent form can be found in Appendix B.
Interview Process
The primary source of research data for this study was the 20 interviews conducted with
these high-net-worth philanthropists or their staff. Interview questions were modified, added,
deleted, or clarified to better draw out the study participants’ thoughts and experiences on
making an impact through their philanthropic giving. Appendix C provides detail on the
questions the researcher aimed to have answered through these interviews. The questions were
not strictly adhered to, nor were they necessarily asked in order. Participants often answered
questions in the course of their explanations or descriptions without being prompted by the
interviewer.
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Transcription Process
Interview conversations were recorded and assigned a numeric value that represented the
participant. All recordings were sent to an independent third-party professional transcription
service. Upon receipt of the transcript, the original audio recording was reviewed and compared
to the transcript. It should be noted that the researcher made minor changes, mainly for
clarification when transcripts reported an inaudible message, but there were no discrepancies,
especially in terms of content. The researcher then removed any identifying information from the
transcript to maintain privacy and forwarded the redacted transcript to participants for their edits
and approvals. Only one informant made changes by adding information. Eight participants
provided approvals without changes. There were no response from the remaining participants.
Coding Process
As for analysis of data such as transcripts, Johnny Saldaña (2011) described a pragmatic
approach: “choosing the right tool for the right job” (p. 177). For this study, the transcripts were
coded in order to make sense and meaning out of the interviews. Saldaña (2011) defined a code
as follows:
A code in qualitative inquiry is most often a word or short phrase that symbolically
assigns a summative, salient, essence-capturing, and/or evocative attribute for a portion
of language-based or visual data. The data can consist of interview transcripts, participant
observation field notes, journals, documents, open-ended survey responses, drawings,
artifacts, photographs, video, Internet sites, e-mail correspondence, academic and
fictional literature, and so on. (p. 4)
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For Kathy Charmaz (2001), coding is the first step of data analysis. She described coding as the
link between the data and the explanation of its meaning. “It leads you from the data to the idea
and from the idea to all the data pertaining to that idea” (Richards & Morse, 2013, p. 154).
The transcripts created from this study were uploaded into Dedoose, a web-based
application for data management, excerpting, coding, and analysis of qualitative and mixed-
methods research (Dedoose, n.d.). Each participant interview was coded.
Each of the 20 interview transcripts from this study was open-coded line by line in
Dedoose. The interview transcripts were coded in chronological order based on the date the
interview was completed. The first interview was coded, followed by the second interview, and
so on. Codes were created for participant responses that reflected on the research questions of
“What does making an impact through philanthropic giving mean to high-net-worth
philanthropists?” and “How does making an impact motivate the philanthropic giving of high-
net-worth individuals?” The codes created in Dedoose are shown in Appendix D. The coding
process was repeated in Dedoose three times as vignettes of data were recoded, linked to an
existing code, or coded with a new code. The approach was iterative, as suggested by Saldaña
(2011):
Rarely is the first cycle of coding data perfectly attempted. The second cycle (and
possibly the third and fourth, etc.) of recoding further manages, filters, highlights, and
focuses the salient features of the qualitative data record for generating categories,
themes, and concepts, grasping meaning, and/or building theory. (p. 17)
The data were then extracted from Dedoose into Excel spreadsheets for further analysis.
Excel spreadsheets allowed the researcher to manipulate the order of the coded quotes and to
group similarly coded ones together. Columns were added to the spreadsheet to provide view of
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the coding and organization. Columns were created for themes that emerged, and rows of
extracted quotes were assigned a checkmark if the theme in a column applied. The rows were
reorganized and grouped by column themes to allow for deeper analysis and comparison. This
method of grouping and rearranging by column category or theme was utilized to make
mathematical calculations such as percentages and totals. Codes developed in Excel are listed in
Appendix E.
At the end of this process, the interview responses of each participant were reviewed in
their entirety to better understand that participant’s characteristics and approach to making an
impact. To this point the analysis of responses has focused on coding responses and comparing
them to other participant responses. In this instance, each participant’s responses were reviewed
in their entirety separately from other participants. The interview for an individual study
participant was analyzed against the subquestion, How does making an impact motivate the
philanthropic giving of high-net-worth individuals? For example, Participant 1’s interview
responses were reviewed and analyzed against the subquestion, How does making an impact
motivate the philanthropic giving of high-net-worth individuals? Then, all of Partcipant 2’s
interview responses were compared, reviewed and analyzed against the subquestion, How does
making an impact motivate the philanthropic giving of high-net-worth individuals?
Participation and Anonymity
Participation in this study was voluntary. Participants could withdraw from the interview
without consequence. Participants were not paid for participating.
Confidentiality and anonymity were very important to the participants. To meet these
standards, participants were assigned a numeric value, and transcripts were labeled with the
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numeric code and date and time of the interview. The transcripts and recordings are held by the
researcher only.
Institutional Review Board
Because human subjects were involved in this study, prior to conducting this research,
documentation was submitted for institutional review board (IRB) approval. The project was
determined to meet the requirements and was approved by the IRB. Documentation submitted
included responses to question about potential risks and harm to human subjects. The IRB also
evaluated confidentiality procedures and how the identity of participants would be protected. The
IRB approval is found in Appendix F.
Summary
This chapter provided detail on the research method used in this study. It included a
discussion of procedures, including participant selection and data collection. A
phenomenological approach was utilized to understand how making an impact might affect the
giving of high-net-worth philanthropists. This chapter examined the methodology to collect the
data. The next chapter outlines the results of this study.
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Chapter 4: Findings
With government support decreasing and the need for services increasing, nonprofit
survival is dependent on attracting additional revenue. This study investigated ways that
nonprofits can better understand high-net-worth donors to increase philanthropic funding to their
organizations. Specifically, it focused on making an impact, an important consideration for
gaining philanthropic support. Because there is no standard or clear definition of impact and its
meaning varies regularly, this study sought to understand what making an impact through
philanthropic giving means to high-net-worth philanthropists and how it affects their giving. This
chapter reports these findings.
Defining Impact
The 20 philanthropists interviewed were informed that impact was a focus of this study.
Some participants indicated what they meant by the word “impact” without being prompted. In
other cases, the participant was asked to provide a definition or describe what impact meant to
them.
Responses to the question of defining impact were varied and at times unclear.
Participant 19’s response offered some insight into the diversity of answers to defining impact
when she stated, “I think that it is a complicated question. I think it’s very complicated.”
Many participants slightly hesitated before answering, as if they grappled momentarily in
coming up with an answer. Additionally, throughout the interviews, participants often used the
word “impact” in the course of explaining what impact means to them.
Defining Impact Can Change Depending on Use
A quarter of the 20 interview participants explicitly acknowledged that impact can be
defined differently based on the situation. Two responses were almost identical. In response to
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defining impact, Participant 20 offered, “[It] depends what the organization is,” whereas
Participant 5 explained, “[Impact] depends on the organization and what their goals are. … It’s
really within their own set of goals and what their mission is.”
Participant 8 provided a similar response: “Impact is in relation to your goal. What you’re
trying to do. So, if you’re meeting your goal, then the impact is there. … If you don’t know what
you’re trying to do, how do you know what impact to do?” Echoing a similar thought, Participant
19 defined impact based on the area that she supports: “[Impact] really depends upon if it’s
education, or if it’s medicine. Before we start out, we think about how the program will match
the population of people that they’re working with.”
Participant 7 differentiated both giving area and nonprofit. In her words, “[Impact] is
defined very differently in the … areas [of giving], but also among grantees.”
Defining Impact through Stories
Instead of providing definitions of impact, some participants offered descriptions of their
experiences of impact. Throughout the interviews, participants relied on stories to define and
explain impact. For example, when pointedly asked to define impact or explain what it means, in
lieu of a definition, Participant 10 responded:
I worked down at Homeboys and it’s really great. It helps them get jobs and now, there’s
an impact! I know that if I remove tattoos from their hands and their face, they’re far
more likely to have success in finding a job. And if they have actual gang tattoos
removed, they can be more successful in life in general and sort of escaping that gang
culture.
Participant 6 responded to the question of defining impact with this anecdote:
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For me, for example, let’s just say I take care of homeless people. And the homeless
families I take care of, it wasn’t about giving them money. It was more about giving them
opportunity that they would never have. And I actually help a family myself. There are
10 kids and six of my kids are in college. So, if that is an impact, they have gotten it by
my being a mentor. It’s helping them financially. It’s helping them with contacts that they
can [use to] get dental work done. It’s various things, where to me that’s impactful to
homeless people. To help them get off the streets; get into housing; and then go to school
and get a job. Help themselves, and then that gives them the opportunity to help someone
else. For me, that’s impact.
Participant 20 provided this definition of impact: “So here’s an impact. In one of our
organizations or foundations, it’s about kids. … And the mission is basically helping to develop
good, productive adults that are productive for themselves, and productive to society.”
When asked to define impact, Participant 18 sidestepped impact on beneficiaries or
clients created by services or programs. Instead, he focused on the magnitude of monetary gifts
to the nonprofit and whether the relative size of the gift created impact:
I just think most of the organizations that we fund do good things. So, if you’re giving a
small amount, $10,000 or $50,000 or even more to [an organization that] probably spends
$80 to $100 million a year … I’m not sure how much of an impact there is, other than
adding to the aggregate. … So, [for another organization] we’ll probably be, as far as
individuals, we’ll probably be one of two or the three highest individuals as far as giving
on that. So, it’s more impactful there.
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The use of stories and real-life examples were a hallmark of these interviews. The
participants’ quotes throughout this chapter are representative of this phenomenon.
Defining Impact as Making a Difference or Change
In defining impact, many participants used specific words such as “making a difference”
or “making a change” to explain what impact meant to them. In the words of one participant,
“[Impact] is where my philanthropic efforts could really make a difference.” Although each gave
their own perspective or spin on the definition, there was a recurring and common theme that
impact was a matter of making a difference or a change, whether for an individual, community,
society, or other entity. Of the 20 participants, 13 specifically used the word “difference” or
“change” in talking about impact related to their philanthropic support. Figure 1 illustrates this
breakdown.
Figure 1. Participants Using the Words “Making a Difference” or “Change” to Define Impact
65%
35%
Used specific words, such as: "make a difference"or "make a change"
Did not use specific words, such as: "make a difference"or "make a change"
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Of the 65% who specifically used the words “difference” or “change” in defining impact,
a further breakdown shows that seven donors used the word “difference,” four used the word
“change,” and two used both words in defining impact, as shown in Figure 2.
Figure 2. Participants Using the Words “Difference” or “Change” to Define Impact
Table 1 provides quotes from participants to support these numbers. Some quotes are
direct responses to the question of how participants’ defined impact, whereas others were
mentioned in other parts of the interview.
Table 1. Participant Responses that Defined Impact as Making a Difference or Change
Participant 4 The terminology of an impact means, for me, that your giving actually makes
a difference. That it’s going to make a difference in someone’s life in some
way. … Impact to me, is really about, you know, creating change and leaving
the, whether it’s the person or the organization or whatever, a little bit better
by your giving.
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Participant 6 Making a difference, that’s really the thing. That your involvement has made
changes … and that you see what they’re doing is productive and positive and
is treating the patient or treating the students. To me everything is about, the
result of the patients and the students.
Participant 7 Will [the project we are funding] make a difference in 20 years?
Participant 8 They want to know that they’re making a difference.
Participant 9 You’re always asking, how many kids have been affected? How many lives
have been changed this way?
Participant 10 Not giving millions of dollars. I give smaller amounts, more widespread, and
I know I’m throwing it in. I mean, I hope it’s making a difference.
Participant 13 I don’t define it as I find that more people than not do, which is, by virtue of
the volume, the numbers. … [Impact] would mean change for the good.
Palpable change for the good or numeric. … But I’m much more interested in
qualitative change rather than the quantitative.
Participant 14 Well in the simplest way, I define it by a woman’s life changing.
Participant 15 Impact for me is qualitative changes in people’s lives. Whether it would be
longevity, quality of life, happiness, even if they’re ill or whatever. The idea
of having as good a life as you can. … So, the impact has to do with how we
can better people’s lives, better the condition of the world, which will impact
us, our children and their children.
Participant 16 I think making an impact is making a difference in a community. And,
hopefully, creating a better environment, socially and scientifically.
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Participant 17 [It] was, what is right in front of my face where my philanthropic efforts could
really make a difference. That is the distinguishing factor as to how we chose
where and how to give.
Participant 19 We really try to understand what the costs are in servicing people, what
metrics they use to see if they feel that they’ve made a difference in the lives
of these people.
This basic theme of making a difference or positive change was echoed through most of
the interviews. Many were not as explicit in their descriptions, but the general idea that impact is
related to making a positive difference or change came through in their stories and explanations.
Defining Impact Quantitatively
Aside from the many qualitative definitions noted, some participants looked to numbers
to define impact. Most participants referenced metrics at some point during the study’s
interviews, and seven of the 20 of participants or 35% used quantitative measures to define
impact, as evidenced by the quotes in Table 2. These responses ranged in perspective, scope, and
application, but commonly focused on measurement to define impact as related to their
philanthropic giving.
Table 2. Participant Responses Representative of Quantitatively Defining Impact
Participant 1 We measure our impact, our results in the world of health and wellness.
Participant 3 We wanted to make sure that there’s some deliverables and then some
accountability and then also to figure out exactly how are we moving the
needle.
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Participant 5 I think that that they make a measurable difference, and measurable meaning
how many people it helps, or touches, how well spent their dollars are.
Participant 8 You want your money to go as far as possible and help as many of your
intended people as possible. … You want to impact the most people as
possible.
Participant 9 [Giving to a public school] has a whole lot more impact than giving to a
private school. You know they don’t need our money. And we can’t really
affect change as well as we would here. … We want it to benefit as many
kids as possible.
Participant 12 Impact to me … is helping the most amount of people, or the highest number
of people we can help for what we give. And it’s not always the most
amount, but it’s the most how we can make a difference.
Participant 20 To provide some money and some time to an organization that's been well
funded for decades, the probability of making an impact is extraordinarily
small.
Measuring Impact and Metrics
As noted in the preceding excerpts, when asked to define impact, some of the interviewed
philanthropists cited measurement and numerical standards of measurements known as metrics
to describe what impact meant to them. A separate question posed to study participants inquired
about how metrics and measuring impact affected their philanthropic giving to nonprofit
organizations, if at all.
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The participants overwhelmingly noted that metrics were important as an element of
impact, and all 20 participants referenced metrics at some point during the interview. However,
they indicated there was disparity in the need for and use of metrics depending on the situation.
Most participants noted that they relied on metrics in some instances but not in others. In the
words of Participant 16, “We give to different things. [With] some things, the metrics are there,
and some, they are not there.” The majority acknowledged that in many instances, the impact
could not be measured, but they continued to give despite a lack of clear metrics. Many
participants made a point of noting that that their volunteer work, including board service, gave
them access to additional information that allowed them to better gauge and understand what was
happening with the nonprofit. As Participant 6 put it:
I’m very hands on. … I’m so active in the things I really zeroed in on, that I can see the
impact I’ve made. I mean it’s not just guessing. I certainly am hands on, maybe not day
to day but I’m involved directly in doing the work for the [clinic] and doing my [other
health] program. And setting up different guest artists or looking at the programming of
the school. So, I see how it affects the kids that we serve. I read all of the results of how
the school has impacted the kids and I have talked to the kids. I can make suggestions and
see what’s happening, and, can see the direct results because I’m so there and involved
and [it’s] the same at the [clinic].
