A fresh episode of the Civil Society Podcast has been published with Jen Shang, co-director of the Institute for Sustainable Philanthropy. In this interview, Shang discusses the psychology behind giving, how to understand donor motivations and engagement strategies for charities which seek to build strong relationships with donors.
You can listen to the interview now below or on streaming platforms including Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music and Pocket Casts.
AI-generated transcript
George Hayes (GH): Hello and welcome to another episode of the Civil Society Podcast. I’m George Hayes and in this episode, I spoke to Jen Shang about her book Meaningful Philanthropy. We discussed the psychology behind giving, donor motivations, engagement strategies for charities and moral conviction, among other fascinating subject areas.
I hope you enjoy listening to my chat with Jen as much as I did recording it, and I’ll speak to you before you know it at the end.
The topic under discussion today is your book Meaningful Philanthropy, and there are a few subject areas we're looking to delve into. My first question is, what does being a philanthropic psychologist mean in practice?
Jen Shang (JS): That's a very good question. Being a philanthropic psychologist doesn't mean I give money to all charities all day long, every day, which you know could be one interpretation. For me, philanthropic psychology is the scientific discipline that studies how people love and primarily in the last 20 years, I've been studying how people love through giving to charities. So practically, it means I do research into donors through survey or interview methods, and I help fundraisers to understand their donors better and so that they can take care of them better through fundraising communications. We also carry out certificate educational programmes at our institute, and I do webinars and podcasts like this one to help people understand what philanthropic psychology is and how they can use it to change the way they practice philanthropy.
GH: Okay, fantastic, and how did you get started on this work? I mean, on your website you're described as one of the first, or pioneering members of this community. How did you start your project on meaningful philanthropy in the first place?
JS: Diving deep into how high and ultra-high-net-worth individuals experience their philanthropy has always been something that I wanted to study, and I have just been waiting for the right partner to come along, so that we can do the project together. And when Mr Tony Bury came along, who is our key benefactor for this research, who also has a passion to grow philanthropy, it was the perfect person, the perfect timing, and he has the perfect connection into the right networks. So it really all came together as a long-term dream coming true, really for me.
GH: Can you just tell us a bit about the sort of people who influenced you to create this concept and to go more into it? So, tell us a bit about who you studied, how you studied them, and what you found in some of your more meaningful discoveries.
JS: Yes, absolutely. So for this project, we interviewed 48 high and ultra-high-net-worth individuals. 36% of them are female, 90% of them are under 40 and 15% of them are from APEC, and 10% are from MENA, the rest of them from North America and Europe. So it's a global reach across 10 time zones and five continents in our sample, and we carried out interviews with these individuals, some of them, one one-hour interview, others two one-hour interviews for two different times. Then, primarily in this project, we want to paint a road map of how did they get started with their philanthropy. How do they set the direction of their philanthropy and how they sustain themselves in that journey.
GH: We're interested in the different kinds of philanthropists. Obviously, there's a broad spectrum of people who are inclined to give. I guess, what surprised you most about the reasons that people give to charity, given all these variances that can occur?
JS: Yeah, I'm rather surprised about how just deeply personal and transformative the philanthropic experiences that they shared with me were, because often I only met these people for the first time, so I was quite surprised by how honest and open people are in sharing their experiences. So I'm quite grateful for that.
GH: That's really interesting to hear and obviously we're interested also in the slight differences in different philanthropic means. For example, we're interested in the difference between meaningful philanthropy and impactful philanthropy. Which do you think charity should focus on more or most?
JS: Well, I mean, I think it is up for the charities to choose which one they want to focus on. And these two are not exclusive terms to each other. Highly impactful philanthropy can be also highly meaningful, and vice versa, right? So I think the only missing opportunities that charities might have are if they only focus on one at any given point of time for any given donor. I hope what they would do is they always have both in their mind as they carry out conversations with donors, so they can speak about impact, if that's the language they use, if that's what they're interested in. At the same time, they can explore, when does impact become personally meaningful for the individual? So talking only about impact, without asking questions about why this impact becomes so personally meaningful for them, for me, just misses out an opportunity for some potentially quite fruitful conversations.
