Chronology of TPI's Promotion Work

TPI initiates a formal outreach education program to encourage advisors, advisor institutions, and their professional associations to promote philanthropy in their work with clients. In 1993, with the support of the Council of Michigan Foundations, TPI begins an organized outreach approach to wealth advisors in Michigan, seeking to use the experience as a laboratory to test approaches to engage advisors in promoting giving.

TPI publishes, with the editorial assistance of a diverse, nationwide group of donors involved in their families’ giving, a Primer on launching a strategic family philanthropy. Subsequently, the Primer is republished by a number of advisor institutions for their clients. By the end of 1999, more than 5,000 copies have been distributed.

At the request of the Johnson Foundation, TPI creates a Wingspread Seminar on the philanthropic opportunities offered by the unprecedented intergenerational transfer of wealth the U.S. will see over the next 40 years. The conference, co-sponsored by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, attracts exceptional participants – donors across several generations, advisors, philanthropy professionals – and becomes a seminal event as the conference’s dialogue produces a strategic template for promotion work in the 1990s. The subsequent report of the conference’s findings codifies the group’s game plan to reach out to wealth that is not yet philanthropically engaged.

TPI client Alan Alda delivers the keynote speech to the Council on Foundations Family Foundation Annual Conference. Citing TPI’s support for his family’s development of more strategic giving, Alda issues clarion call for families with financial resources to use their philanthropy to get more involved in society. Later in 1995, TPI publishes Alan Alda’s edited presentation in its promotion newsletter, “Initiatives.” 10,000 copies have been distributed to date.

Under the sponsorship of the Council of Michigan Foundations and with the support of the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, TPI begins an extensive process of personal interviews with senior advisors regarding their promotion of philanthropy with high net-worth clients. The results of the approximately 200 interviews are published in a centerpiece article in the first-ever edition of "Trusts and Estates" to focus exclusively on philanthropy. Through the article, TPI’s efforts to encourage advisors to place philanthropy at the heart of discussions with clients reaches a national audience of 60,000 advisors.

The Ford and Kellogg Foundations engage TPI to determine whether organized philanthropy could effectively fund grassroots efforts to promote philanthropy. TPI’s research findings and subsequent program design provide the framework for the groundbreaking New Ventures in Philanthropy initiative of the Forum of RAGs. TPI staff continues to be involved with the initiative by serving on its board of advisors and grant committee.

With the editorial assistance of 25 practitioners and staff of the Conference Board, TPI publishes a Primer on how companies can get started on creating effective and strategic corporate giving programs.

With a significant grant from The Atlantic Philanthropies, TPI conducts an unprecedented nationwide survey of the attitudes and practices of legal and financial advisors regarding their support for their clients’ philanthropy. The study’s findings are published in "Trust and Estates" and a major report (infra), and are shared with major advisor professional associations.

At the request of a consortium of large nation foundations (including The Atlantic Philanthropies) TPI develops a first-ever, major sourcebook on resources available for new and emerging donors. Entitled “What’s a Donor to Do,” the report remains a benchmark on donor education and resources, and has led to considerable follow-on work at TPI and elsewhere.

Following on research underwritten by the Rockefeller Foundation, TPI publishes “Global Social Investing,” one of the first known surveys of mechanisms, barriers and obstacles to global giving

TPI chairs a working group for the International Network for Strategic Philanthropy, a global consortium of donors and philanthropy experts committed to identifying, creating, and promoting best practices in effective giving.

TPI, in collaboration with New Ventures in Philanthropy and with support from the Surdna Foundation, convenes the first national “summit” on advisors and philanthropy, bringing together some of the nation's premier advisors and advisor institutions to demonstrates the need for and the ability to create tools and strategies for supporting advisors in their philanthropy-related client work.

Since 2003, TPI has been a consultant to the Place-Based Philanthropy Initiative of the Annie E. Casey Foundation, an effort to increase philanthropic resources that advance the mission of improving results for disadvantaged children and their families. TPI has created a donor learning and engagement curriculum and helped the foundation launch giving circles involving individual donors and family foundations. Through this project TPI has had the opportunity to undertake a comprehensive review of existing donor engagement and learning activities. In early 2006 the initiative brought to a two-day Atlanta workshop some of the fruits of this effort.

Concluding a two-year research and advisor education campaign underwritten by the David and Lucille Packard Foundation, TPI publishes "Doing Well by Doing Good in California," the most complete picture to date of advisor behavior, complete with advisor-focused strategies for community foundations and recommendations for broad-based action aimed at leveraging the advisor's role in increasing philanthropy.

In June, 2004, TPI and the National Center for Family Philanthropy co-sponsored the first ever National Summit of community foundation CEO's: Community Foundations and Family Philanthropy...Stepping into the Future. At the event, underwritten in part by the C.S. Mott Foundation and held at the Rockefeller Brothers Fund’s Pocantico Conference Center, participants identified a targeted set of research, resources and next steps that will help the community foundation field successfully navigate this growing but complex market.

In 2004, TPI became fiscal agent for the Social Venture Partners' Boston chapter. In addition to providing administrative support for this innovative model of donor engagement and philanthropy promotion, TPI will be collaborating with SVP to deliver educational programs.

Working with the Asia Pacific Philanthropy Consortium in a Hewlett Foundation-funded initiative, TPI is assisting APPC in developing methods and tools for determining how to encourage and support greater philanthropy among high-net-worth individuals in six Asian nations: Bangladesh, India, Indonesia, Pakistan, the Philippines, and Thailand.

The Bertelsmann Foundation commissions and TPI coordinates and co-authors two important papers on global giving: “Promoting Philanthropy: Global Challenges and Approaches,” and “Tools for Good: A Guide to Vehicles for Philanthropy and Charitable Giving.”

TPI designs and manages for the Bertelsmann Foundation an international workshop on strategies for promoting global giving. Using the “Promoting Philanthropy” paper as a point of departure, the workshop brought together in Mexico City professionals committed to philanthropy promotion from around the world.

With support from the Bertelsmann and the Hewlett Foundation, TPI undertakes a major study of diaspora philanthropy – best practices, methods for promoting diaspora philanthropy, etc.

With a grant from the C.S. Mott Foundation, TPI launches a small initiative to study the practice of U.S. community foundations around encouraging and supporting global giving. A workshop on that subject was conducted in Chicago in early 2006.

2005-2006

TPI is retained by “Give 2 Colombia,” a US-based public charity committed to encouraging and facilitating diaspora giving by Colombians in the US, to assist in the design and delivery of a two-day conference on achieving greater impact and reach in this effort.

2006-2007

TPI partners with community foundations in the Excellence in Family Philanthropy Initiative to support the development of a training curriculum, tools and peer learning agenda for community foundation staff who work with families.