Are Metrics on Impact Important?
Thirteen of the 20 participants noted the importance of metrics to their philanthropic
giving. Three explicitly said metrics were not important, and the remaining four participants did
not clearly indicate whether or not metrics were important. Figure 3 is a representation of these
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responses. The majority (65%) noted the importance of metrics, whereas the minority (15%) did
not find them to be important. Of Note, 20% of responses fell in the “unknown” category.
Figure 3. Percent of Participants Who Consider Metrics Important to Giving
The following excerpts from participant interviews provide examples of the importance
of metrics. Participant 20 summed up the significance of metrics by saying:
So, we believe you can always find a metric. And, if you actually can’t find a metric then
… you may need to rethink … what you’re trying to do. ‘Cause if you can’t measure it,
you’re never gonna know if you’re having [impact]. You’re never gonna know if it’s
effective. So, we’re big on that. It’s all about objective measurements. We also require
[nonprofits] focus on starting to measure their impact and truly understanding it and
being able to report out on it.
Yes
65%
No
15%
Unknown
20%
ARE METRICS IMPORTANT IN
PHILANTHROPIC GIVING?
Yes No Unknown
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And so, it’s all about. … everything’s about impact. If we can’t measure, if we
can’t truthfully measure the impact by a third party, we’d never do it. We never do self-
surveys. We never measure it ourselves. Any organization we give to, we don’t say you
can rely upon yourselves to measure impact. We always require and we also provide
money for third party independent measurements of impact.
Participant 20 added that they push their grantees to reach the metrics they set and work
with them to readjust so they can do better in the future. How they measure impact varies as
well, and they work with grantees to demonstrate their impact through metrics. As an example,
he noted, “The easiest measure of anything is if someone’s willing to give back time or money
after they’ve gone through something [like a program].”
Participant 8 requires metrics from his grantees, noting:
There’s always some way to measure things. Yes, it’s harder in certain areas, but if PR
can find a way to measure, any nonprofit can. Public relations is a very fast and loose
thing, yet they find a way to quantify their work. So, I’m assuming that most nonprofits
can. They have to for many different reasons—either for the institution they’re working
for, or their board. It’s going to have to happen.
Participant 12 also noted the significance of numbers:
Well, you know it’s all about data. And I know that, and I agree with … I mean, I sit on a
lot of boards, so I know we’re always looking at the data. What’s the data? What was the
impact of people that were [helped]? We have taken this X amount of people out of
poverty and put them into housing. So, what were the levels?
Metrics were so important to this participant that she hired a third party to do the
calculations for one of her projects. “[The consultant] helped run something like, what was the
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impact of—? Or like, once the kids got out of rehab, did they go back into rehab? How did they
get on with their lives?”
In the first interview, the participant recanted many of the actual statistics related to the
work she has been doing and generously shared many. They included metrics such as the number
of students who attended a 4-year college, the drop in the crime rate, and reduction in diabetes
across a population. According to her, these data points were an important part of the impact that
had resulted from her giving.
Are Metrics Integral to Philanthropic Funding?
Despite many study participants who noted the importance of metrics on impact, metrics
were not necessarily a factor even in large scale philanthropic giving. While most participants
deemed metrics to be important, they also noted that they would continue to give even with no
metrics to show impact. Eleven of the 20 participants, or 55%, noted that they are willing to give
regardless of the nonprofit’s ability to show metrics and impact. One common reason given is
that impact can be a long-term proposition, so the numbers may not be readily available.
Participant 6 was among the participants who noted that it can take time to make an impact, and
many participants were willing to support a cause or organization even without numeric
evidence. For some of the donors who fell in this category, they indicated relying on gut feeling
or nonnumeric criteria in making this decision. Emotionally based attachments form, for
example, when a family member or friend has experienced a problem, or a donor has a close
connection to the issue being addressed by the nonprofit. Three participants (15%) stated they
would not give without appropriate metrics. These participants did their philanthropic giving
through a family foundation. Thirty percent of study participants did not indicate their
willingness to give despite metrics. Figure 4 provides visual representation of these statistics.
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Figure 4. Percent of Participants Who Give Without Metrics on Impact
Table 3 encapsulates responses of participants who continue to fund philanthropic
endeavors despite a lack of metrics.
Table 3. Responses that Reflect Giving Despite a Lack of Metrics
Participant 13 They’re not unimportant. But I don’t live for them. And I don’t give because
of them. And I’m not influenced by them very much. I would say sometimes
a little.
Participant 15 So, those stats are sometimes very important. With the [hunger] program for
instance, you know you’re impacting these people every single day. But, do
you think you’re really impacting hunger in America and that you’re going to
eliminate it? Forget it, because the need keeps growing. Do I know that it’s
making an impact? Yeah. Do I know they serve greater needs? Can I quantify
them? No, but it makes me happy.
Yes
55%
No
15%
Unknown
30%
Donor gives regardless of metrics
Yes No Unknown
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Participant 16 If they didn’t show any results, we wouldn’t be giving. I think very few
things have immediate impact, so most of the things that you give to, you
hope will encourage progress and change. [When asked if metrics enhanced
or helped her giving, she responded with a curt “no” and could not be
prompted to offer further explanation or detail.]
Participant 18 I mean, the fact that we give every year to homelessness and the homeless
increase in Los Angeles does not deter us from giving. … I would say it
doesn’t play a big part. It’s not my starting off place.
Participant 6 Metrics are important, because I’d like to serve as many people well as
possible. Yeah numbers are important to me. [This donor noted that change
can take time and that she utilizes metrics to reevaluate the work and her
giving.]
Although responses on the importance of impact metrics and giving were gathered
through this study, the answers were unclear for those who found impact metrics to be important.
The inconsistency may be attributed to other considerations such as the size of the gift and the
donor’s level of commitment to the cause or organization. Participant 4 recognized and noted
how these factors influence her thinking around the importance of metrics on impact:
It really depends on how invested we are in that particular organization and that gift. But
you know, smaller [gifts] where someone reaches out and they’re being honored or
they’re involved in a charity or something and I donate, then no. … On the smaller
donations, no. I would say no.
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Another factor that may affect donor thinking about the importance of metrics is a donor’s trust
in the accuracy of the figures. Participant responses that reflect this potential issue can be found
in the next section.
Variations and Issues with Metrics and Measuring Impact
Variation around the use of metrics for impact was a common theme in this study. One
theme regarding variation in the use of metrics to measure impact referred to the item being
measured. About 75% of participants alluded to this type of variation in measuring impact. As
noted in the excerpts in the preceding section titled “Defining Impact Can Change Depending on
Use”, participants in this study acknowledged that they defined impact differently depending on
the situation. Similarly, many participants noted that their use of metrics and measuring impact
could change with the context. Participant 10 summed this disparity up by offering:
[Metrics] are generally not my criteria. With certain organizations, I love that we do
really heavy-duty research to assess our recipients of our grant every year and that they
have benchmarks. They have to show us how they’re using the funds, and we do
anticipate an impact with that giving. But I don’t impose that on a lot of the other things
that I give to. I mean, I believe there is an impact, but I’m not sure how you’d measure it
in some of the other things I’m doing. There is some giving that I can calibrate the impact
and I know what it’s going to be, but for the majority of things I’m participating in, I
believe there’s an impact, but I can’t measure it and I can’t be sure, but of course if I
didn’t believe something was going to be better, I wouldn’t be doing it.
Participant 20 questioned how larger nonprofits measure impact as compared to how he
calculates it. In his words, “When we measure impact, it’s measured by activity and actions, not
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by a survey or an intent. I don’t think a lot of large organizations truly measure impact very well,
if at all. And I don’t think they’re about impact.”
Other study participants noted concern about the use of metrics, as evidenced by the
following interview quotes. When asked about the use of metrics in measuring impact,
Participant 11 was quick to point out that numbers alone are not enough. “[A nonprofit] can see
600 kids, but what impact have they made on them? So, we want to know the results of that.” For
the organizations she funds, she looks at many different metrics, such as the number of people
served or changes in medical statistics:
Just giving money is not important. I mean, it’s important, but that doesn’t do it. You
have to hear the results and know that [the results are] what you want—that they’re doing
what you want to be done and that it’s being done the right way. (Donor 11)
Participant 17 offered:
Metrics can be very self-serving. … I think that obviously, metrics are useful to
determine what you’re doing is reaching its purpose, right? But I think it’s a tricky
minefield, because metrics can make you look more successful than you are.
However, Participant 19 cautioned, “You can look at numbers, and numbers can fool
you.” In these cases, she said she triangulates information by visiting nonprofits to observe what
is happening and reviewing tangential indicators such as thank you cards from patients or letters
from students. She also looks at general statistics like the number of people who utilized a
service or program, or interactions with a social worker.
Many of the excerpted quotes in this chapter demonstrate variations in the use of metrics
related to impact. When referring to measuring impact, participants in this study may have been
referencing the impact on beneficiaries, achievement of goals, metrics around efficiencies and
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effectiveness, organizational metrics, or other metrics. The context and surrounding dialogue
often made the participants’ use and meaning of the word clear, but not in all cases.
Metrics Used to Support a Business-Like Approach to Impact
Twenty-five percent of participants considered their use of metrics to be akin to
measurements used in the business world. In the first interview, the participant cited many
different metrics as evidence of her philanthropic success in making an impact. In explaining the
reason for her focus on metrics, she said, “I treat the philanthropy in a similar way that I treat my
business. So, obviously, you’re not going to spend money on a project and not see results, and
so, we’re very results-oriented, and we’re very data-driven.”
The second participant interviewed took a similar approach: “To some degree we make
decisions on philanthropy the way we would make them on an investment in a for-profit
business. … I obviously do a lot of due diligence about each of these locations or organizations.”
This participant considered metrics and analyzed data to avoid giving to organizations that are
not going to succeed or be sustainable.
Participant 5 explained her use of metrics as follows:
I do look at [metrics]. I think I pay more attention to really the overhead and what percent
of the funds go to actual programs and to benefit the people who are intent to be
benefited, and I look at CEO salaries. I look at salaries across the board. Again, I look at
is as investing in these organizations and I am particular as to how they’re spending my
money and other donor’s money. … It’s more of looking at it as from a business plan or a
strategic perspective. … That it’s a sound investment and that, you know, whatever it is
I’m investing is going to pay off.
Participant 14 summarized the use of metrics and their effect on impact as follows:
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We have something in our foundation, something we call the ROI of philanthropy. So,
we turn on our investment [thinking], and we can follow the money and make sure it’s
actually getting where we want it to go. And that it’s having an impact on the population
that we’re hoping to serve. … We definitely use metrics if we can. I mean, that’s our long
term, so we’re looking at the health of the organizations. … We do look at what is the
impact. How have we changed these lives? And should we continue to go down this
funding stream, or do we need to look elsewhere? Do we need to identify something that
we know is going to make an impact? If not initially, then it has to be like a long-term
impact.
Participant 20 takes the approach of an angel investor who seeds the organization in the
initial stages and help builds it into a legitimate entity that others would be willing to invest in.
As he put it:
You need to have at least enough operating funds to implement and execute on your
programming, but you also need to have backers on your side. Your donor list has to look
like something that others will want to invest in. That’s how everything works. … If there
are certain foundations and certain people that are giving to an organization, others just
by the very nature of them, will tag along. So that’s what we like to try to do is offer
enough financial safety net where they can operate their programming for at least a
couple or three years and be able to show that they know how to do it. And then
secondly, others can look and go, “Oh, those guys are investing in it [so we can too].”
Obstacles to Making an Impact
Participants were asked to weigh in on what they considered the biggest obstacle to
making an impact through their philanthropic giving. Figure 5 illustrates the breakdown of
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obstacles that were cited. In the 20 interviews, the main obstacles noted were: tax laws and
policies (cited by five); bureaucracy and process issues (cited by seven); relationships and other
people (cited by nine); and limited resources (cited by seven). Because some participants
provided more than one obstacle when asked this question, participants may be represented more
than once in this section.
Figure 5. Obstacles to Giving Cited in Percentages
Tax Laws and Government Policies as Obstacles
A quarter of participants cited tax laws and government policies as a major obstacle to
making an impact. Participant 8 said, “I think the biggest obstacle, or the biggest concern is
mostly tax changes to your ability to give. If people aren’t encouraged to give, guess what? They
don’t.” He further explained that he believed that those who have the capacity should be
generous, but they are not. He thought tax deductions were a strong motivator for many and
should be utilized as an incentive to get people to give. He also added that changing the tax rules
25%
35%
45%
35%
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%
Tax laws & government policies
Bureaucracies & process issues
Relationships & others
Limited resources
Obstacles to Impact
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to make it harder or less desirable to give was a hardship for charitable institutions like
museums.
Participant 15 framed his answer as follows:
One of the big obstacles that has been created, not just for me, but for many people and
some charities now, is the new government rulings on tax deductions. It is deeply
affecting charities right now. … The fact that a lot of charities’ government funding has
been cut off to many of them. So now they need more and more money from the private
sector and philanthropy. So, it’s become even more challenging because they need much
more from us to make an impact.
Similarly, Participant 16 responded by saying, “I think the changes in rules in taxes are
hurting a lot of institutions. When things, when philanthropic donations are no longer tax
deductible, I think that that hurts. … That hurts the institution.”
Another participant more explicitly faulted the current federal administration as
compared to past ones. He noted that changes to tax, immigration, and reimbursement policies
had created a “much more precarious” environment for nonprofits. He explained that cutbacks on
reimbursements had caused a financial burden on nonprofits, whereas changing attitudes and
policies on immigration have made people too afraid to seek needed services.
Bureaucracies and Process Issues as Obstacles
Thirty-five percent of participants cited bureaucratic issues, or as Participant 6 put it, “too
much red tape,” as a major obstacle to making an impact. Noting the same issues, Participant 9
offered, “Sometimes if you are working with very big organizations, it’s the bureaucracy. That is
the—that is a problem for sure. It’s the inertia of wanting things to happen sooner than they do
and that it doesn’t happen.”
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Participant 7 cited examples of how this obstacle takes effect:
The obstacles are in education and, I think for any funder working on anything social
justice-oriented, civil rights-oriented, anything where there’s a lot of politics involved,
there are huge obstacles. Education is like three million teachers in the classroom, right?
It’s just hard to impact anything that’s so big and governed in so many different ways and
struggling in so many different ways from underfunding for decades. There’s just so
many obstacles.
Participant 17 had a similar response:
One big obstacle is that it’s very difficult to do something good—people wanna do
something good but it’s either against the rules, or it’s in the wrong zoning, or you can’t
get something approved. There are other systems who make it difficult for you to just
break through and achieve what you want to achieve.
In the final interview, Participant 20 framed his response to the question of the biggest
obstacle to making an impact as due to process issues, particularly fragmentation:
There’s no coordination. It’s all fragmented. Everyone has their mission about doing it. If
it ever was brought together, there’d be like 25 companies out of business.
Because … you’d look and [realize], wait, there isn’t really a problem. I mean, there may
be a problem. … This is where fragmentation is the problem. The information doesn’t get
out.