GH: What sorts of conversations do you think should be had? It's interesting that you say that you can miss the point by making it too binary. Yeah, what sort of conversations do you think would be advantageous to have around these areas?
JS: Obviously we always know, and fundraisers always talk about this, which is, we always want to go into a donor conversation and begin by listening to them. And when we listen to our donors, they obviously will touch on the impact that their philanthropy has made, if they have already matured in their philanthropic practice. What they may or may not share without fundraisers asking is why making such impact is so personally meaningful for them. You know, anybody can make this impact. Why do they choose to be the one? They could choose to make any other impacts, why do they choose this one? So there is something in them and about them that led them to where they are in their philanthropy today. So I think asking questions to help fundraisers understand how they journeyed here is is quite important, not just because then it provided us with that shared understanding about the best way to journey forward together, but it also just helps us to understand a little bit about what we as organisations can do to make the giving experience more rewarding and meaningful for the for the giver.
GH: That's very interesting, and I just had a thought. I was going through the book, and you mentioned the topic of one of the chapters is on this concept of identity ceding, and it's something that you mentioned about, you know, philanthropists having their own personal stock in certain causes. I was taken by the idea that philanthropists often need to cede their sense of self in order to better suit the goals of a certain organisation. Can you speak a bit more to that? Because I think that's a really interesting point that you raised.
JS: It's not even like philanthropists are consciously doing this, or fundraisers need to consciously make people seek their identities. That's just not how love works. Very often, the way it happens is that when philanthropists get engaged in some courses, like they would go on to site visits, they will get to know people, they will spend sometimes quite a large chunk of their time with the people they're helping. And people just can't help but to be changed by the people they meet, and if, through their philanthropy, they meet a very different group of people from the people that they have known from their business world, from their family lives, from other recreational activities, then by definition, because they are spending time with these people, they will get to know them, and these people will help them to get to know themselves. This ceding process is a natural consequence of getting to know each other.
GH: Okay, that makes a lot of sense. And on the other side of things, do you think there can be some barriers that charities face? For example, what do you think are some of the biggest barriers that charities face when trying to meaningfully engage with their donors? And what would you suggest? How can these sorts of things be overcome? Because there can be issues sometimes.
JS: Absolutely, I think from the charity's perspective, it is really about taking that courageous step and stepping back a little bit to put our donors, almost in a way before our mission, in a way, to say - let me just have this conversation with this donor, because I'm genuinely interested in this person as a human being, whether eventually he or she gives me money or not, is their decision, but for me as someone who cares deeply about this mission, let me just listen to this person as a person first. Often because fundraisers and non-profit leaders were often under quite tough constraints on our time, on our resources, on the deadlines we need to meet, on the budget that we have, on how quickly we're being evaluated, on our output, we don't often feel like we have the time or the space to give our donors the opportunity to really be human with each other. So what I would recommend is that I appreciate the fact that our time is limited, and we can't always break through in that particular limit, but I think what we can do is, given the limited time we do have with people, even if it is only half an hour or 60 minutes, if we can't devote more than five or 10 minutes of it to treat our donors just as a person, not as a donor, then do however many minutes that you feel like you can afford, you know, not in the small talk way, but in that genuine understanding of being a person.
GH: That's interesting in that it reflects on another of your chapters about the essential self, and I was interested in this concept of self-efficacy and self-esteem and how that can contribute to charities. Do you mind unpacking a bit more about how one's self-esteem and belief in one's values and what they can contribute can lead to meaningful connections with charities?
