Giving with purpose
Holiday seasons are a time where people open their hearts and wallets. This isn’t just the Aussie summer; it’s a trend we see around the world. It is generous, kind and a powerful force for good.
For many, gifting time and/or money to a favourite charity may be a regular habit with a certainty of knowing where they want to give. For others, finding charities to give to that align to the people, places and causes they care most about can be tricky.
How might we translate our good intentions around ‘giving’ (in whatever forms) into the changes we seek?
Take the Celeste Barber bushfire appeal. It started with passion and urgency. It raised over $50 million in record time. Yet many donors assumed their money would go directly to victims and frontline services across the country. In reality, restrictions on the recipient charity – the NSW Rural Fire Service – meant funds were allocated differently. Celeste herself publicly wrestled with the mismatch between donors’ intent and the outcomes.
The lesson is not “don’t give” or “don’t trust”. The lesson is that if you want your giving to align to the changes you want to help create, ask a few questions before you donate to close the gap between your giving intent and gifting impact.
As PRF, we are one of the country’s biggest donors. We take the stewarding of our funding very seriously and have an incredible team dedicated to why, what and how we fund. But you don’t need to be a big foundation to benefit from some guided giving questions.
I was recently invited to speak about this, which gave me the opportunity to pause and consider 10 questions that might be useful to help guide people on a giving journey. Throughout my career in social impact, these questions have been percolating. You might already have your own way of doing this. Whatever your approach, there’s no ‘one way’ to give and I encourage you all to keep giving in ways that are meaningful for you and the areas you care about.
1. Why: what cause do I care about and why?
Sometimes giving can be reactive or habitual. We see a disaster and donate; we’re invited to an event and donate; we are stopped in the street and we donate.
If you’re keen to sharpen your purposeful giving, (if you haven’t already) start with understanding the causes you care most about and why.
Are there issues that you feel passionate about, something that touches you personally, or areas you’d love society to make progress on? Is there a priority for you, your family, or your organisation? Is there an inequity you want to help address? Knowing what you care about and why helps you stay committed beyond a crisis moment, helps you contribute (however small or big) to a longer-term goal, and to choose partners who align with your values.
2. Who and where: for which people, in which places?
Drilling down to the next level beyond the ‘cause(s)’. Who or what are you trying to support? Is it young people in regional towns, migrant women in urban centres, First Nations people and economic empowerment, First Nations communities, animals requiring rescue support or rehabilitation, conservation of the environment, people experiencing family and domestic violence, families with young children having the best start to life?
People matter. Places matter. Planet matters. We will all have different priorities that need support. Collectively, we can make a difference.
Being specific can assist to choose a charity. For example, if an initiative claims to support a community, how is that community is genuinely involved in its design and delivery? If it is for First Nations people and outcomes, what First Nations leadership is in place? If it is a project “for” a rural area, how are people from that area involved?
As givers, understanding who benefits, where, and on whose terms, can help target our giving, and ensure that we’re responding to needs, aspirations and progress.
3. How: what kind of change do I want to contribute to?
Think in symptoms and systems. Is your funding for immediate relief, for building capability, for prevention and addressing root causes?
At PRF we often use the tree analogy. Leaves represent individual needs: meals, emergency relief, scholarships etc. Branches represent programmatic work: such as services, programs, piloting innovations. Roots represent addressing the conditions that will enable progress/ or are holding it back: tackling policies, structures, ways of working, narratives, early intervention and prevention etc.
All three levels matter. But they’re different kinds of work, with different timeframes, risks and results. Are you focusing on prevention, or do you prefer to have the flexibility to be reactive in a crisis? Or do you want to do both? Being clear helps make choices and ensure collectively we address all parts of the picture.
4. Return: what do I want out of it?
Sometimes we don’t want anything out of it. And sometimes we do, and that’s ok. It’s worth giving ourselves permission to ask this question.