If there are 25 of these places or 30 of these places and they’re not sharing
information, they’re not disseminating information, and no one is knowing what’s going
on even next door, then everything becomes fragmented and siloed. So, it’s not solving
the problem, because the problem has been solved. There’s no [real] hunger in Los
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Angeles. Now are there hungry? Yes, there are hungry people. But that’s not because the
resources don’t exist. It’s because the fragmentation has created a system where you
don’t know about it, so you can’t get to it, you’re not made aware of it. I mean that’s the
problem.
Participant 12 lamented these same types of obstacles but attributed them to nonprofit
processes and ineffectiveness. “I think they’re just not run and operated properly, so you might
give money and it’s not going to what their mission is.” She said she thinks the remedy is in
educating the nonprofits. “[To teach] nonprofits how to be better nonprofits.” In a related
response, Participant 13 found the ineffectiveness of nonprofits to be a result of their routine
processes and thinking. She thought they lacked creativity in resolving issues and creating
opportunities for impact. With a more simplified explanation, Participant 6 simply related it to
“incompetent people that you’re dealing with.”
Relationships and Others as Obstacles
The involvement of others was viewed as a main obstacle to making an impact for many
participants. As an overview, philanthropists, governments, nonprofits, and even people in the
surrounding communities were cited as obstacles, but private-sector organizations were not
mentioned except in one interview in which business was highlighted for its successful
participation. Nine of the 20 participants cited relationships and others as an obstacle. A further
breakdown shows that, of those, three participants specifically noted collaborations and
partnerships as the issue, whereas participants noted an unwillingness of others to give or receive
funding that could make an impact.
Collaborations and partnerships. Fifteen percent of participants noted collaborations
with others as the biggest obstacle to making an impact; however, the specific details varied
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across respondents. Participant 17 said the biggest obstacle to making an impact came from
collaborative issues in public–private partnerships. In highlighting a specific example to make
his point, he said:
That was a funders’ collaborative. The principle was well-intentioned and certainly made
sense. … One of the problems with this collaborative effort was that it was a public–
private collaboration, and the reason it was necessary was because the public part wasn’t
doing so well on its own, and unfortunately when the private part came into work with
the public part, many of the reasons why the public part wasn’t doing well on its own
could not be changed in any reasonable amount of time. So, here sat the private part
looking at the public part, and it made it kind of dysfunctional.
Although Participant 19 initially responded with, “I need to think about that,” she quickly
cited partnerships and working with others as the issue.
I think a big problem is being able to work with public organizations. … I think it’s hard
to work with other philanthropists, but I think it’s also difficult to work with the
government. I think that, that’s very tricky, [also] when you’re working with a university,
or you’re working with a hospital.
One participant was very animated in his answer to the question about the biggest
obstacle to making an impact and immediately came forward with a well-thought out response
and example:
The obstacle? To achieve impact? People, there’s the biggest obstacle. I have on every
board, in every organization, it’s that, people with great intent lose sight of holding other
people responsible and accountable for things, for outcomes. … So that’s … what I find
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my biggest obstacle all the time. People with great intention. People with big hearts and
great intentions are the greatest obstacles.
Unwillingness to give or receive. Separate from collaborations and partnerships, the
unwillingness of others to donate and difficulty giving money away were both cited as major
obstacles to making an impact by 30% of participants. Two of them focused on their concern that
others would not be interested in philanthropy. One participant explained:
I have two kids, so for me the challenge is teaching them about giving because not
everyone has that. And if the next generation, you know. … It’s the Me Generation that’s
kind of in charge now, and they are interested in being entrepreneurs more than they are
giving and so … it’s trying to engage people and meet them where they are and explain
to them why giving is important. So, I think that’s the biggest challenge is changing
people’s values or perspective to understand the importance of the work that everyone’s
trying to do, and why it’s important, and why they have to care about these things.
Two participants found the issue related to difficulty getting people to give to causes in
the near term. As one participant put it, the biggest obstacle to making an impact is “trying to get
other people to give.” The participants with this viewpoint were all closely involved with their
charities and helped raise funds.
Two participants noted the difficulty in making an impact was the beneficiaries. In these
cases, the participants were trying to make systemic changes in low-income communities. One
explained the issues as follows:
I think the main sort of thing that’s been fascinating here is that I think people would be
surprised that you can’t just hand out money, right? People have to trust you. You know?
And sometimes that’s really hard for people who work in underserved communities, for
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organizations that work in underserved communities.… So, it’s starting there, to sort of
convince them that we want to do good and we want to help you do good; however, if
you want to do it, it takes time and trust.
The other participant echoed these thoughts and added a layer of responsibility on the donor side.
What happens a lot in philanthropy is people decide what people should do, and they go
in and tell them, and then, they don’t understand why it didn’t work, but they never take
the time, or they don’t often take the time to understand the people they’re going to serve
and to really get into their brain and their psyche and learn what’s important to them, not
to look at the world through my eyes, but to look at the world through their eyes.
Limited Resources as an Obstacle
A limited supply of resources was cited as a major obstacle to making an impact for
seven of the participants. Time and energy were noted, but overwhelmingly, a lack of money was
seen as the main obstacle. As one participant put it:
Well, the biggest obstacle is not having enough money. And that depends on what [kind
of] impact you want to make. … Where you’re really trying to take on the systemic
problem, or a giant social problem, things like prison reform, or homelessness, or mental
illness, for those kinds of things, I think it’s really a lack of money.
With a similar response, Participant 14 noted:
If I had more, I would be giving more. The opportunity is that there’s so much need,
sadly. I would love to say that we don’t need the kids to go to the hospital, we don’t need
to keep funding different things. I would love to see that happen but that’s not the way
the world works, so our opportunity is that we have to find the resources.
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Another explained:
First of all, one of the biggest obstacles is I’d like to be able to give more, and one of the
obstacles is I have bills and [other] things to pay. … It’s not like there’s less need the
more you give. It’s that more and more people, unfortunately in these economic times,
are falling on hard times themselves when there aren’t jobs and people lose their jobs.
They can’t afford to feed their children. They leave their apartments. They fall to social
services and programs that, some of which I deal with, and you’re asked to do more and
more. It’s a huge challenge and it’s hard.
Acknowledging the limited supply of philanthropic dollars, one participant framed the
issue as one of competition among nonprofits and exposure for the cause.
I think the biggest obstacle is that depending on the issue, or whatever the cause is, we
are competing with many different important causes, and, you know, valuable causes—
finding a way to have your voice [and showing] that your cause is something that has
value and is worth supporting. So, I think to me, that the biggest obstacle is standing out
and showing that it’s an important place to get involved.
Another answered the question by saying, “Honestly, just not enough money. I can only
give so much of money, and I can give so much of my energy.”
Participant 14 acknowledged that having more money would allow her to do more, but
ultimately framed the obstacle as follows:
Sometimes, it’s time. It takes time to investigate different organizations, particularly
when we’re working outside of the U.S. It takes time to vet them. So, it’s not that we can
always be so nimble, and just say, “OK, you guys are starting, we’re gonna give you
money right now.” I mean, over the course of our giving, we have established ways to
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make sure that we make it through all the areas and challenges to make that impact. It
just—sometimes it just takes time.
Development’s Role in Making an Impact
This study has focused on giving to nonprofit organizations by high-net-worth donors. In
many cases, this type of support is facilitated by fundraisers also known as development officers
who work for nonprofits. Study participants were asked their thoughts on development
departments and officers, especially in conjunction with the donor’s desire to make an impact
through their philanthropic support of nonprofit organizations.
Two main findings were the importance of development as a function in a nonprofit and
the difficulty of development work. Eighty-five percent of participants noted the need to build
relationships with donors. All participants were informed that the researcher is currently a
development officer, yet they freely offered their generally unfavorable attitude about
development. Table 4 summarizes the main findings related to development departments and
fundraising. The findings are mixed between and within interviews.
Table 4. Responses Reflecting the Role of Development in Making an Impact
Theme n
Development is important 5
Development is a tough job 7
Development should build relationships and know donors better 17
A bad experience or story about development was reported 18
Both a good and bad experience or story about development were reported 9
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Participants had varying responses and at times contradicted themselves. The interview
with Participant 9 did not elicit any data about development or fundraisers, because she did not
answer this question. That participant has been excluded from the statistics and excerpts.
Development is Important
A quarter of the study participants noted the importance of the development department
and officers. Table 5 lists those excerpts from five interviews. Other participants may also think
development is important or a key factor in philanthropic giving, but they did not note it in the
course of their responses.
Table 5. Participant Responses Noting that Development is Important
Participant 5 I think that they can make it or break it, to be honest. … I think that your
development person makes or breaks it. I actually think that it is even more
important than operations people in an organization.
Participant 6 Development, I think, could be a great help, if they are able to get it.
Participant 11 That’s how we got started with [helping] the kids from [that nonprofit]. It was
the development officer there.
Participant 14 I think they have a huge role to play. I mean, every organization has, for the
most part, has a development arm. We know that means, they need to go look
for funds from people who are wealthy enough to give. … And development
finds out about people who have wealth and try to find out what it is they care
about. And if they could get them to tour an area for example, which is the
biggest deal. If you go tour a place, and you see the needs, you’re much
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more—I think you’re much more apt to consider it as a recipient of your
funds.
Participant 17 I think development people are essential, hooking up with [philanthropists]
and their philanthropic effort. I don’t think philanthropy can operate
successfully, at least on a significant scale, without development.
Development is a Tough Job
Thirty-five percent of participants noted that development is a difficult job. Table 6
captures interview excerpts that reveal that sentiment.
Table 6. Participant Responses Noting that Development is a Tough Job.
Participant 3 So yeah, I think that’s why a development officer, in my mind, is the hardest
job.
Participant 5 Development—first of all, it’s the hardest job. I always say I would never ever
work in fundraising, and I’m the campaign chair here, by the way.
Participant 7 That’s a really hard thing for development to do and philanthropists need to be
more open to it. I feel like that’s really hard, and I think philanthropists,
philanthropy has made it hard.
Participant 8 You know, you’re matchmaking. So, you already have a very difficult
position.
Participant 12 You know, it’s a challenge, but they need to learn how to ask for money.
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Participant 14 It was amazing to us how difficult it was in the beginning to raise money for
kids. It just wasn’t as easy at all. People just didn’t have that in their head, in
their mindset.”
Participant 16 I think it’s a very tough job, being in charge of development, because nobody
wants your calls, and no one wants to be asked for money. So, I think it’s a
very tough job.
Although these quotes reflect responses about the difficulty of nonprofit work and
fundraising, they were focused on these issues from the perspective of the nonprofit and its
development staff. Other participants, however, remarked on these issues from their own vantage
point. They noted their fundraising work, board service, and other volunteer efforts that support
nonprofits and causes outside of their philanthropic giving. Table 7 details some of these quotes
related to the difficulties of fundraising and philanthropic work that participant donors may
experience through their own efforts.
Table 7. Participant Responses signifying Fundraising Difficulties Apart from Development
Participant 1 Well, I make it look easy, but I promise you, it’s not easy, OK. … It’s very
hard. Our work is exhaustingly hard, but I’m not going to sit up there and
complain when I give a speech. I want to be hopeful, but it’s hard. What can I
tell you? Life’s hard. It’s all hard.
Participant 6 So, I have been doing philanthropic work forever. Sometimes I take a pause
and go: Wait a minute. You know no good deed goes unpunished, and why am
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I not making the money. Sometimes you know because you work as hard in
nonprofit as I’m sure at a regular job, because I’ve had jobs.
Participant 15 The problem is, the biggest challenge is that the need keeps growing. It’s not
like there’s less need the more you give. It’s that more and more people, they
fall to social services and programs that, some of which I deal with and you’re
asked to do more and more. It’s a huge challenge and it’s hard.
Development Should Build Relationships and Get to Know Donors Better
Seventeen of 20 participants explicitly mentioned or provided an anecdote about the need
to cultivate relationships with donors to raise money. The study participants noted that
development officers needed to get to know prospects and donors to learn what is of interest to
them. Many noted that it can be a long-term process to get to know a donor and build a
relationship. Table 8 provides quotes from the interviews to support this assertion.
Table 8. Responses Noting that Development Should Build Better Relationships with Donors
Participant 2 Oh, I have a very strong opinion on this. They’re all elephant hunters, they all
want big gifts and they wanna wine and dine wealthy people. And they don’t
mind the fact that maybe one out of every 10 wealthy people that they
cultivate who might take 10 meetings over two years, they think there’s a
good ROI. Which there is [some], but you also need to have a program for
cultivating small to medium sized donors and engaging with them with thank
you notes, with a very personalized description of what you’re doing with
their money. And I find that a lot of development people don’t really have an
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interest in doing that. They wanna get a few big gifts rather that building a
large pool of smaller donors that could become bigger donors over time. So,
I’m a strong believer in building that foundation and that pipeline, as opposed
to just elephant hunting for every couple of years, that one big gift every few
years.
Participant 3 I think the development officer’s primary job is to just provide the
environment and also getting to know the donor in a really deep, deep way.
Participant 4 So, for me I think the best way to fundraise is to have a face-to-face—for big
money I’m talking about here. Whatever, big money, it’s all relative. But to
have a face-to-face conversation with somebody.
Participant 5 It’s really about relationship. It’s all about the relationship they’re able to have
with donors, and the money comes after that.
Participant 8 Make it a required reading that they read How to Win Friends and Influence
People by Dale Carnegie.
Participant 13 The one thing I would answer specifically to your question of what
development people can do, is it’s the thing that Harvard does so brilliantly.
They cultivate people. They understand you don’t go for the ask. You
cultivate and you make relationships happen. And from there, pretty much
anything could be possible. That has to come first. And a lot of the people are
altogether ready to ask me in the fourth quarter, way into the fourth quarter
sometimes, for a commitment for something I have not lived with. I have no
feelings for, or very little. They needed to have worked all year or several
years with me to have found where is my bleeding-heart spot.
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Participant 14 Sometimes you have to develop a relationship with someone for quite a long
time to inspire them to understand what they care about. And that’s what
development departments have to do. There are so many organizations here,
and they’re all for good causes. So, it ends up being like, OK, who is your, is
your relationship with? The person who’s asking? How important is that? And
the organization and the work that they do?
Participant 18 There have been a few development officers but for them, we probably
wouldn’t still be giving to the organization. But that’s not the majority.
Negative Experiences and Opinions about Development
Eighteen of the 20 study participants relayed a negative story or criticism about
fundraisers. Many indicated their disapproval by citing a bad experience they had. Nine
participants shared a positive opinion or story along with the bad one, but no participants who
answered this question only had positive things to report. Participant 9 did not respond to this
question, whereas Participant 10 largely ignored it and focused on her relationship with the
executive director. In her words:
Well, it’s kind of interesting because I’ve really never thought about that. I’ve never
accessed any [development]. … I usually come to the decision of what I’m going to do,
and I do it regardless of the development director or what they have to say or anything.
It’s sort of a done deal by the time I’m talking to them. I’m not often solicited by
somebody who I wasn’t going to give to anyways.
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Forty percent of negative responses highlighted the ineffectiveness or inability of
development staff to raise money and support nonprofit organizations, as reflected by the quotes
in Table 9.
