Giving Compass' Take:

• Suzanty Sitorus writes on philanthropy in Indonesia and how to encourage family foundations to stay focused and align their work with Sustainable Development Goals.

• What is your family foundation already doing well? How can you build on successes and improve weak areas?

• Here's an article on finding common ground within family-run philanthropies. 

Along with their increasing wealth, many families who own business empires in Indonesia set up a foundation to carry out their philanthropic mission. In recent years, the second and third generations of some of the family foundations have begun to take the lead. They bring in new approaches such as strict separation between family foundation and their business group’s corporate social responsibility and employing professionals to run the foundations. Other family business group remain traditional, blending family philanthropy with corporate social responsibility of their business. Either way, the family and corporate foundations are showing bigger interest in collaborating with other partners.

Such encouraging development is a good start to make philanthropy by family foundations more effective. The global and local challenges today require strategic and systemic interventions as they become ever more complex and interwoven. Many foundations are increasingly drawn to align their work with Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The SDGs’ universal values present an opportunity for the foundations to work on underlying issues and collaborate with other stakeholders. At the same time, the interlinkages of the goals can be overwhelming. While a strong drive from the founders can help a foundation to consistently stay in focus, various relevant challenges emerge—often unexpectedly, and create distraction. Traditional family foundations who are not supported by seasoned professionals are more prone to such a distraction.

Read the full article about effective family philanthropy by Suzanty Sitorus at Philanthropy In Focus.