For corporates it might be staff volunteering opportunities, impact reports, or public recognition. For individuals it might be a sense of aligning to your identity, contributing to something you care about, understanding progress, being part of a collective group contributing to something you couldn’t achieve alone, feeling joy and/or being involved in some other way. Naming what you want out of giving helps you choose where you give your time or money, or at least understand whether these expectations can be met.
5. What’s going on in the ecosystem?
All of us see things from our own perspectives, so it’s always worth thinking beyond funding what we already know. Who else might be working in the space? Where are the gaps? Is there role that your funding can play that others might be less willing to fund?
For example, you might strengthen an under-resourced organisation that’s already embedded in community. You might look for coalitions, networks, or place-based initiatives that already exist. Thinking about who else, where else, what else is happeing in the ecosystem, can open up new possibilities for funding, partnerships, and co-funding opportunities.
6. Which levers might help create change?
Lasting change rarely comes from one organisation, or one intervention. There’s rarely a silver bullet, and instead there are a host of possibilities: technical levers (policies, programs, research, service design), considering where and how resources flows (who makes decisions, where is the funding directed), and hearts and minds (narratives, leadership, public will).
If you want to make better sense of it, seek out and get the insights of local leaders, people with lived experience, community organisers, researchers, practitioners and others who understand what changes might be needed from different perspectives. Or find others who are doing this already.
As per point 3, considering the levers can also help you decide what kind of giving you’re practising: are you helping people survive now, or working to change the system so fewer people need help later? Both are valuable, but they require may require different partners and approaches.
7. Who could be funded to do the work?
Often, the biggest charity brands are doing some of the heaviest lifting on a national level. And sometimes the smaller brands are doing the important work and are really well trusted in communities. Look at different sized organisations, who needs different resources and supports and who is trusted where.
If you’re investing in First Nations outcomes, is the organisation First Nations led? If you’re investing in a regional town, is the organisation located there?
Big or small, charities are all doing incredible work. It is worth making a conscious choice.
8. Rules: what are the boundaries I can choose within?
There may be some guardrails or rules around who you fund. Funders and charities have purpose boundaries and scopes, as seen with the NSW Rural Fire service example. It’s worth understanding what the rules (or at least scope of the type of things that can be funded) might be to match to your intent.
If you need a tax receipt, make sure you’re giving to a charity that is equipped to provide one. Boundaries are not about closing off opportunities, they’re about sharpening focus and increasing the odds of expectations and impact.
9. Consequences: what are the unintended effects?
Every decision we make in all different areas can have ripple effects. Asking, “What might be the intended and unintended consequences?” can be really useful. In the context of giving, considering where these could be and for who is important. For example, we have seen unintended examples where groups are crowded out, funders request activities that aren’t fit for purpose, inequities are accidentally reinforced, and expectations are set that can’t be achieved and/or sustained.
Thinking ahead may help mitigate risks, avoid harm and build trust. This doesn’t require perfect foresight, but rather, curiosity and humility.
10. Results: how will I know if I have contributed to making a difference?
Finally, understand what success might look like for the people, group, community, area you’re supporting. This doesn’t have to be tied to specific numbers. It could be stronger local leadership, increased participation, or policy change or a small contribution to a much longer term change. This isn’t about attributing the outcome to your contribution alone, but about about understanding your contribution among others.
Understanding what’s changed, for who, where and how, helps us all learn, adapt and improve. We should expect surprises and setbacks in things that are going to take a long time for progress. We should be prepared for it to be messy and build in feedback loops so we can adapt.
From checklist to mindset
These questions are hopefully a way of connecting heart and head that shifts us from “Which charity do I already know?” to “What change do I want to help create?” It also hopefully helps prevent the mismatch between the intent and impact that Celeste Barber experienced.
As we head into the end of the year, when giving and volunteering surge, I invite you to try some or all of these questions. Whether you’re a seasoned giver, or just starting on your giving journey, these questions may help you give with clarity and confidence, and make sure your generosity lands where it can do the most good.
To all of you who are giving with purpose, now and throughout the year, thank you for your generosity.
Kristy Muir