Table 9. Responses on the Ineffectiveness and Inabilities of Development
Participant 4 When I was president of the education foundation, there was talk about hiring
a development officer. And from my perspective, I mean, I generally respond
better to people that I feel are kind of living and breathing it on their own as
opposed to somebody who’s paid to do the job and then you know, whether
they get either a percentage or they get paid based on bringing the donation,
you know whatever. It’s somebody—I personally, myself, respond better to
people who are living and breathing the cause as opposed to somebody who’s
hired to raise money.
Participant 6 [The clinic’s] development, for us, is pitiful. I’m having that argument with
them now. I want to know, they assigned somebody supposedly that’s doing
development, I don’t care if you say this, that’s doing development and I don’t
know what she does. She does nothing and it [makes me angry]. She’s getting
a nice salary and we’re doing all the work. It’s frustrating to me. Development
should be helping the organization that is out there raising money for the
[clinic]. You know for the larger organization that you’re raising money for or
accessing them or whatever. They do nothing and that is really frustrating.
Participant 12 Well, I think there’s an issue, ‘cause I know on all of my boards, all
development people leave after a year. Like, what’s going on here? Because I
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think they’re not able to go out there and raise money, they need to learn how
to raise money. And they need to learn how to work with the boards. …
They’re all afraid to ask for money. It happens, I see it all the time.
Participant 13 They need to do their homework better. Some have done it wonderfully, and
I’m so grateful that they do and have. But so many of the development people
are just … everybody is … they’re formulaic in how they approach it. The
ones that are the most formulaic are the money managers. If I see one more
chart and fancy shiny, polished expensive brochure come out. I mean, they’re
all generic for everyone. They’re the same. I don’t care about those brochures,
I don’t wanna see them. Tell me stories. Tell me how you feel. Tell me what
difference what you do makes. I mean, that’s what is lacking very often.
Participant 19 I have not found development officers very helpful personally. One or two,
maybe. … And most donors that I know that are fairly large donors, we all
know that, it’s kind of a game. So, you know to be kind of cautious of the
development person, and oh my gosh, is that person going to call again? And I
think that if the development person really authentically wanted to understand
the donor [and] why are they giving? And if they didn’t feel that the donor’s
ideas were appropriate for that foundation, to talk them through why, and
maybe help them figure out another way in which they could help that
foundation.
Another 40% noted negative characteristics of development staff, such as insensitivity or
aggressiveness. Some of those responses are captured in Table 10.
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Table 10. Responses Highlighting Negative Experiences with Development
Participant 14 I think development departments have to be savvy about who they reach out to
so that they don’t [upset someone]. And somebody who’s not a giver anyway,
may not wanna hear you say, “I would love you to give $10 million to the
capital campaign.”
Participant 15 I think it’s very important for the development officers to be educated,
articulate, and sensitive. They need to understand that, very often they
pinpoint people and they think that somebody should be giving this and that or
whatever and they’re brutal, actually. Some of them are mercenary, you know.
Our executive director, who finally got let go, he was dreadful. He was
dreadfully aggressive. So, I think that being patient, understanding the focus
of the family or an individual’s interest, and thinking about what it is that
would actually—what is going to satisfy them about giving? What’s going to
make them feel good about the process?
Participant 16 But it’s targeting people that are interested in the institution. If somebody is
interested in technology or medicine, I’m not gonna go to them and ask them
for money for a museum. So, I think it’s being target specific, and not
badgering people. Listen to them. If they say we’re interested but not right
now, then keep in communication. If they’re not interested at all, don’t waste
your time.
Participant 18 Yeah, we’ve had a few development officers that have been really good, and
they’ve done a good job of making sure that we’re aware of what’s going on
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with the nonprofit. And they’ve probably done a good job of making sure that
we continue to give to that nonprofit. So, I would say that’s not the rule, but
there are some development officers that are really strong and do a really good
job. I don’t think we’ve had too many negative experiences. I think actually
my mom did have one recently, like in the last six months, where a
development officer—[my mom] was invited to a dinner, and basically people
know now not to hit her up because we have a process … and she was sort of
ambushed by this development officer where she thought it was a social
dinner. And we actually stopped giving to [the nonprofit because of it]. But
that’s the exception to the rule.
Motivations for Philanthropic Giving
Participants in this study were asked who they give to and why. Although they were told
that making an impact was a focus of this study, the question about their general motivation and
funding priorities was independently posed without reference to impact. As noted in earlier
sections of this chapter, making an impact was unanimously highlighted as a reason for giving.
Some of the other motivations beyond making an impact that were cited or inferred by
participants in this study include personal passion or interest; the donor’s upbringing or beliefs; a
business-related connection; a sense of obligation or desire to give back; social reasons such as
family ties, friends, and other associations; and the benefit of good feelings or improved sense of
self, which Andreoni (1989) termed “warm glow.”
Figure 6 illustrates the breakdown based on participants’ responses for each of the
motivations noted.
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Figure 6. Percentage of Participants Noting a Motivational Factor for Giving
Like the desire to make an impact, these motivating factors were evident throughout the
responses of the study’s participants; however, rather than a clear delineation among them, these
motivations seemed to overlap in varying degrees in each interview. Motivations of each
participant were informed by the entire interview; therefore, the following quotes are not fully
representative of the motivating factors behind each participant’s philanthropic giving, and these
excerpts may be illustrative of one or many motivations.
Personal Passion or Interest as a Motivation
Personal passion or an interest in a cause was noted as a motivator by half the participants
in this study. Participant 20 noted that he gives to one area because “it is my passion.”
Participant 14 recognized this motivator by noting:
People give to things that they have an emotional reaction to, for the most part. If you
know somebody who has cancer, or you have cancer, you’re gonna jump on that train, if
you have the money to give. … I think you’re gonna gravitate towards things that touch
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60%
Social / Family Association
Business Related
Feeling Good / Warm Glow
Upbringing / Beliefs
Obligation / Giving Back
Personal Passion / Interest
MOTIVATIONS FOR PHILANTHROPIC GIVING
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you emotionally. If your child has been gravely ill, and you’ve had to go to a hospital,
you’re gonna probably be inspired to look into that kind of giving.
Half of the participants cited a personal passion or interest in the cause or activity as a
motivation for giving to nonprofits. Participant 16 described this motivation as:
We have certain things that we’re interested in, that we narrow the places that we give to.
So, I think most of the—today, usually, we’re reaching out to institutions and to
researchers, and to [organizations] that we’re interested in. And that changes, by the way.
As you age, it changes. When you’re young, I think you’re interested in things for early
childhood and elementary schools, and as you get older, you get more interested in
donating to hospitals and to research and disease. So, I think your interests, as you grow,
and if you live in a community, change. As you see different needs arise, your interests
change.
Participant 19 noted:
So, most of our giving, I would say, has really come from some kind of a personal place.
Where my sister had a learning disability, so I looked into testing and assessment and
understanding learning. [Because] my father [was ill], I understood medication, and
really learned about holistic care and the importance of it. So, I’ve been able to take my
own personal life story and implement it. And that’s basically how I started.
The following three participants noted the foundations they worked for or participated in
were established based on the interests of the founders. Participant 7 offered:
They’ve had a family foundation … and their giving sort of evolved naturally for the first
30 years. They followed their passions. [When] they started supporting scientific and
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medical research, they were really inspired by … both sides of the family having [a]
disease, so that’s where they initially focused their scientific and medical research.
Similarly, Participant 8 noted:
It’s what our founders set up. Our founders set up our two areas that they were interested
in. One was interested in art, and the other was interested in medicine. And so, that’s
what led us to where we are today.
Participant 18 recalled how his family determined their giving priorities. “Basically, the
process was to sit down with my mother and say, “What is really important to you? And we
decided to make four major gifts to things that were very important to her.”
Obligation or a Desire to Give Back as a Motivation
Eight of the 20 participants noted a desire or sense of obligation to give back because
they have done well in their lives. Participant 6 described this motivation as follows: “You know
when you see other people with different infirmities and different problems and stuff and then
you know you’re relatively okay. … I just felt like it was your obligation to help other people.”
Participant 8 voiced a similar sentiment about philanthropic giving: “When they are very
successful people who made it … I think they should give back. I’m sorry, I just do.”
Participant 18 noted:
Well, the motivation to give is we’re very fortunate and we’re able to give. And I think
it’s a responsibility, as a responsible person to, if you’re able to, to give because there’s a
lot of need in the world. So, the motivation is the need and the ability that we have to
give.
Participant 12 had a similar reason in describing her father’s motivation: “It’s just that my dad
always felt that he’d done well in life and for him, it was just really important to give back.”
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Participant 3’s desire to give back is connected to her coming to America as a young
child and becoming wealthy and successful. Her philanthropy reflects her experience and is
rooted in her gratitude and desire to give back. “America for me is about the land of opportunity
and the land of making your dreams come true. And I want everybody to understand that
America is that way.”
Upbringing and Beliefs as Motivation
Seven of the 20 participating philanthropists referenced their upbringing as a motivating
factor behind their philanthropic giving. Participant 14 offered:
The motivation for giving is it’s part of my DNA. I grew up even without having any
money, but we were always community service oriented. We did community service at
our church. We collected clothing. It was part of our world. It’s how my parents raised
us.
Participant 12 noted: “My dad’s been always very philanthropic. My grandparents were
philanthropic. And it’s just a generational thing that you have no choice in my family.”
Participant 6 noted:
Ever since I was a young girl, I just always felt that if one was able to do something for
somebody else, that it was the right thing to do. It was kind of like the mantra of “There
but for the grace of God go I.”
Participant 19 described her upbringing as a motivator by offering:
Number one, my father was a philanthropist. My father gave money. My father believed,
as I said, you give back to a community if you do well. You’re a part of a community. So,
you give, and you receive. You receive. He did well in his work, in his life, in his
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community, and therefore, he believed in giving back to the community. So, that’s
something I grew up with.
Participant 11 explained that her philanthropic giving is motivated by her Jewish upbringing.
Well, in the Jewish religion … you give and it’s very important. We are very lucky,
whether we have $1 or $100 or a million or a billion, whatever. It’s that we can share
what we’ve got with people who don’t have. My husband and I do all kinds of charities.
We believe in such things.
Donor 20 explained that his Jewish upbringing is a strong motivator behind his giving.
“[We] believe it’s a necessary thing. We grew up sort of learning and being told this is what you
do. It’s part of what you do as good Jews.”
Feeling Good or Warm Glow as a Motivation
Twenty-five percent of participants noted that they were motivated by the good feelings
or warm glow that they experienced by helping others. Participant 10 highlighted how her
philanthropic investment in a program generated good feelings. “It’s such a tiny little program
and every dollar makes a difference, and I love that feeling.” Participant 13 noted that part of her
motivation for giving is for the good feelings she gets. “It isn’t just the goodness of my heart, so
to speak. [It’s also] to have those good feelings.”
Participant 12 explained that her philanthropic giving gave her even more than good
feelings. In her words, “It makes you feel good and good things come back to you when you
[give]. You know, not just financially.” Participant 6 summed up the good feelings she gets
through her philanthropic efforts by saying that giving “makes me feel really good. That I have,
you know, really helped a lot of people and I continue to do that. But it really is, you know,
that’s why I continue … on with the charity work that I do.”
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Participant 15 also acknowledged the good feelings that philanthropists get from their
giving by noting,
There’s no sense in just arbitrarily, just throwing money out there or even spending
energy or whatever—what, to just make yourself feel better about yourself? Sure,
everybody thinks they do things selflessly, but most people also do it because we just feel
better about ourselves when we’re helping other people.
Business as a Motivator
Three participants noted that their funding was motivated in part because of their
businesses. Study participants were not specifically asked to connect their giving to their
business or work. The responses were unprompted and offered in the context of responding to an
unrelated question about their philanthropic giving.
Participant 1 acknowledged that most of the people who are affected by a portion of her
philanthropy are employees and therefore, her company benefits as well. In describing her
success, she noted “[it’s] what we’ve been able to do with a really captive audience because the
people that work for us [are beneficiaries of our philanthropic work]. We impact them at home.
We impact them at work, and we impact their families.”
Participant 2 was motivated to enhance his company’s brand through his giving,
primarily by gaining positive publicity. As he put it:
So, I got a lot more yield out of the [gift] because of when it was given and the amount of
publicity surrounding it. … I replicated that in a completely different context about eight
years later … [when] we got a lengthy column in the [newspaper] the next day. … It was
one of the best $10,000 investments I ever made, because that guy from the [newspaper]
gave us all sorts of access to politicians we never would’ve got.
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Participant 15 also acknowledged that her business is a motivator behind some of her
philanthropy:
Well, my philanthropic giving is actually somewhat varied … and some of it has to be
varied because the nature of the businesses I’m in. So, invariably, every customer has
charities and things they believe in. So, we wind up, very often, giving [a little] here,
doing things there. But sometimes, we wind up doing something quite larger.
Social and Family Associations as Motivation
Seven of the study participants specifically mentioned family ties, friends, and other
associations as reasons for their philanthropic giving. Participant 6 noted that she is part of a
women’s association that supports a nonprofit organization. She provides philanthropic funding
and other types of support in a collaborative effort. In her words:
I’ve been a member of a [women’s] group for, I don’t know, 35 years, and I’ve taken a
very active role. They’ve always asked me to be president, but I feel I’m more effective if
I can just do it more my way. … It’s a group, so you have to be collaborative, but I hate
the politics of all that stuff. So, I try to, you know, just be able to plow through a lot of
the … drama. There’s always drama.
Participant 9 utilized her network and community to drive philanthropic funding to a
specific cause several decades ago.
So, one of the things that I wanted to do through philanthropy, it was two-fold. One was
to get together my friends and so that we could have events that would shift awareness
around disabilities. So, there should be more conversations about that, and through the
events, have positive role models, and then raise money. … And I thought to myself, that
a lot of philanthropy is about the power of community. How I can get behind, you know,
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I already have a built-in community that I could, you know, have a luncheon and invite
300 people, no problem, you know? That’s unknown to others, but it’s very easy, it’s so
easy for me.
In a similar fashion, Participant 4, leveraged a network of women to support philanthropic
giving:
That’s one of the organizations that I co-founded recently. There’s an organization [for
women philanthropists] where its like-minded women, women like myself, and we all
donate to, you know, a shared vision of woman causes. So, it’s kind of a community
group family type of mentality, where it’s not just individual giving. It’s where we all do
it together. And I actually think it works really well, because you find others who have a
shared goal, a shared vision. You have friendships that come out of it, and I think it’s
more impactful that way.
Hyperagency as a Driver of Philanthropic Giving
The concept of hyperagency (Schervish, 2005), whereby wealthy people’s ability to
control and shape their environment creates expectations and activities that are grander and more
impactful than the average donor, was evident among the high-net-worth participants in this
study. Overall, the expectations and actions of all study participants, at a minimum, hinted at this
characteristic of hyperagency. This nod to hyperagency was found across the study and reflected
in the nonprofit endeavors these high-net-worth philanthropists choose to address, their
participation levels, and their expectations for impact. Their close engagement with nonprofits
and causes allowed them to guide and influence decision making. These efforts often
materialized through volunteering, especially via board service. Of the 20 participants, nine had
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specific responses that were indicative of hyperagency and illustrative of the difference between
them and nonwealthy donors. Various responses from those nine participants follow.
