teaching effective philanthropy through giving games

TEACHING EFFECTIVE PHILANTHROPY THROUGH

GIVING GAMESFebruary 11, 2014

Presented by Jon BeharDirector of Philanthropy Education at The Life You Can Save

My life in finance

2001 2010

Assets under management

My job satisfaction

Living the dream…

How and where should we direct our resources? What should we try to achieve?

TimeMoneyExperienceSkillsNetworks ?

Styles of Giving•Reactive giving• Often in response to a direct request or to a familiar

and/ or highly publicized need• Few concerns about accountability or outcomes

•Proactive giving• Uses strategic trade-offs to allocate scarce resources• Requires reflection as to what you want to achieve• Informed by information about causes and

individual charities

Donors motivated by different things

How to make good giving easier• Push information about great charities and

giving resources• Provide relevant, high quality information to

use in decision making• Make giving a fun, social experience• …and let people give for FREE!

Giving Games raise questions both…

…conceptual …and practicalWho should I try to help? Which organizations do the work I

care about?

How should I try to help them? How will charities spend incremental donations?

What are my most important values?

What evidence is there that a charity’s programs work as intended?

Who is a philanthropist?

“A philanthropist is anyone who gives anything—time, money, experience, skills, and networks

—in any amount, to create a better world.”

Laura Arrillaga-AndreesenAuthor of Giving 2.0

Founder and Board Chairman of Stanford Center on Philanthropy and Civil Society

Better giving by individuals could be transformative

Few donors research their giving

Psychological biases• Scope Insensitivity: Donors don’t respond to the scale of

the problem

• Identifiable victim effect: Tangible victims are more evocative than statistical victims.

• Psychic numbing: Thinking about suffering, particularly large scale suffering, desensitizes people.

• Parochialism: Donors are more willing to help victims they’re similar to (e.g. shared race or nationality) regardless of need

Room for improvementWe know that individual donors…• Give huge amounts of money• Do very little research into their giving• Are hard-wired not to give to the most pressing causes

But they can achieve more good by increasing…• Number of dollars donated• Historically steady at ~2% of GDP

• Average impact per dollar• Huge variation across charities• Re-allocating giving is “free”

The economics of Giving Games•Default option: $500 to Charity A, $500 to charity B• Leveraged option:• 2 Giving Games @ $500 = $1,000• 10 participants per game = 20 people reached• $1,000 annual giving per person• Result: $1,000 still split between Charities A + B,

with an additional potential to influence $20,000 of giving in the first year alone.

“So how do you get paid to do this?”

Possible business models:• Non-profit startup• For-profit startup• Grad school

Partnership- my preferred model•Advantages of partnership• Access to funding• Ready-built team• Credibility/reputation

•Disadvantages of partnership• It takes two to tango• Crucial to find the right fit

April 2012: The Pilot Giving Game• The audience: Princeton undergrads• The organizers: Giving What We Can: Princeton

• The results: Outstanding!

Direct feedback from playersIn response to the question “Has this experience changed how you think about giving?”

“Yes it has made me more aware of the impact of charities and donations.”

“I will think about implications a lot more- there’s a lot more to consider than I thought.”

“It was interesting to learn about ‘Give Well’- I’ll base my choices more on organizations like it.”

An “organization” designed for leverage• Team: A global network of GG organizers• Giving What We Can• The High Impact NetworK (THINK)• Philanthropy educators• Giving researchers• Anyone else who’d listen to me

• Infrastructure• Donor advised fund (for record keeping)• Website: apaththatsclear.com• Online GGs

Taking stock at the end of 2012•What APTC had accomplished• 13 Giving Games in 3 countries (US, UK, Kenya)• 101 participants in hour long GGs• 965 total GG participants• Network of experienced facilitators

•What APTC still needed• A sustainable plan for the future

The Life You Can Save• TLYCS: a movement of people fighting extreme poverty

Is this how to build a movement?

Personal best- a way to do better•Why it works• Expands our comfort zones• Sets ambitious goals, but realistic ones

•How it can be applied to giving• Gathering more information to make our decisions• Challenging ourselves to give more, or give more

effectively• Taking more time to enjoy the satisfaction of giving

How APTC and TLYCS fit together

Natural pyramid of “asks”

A clear path toward success

Metric 2012 2013Y/Y

Growth# of GGs 13 67 415%

# of players 965 2071 115%# of players

spending >1hr on GGs 101 731 624%

$ Donated through GGs $2,125 $16,501 677%

Progress IS possible!

Q&A

The Life You Can Save