JS: This is something that I have learned, not only from my conversation with philanthropists, also from our conversation with fundraisers, where sometimes in our profession, we obviously are highly performing individuals who have become leaders in their own field. But sometimes the professions we do belong to part of who we think we are in our essence. For example, I care about renewable energy. I do renewable in my business. I do renewable energy in my philanthropy. I do renewable energy in my social enterprises, I talk about renewable energy. I dream about renewable energy. So renewable energy is part of my experience - I don't have to doubt it. It's just so natural to me, right? But not everybody is as lucky as this kind of particular individual, where they can find that one thing, that encompasses every part of their lives. For other people, their business might just be a career option where they accumulate wealth, and then once the wealth is accumulated, they really don't need to spend any more time in that business. They completely switch to, for example, become a nature lover, help conservations, build community, and they find their true selves in those charitable activities. So when it comes to self-esteem and self-worth, the hypothesis that psychologists have for a long time is that the more when people can live out their essential self in any activities they carry, whether it's their business or their philanthropy, the higher self-esteem and self-worth people can experience. So in that perspective, if fundraisers can interface with philanthropists' essential sense of self in their interactions with people, those conversations will naturally become more meaningful for the philanthropist themselves, because it's just so core to their sense of who they are, right? But they also have a real opportunity to contribute to their psychological well-being, and from that perspective, we might say philanthropy is an area where philanthropists have the highest degree of freedom in experiencing, expressing what their essential sense of self is. And just to build on the earlier point about that identity ceding idea in several of the interviews that we did when a philanthropist articulated the essential self through the process of identity ceding, they experience their essential self in the context of the relationship with the people they help with, right? So they take on a community who needs to take on conservation, they take on the community who needs to fight poverty. They see themselves as part of the community, and they all are overcoming challenges together, and that becomes their defining identity.
GH: That's something that I noticed coming up quite a lot in the research and, on the other side of things, just going back to the discussion about the barriers that charities face to engage with donors. Can you give some examples of quick wins that charities could implement as soon as tomorrow to overcome some of these barriers or hurdles?
JS: To introduce the difference between highly impactful philanthropy and highly meaningful philanthropy can be a very quick win in the boardroom in conversation with CEOs, in conversation with donors - it is simply a different channel for us to deepen that conversation that we have with our donors. The second quick win is, if you have only 30 minutes, think through it from the perspective of, how can I get to know the person as a person? These are very simple mindset shift that might help us to just be present ourselves in a slightly different way, and perhaps pose questions, maybe just one or two questions per conversation, in a slightly different way, but they have the potential to unlock deeper relationships and more meaningful kind of giving, and hopefully a greater amount of giving because it is more meaningful.
GH: To expand on that, what advice would you give to smaller charities who have these limited budgets and may not have the reach of some of the larger charities or more established organisations?
JS: In my experience, the largest barrier for small charities is the degree to which people feel confident about their own mission. For small charities, it is especially important for small charity leaders to become really comfortable with what their charities stands for in their community and in their mission, and to recognise that they exist because they are the only one and the best one in doing what they're doing in their community. If they can feel comfortable and confident standing in that space, then when they have conversations with donors, they carry that confidence with them, and I think in a to a certain extent, that is actually more important for small charities, just because sometimes they feel like they might not be able to compete with their brand, more established brand, they might not have enough resources. But if they are the only one, and they're the best at doing what they do for their community, and if they find donors who care specifically about that one thing, then the good news for them is these will never be other people's donors. Right? So they just focus on building those relationships with those very few people who love them for the lack of a better word to death.
GH: That's really interesting. We've been speaking to quite a lot of smaller charities as part of our news coverage. I've noticed that their cause is obviously very, very close to their hearts and I imagine that is the case across the board, but especially with a smaller workforce and lower budgets, you do really need to care about your cause. I guess it links back to this idea of authenticity that you mentioned quite a lot. How important do you think the concept of authenticity is to being a meaningful philanthropist and encouraging those connections between donors and charities?
JS: It is quite important. The flip side of that, however, is that the discovery and the articulation of one's authentic self is a journey, and not everyone is prepared to express that and to share that and to experience it in a given relationship. So I think although we charities, we can appreciate and respect the fact that if someone chooses to express their authentic self with you, you can have the open door to build that authentic relationship. I don't think charities should take the attitude that somehow authenticity can be imposed, created or pressurised or manufactured. It has to be a natural flow of the quality of the relationship that's built.