Participant 1 directly noted her hyperagency in saying, “I’m in a unique position because
I can really concentrate on the things that I think need help, and I have the wherewithal to do it
and the energy and the money and so forth.” Noting the scale of the projects and the ability to
make an impact, Participant 17 offered, “We could have just funded our own activities, we didn’t
have to fund anybody else’s. … And having experienced the benefit of being a private
philanthropist, you can just give what you want to give, right?”
Others saw themselves as comparable or even more successful than the government at
solving issues and making an impact. Participant 8 offered:
So as far as that, you know, changing the world is more like you have to take charge. If
you wait for the government to do it, we’ll never get anywhere. They have too much red
tape and ridiculousness to deal with taking on innovative projects.
With a similar perspective, Participant 17 said,
We often encounter a kind of friction point, especially in private public collaborative
efforts, and it might be there are certain things that only government can do effectively,
and there were points in our activities where we felt like the government is trying to get
us to do their job. Why should we have to buy a $2,000,000 building to house homeless
people? Because the government can’t find $2 million to do it? Wouldn’t our money be
better spent [elsewhere]? This is why I was against [the governmental agency] because it
was woefully inadequate. … We recognized that traditional private funding and certainly
public funding were not always nimble enough, or perceptive enough, or daring enough,
or courageous enough, or unfettered enough to fund something new and different.
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In comparing her and other like-minded high-net-worth philanthropists’ activities to the
government, Participant 12 offered,
The government maybe should match us. If there was some government funding, then—.
… So yeah, I [go to] the [Capitol] Hill. Like we’ll go see [a congresswoman] and we sit
around with her and her people. And we’ll say, “Hey, we funded a building at [a]
hospital, and another one [elsewhere], and look what [this person] does. Everybody goes
around the table and tells them [what we’re doing], and we’re like, we need you to start
doing some of the government grants to sort of match what we do.
This type of access to power, influence, and ability to convene important partners was
also found in five other interviews. A former CEO of a Fortune 500 company who lived in one
of the wealthiest zip codes in the United States, Participant 2 remarked on his personal ability to
fundraise through his contacts:
I think that one of the campaigns that I was proudest of was [when] I was asked to co-
chair … a new center for the hospital. … One of the other co-chairs [who was also a CEO
of a Fortune 100 company and had already made a principal gift] said to me, “This’ll be a
piece of cake. You will be a lead giver, and [another Fortune 100 company] will be a lead
giver, and here is where. … you just need to call on 10 organizations to get to the [goal],
and here’s our target for these 10.” Well, [I] kept up [my] end of the bargain because I
was in charge, but [the other company] cut its commitment in half, and one after another
of these original 10, they all melted away. So, I was in the situation where I had to go out
and find donors that nobody had ever tapped before—family businesses, small regional
banks … and I had to really be creative in thinking about what kind of case would I make
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to each firm, like [when a big accounting firm] gave us money. We reached the goal, so, I
was pretty proud of that.
When asked about current collaborative efforts with other philanthropists, the
government, and business, Participant 20 said,
So, the short the answer is no, we’re very limited in our ability to bring an ecosystem
around things. But it’s a major focus of mine to try to begin to crack that code [here] like
we did in [another city]. We did it, we brought charities together and said, “Each of you
put up a million dollars,” and the idea of, it’s gonna be, we’re gonna go and solicit either
existing organizations or new startups to try to solve this problem from every angle.
Participant 8 also noted collaborative efforts as important to philanthropic giving.
Yes, I do that. I do that. I don’t know that all donors necessarily do that, but I think that
we’ve always been, you know, connectors. If we’re interested in something or see people
that should be connected, that’s your responsibility once you’re in a small group of
influential people. It’s putting the right people in contact with each other to make good
things happen.
Participant 17 exhibited hyperagency through a focus on convening nonprofits around a
cause rather than the funders.
[Our aim] was to try to help create a community of collaboration. If you’re in the
community you identify with or within which you’re operating and there might be 10 or
15 wonderful philanthropic efforts going on loosely, in somehow dealing with some, if
not all, of the same issues and demographic. Some are stronger than others and some are
more easily funded by government, some are more easily funded by private. We would
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keep an eye out on all these collaboratives. All these connected, not officially, but all
these community elements and would see where there was a need.
Participant 15 noted that her access gave her an edge and allowed her to support a large-
scale philanthropic effort:
[We agreed] to support [a major charity] because obviously being in the industry [and]
having access to all these [professionals], vendors, and everybody else, we thought that
we could probably do events where we could control the overhead, in some capacity, and
[thus] have a good net result.
The comparison of the participant or his or her giving to others was another clue to the
presence of hyperagency. Participant 1’s explanation of how she is viewed and treated by the
people she serves through her philanthropic activities denotes her level of power in the situation
and her otherness.
About eight months ago, I was doing a series of focus groups and the women attacked me
because they said I made their bill go up. So, being the angel has good points and bad
points, but when bad things happen, they blame me, too. Obviously, I don’t have
anything to do with their bill going up, and I did the research. The staff and I did the
research, and we found out what was going on, why the bill went up, but it certainly
wasn’t us that did it. So, even though they appreciate what I do, they don’t show me a lot
of appreciation. I don’t get a lot of accolades. The children are open, because they didn’t
grow up with as much fear. But the adults are very wary of me still after 10 years. I am
still proving myself as their friend. So, that kind of stuff can be very disheartening, but
you get over it because you realize, look, you just came into their lives…and that’s the
way it is.
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Participant 7 noted a similar issue with trust:
And I think the main sort of thing that’s been fascinating here is that I think people would
be surprised that you can’t just hand out money. Right? You have to … people have to
trust you. You know? And sometimes that’s really hard. For people who work in
underserved communities, for organizations that work in underserved communities,
philanthropy is people who gained a system that’s not set up fairly and have a bunch of
money to give away at a subsidized tax rate. So, it’s starting there, to sort of convince that
we want to do good and we want to help you do good, however you wanna do it. It takes
time and trust.
Philanthropic Giving Styles for Making an Impact
Through an analysis of the responses of the 20 study participants, a new feature emerged
behind philanthropic giving. By reviewing all responses from one participant and analyzing them
in their entirety, a profile or theme emerged about that individual participant’s basic approach to
giving or giving style. These giving styles are akin to character traits or qualities that would be
the basis for a personality profile but instead focuses on the participant’s desire to make an
impact. Beyond just the underlying drivers, the entirety of a participant’s responses revealed
patterns about that particular donor’s preference and how he or she prefers to make an impact
through philanthropic giving. The responses provided clues as to what items were most
important to that donor or indicated in what ways that donor was most interest in making an
impact through his or her philanthropic giving. The participant’s past experience, talents, skillset
and resources contributed to the giving style.
A few of the giving styles for making impact were shared among some of the participants
to the study. Although there are others, giving styles that were identified for more than one
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participant in this study include: transformational, deep, and systemic change; seed funding /
multiplier; feeling the impact; and a collaborating partners approach.
Transformational, Deep, and Systemic Change Style
Some participants were deemed to be transformational or systemic change agents based
on their responses. Although all participants expressed an interest in making an impact, these
participants were motivated to give to create broad-based, sweeping changes with repercussions
for a wider audience of recipients. To create this type of grand impact, these participants tended
to narrow the scope of their philanthropic giving in certain ways.
Participant 1 focused a large portion of her giving on one geographic region and
influenced almost every aspect of community life. The work she has supported includes
education from grade school through college, employment, job training, recreational activities,
construction of a community center and park, partnerships with government for benefits and
services, advancing small business, safety, medical care, health, and well-being. Despite the
length of this list, the participant noted:
The thing is that I have so much more to do in the [region]. I’m not going to any other
towns. I might go to other towns in the [region], but I’m not going to [other big cities
across the country that are in need, even though] our model is replicable. I’m hoping that,
in time, people will copy what we’ve done and have an interest in doing it the right way.
… The needs here are huge, and there’s nobody else interested in helping in this area.
People don’t understand the need.
Participant 1 customized her approach to transforming a community by taking the time to
understand the needs in that specific community. In her words:
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What happens a lot in philanthropy is people decide what people should do, and they go
in and tell them, and then, they don’t understand why it didn’t work, but they never take
the time, or they don’t often take the time, to understand the people they’re going to serve
and to really get into their brain and their psyche and learn what’s important to them. Not
to look at the world through my eyes, but to look at the world through their eyes.
Participant 17 noted a similar approach of aiming for transformation:
I think the majority of philanthropic efforts are probably … just focused on providing the
goods and services, right? And they hope they’re providing the right goods in the right
way, and they hope they’re providing the services that people actually benefit from and
need … but we were also trying to shift the paradigm. For example, by feeding and
clothing the homeless, which brought us the hatred and backlash of the community,
right? We already had a vision that it was time to acknowledge the presence of these
[homeless] individuals, not be in denial about them, not simply recognize them—“Oh, I
see a homeless person”—but to actually—we had a whole philosophy going here and the
idea was to change the mindset of the community from “These people are in our
community” to “These people are part of our community.” And that, seriously, I think, is
probably the most successful thing we did. We did make that change. We did force that
change. It actually happened.
Participant 16 aimed to give in a more focused manner in order to make an impact:
In a way, it’s trying to make a bigger impact, because you can give a little to a lot of
things or you can give a bigger gift to fewer things. We choose to narrow it down to the
things that we really are interested in and would like to make an impact, and where we
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feel our donations will make some sort of an impact. Or, hopefully, a change in the
future.
Participant 14 acknowledged that she had given away several hundred million dollars to
roughly 1,000 nonprofits but noted that she too aimed to give deeply enough to effect real
change, whether for an individual or in a broader way. In her words:
Our basic idea is to give narrow and deep, however. It’s to choose organizations and
issues that we can see, that we can make an impact on. And so, narrow and deep in
education is a big one for us. Health care in this city is a big one. We give a lot of
donations to [health and medical] research, so it’s one of our main concerns.
Seed Funding / Multiplier Style
Several participants were motivated to use their philanthropic dollars to seed projects or
be an early investor in programs. These donors intentionally timed their gifts to help advance
nonprofit efforts in the early stages in hopes that their gifts would multiply and entice others to
give. They purposefully created scenarios that would help catapult a nonprofit in some beneficial
way or bring future funding. Engaging with a nonprofit in this specific way was motivating to
these philanthropists. Participant 20 described this approach as:
So, what we do is, we focus more on either just plain old startup philanthropic
organizations. Like a guy, a girl, a woman, whoever has a great idea for something.
Maybe it’s the very first year they’ve been around, maybe it’s the second or third year,
but we try to go in and offer, for where they are, a substantial amount of money. That
helps them look legit and feel legit and maybe [helps] get a couple extra resources to do
their programming.
His approach extends beyond financial support:
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It’s a startup. Like anything else is a startup. And people that are starting something up
have no idea what they don’t know. They have an idea. They have a passion. They have a
mission. They have a goal. They have a dream. … So, we take very active roles and we
require that there’s a board meeting every single month. And we are brutal, if you will, in
demanding that they come. They prepare. They think about it. And we ask tough
questions, and you go back and do it again. And come back the next month better than
you were the previous month, and it’s a really—it’s a tough go for the first couple or
three years. But the ones that are gonna succeed are the ones you want to stick with and
the ones you want to—you really hope can move on. And so far, we’ve been pretty
successful in finding the right, backing the right horse. Backing the right people.
An administrative representative described the giving approach of her foundation’s
philanthropists as follows: “They like to be sort of catalytic. They like to do things that they feel
wouldn’t happen without them.” As with Participant 20, these donors stay close to the nonprofits
to advise them during the early critical stages. Their funding criteria include the likelihood the
project will last and be relevant long into the future.
Participant 2 explained his effective use of this approach:
Where my donation, because of the timing and the circumstances, had a big impact well
beyond the amount of money was, in the first instance, going back to the ‘90s. There was
a bipartisan effort … to get internet access in public schools and public libraries. This
was before the internet was really widely available. And I think we gave $25,000, and
there was a big press conference and we were the first company to be a donor, and that
enabled them to go out, to go to many other companies and get money.
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Participant 16 noted that she, too, had seeded some nonprofits such as cultural and other
institutions that she helped found and wanted to see flourish. She believed so strongly in the
importance of their work, however, that she continued her support over the long term unlike the
other participants.
Feeling the Impact Style
As previously noted, making an impact was unanimously voiced as an aim of
philanthropic giving in this study; however, some participants noted the experience of making an
impact as especially important as a motivation behind their philanthropic giving. Rather than a
byproduct of giving, the ability to see and feel impact was central to their philanthropic behavior
These participants sought out opportunities that allowed them to see or feel the impact of their
philanthropic giving.
Participant 10 noted that chasing the impact has shifted her giving away from larger
organizations or projects to ones where the impact of her gift is visible to her. Even though she
may cumulatively end up giving just as much as someone who makes one large donation, she
preferred a more scattershot approach.
I like to be part of something that’s small that needs your help, and for me that’s an
impact because it’s small enough that I can actually feel that impact. Because like the
medical programs that we run in [South America] won’t run if we don’t get enough
people giving, so you feel it. It’s not like giving to the [large charity] where you hope it’s
making an impact, but who knows? Is it? I mean, is your little dollar making an impact?
Whereas when your little dollar is part of only $10, the financial impact is huge. It makes
the trip possible and you assume you’re having a—yeah, making an impact that you can
actually feel. So, I like smaller things.
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This participant’s response echoes the effect noted in Duncan’s (2004) theory of impact
philanthropy, whereby impact philanthropists give to organizations or projects that allow them to
obtain the biggest impact. However, unlike Duncan’s theory, this participant did not reduce the
overall charitable dollars being donated to the field, and her total giving remained the same
overall. The recipients, not the aggregate amount of giving, changed to accommodate the desire
to feel the impact.
Similarly, Participant 17 described a concerted effort to discover areas for giving that
were dire for the organization and would create a big impact. Whereas Participant 10 wanted to
feel the impact on the beneficiaries, Participant 17 was seeking to make a big impact at nonprofit
organizations. Again, there appears to be no support for Duncan’s (2004) theory that aggregate
giving declines due to a need to personally make an impact. Giving was instead based on what
was available. Participant 17 noted the approach of the philanthropist he worked for:
I think she was also motivated to give [when] she realized that certain things she
believed in or certain visions that she had in terms of what could improve things or make
differences or be useful were not funded. That were not easy asks. In other words, they
didn’t present themselves easily for public funders, or gigantic foundations, or
philanthropic, or governmental operations that just had too many rules and regulations
and restrictions and constrictions. She would search those opportunities out. Even with
something relatively small you could feel the impact the organization felt and what she
agreed was a very important part of their program but just wasn’t fundable. That was a
motivating factor, too.
She would keep her eye out for other interesting endeavors to try to in some way
to improve human circumstances or human life. … She realized that there were other
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organizations that benefited from private philanthropy but also benefited in great part
from government funding, but there were aspects in those programs that just weren’t
gonna get the government funding. Often those were the most important innovative
aspects of the program, and so she tried to subsidize nonfundable innovations in the
community effort to generally improve life in the community and be more impactful. She
was kinda doing stuff that wouldn’t be done unless she helped make it happen.
Participant 5’s thoughts on impact were noted earlier but are reiterated because they are
applicable in this context of wanting to feel the impact of giving.
