The positive effects of MacKenzie Scott’s massive, unrestricted gifts are increasingly apparent and, to date, the experiences of recipient organizations belie widespread concerns about negative unintended consequences from her approach. These are among the key insights of a new CEP report released today, entitled Emerging Impacts: The Effects of Mackenzie Scott’s Large, Unrestricted Gifts.

Our report is based on a large-scale survey of grantees as well as in-depth interviews with a subset of organizations. We also interviewed funders to understand their take on Scott’s approach. To our knowledge, this represents the largest effort to study Scott’s giving.

The new report builds on last year’s Giving Big: The Impact of Large, Unrestricted Gifts on Nonprofits, in which we reported that Scott’s large, unrestricted gifts were experienced by recipient organizations as transformative.

Nonprofit leaders continue to report that they are using Scott’s funds to create impact through their programmatic work and within their organizations.

Nonprofit leaders also describe using Scott’s grants to strengthen their organizations’ capacity and staff climate, translating into better support for the communities their organizations serve.

Funders generally express positive opinions about Scott’s giving, but most also communicate concerns, particularly about the ability of nonprofits to handle large, unrestricted gifts.

But these concerns are, so far anyway, simply not borne out in our data.

Read the full article about MacKenzie Scott’s gifts by Ellie Buteau and Christina Im at The Center for Effective Philanthropy.