Philanthropy pundits, in recent years, have divided the sector into two distinct categories: “strategic” and “trust based.” While useful, these labels oversimplify reality.
For example, my employer, the Gates Foundation, viewed by many as the epitome of strategic philanthropy, doesn’t make secret decisions in a conference room in Seattle. Gates program officers are in constant contact with grantees doing the work in communities every day. Meanwhile, McKenzie Scott, considered the embodiment of trust-based philanthropy, doesn’t throw darts at a wall to determine the recipients of her largess.
Still, there is value in trying to characterize different ways of practicing philanthropy, not because one is right and the others are wrong but because different approaches are needed to accomplish different things.
With that in mind, I’d like to add a new category to the mix. I call it “kitchen-table philanthropy” because it reminds me of what happens when a family sits down around the kitchen table to figure out how to respond to a crisis. They rally together to take care of their own.
I’ve been thinking about this approach to philanthropy since I moved back to my struggling home state of Missouri in 2015, after more than a decade away. The troubles facing Missouri and St. Louis, the city where I now live, have been apparent for years. In St. Louis, 37 percent of children live below the poverty line, well over twice the national average. Across the state, 32 percent of working families are getting by on incomes under 200 percent of the poverty line, and the vast majority of them have no realistic path to a secure, stable life. Their jobs in areas such as office support and food services are disappearing, and they lack the skills to fill the jobs in growing STEM professions.
Soon after I got settled, members of my community began expressing their concerns about what was happening in our state. I received lunch invitations from local people who wanted to know what the Gates Foundation was going to do to help. My answer was that I was not in town for the foundation. “I just live here,” I said. “Missouri is my home.”
But when my wife and I welcomed our first child, Miles, I started thinking more about the place where he was going to grow up. Every good thing that has happened in my life originated in Missouri, where I felt and still feel the love and support of people who care deeply about what happens to me. In a way, Missourians are my family — and I felt an obligation to do something.
Something New
I started asking others who I knew felt the same way if they wanted to build something new to address the state’s economic mobility problem — not something led by the Gates Foundation but something of, by, and for Missourians.
This past summer, those questions resulted in the launch of Upward Momentum, a philanthropic collaborative backed by $30 million in commitments from three Missouri-based foundations and millions more from local families and individuals.
But this isn’t just a story about one organization in one state. It’s a story about a different kind of philanthropy, practiced far beyond the boardrooms of Big Philanthropy.
When I started talking to people about what would eventually become Upward Momentum, it didn’t feel like fundraising. So many Missourians were already committed to fighting poverty in the state and eagerly jumped at the opportunity to work with others who shared their priorities. We talked to local foundations. We talked to friends. We talked to friends’ friends. My wife chatted with a woman at an event and introduced us, and she ended up bequeathing her estate to Upward Momentum.
Many of the donors asked to do more than contribute money. They also wanted to give their time and their perspectives, to invite others to donate, to participate in learning and strategy sessions, and to help make the hard decisions about what Upward Momentum would be.
One point we all agreed on was the need for inclusivity. We reached out to people from every part of the state, from rural and urban communities, and from both political parties. To create a movement that reflected the state’s diversity, we focused on learning rather than starting with a set of solutions. We asked questions and tried to answer them together, based on conversations with experts across the state and the best evidence available.
Eventually, we chose three broad focus areas — family, work, and community. We began our grant making by supporting two established organizations — Kids Win Missouri and Missouri Women’s Business Center — whose proven projects on affordable child care and small business development, respectively, were ripe for expansion. In November we issued an open call for proposals so that Missouri nonprofits could guide our work, instead of the other way around.
Inspired by Charlotte
Although the term kitchen-table philanthropy is new, the method it describes is not. We are following the lead of trailblazers such as Charlotte, N.C.’s Leading on Opportunity.
In a 2014 landmark report, the noted economist Raj Chetty ranked Charlotte last out of 50 cities for social mobility. Embarrassed by the finding, Charlotte’s leaders resolved to take action, resulting in Leading on Opportunity’s launch in 2017.
The group’s list of funders includes large corporations, foundations, the United Way of Greater Charlotte, and several local families. Its founding co-chairs were a retired Bank of America executive and a former North Carolina teacher of the year.
This range of leadership reflected the power of public spiritedness to bring together people with different backgrounds, ideologies, and skill sets. Sitting around the metaphorical kitchen table, these Charlotte residents raised money, mobilized the community, and came up with an economic mobility strategy. It was a movement as much as it was an organization.
This July, Chetty published an update, and Charlotte wasn’t last anymore. It had moved up to a much more respectable number 38. This impressive progress shows that places can change fast if people who care about them band together.
The Neighborly Thing
When I was 12 years old, I needed to dress up for a student council election speech. I had no idea how to tie a tie, and neither did my mother. She told me to ask Mr. Digges next door for help. He taught me how to do it, and he started inviting me over weekly to encourage me in life. He asked how I was doing in school. He told me he believed in me. He helped me pay for summer camp and, eventually, college.
Mr. Digges wasn’t the only one. Whenever my family was about to hit a dead end, someone nearby steered us through. They were doing the neighborly thing, fulfilling an obligation that people feel to care for one another.
That is what kitchen table philanthropy comes down to in the end. The people who have created Upward Momentum intend to tap into a common set of values — Missourians having one another’s backs — and put a little money and planning behind it.
Precisely because these values are so common, I think this approach to philanthropy can play an important role in bringing opportunity back to many American communities. Just like Charlotte’s work inspired us, I hope we can inspire people in places across the country to understand that they have what they need — the financial resources, the ideas, and the work ethic — to solve seemingly intractable challenges.