Impact is probably one of the most important things in my criteria because I tend to, you
know … I consider investing in these organizations and I invest in organizations where I
can have financial and personal impact. So, I really look at organizations where my
donation is going to have an impact and where my presence has an impact. So, I think
that that’s my main criteria. … So, I think that’s probably one of the biggest things that I
look at, and then, I mean, obviously, that the goals of the organization and their values.
But making sure that the money is impactful and that the organizations are well managed
are probably my two largest criteria.
Collaborating Partners Style
Some participants described their role as one of making connections and are motivated by
the opportunity to connect with others to make an impact. These participants will reach out to
people they know or help create relationships and partnerships with organizations and
individuals that would benefit the nonprofit. This approach became evident through the
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responses of Participant 13. On three occasions, she voiced her interest in making connections
and helping foster new collaborations. She uses this approach in connecting with new
organizations.
So, I don’t give to general funds. I try not to. It’s meaningless to me. I’m very glad
everybody else does. Most people, many people do. Thank goodness. Because you have
to support infrastructure, and there are many things that aren’t exciting to me but need to
get done and that’s what general funds do. … What I do like to do is to bring different
organizations to the table. … And the giving more is not necessarily out of my own
pocket, out of my own foundation. It’s the cumulative impact of the different
organizations coming together to support whatever cause.
She also prided herself on discovering innovative ways to bring in new donors. One example she
provided was to include a person with a disability in exposing work associated with the
nonprofit. In her own words:
Did you realize that if you include someone with a disability, you’re going to be reaching
the largest minority in the world? And they have money. I find different ways, and
hopefully appropriate ways, to expand people’s thinking and their giving. And it gives us
that much more money to play with by doing that.
Participant 6 noted the importance of her role as a connector for the nonprofit by saying,
I’m their conduit to the entertainment world. … I’m an advocate for them too when
they’ve had problems with different issues that have hit them. Since my husband is part
of the media, you know, media counts a lot and entertainment is very helpful, too,
because you can, you know, pull out some celebrities that will help you. As we know,
celebrities are the royalty of our, you know, of our state.
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Summary
This chapter reflected the responses of the 20 high-net-worth philanthropists or their staff
members who were interviewed for this study. The main findings are that impact is
inconsistently defined by philanthropists and deemed important in some cases but not in others.
These philanthropists said they see many obstacles to making an impact but still strive to achieve
it. According to the participants, although development is an important and tough job with which
they expressed displeasure, getting to know donors better is viewed as crucial to securing
funding.
Participants exhibited or noted motivational factors underlying their philanthropic
support. Motivations included personal passion or interest; the participant’s upbringing or
beliefs; a business-related connection; a sense of obligation or desire to give back; social reasons
such as family ties, friends, and other associations; and the benefit of good feelings. The
responses and underlying motivations of study participants were summarized into giving
approaches or giving styles that encapsulated an overarching giving manner that became
elucidated through this study.
These giving styles are a few examples of how high-net-worth philanthropists in this
study approach making an impact through their philanthropic giving. A single donor may exhibit
or utilize more than one giving style. In such cases, one style may dominate over another.
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Chapter 5: Conclusion
The purpose of this study was to understand how high-net-worth donors view the concept
of making an impact and how it may affect their philanthropic giving, with the ultimate aim of
helping nonprofit organizations garner more philanthropic funding. The research was guided by
the question: What does making an impact through philanthropic giving mean to high-net-worth
philanthropists from their perspective? A subquestion was: How does making an impact motivate
the philanthropic giving of high-net-worth individuals?
This chapter highlights the major findings as related to the scholarly literature, discusses
the findings of the study related to making an impact and philanthropic giving, and puts forward
a theoretical model for charitable giving based on the study population of 20 high-net-worth
philanthropists mainly from the Southern California region. The chapter concludes with a
discussion of the limitations of the study, areas for future research, and a brief summary.
Discussion of Findings in Relation to Literature Review
This study supported the literature, which noted that despite some commonalities, impact
can be defined in a multitude of ways depending on its application (Izzo, 2013; Osborne et al.,
1995; Wainwright, 2003). Answers by study participants were varied and highlighted flexibility
in defining impact. The study further showed that philanthropists will customize their definition
of making an impact to suit the situation, organization, or use. In other words, impact can be
defined differently not only by different people, but also the same person depending on the
context of where and when it is used. Therefore, in a conversation with a donor, it may prove
helpful if the staff member takes the time to listen and learn how the donor is using the word
impact and to what he or she is referring. One similarity found among 65% of respondents is that
they define the concept of making an impact as “making a difference” or “making a change.”
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Duncan’s (2004) theory of impact philanthropy noted this same terminology in defining an
impact philanthropist as “someone who wants to personally ‘make a difference’” (p. 2160). This
phrasing is one point of commonality that a nonprofit staff can utilize when interacting with
high-net-worth donors. It provides one fairly solid anchor in the often murky world of defining
impact.
The use and importance of metrics to show impact was another area with variance.
Although 65% of participants found metrics to be an important factor for gauging impact, 55%
suggested they would give to a nonprofit even if it could not show corresponding metrics.
Participants noted that it can take a long time to produce evidence of impact, especially in
particular situations such as in public policy or medical research so, nonprofit staff may improve
relations with donors by listening and learning to what metrics or measurements they find
important.
The study showed that defining and measuring impact overall are gray areas that
nonprofits can to a large degree alter to best suit their situation and needs. Philanthropists may
review and assess a nonprofit’s reporting on impact, but they also recognize that there is room
for variability in these measures, especially when trying to obtain longer-term impact. These
findings can help nonprofit staff members guide their conversations with philanthropists so they
can best meet their expectations when cultivating and stewarding them through the gift-giving
process.
Discussion of Findings in Relation to the Theorical Framework
Academic research on philanthropy can be found in many areas, including but not limited
to economics, psychology, marketing, biology, and sociology. This study confirmed what was
found in the literature from these disciplines regarding drivers affecting philanthropic giving;
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namely, many factors motivate giving, such as the intrinsic and extrinsic factors found in
psychology (Bennett, 2003; Sargeant, 1999; Schlegelmilch et al., 1997) or those found in the
public good and private consumption models from economics (Andreoni, 1990; Glazer &
Konrad, 1996; Piliavin & Charng, 1990).
This study supported much of the findings in Bekkers’ and Wiepking’s (2011)
overarching literature review of philanthropy that explored more than 500 articles to uncover the
eight mechanisms of values, costs and benefits, awareness of need, altruism, reputation,
solicitation, psychological benefits, and efficacy to explain why people donate money to
charitable organizations. Similarities and connections exist between Bekkers’ and Wiepking’s
(2011) review and the findings in this study, particularly in regards to mechanisms explicitly
related to donors. This study framed the motivations under the terminology of personal passion
or interest; the donor’s upbringing or beliefs; a business-related connection; a sense of obligation
or desire to give back; social reasons such as family ties, friends, and other associations; the
benefit of good feelings or warm glow; and making an impact. Table 11 offers a comparison of
some of Bekkers’ and Wiepking’s mechanisms to corresponding motivational factors found in
this study based on participant responses. Although not exact matches, there are resemblances
and overlap between the two.
Table 11. Comparison of Bekkers and Wiepking Mechanisms to Study Motivations
Bekkers’ & Wiepking’s Mechanisms Participant Motivations in this Study
Values Beliefs / Upbringing
Psychological Benefits Good Feelings / Warm Glow
Reputation Social and Family Associations
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Altruism Obligation / Giving Back
Costs and Benefits Business Related – Costs and Benefits
Awareness of Need Personal Passion / Interest
Efficacy Making an Impact
Bekkers and Wiepking’s (2011) mechanism called “values,” for example, refers to some
of the same features that fall under this study’s category of “beliefs.” What donors value is
intertwined with their beliefs, which are often also affected by their upbringing. The
“psychological benefits” mechanism is inclusive of a warm glow or the good feelings a donor
derives from philanthropic giving. The mechanism of “reputation” is inclusive of the social and
family associations described in this study, and the mechanism of “altruism” aligns with the
concept of obligation or giving back. Any costs and benefits derived from philanthropic giving
are contained in the “costs and benefits” mechanism, some of which were also found in this
study, especially among participants who noted the business-related motivation underlying their
philanthropic giving. The “awareness of need” naturally applies, because donors generally
cannot give if they are not aware of a need. More specifically, this study’s findings on personal
passion and interest more closely correlated with the “need for awareness” mechanism because a
donor is more likely to know of a need when it is within his or her personal interest area.
The mechanism of “efficacy” correlates with this study’s finding on a donor’s desire to
make an impact. “Efficacy refers to the perception of donors that their contribution makes a
difference to the cause they are supporting” (Bekkers & Wiepking, 2011, p. 942). The responses
of the high-net-worth philanthropists in this study similarly noted that donors are motivated by
the concept of making a difference. It also found that they are less inclined to give when they
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think their giving is not having an impact; however, this study did not concur with Bekkers’ and
Wiepking’s finding that nonprofits perceived as being able to make the biggest impact will tend
to yield higher levels of philanthropic giving. Given the variability with which donors are willing
to define impact, it is not clear how donors would make such an assessment. Additionally, given
that 55% of participants were willing to give regardless of a nonprofit’s ability to show metrics
and impact, and that this study showed variability and issues with metrics and measuring impact,
it is not clear how a nonprofit would show that it is making the biggest impact. Notwithstanding
this variance, showing impact is considered beneficial to gaining philanthropic support.
Abraham Maslow’s (1943) seminal work on human motivation offers a hierarchy of
needs that dovetails with some of the motivating factors found through this study. By way of
their philanthropic giving, donors can fulfill some of the higher levels of Maslow’s hierarchy of
needs, such as love, esteem, and inner meaning and purpose. According to Maslow (1969), a
person is motivated to attain higher levels of the hierarchy as a natural inclination to grow as a
human being.
At once other (and “higher”) needs emerge and these, rather than physiological hungers,
dominate the organism. And when these in turn are satisfied, again new (and still
“higher”) needs emerge and so on. This is what we mean by saying that the basic human
needs are organized into a hierarchy of relative prepotency. (Maslow, 1943, p. 375)
In this study, participant responses that correspond to Maslow’s love, esteem, and inner meaning
and purpose were framed in relation to motivational drivers such as personal passion, social and
family associations, and the desire to make an impact. Participation in and support of nonprofits
is one way for high-net-worth individuals to fulfill some of Maslow’s hierarchical needs and
actualize their intent.
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Along with correlations to Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, this study found evidence of
Schervish’s (2005) characteristic of hyperagency among its high-net-worth participants. The
existence of hyperagency indicates that the study participants have satisfied at least the first two
levels of Maslow’s hierarchy, namely physiological and safety needs.
The hyperagency exhibited by the study participants seems to be driven by and due to the
higher levels of needs. The need for love, affection, and belonging as well as self-esteem needs
were influential factors behind the participants’ hyperagency. Based on participant responses,
this study found that the behavior of hyperagency can be tied to the need for love, as it helps
donors gain recognition and affection from their peers and families. Their hyperagency-related
efforts can place donors in unique positions that often are recognized by nonprofit organizations
and extend into the public through avenues such as donor acknowledgement listings, media
announcements or events honoring the donor. Hyperagency also helps donors meet the need for
self-esteem. According to Maslow (1943), “Satisfaction of the self-esteem need leads to feelings
of self-confidence, worth, strength, capability and adequacy of being useful and necessary in the
world” (p. 382). Each one of these qualities were exhibited by the high-net-worth philanthropists
in this study and are an indication of their hyperagency.
Hyperagency, however, seems most closely correlated with Maslow’s need for self-
actualization that “refers to the desire for self-fulfillment, namely, to the tendency for him to
become actualized in what he is potentially. This tendency might be phrased as the desire to
become more and more what one is, to become everything that one is capable of becoming”
(Maslow, 1943, p. 382). Through their giving and along with the characteristic of hyperagency,
high-net-worth philanthropists are afforded the opportunity to strive for and often achieve at least
a part of their potential. The participant responses in this study reflected a sense of self-
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satisfaction and a recognition that they have been afforded resources and opportunities that bring
personal satisfaction and reward. Their philanthropic giving and engagement with nonprofit
organizations is one vehicle toward achievement of their self-actualization.
Hyperagency and self-actualization seem to work together and possibly simultaneously to
better the individual philanthropist and the nonprofit organization or cause. The vehicle for
achieving self-actualization through hyperagency is often the concept of making an impact.
These three elements of self-actualization, hyperagency, and making an impact were found to be
linked in this study and can work in concert with one another. The qualities of hyperagency serve
to advance the impact or intended change and leads to a donor’s sense of self-actualization. This
relationship may explain why donor’s in this study pointed to the difficulty of their nonprofit
work. Perhaps, the perceived level of difficulty in achieving impact through their hyperagency
enhances their sense of self-actualization.
In keeping with Duncan’s (2004) theory of impact philanthropy, the study’s participants
were motivated by the desire to personally make an impact. This trait was stronger for some
participants than others but was found to be universally true for all participants. The study,
however, did not fully align with all of Duncan’s suppositions. For example, Duncan noted that a
philanthropist’s desire to personally make a difference could create certain negative externalities
such as a decline in aggregate giving. Although some participants noted that the presence of
other funders and larger gifts drove them to shift their funding to places where their personal
impact was more apparent, they did not decrease their overall giving. Additionally, many of the
study participants noted their efforts to join forces with other funders to make a collective
impact, which runs contrary to Duncan’s assertion. Participants in this study considered other
factors aside from just making an impact when giving; therefore, this study strongly supported
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Duncan’s (2004) disclaimer that “it would be unreasonable to assume that a philanthropist has a
single motive for giving” (p. 2160). Impact was not the only driver for giving, nor was it always
the most important one.
Contribution to Practice
The scholarly literature from various disciplines has focused on factors such as
demographics, motivations, and impact to determine why people give. This study, however,
revealed a new theory that considers other elements that also motivate high-net-worth
philanthropists to give. This holistic, bespoke approach accounts for an overall giving approach
or giving style and also considers the experiential preferences and attributes of high-net-worth
philanthropists when interacting with nonprofit organizations to make an impact.
A Theory for Gaining Support from High-Net-Worth Philanthropists
This study has supported findings in the academic research on motivational factors
related to philanthropic giving, including personal interests, obligations, upbringing, warm glow
effect, business reasons, social associations, and desire to make an impact. Although all
participants in this study voiced a desire to make a positive change through their giving, the
reasons and pathways behind that desire varied based on the donor’s areas of interest, resources,
and preferences for giving. Aside from the demographic, motivational, and other drivers of
philanthropic giving, this study found that the three dimensions of a donor’s impact giving style,
attributes and engagement preferences contribute to a nonprofit’s ability to garner philanthropic
support from high-net-worth individuals. The giving style serves as a general outline to
understand how the donor wants to make an impact. The attributes and preferences are specific
criteria about the type of experience that donor wants to have and how best to engage him or her.
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The sum total of the three dimensions can be reflective of the high-net-worth philanthropist’s
experiential preferences related to how he or she generally wants or likes to engage in the world.
Giving Approach / Giving Style for Making an Impact. As discussed in chapter 4, this
study found that high-net-worth individuals have different approaches for how they want to
make an impact via their philanthropic giving. Through questioning, conversations and other
research, nonprofit staff can begin to assess what activities and outcomes a donor prefers when
they want to make an impact. Chapter 4 identified four giving approaches:
1) Transformational / Systems-Level Style—impact that is transformational, deep and
aimed at the system;
2) Seed funding / Multiplier Style—impact that will multiply and generate additional
funding;
3) Feel the Impact Style—impact that is palpable to the donor; and
4) Collaborating Partners Style—impact that comes from gathering or connecting
additional people or organizations.
