What is Leading Edge Philanthropy?
Leading Edge Philanthropy is the home for Doug Easterling’s writings on questions and dilemmas that confront the staff and boards of foundations.
Doug began working in the philanthropic field in 1992 as the Director of Research and Evaluation at The Colorado Trust. He moved to a faculty role at Wake Forest University School of Medicine in 2003 where he his work has focused on supporting foundations across the U.S. as is an evaluator, strategy advisor, program designer, facilitator and coach.
With all these assignments, Doug has sought to not only serve the highest interests of the client but also distill the experience into lessons to inform the wider field. He and his colleagues have written over 50 journal articles, book chapters and reports, many of which introduce innovative theories, models and tools.
This website compiles all these writings in a single place, organized in a way that we hope will point users to documents directly relevant to their interests. Users looking for consultation services can also use the website to reach out to Doug.
Latest Writings
Developing and Implementing the Foundations Strategy
Having a clear, well-grounded strategy is essential to philanthropic impact. However many foundations have developed unrealistic strategies that presume simplistic pathways to social change and implausible levels of influence among the foundation and its partners. My writings offer insights on how to get real on how change can happen and to understand where the foundation has influence.
The Cultivation Model of Place Based Philanthropy
In contrast to traditional place-based approaches where foundations require a centralized coordinating group to develop and implement a shared strategy, “cultivation” deploys foundation staff as on-the-ground activators and supporters of promising ideas that are already percolating in different segments of the community.
Evocative Grantmaking & Generative Engagement
Evocative grantmaking recognizes that foundations have the power to entice nonprofits to consider lines of work that wouldn’t otherwise come to mind. Using that power wisely requires staff to bring strong inter-personal skills, new knowledge that is directly relevant to the nonprofit’s interests, genuine respect for those interests, and an ability to recognize and think critically about opportunities.
Collective Impact: How Foundations Can Add Value
For over 30 years, foundations have supported coalitions, networks and other collaborative groups with the hope that they can develop comprehensive, synergistic strategies that achieve progress on large-scale issues. These have had varying degrees of success. My research and evaluation work in this field points to the facilitative roles that foundations can play to help collaborative groups achieve their goals.
Building Community Capacity, Social Capital and Civic Infrastructure
Foundations can help communities address their most pressing challenges either by supporting targeted solutions or by using a broader approach focused on improving the ability of communities to define and solve their own problems. Building community capacity (including elements such as social capital and civic leadership) has been an important and challenging opportunity for foundations over the past 40 years.
Managing the Polarities that arise in Philanthropy
Polarities are pairs of orientations that appear to compete with one another, but in fact are interdependent. One of the big polarities in philanthropy is the contrast between developing a strategy internally within the foundation, versus supporting nonprofits to implement their own strategy. While foundations tend to select one pole over the other, this often leaves them vulnerable to a predictable set of downside risks. Foundations do better when they explicitly manage these polarities.
