In an updated description of what guides her philanthropy, Melinda French Gates has signaled that she will do more to listen to the guidance of nonprofit leaders with direct experience in the problems they are trying to solve rather than basing her giving decisions largely on data and metrics.
French Gates’s giving philosophy took on added significance last week following a report that she may not put the bulk of her philanthropic contributions into the Gates foundation going forward.
French Gates’s new philanthropic vision was outlined in a Giving Pledge letter she posted late last year. With her former husband, Bill Gates, and Warren Buffett, French Gates was an original champion of the pledge, in which billionaires commit to giving most of their fortunes to charity.
In the update, French Gates, who is worth $11.3 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, mentions both her work leading the Gates Foundation and her investment group, Pivotal Ventures.
A Wall Street Journal report, citing unnamed sources close to French Gates, said that the refreshed Giving Pledge letter was an indication that a large part of her future giving will come outside of the Gates Foundation. A Gates Foundation spokeswoman declined to comment, and Pivotal Ventures did not respond to a request for comment.
Under the terms of the Gateses’ divorce, if either Bill or Melinda can’t work as a co-chair of the foundation, Melinda will leave the organization. Last week, when the Seattle grant-making giant announced its first independent board, which still gives Bill and Melinda veto power, Gates Foundation president Mark Suzman said the foundation was working at “full speed” with the two as co-chairs.
In her new letter, Gates says that in addition to making grants, she will devote her time and energy to “fighting poverty and advancing equality — for women and girls and other marginalized groups — in the United States and around the world.”
French Gates affirms that the “data-driven” approach that has guided her giving is important in setting goals and measuring progress. However, she’s learned that “it’s equally important to place trust in the people and organizations we partner with and let them define success on their own terms,” she writes. “Philanthropists are generally more helpful to the world when we’re standing behind a movement rather than trying to lead our own.”
Philanthropy leaders critical of how billionaire donors wield their power welcomed French Gates’s commitment to seek out “new partners, ideas, and perspectives” but said questions of how French Gates would change her giving practices, and of the role grassroots leaders would play in designing her broader philanthropic strategy, were left unanswered in the updated Giving Pledge letter.
French Gates’s commitment is important, says Marcus Walton, chief executive of Grantmakers for Effective Organizations, a network of foundations that seek to improve their work, because social progress will take collective action.
By announcing her intent, French Gates is saying she wants to work in collaboration with others, he says. But, Walton adds, it is unclear how she will follow through on the themes in the letter. For instance, she does not say she will provide general operating support or multi-year grants, two grant-making practices long sought by nonprofits.
While there is much to learn about how her philanthropy will operate in the future, Walton says French Gates’s reflections must be taken at face value as a sincere statement of purpose.
“Any explicit statement of commitment to invest in social progress is welcome, period,” says Walton.
Changing Approaches in Philanthropy
The shift from French Gates reflects changes in attitudes and practices at a lot of grant makers since the pandemic began and arising from the outcry over the murder of George Floyd in 2020. Within months of the outset of the pandemic, 806 foundations signed a pledge that they would temporarily make changes in how they distribute money, including a streamlined application and reporting process for grantees, more multi-year and general operating grants, and an effort to listen more closely to the needs of their grantees.
A survey conducted by the Center for Effective Philanthropy in early 2021 of nearly 300 grant makers, about two-thirds of which had signed the pledge, found that a majority of foundations sustained “most or all” of the changes they made in the first year of the pandemic into 2021. But less than one-third of the foundations surveyed said they began to make unrestricted, multi-year grants as a result of the pandemic, and of those, about one-third said they were not sure they would continue the practice.
In addition to the lack of specifics on flexible, longer-term support in French Gates’s updated letter, Walton says it is uncertain whether the trust she says she will place in grantee leaders will be reciprocated. The reason, he says, is that trust comes through building relationships in which people hold each other accountable.
“I don’t know that there was an invitation to be an accountability partner” in her letter, Walton says. “We don’t have a relationship, and as such I don’t have the levers to establish accountability, which is supporting an individual to live up to their own aspirations — not so much as to act as a compliance monitor.”
French Gates’s new approach reflects a shift in the culture of philanthropy, where foundation leaders have become more aware of the power they can wield over grantees, says Shaady Salehi, executive director of the Trust-Based Philanthropy Project, a network of grant makers that was formed to reduce the power imbalance between nonprofits and their wealthy benefactors.
Over the past three years, the project has advocated for donors to lighten the burden on grantees and grant applicants. Hundreds of foundation leaders and donors have taken an interest in the project, Salehi says, including French Gates’s team at Pivotal Ventures, who invited Pia Infante, chair of the Trust-Based Philanthropy steering committee in 2018, to discuss the approach. Infante also made a presentation to Giving Pledge members last year.
Salehi praised the letter but said it contained “elements of a mindset” that suggests philanthropists have an outsize role in generating social change. French Gates could have more clearly outlined how she would use her influence on behalf of her mission, Salehi says, and more clearly stated how the give and take between her and her grantees would look. Donors, Salehi says, can provide the “fuel” for social change through their dollars, but getting things accomplished will come from ideas generated by leaders directly involved in the work.
“Building trust with people on the front lines has not been part of the discourse until recently, so I think it’s a positive step,” she says. “But if she really means this and really wants to listen to those on the front lines. then she needs to be prepared to hear those voices and have them inform the overall strategy and goals” of her giving.
Still, the course change announced by French Gates could have a broader impact than her own philanthropy, both Walton and Salehi say. Other wealthy donors are more likely to listen to their peers, Walton suggests. Salehi adds that French Gates is a public leader who commands attention.
Says Salehi: “People listen to what Melinda French Gates has to say.”