These giving styles were defined based on the participant response to this study but other
approaches and giving styles exist. In addition to determining a high-net-worth philanthropist’s
giving style for making an impact, this study found that specific attributes and engagement
preferences of each donor are also key indicators behind philanthropic giving to a cause or
nonprofit organization.
High-Net-Worth Philanthropists’ Attributes. Unlike most of the academic literature
from psychology, marketing, and economics, this new theory takes a more holistic approach to
considering donors. It looks at the range of offerings a donor has that could help a nonprofit
make an impact. Donors have much to offer beyond just their financial resources. Today’s high-
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net-worth philanthropists are more than customers, or individuals motivated by needs, desires,
and money, as the business literature might imply. They are active participants with time, energy,
and resources that they will utilize for the opportunity to make an impact and improve the world.
Assessing and understanding attributes that high-net-worth philanthropists can offer may
be a key to keeping them close, happy, and ultimately willing to give to a nonprofit organization.
Items that would be considered an attribute include (a) how hard the donor likes to work or the
difficulty level; (b) the complexity of tasks the donor prefers; (c) the donor’s hierarchical
position of preference at the nonprofit; (d) and the range and type of feedback on impact that the
donor prefers to track and receive. These “attributes” are essentially donor characteristics and
provide a guide to assess how best to engage a donor. For example, some donors want to
participate at a very high level and will put themselves in a position to do a great deal of hard and
time-consuming work for the nonprofit while other donors may only provide financial support
and do not participate in any other way. Table 12 provides details on donor attributes.
High-Net-Worth Philanthropists’ Engagement and Experiential Preferences.
Although a donor may have useful attributes, skills, and talents to lend to nonprofit work,
it is important to determine his or her willingness and interest in utilizing those skills. A central
focus of this study was understanding a high-net-worth philanthropist’s underlying motivation to
make an impact; however, experiential preferences are also key. Engagement and experiential
preferences may be especially relevant as attributed to high-net-worth philanthropists because of
Schervish’s (2005) distinguishing characteristic of “hyperagency.” He suggested that wealthy
people have a greater ability to control and shape their environment, for example, because they
can use their resources to circumvent constraints and more easily get what they want. They also
have more choice in how they spend their time. Schervish (2005) posited that wealthy people
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will bring this trait of hyperagency to their interactions with nonprofits and may be inclined to
utilize their resources and desire to shape agendas and activities to make an impact.
Understanding high-net-worth philanthropists and recognizing their attributes and engagement
preferences can aid nonprofits in garnering financial support.
Engagement preferences refer to the type of experience a donor would like to have with
the nonprofit and cause. Donors have a preference for engaging with a nonprofit and with
people, both internal and external to the organization. Nonprofit staff could assess a donor for his
or her engagement preferences with the staff, other donors, beneficiaries, external constituents,
etc. For example, a high-net-worth philanthropist who is motivated to make an impact and wants
deep engagement with the staff and beneficiaries while exhibiting a preference for taking on a
leadership role might be offered experiences such as hosting events or chairing the board.
Another who wants systemic change and limited engagement with the staff and beneficiaries but
doesn’t want a leadership position could be the right person to help with strategy and connecting
the nonprofit with key partners and prospective funders.
Understanding a donor’s preferences along experiential dimensions will be instrumental
in building better relationships with donors, meeting expectations, and ultimately bringing in
more funding. As evidenced by the data in Chapter 4, 55% of donors said they would continue to
give to a nonprofit even if it were unable to show metrics on impact. The donor attributes and
engagement preferences found in this study may help a nonprofit ascertain what other criteria are
motivating philanthropic giving or will help keep them close.
Another engagement factor to consider is a donor’s giving preferences. Giving
preferences focus on a donor’s preferred giving style. The three levels of “giving” criteria refer
to the (a) Frequency; (b) Type, Level or Area; and (c) Target of giving a donor prefers. For
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example, a donor may prefer to only give to an event or when a specific appeal for funding has
been made, whereas another may be so invested, he or she may regularly support the
organization whenever funding is needed. Another donor may prefer to give to operational
activities as opposed to giving to specific projects or programs, whereas another may want his or
her giving to go directly to beneficiaries so he or she can feel the impact of the support. These
giving preferences enhance the information development already collects on its donors and
prospects such as financial capacity and can change.
These preferential indicators can serve as guides to help assess a donor and determine
how best to engage him or her based on these underlying drivers. Nonprofit staff can utilize
attributes and engagement elements to gain a more robust picture of the donor, by learning a
specific donor’s preferences framed within their motivation to make an impact. Once these
attributes and preferences are determined and a high-net-worth philanthropist’s preferred giving
style or approach is understood, nonprofit staff can begin to better engage with these donors to
create opportunities that will enhance their relationship and investment with the nonprofit and
ultimately will translate into greater funding. These factors are different for each donor and can
vary for the same donor based on the various organizations he or she supports. Some questions
that could guide this analysis include: What resources, including time, skills and connections,
can this donor contribute? What type of experience is the donor looking to have in engaging with
the nonprofit? What skills can he or she add? What type of impact does this donor want to make?
How can this donor help the nonprofit make an impact?
Table 12 provides detail on some potential criteria to consider when determining high-
net-worth philanthropists’ attributes and engagement preferences. Additional attributes and
preferences may apply beyond this list of suggestions.
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Table 12. Criteria to Determine Philanthropists’ Attributes and Preferences
Criteria TYPES
Giving:
Frequency
Once Tied to event or
appeal
Occasional Continuous;
sustained
Giving:
Type, Level or Area
Early or seed Programs and
projects
Operations All levels
Giving:
Target of
Individuals or
beneficiaries
Program and
projects
Organization System
Attribute:
Difficulty Level
Easy Hard
Attribute:
Complexity of Tasks
Simple Complex
Attribute:
Hierarchical Position
None Group
participant
Committee head;
Co-host
Leader
Attribute:
Feedback on Impact
Short-term /
regular
Long-term /
limited
Engagement:
With Other Donors
None Annual Occasional Regular, consistent
deep
Engagement:
With Staff
None Annual Occasional Regular, consistent
deep
Engagement:
With Beneficiaries
None Annual Occasional Regular, consistent
deep
Engagement:
With Outsiders
None Annual Occasional Regular, consistent
deep
Engagement:
Frequency
None Annual Occasional Regular: weekly,
monthly
Engagement:
Type
Financial only Event
attendance
General
Volunteering
Board &
Committee service
Some of the criteria in Table 12 work hand-in-hand with the elements that help form the
giving styles. For example, it could be generally assumed that a transformational, deep, systems
giving style philanthropist would want his or her giving to be targeted at the system rather than a
particular program or project and that feedback on impact that is focused on the long term, and
provided less often, would be acceptable. It can also be assumed that seed funders / multiplier
types would not want to provide sustained giving while the collaboration partnering type would
want to engage with others rather than only providing financial support. Those donors who want
to feel the impact are probably looking to target individuals and beneficiaries of the services they
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are supporting. In order to feel the impact, support for programs and projects would probably be
as broad a reach as they would want for their giving.
Although some of these criteria in Table 12 work in concert and in tandem with the
giving styles for impact, many of the criteria are specific to the individual donor and therefore,
cannot be generalized. For example, a high-net-worth philanthropist who wants to have a
transformational, deep and systemic impact could do so through continuous or sustained giving
or by one large lump sum. The giving styles are not necessarily indicative of the attributes or
engagement criteria that a particular donor prefers so conversations and research are important
elements in getting to know a donor or prospect. This approach to fundraising is intended be
customized for each high-net-worth philanthropist.
Putting Donor Giving Styles, Attributes and Preferences into Practice. Figure 7
illustrates the steps of this process for engaging high-net-worth philanthropists based on their
impact style of giving and experiential preferences and attributes.
Figure 7. Process to Engaging High-Net-Worth Philanthropists to Obtain Financial Support
Step 1 consists of conversations and research to allow nonprofit staff to glean information
about their high-net-worth donors, including their motivations for giving. This process may be
iterative with information of donors gathered over time. Once sufficient information on the donor
Interview and
Research High-
Net-Worth
Philanthropists
Determine and
Discover
Philanthropists’
Giving Style for
Making an
Impact as well as
Attributes and
Preferences
Create
Opportunities
for
Philanthropists
to Make an
Impact Based on
Giving Style,
Attributes and
Preferences
Enhanced
Donor
Engagement &
Commitment
Leading to
Increased
Financial
Support
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is accumulated, nonprofit staff can begin determining his or her giving style for impact and plot
that donor’s attributes and engagement preferences along the criteria in Table 12. Based on
donor’s attributes and engagement preferences, nonprofits can categorize the donor’s giving
approach or giving style and create opportunities that match how the donor prefers to engage and
make an impact. Creating opportunities that align with underlying motivations and preferences is
expected to resonate with the donor and provide a more fulfilling experience. Taking the time to
understand a high-net-worth philanthropist’s giving style for making an impact as well as his or
her attributes and engagement preferences is an opportunity to get to know donors and prospects
which was noted as an important consideration to improving donor relations by participants of
this study. Ultimately, the goal is to have the donor become more engaged and more willing to
commit to and support the nonprofit organization.
Phenomenology and the Role of the Researcher. The giving style, attributes and
engagement preferences were discovered through the phenomenological approach of this study
that looked at the lived experiences of philanthropic giving by high-net-worth donors and
reflected their responses against the research questions of “What does making an impact through
philanthropic giving mean to high-net-worth philanthropists from their perspective?” and “How
does making an impact motivate the philanthropic giving of high-net-worth individuals?” Those
responses were evaluated through the lens of the researcher’s background as an experienced
fundraising professional. The interpretation of participant responses was influenced by the
researcher’s personal knowledge of nonprofit organizations and philanthropists and her expertise
in development. The researcher’s competency in these areas enhanced the analysis of participant
responses through a backdrop of real-life examples. The researcher drew on actual situations and
experiences with philanthropists to guide this theory into practical suggestions that are
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anticipated to be compatible with donor thinking, interests and capabilities while being
accommodating of the existing task and duties of nonprofit staff.
Nonprofit Considerations
Nonprofits can do more than just ascertain where the donor fits in these preference and
attribute categories. To better interact with its donors, a nonprofit can determine what it, as an
organization, can realistically offer to donors in terms of an experience. A nonprofit should
understand its own capabilities. For example, if its offerings fall short of donor desires, the
nonprofit can work with the donor to determine acceptable types of engagement. With an
awareness of these donor preferences, a nonprofit staff may be able to guide the donor into
experiences and engagements that will bring more satisfaction.
These assessments of skillsets and engagement preferences can be part of the ongoing
relationship between a donor and an organization. Nonprofit staff members can listen for clues to
determine preferences or if something has changed for the donor. Preferences can change over
time, so occasional reassessment would allow for more accurate representation. A life-changing
event for a donor such as illness, job loss, or death in the family may signal a time to consider
conducting a reassessment of a donor’s engagement preferences.
Limitations of the Study
This study was limited by the relative homogeneity of the population. The majority of
participants were Caucasian, older than 50, of Jewish faith, female, and residing in Southern
California. This limitation may have influenced the framework for giving styles and the
engagement preferences that emerged. A broader study might reveal more giving approaches and
giving styles.
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This study may have been limited by the philanthropists themselves, because many only
agreed to participate as a favor to the key informant, which may have been reflected in their
responses. Three of the interview participants were staff members who responded on behalf of a
philanthropist, although two of the three were also related to the philanthropists. Another
limiting factor was time. More information may have been gleaned, but time constraints were set
by many participants at the outset.
Suggestions for Future Research
Given the limitations of the study, it is recommended that the sample population be
broadened in future studies to include a range of ethnic backgrounds, ages, geographic regions,
and other differentiating factors to enhance and strengthen the conclusions presented herein.
Future research should seek to better understand a donor’s approach to giving, skillsets, and
engagement preference for giving, as well as insights regarding how a nonprofit staff can best
draw out this information.
This study could be enhanced by a survey rather than interviews with high-net-worth
philanthropists. A wide-scale survey could capture additional information from more participants
and would serve to strengthen current findings. A survey could also help overcome the access
and time constraints that represented limitations to this study.
Understanding the engagement and experiential preferences of high-net-worth
philanthropists could help with retention of donors. According to Nathan and Hallam’s (2009)
qualitative investigation, lapsing donors can be expensive for a nonprofit. It is suggested that
nonprofits can lower expenses if they are able to retain their donors. Additional research could be
conducted to explore the relationship between understanding donor experiential and engagement
preferences and retention rates.
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Additional research to determine how a nonprofit can best assess its ability to
accommodate donors in terms of engagement preferences would be beneficial. Research could
help bring these two areas together; namely, aligning the donor’s engagement preference and a
nonprofit’s menu of options will likely create a strong match and would be expected to create a
better experience for donors and consequentially help the nonprofit garner greater philanthropic
funding.
Another angle for future research is a literature review of experiential preferences. The
literature reviews of Bekkers and Wiepking (2011), Sargeant and Woodliffe (2007), and Konrath
and Handy (2018) focused on motivations underlying philanthropic motivations. To advance the
findings of this study, a literature review of approaches and experiences related to philanthropic
giving could be beneficial.
Summary
As noted by Bekkers and Wiepking (2011), “there is a large potential for theoretical
progress in the literature on philanthropy” (p. 945). Past studies have largely focused on
economic, marketing, and psychological factors for explaining why donors give. This study,
however, took a more holistic approach to understanding how to interact with high-net-worth
philanthropists and encourage their financial support based on their desire to make an impact.
This study found that by considering the giving style, attributes, skills, and resources of a
high-net-worth donor and determining their engagement preferences with the nonprofit and
cause, a nonprofit can improve relations with donors and better manage their expectations.
Through a framework of dimensions that place a donor’s preferences along a continuum of
criteria, nonprofits can begin to understand and engage their donors in a more advantageous
manner. Learning more about a donor’s giving style, attributes and engagement preferences in
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the context of making an impact will help nonprofits align more closely with their high-net-
worth donors and ultimately assist them in garnering more philanthropic support so they can
continue to do work and provide services that support individuals, communities, nations and the
world.
148
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Appendix A: Email Request for Participation in Study
From: Muna Deriane
To: Potential Participant
Subject: USC Dissertation Interview Request
Dear Participant,
I am a student in the USC Price School of Public Policy Doctor of Policy, Planning, and
Development program and am inviting you to participate in my dissertation by agreeing to be
interviewed. My research is focused on philanthropy and understanding the giving of major
philanthropists. Your input would be an important addition to this study so I hope we can find
about an hour to conduct this interview either with you or an appropriate representative.
More specifically, my interest is in learning how major philanthropists are thinking about making
their philanthropic gifts, and what impact they are looking to achieve. The purpose in collecting
this data is to analyze it through the dissertation process and ultimately to create evidence-based
research that can be used in the academic arena as well as in the field. The interviews are
confidential with the option of remaining anonymous. There will be no request for funding.