GH: That's a good point and also, I was interested in learning a bit more about fundraisers who have yet to explore this concept of meaningful philanthropy or meaningful impact. What advice would you give to those fundraisers who are yet to come to terms or get to grips with these concepts? How can you pitch it to them as something that could be beneficial?
JS: So the first thing to think about is that, if people have been quite comfortable with the language of high-impact philanthropy, then switching it to or complementing that with meaningful philanthropy is not such a big, big leap. They just need to include the meaningful philanthropy in their vocabulary, where they can purposely differentiate that impact is about the difference that philanthropists make for other people, versus meaning is how they take personal responsibility for making that impact, and consider that as something important in their own lives. So it's that two-way exploration that they can keep in mind when they interact with donors. That is the simplest mindset that they can take. By the end of this podcast, every time when they look at the donor, they think about both sides of that equation. So I would say that is probably the best first step. Beyond that, on our website we have a short executive summary of the research that people can read about. We obviously have the book that people can read, but I appreciate for non-psych majors, it might not be the easiest to read. I don't know how long it takes you to read it, George, or how you find it, but the good news is we are also contracted with the Association of Fundraising Professionals in the US to generate a four part mini education series that we're going to release sometime later this year that helps digest this content into a four part one hour long mini education series that we will make available freely for everyone to get to know meaningful philanthropy more. So stay tuned to our website. You will be able to find it later this year.
GH: Obviously different forms of media can help bring these new concepts to different audiences and I would say that you can understand it [the book] without having a degree. I was going to just ask a couple more questions to round off. How do you predict that philanthropy will change in the coming years? Which charities do you think will thrive?
JS: My sincere hope is that philanthropy can become more and more, quote, unquote, recentered into the original meaning of what philanthropy means, which is the love of humankind, right? Whatever means that we as fundraising professionals or academics or philanthropists themselves, or people who are helped by philanthropy over the years, whatever we can do to bring the love of humankind back to the transference of money, time, talent, I think that would be a quite meaningful shift.
GH: I just had one more question I was also interested in, again, this idea about moral conviction and the connection to philanthropy. Is that something that you think is essential for donors to have and for there to be an alignment between one's moral conviction and the specific cause or the specific charity?
JS: As a social scientist, I'm not in a place to say the shoulds and the should n'ts. What I discovered from my research is that for some people, moral conviction is really important. They do see their right and wrong choices in philanthropy, versus for other people, philanthropy is more like a preference, without necessarily any associations for moral judgments. Both of these two people, two types of people are prevalent in the practice of philanthropy. For fundraisers, what's important is, again, to go back to that listening. What I hope the book can provide for fundraisers who need to carry out deeper and deeper and more authentic listening is a whole set of questions that they can use to scaffold their listening. They can ask questions about how people think about moral conviction. They can ask questions about what people care about and whether that's right or wrong, right. So I think it's going back to the same recommendation I made earlier. The only missing opportunity that people have is to have only impact for or only meaningful philanthropy. As long as you have both concepts in your mind, and they are both options during a conversation, you are reducing your chance of missing out something really important, right? So the same with moral conviction: as long as you understand for some people that could be important, while for others is not, and you are prepared for both options, and you respect how these options play out in ways that are meaningful for people, then you're not missing out, right? I think that's what the book is really offering professional fundraisers is a set of concepts that they can get familiar with and prepare themselves before they walk into any of these conversations, so that they can listen better they have more precise question to ask, and they have more tools to deepen their conversation.
GH: I think that's really well summarised and probably a good place to end the podcast. I just wanted to say thank you very much from myself and everyone at Civil Society Media for agreeing to take part. It's been a really insightful conversation, and look forward to hearing from you again soon.
Thank you so much for listening to this episode of the Civil Society Podcast. You can like and subscribe to the podcast and listen to all our other episodes on all major platforms. I hope you stay safe and well and we’ll speak to you again soon for another episode.