Although I anticipate the interviews will be more of a conversation, I have created a guideline of
questions that I am hoping to get answered. The questions are attached, but there is no need to
review or prepare. For full transparency, I want to add that I would like to audio tape the
interviews so I can have them transcribed. I will forward the transcript to you for your edits and
approval and then ask that you remit the approved transcript at your earliest convenience. This is
part of a quality assurance process designed to ensure accuracy of the data.
Because my dissertation includes human subjects, by law I am required to get the attached
consent form signed. Here are a few additional points:
• This interview is for academic purposes only. There will be no request for funding at this
time or any other.
• This information will be published (anonymously) as part of my USC doctoral
dissertation only. Data is not being collected for use in any publication, magazine, online
platform or other commercial space. It will be placed in academic venues appropriate for
dissertations.
• This is a request for a roughly one-hour interview, preferably in person, but may be
conducted by phone. I will come to you.
• Should staff, spouse or other representative be better suited to provide answers to these
questions, please refer me.
• Even if you have not explored your future philanthropic plans, this interview will be of
benefit to my study as we will discuss possibilities and there are no right or wrong
answers.
Please let me know if you have any questions or would like to discuss in more detail. I look
forward to hearing from you.
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Sincerely,
Muna
Muna Deriane
Doctoral Candidate
Doctor of Policy, Planning and Development
USC Sol Price School of Public Policy
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Appendix B: Consent Form
University of Southern California
USC Sol Price School of Public Policy
650 Childs Way, Los Angeles, CA 90089
INFORMED CONSENT FOR NON-MEDICAL RESEARCH
TITLE OF STUDY
The Impact of Impact: Is Impact Having an Effect on the Funding of Major Philanthropists?
You are invited to participate in a research study conducted by Muna M. Deriane, M.B.A and
Deborah J. Natoli, Ph.D at the University of Southern California, because you meet the criteria
of being a philanthropist who makes substantial gifts to nonprofits. Your participation is
voluntary. You should read the information below, and ask questions about anything you do not
understand, before deciding whether to participate. Please take as much time as you need to read
the consent form. You may also decide to discuss participation with your family or friends. You
can keep this copy.
PURPOSE OF THE STUDY
Making an impact has become central to the current conversation about philanthropic funding,
but is this concept of impact influencing individual donors who are making substantial donations
and if so how?
STUDY PROCEDURES
If you volunteer to participate in this study, you will be interviewed by Muna Deriane either in
person or by phone or via internet. The 1-2 hour interview will consist of open-ended questions
regarding your philanthropic giving. The interview will be audio recorded and captured by
handwritten notes. You may be contacted again at a later date for clarification or review.
POTENTIAL RISKS AND DISCOMFORTS
Minimal if any risks anticipated.
POTENTIAL BENEFITS TO PARTICIPANTS AND/OR TO SOCIETY
You can benefit from having the opportunity to discuss your philanthropic giving and from
having a chance to explore how the concept of impact may be influencing your decision to fund
a nonprofit. Your participation is of benefit to the wider community as it provides valuable
knowledge to nonprofits whose survival is dependent on philanthropic giving.
CONFIDENTIALITY
We will keep your records for this study confidential as far as permitted by law. However, if we
are required to do so by law, we will disclose confidential information about you. The members
of the research team and the University of Southern California’s Human Subjects Protection
Program (HSPP) may access the data. The HSPP reviews and monitors research studies to
protect the rights and welfare of research subjects.
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The data from your interview will be stored on Muna Deriane’s password protected laptop
computer. She will be the only person with access to this computer. She will transcribe
personally the interviews and code them for anonymity. She may elect to have the interview
audio recordings transcribed at Rev.com, a transcription service provider that securely stores and
transmits files using 128-bit SSL encryption, the highest level of security available. Rev.com
never shares files or personal information with anyone outside of Rev. Files are only visible to
the professionals who have signed strict confidentiality agreements and will be deleted upon
finalization at Rev.
A non-identifying code will be attributed to participants in this study to ensure information
remains confidential. Muna Deriane may retain audio recordings indefinitely but will not be used
for any purpose other than research for this study. Interview transcripts and recordings will not
be released. If the results of the research are published or discussed in conferences, no
identifiable information will be used.
PARTICIPATION AND WITHDRAWAL
Your participation is voluntary. Your refusal to participate will involve no penalty or loss of
benefits to which you are otherwise entitled. You may withdraw your consent at any time and
discontinue participation without penalty. You are not waiving any legal claims, rights or
remedies because of your participation in this research study.
INVESTIGATOR’S CONTACT INFORMATION
If you have any questions or concerns about the research, please feel free to contact:
Principal Investigator
Muna Deriane
RAND Corporation
Office: (310) 393-0411 ext. 6376
Cell: (310) 722-1972
deriane@usc.edu or mderiane@rand.org
Faculty Advisor
Deborah J. Natoli, Ph.D.
Associate Professor (Teaching)
Director of the Professional Doctorate
USC Sol Price School of Public Policy
Ralph and Goldy Lewis Hall, 202
Los Angeles, CA 90089
213-740-8584
natoli@price.usc.edu
RIGHTS OF RESEARCH PARTICIPANT – IRB CONTACT INFORMATION
If you have questions, concerns, or complaints about your rights as a research participant or the
research in general and are unable to contact the research team, or if you want to talk to someone
independent of the research team, please contact the University Park Institutional Review Board
180
(UPIRB), 3720 South Flower Street #301, Los Angeles, CA 90089-0702, (213) 821-5272 or
upirb@usc.edu
PARTICIPANT ACKNOWLEDGEMENT OF INFORMED CONSENT
I have read the information provided above. I have been given a chance to ask questions. My
questions have been answered to my satisfaction, and I agree to participate in this study. I have
been given a copy of this form.
SIGNATURE OF INVESTIGATOR
I have explained the research to the participant and answered all of his/her questions. I believe
that he/she understands the information described in this document and freely consents to
participate.
Muna Deriane ___________________________________
Name of Person Obtaining Consent
______________________________________________ ______________________________
Signature of Person Obtaining Consent Date
181
Appendix C: Interview Protocol
Initial Questions for Interviews
1. What are your main areas of focus for your current philanthropic giving?
2. Why those areas?
a. Looking into the future do you think you will continue mainly in those same
areas? Do you expect any area’s issues to be solved? How far out?
b. Was impact a consideration? Yes or No? How would you define impact? What is
timeframe for impact? (some things can happen quickly other require lead time or
are complex.)
i. If yes, what impact were you looking to achieve?
1. Were you measuring impact and if so, how do you measure it?
What is important?
2. How do you get that information/data? Who do you rely on?
ii. If not, what factors kept you supporting that cause/organization?
iii. In general, what is your opinion about metrics?
iv. Is there anything you would like to add to the idea of measuring impact
and what might be helpful?
3. Do you participate in other ways other than providing financial support to make an
impact?
a. Volunteering
b. Making connections
c. Etc.
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4. Systems thinking: As you address this area/issue are you collaborating, connecting or
partnering with others that are within that field or network? (Other organizations that
might be affected or may enhance your work.) Tell me about that.
a. Are you or the nonprofit looking at the wider ecosystem or other players in the
field who in areas that also affect the area that you give to? Why or why not?
How?
i. If no systems thinking / ecosystem
1. Would It be possible to engage?
2. Helpful?
3. Any suggestions for how to engage with rest of ecosystem?
ii. If yes
1. How big is ecosystem?
2. Are you forging new partnerships and approaching work within the
context of the larger whole? Are you attempting or seeing ability to
scale impact and foster more sustainable change.
3. Ecosystem communication efforts? Feedback?
4. Effort to build relationships and trust within ecosystem?
b. Any role of government?
i. Local, state or federal?
ii. What would be helpful as related to government involvement?
c. Any role of business?
i. What would be helpful there?
d. Are you coordinating with other donors?
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i. Are they in related fields of giving?
ii. What would be helpful to encourage donor coordination and do you think
it would ultimately help to make a bigger impact?
e. What role could Development Departments and officers play in helping you reach
your goals?
5. Is technology and/or data playing a role in your philanthropic giving?
a. If so, do you think it is adding to your impact?
6. What do you see as biggest obstacles to achieving your goals and having philanthropic
success?
7. What are biggest opportunities?
8. Anything else?
Revised Questions following Participant 2
1. Tell me a little about your philanthropic giving and why you give to those orgs. (No need
to include dollar amounts or charity names if you are not comfortable.)
2. You gave many reasons as to why you give. Among your motivations how important is
making an impact through your giving.
3. Pretty much everyone defines impact differently. How would you define impact? What
does it mean to you?
4. Do you follow up on your gift by learning about the impact your gift may have made?
How important is it to you that you receive information on the impact of your gift? Do
you require metrics? How do you get that information/data? Who do you rely on? Is there
anything you would like to add to the idea of measuring impact and what might be
helpful?
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5. Is your subsequent giving affected by the charities ability to show impact? Sometimes
showing an impact can be difficult or could not happen for many years, does that affect
your willingness to give?
6. Systems thinking: As you address an area/issue are you collaborating, connecting or
partnering with others that are within that field or network to make a wider impact? Tell
me about that.
a. If yes, who is included in the ecosystem/network? Government? Business?
i. Ecosystem communication efforts? Feedback?
b. Are you coordinating with other donors to address making an impact?
i. What would be helpful to encourage donor coordination and do you think
it would ultimately help to make a bigger impact?
7. Do you participate in other ways other than providing financial support to help make an
impact? Volunteering, Making connections, Etc.
8. From your experiences, do you see a role for technology in helping to make an impact?
9. What do you see as biggest obstacles to achieving your goals and philanthropic success?
10. What are biggest opportunities?
11. What role could Development Departments and officers play in helping you reach
impact?
185
Appendix D: Codes Generated in Dedoose
1. Accountability for results (impact)
2. Altruism or warm glow
3. Approach to giving
4. Bureaucracy issue
5. Business perspective
6. Communications on impact
7. Defining impact
8. Development department or officers
9. Donor collaboration
10. Examples or stories of impact
11. Government issue
12. Hyperagency
13. Impact feedback tools
14. Impact story
15. Importance of Impact
16. Making a change
17. Making a difference
18. Measuring impact
19. Metrics on funding
20. Motivation for giving
21. Obstacles to impact
22. Opportunities for impact
23. Others as issue
24. Perception of impact
25. Personal participation
26. Perspective on philanthropy
27. Qualitative impact
28. Quantitative impact
29. Source of philanthropic funding
30. Systems thinking approach
31. Tax issue
186
Appendix E: Codes Created in Excel Workbooks
Motivation Codes
• Business-related or driven
• Altruism or warm glow
• Feel Good
• Social benefit or exposure
• Family and others
• Personal Interest
• Obligation
• Giving back
• Sense of self
• Nonprofit work is difficult
or a hardship (Not a motivation)
Defining Impact Codes
• Making a difference
• Making a change
• Both making a difference and change
• Through stories
Metrics and Measuring Impact Codes
• Measures Impact
• Measures other factors
• Measures how money is spent
• Metrics are important
• Gives regardless of metrics
• Metrics are integral to giving
• Varied
Obstacles to Impact Codes
• Tax laws and government policies
• Bureaucracies and process issues
• Relationships and issues with others
• Limited resources
• Unwillingness to give and receive
• Collaborations and Partnerships
Approach to Giving Codes
• Transformative
• Many – Reaching the most people
• Underserved – Reaching the neediest
• Narrow and deep
• Biggest bang for buck
• Individual – focused on individuals
• Hard work
Development Department and
Development Staff Codes
• Need to get to know donors better
• Development is important
• Development is a tough job
• Need to be creative in development
• Development is good
• Development is bad
• Development is both good and bad
187
Appendix F: Institutional Review Board Approval
University of Southern California University Park Institutional Review Board
3720 South Flower Street Credit Union Building (CUB) #301
Los Angeles, CA 90089-0702
Phone: 213-821-5272
Fax: 213-821-5276
upirb@usc.edu
Date: Apr 21, 2017, 08:39am
Action Taken: Approve
Principal
Investigator:
Muna Deriane
SOL PRICE SCHOOL OF PUBLIC POLICY
Faculty
Advisor:
Deborah Natoli
SOL PRICE SCHOOL OF PUBLIC POLICY
Co-
Investigator(s):
Project Title: The Impact of Impact
Study ID: UP-17-00234
Funding: N/A - no funding source listed
The University Park Institutional Review Board (UPIRB) designee determined that your project
meets the requirements outlined in 45 CFR 46.101(b) category (2) and qualifies for exemption
from IRB review. This study was approved on 04/21/2017 and is not subject to further IRB
review.
Minor revisions were made to the application (sections 1.4, 5, 11.2 & 22.1) by the IRB Analyst.
Consent and recruitment documents are not required to be uploaded for exempt studies;
however, researchers are reminded that USC follows the principles of the Belmont Report,
which requires all potential participants to be informed of the research study, their rights
as a participant, confidentiality of their data, etc. Therefore, please utilize the Information
Sheet For Exempt Research and revise the template to be specific to your study. This
document will not be reviewed by the IRB. It is the responsibility of the researcher to
make sure the document is consistent with the study procedures listed in the application.
Please check with all participating sites to make sure you have their permission to conduct
188
research prior to beginning your study.
All submissions, including new applications, contingency responses, amendments and
continuing reviews are reviewed in the order received.
Attachments: Information Sheet for Exempt Studies, dated 03-29-2013.doc
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other International Community of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) approved registries in order to be published
in an ICJME journal. The ICMJE will not accept studies for publication unless the studies are registered prior to
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Abstract (if available)
Abstract
With an increased demand for services and a decrease in access to government funding, nonprofit organizations need additional money to remain viable and high-net-worth individuals provide a practical option. To understand the charitable behavior of individuals, the literature largely focuses on the drivers or motivations underlying their giving. Through 20 semistructured interviews with high-net-worth philanthropists, this study looked at the reasons behind their giving based on the concept of making an impact. This study found that high-net-worth individuals exhibit a “giving style” that defines a favored approach to making an impact through philanthropic giving as well as specific attributes and engagement preferences for interacting with a nonprofit. This study identified four giving styles: a) transformational, deep systemic change style
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Asset Metadata
Creator
Deriane, Muna Kaddo
(author)
Core Title
Making an impact with high-net-worth philanthropists: understanding their attributes and engagement preferences at nonprofit organizations
School
School of Policy, Planning and Development
Degree
Doctor of Policy, Planning & Development
Degree Program
Policy, Planning, and Development
Publication Date
12/10/2019
Defense Date
12/09/2019
Publisher
University of Southern California
(original),
University of Southern California. Libraries
(digital)
Tag
Development,donor engagement,donor-centric,Fundraising,high-net-worth philanthropists,OAI-PMH Harvest,philanthropic impact,philanthropy
Language
English
Contributor
Electronically uploaded by the author
(provenance)
Advisor
Natoli, Deborah J. (
committee chair
), Robertson, Peter J. (
committee member
), Sieck, Katharine (
committee member
)
Creator Email
deriane@usc.edu,munaderiane@gmail.com
Permanent Link (DOI)
https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-c89-249650
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UC11673406
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etd-DerianeMun-8039.pdf (filename),usctheses-c89-249650 (legacy record id)
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249650
Document Type
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Deriane, Muna Kaddo
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Tags
donor engagement
donor-centric
high-net-worth philanthropists
philanthropic impact