Our founder and CEO Aaron Walker, who will be departing Camelback in 2024 after over ten years, recently led us in a powerful visualization exercise. In order to ground ourselves in our why, Aaron had each member of our team hold one of our fellows in our minds. We visualized their success in 2024 and sent them good energy. 

Participating in this activity made me realize I might not do this enough. The Capital Collaborative team was born out of fellows’ need for help navigating the funding landscape. Almost every Fellowship cohort voices the pain points of their journeys as BIPOC, women and non-binary entrepreneurs with the main challenge being a need for guidance through the funding maze.

It can be so easy to move through our daily to-dos towards our missions and forget to actually stop and embrace the why. Let our hearts lead. So much of the work is about us. Examine how we choose to show up for ourselves, our people, our mission. Ground ourselves in intention, especially when doing work that moves us towards a liberated future.

So much of the wisdom our fellows bring to the table is also reflected by guests in our series “It’s Not Your Money: Racial Equity in Philanthropy.” Our interviewees echo many of the sentiments I know we need to hear.

Ground in these reminders with me from our latest “It’s Not Your Money” guests’ provocative wisdom below. We’ve also included some prepared questions for you to use in your next team meeting, over the lunch table, or at a staff retreat to spark discussion and challenge your thinking. You can click through to hear each of the full interviews:

Morgan Dawson, Co-CEO of Threshold Philanthropy and Beth McCaw, Founding Funder of Threshold Philanthropy explore the contrasting experiences between Black leaders and white funders when discussing race in philanthropy and how candid and open discussions about race and power can be transformational:

  • Reducing Performative Due Diligence: Morgan stated “I don’t want people to feel like they have to show me their pain.
    • What are 5 ways you could reduce or remove the performative aspects of due diligence?
  • ‘All easy roads lead to white supremacy’: There needs to be a conscious effort to prioritize discussions around race. These conversations shouldn’t be isolated from discussions about money or organizational management as they can help highlight and lead to the dismantling of systems and structures that perpetuate racial inequalities within organizations and philanthropy.
    • What policies and practices of your org might white supremacy be hiding in plain sight?
  • Money Trauma: Both Beth and Morgan opened up about their personal experiences and the trauma they carry, whether related to race or money. This acknowledgement of personal trauma helped them navigate difficult conversations and recognize when their reactions were influenced by their own experiences rather than the immediate situation or the other person involved.
    • What does money trauma mean to you? How might it show up within your organization? 

Efraín Gutiérrez + Dr. Chera Reid of Freedom Dreams In Philanthropy envision a radical future in philanthropy beyond unrestricted funding and mandatory spend down policies:

  • Fostering Radical Imagination: Despite the overwhelming nature of the existing system and the constraints faced within philanthropy, the call is to start small. It's about beginning the journey of change within one's own organization, even within the limitations imposed by time, structures, and societal pressures, by centering different values, fostering honesty, tenderness, and care in interactions and decision-making processes. 
    • Does your organization create space for radical imagination? Do you create space for staff at all levels to imagine our field and work? What do/could those spaces look like?
  • Overcoming Beliefs Blocking Philanthropic Evolution: Breaking through the limitations within philanthropy involves challenging existing structures and beliefs. It's difficult to envision radical change within philanthropy due to entrenched norms, hierarchical structures, and a lack of space for imaginative thinking. However, creating a culture that allows for freedom dreaming requires personal and organizational transformation.
    • What are your limiting beliefs that tell you philanthropy can’t or won’t change? What beliefs keep you in the work?
  • Reflecting on the Soulful Essence of Philanthropic Engagement: The work of philanthropy isn't solely about producing goods or services but about fundamentally transforming ourselves and our practices. It's about nurturing our souls, feeding our hearts, and growing our humanity amidst the pressures of productivity and delivery.
    • What do you think of Chera’s statement that ‘this work is about growing our souls, growing our humanity amidst all of the forces saying that we should be primarily concerned with producing, delivering.’? How does your soul and humanity grow in this work?

Will Cordery, Founder and Principal of Freedom Futures on rethinking our current definition of ‘legacy’ in philanthropic governance and how funders can begin conversations on legacy with their boards:

  • Sharing Wealth Origins: The importance of creating safe, transformative spaces for families and foundations to have these challenging conversations is crucial. These conversations delve into family histories, racial justice, privilege, and ultimately aim to create a more informed and empathetic approach to philanthropy. “A lot of the work is moving people beyond this framework of donating to returning wealth.”
    • Can your organization or family tell the origin story of its wealth? 
  • Impactful Hiring for Evolution: Who you hire matters but if you can’t staff up differently, you can utilize consultants to foster organizational transformation.
    • Where are 3 areas where you think your organization could benefit from a fresh perspective?
  • Rethinking Legacy: This redefinition involves acknowledging your own family legacies, reevaluating past practices, and embracing new approaches that align with justice and liberation.’The frameworks and approaches you may have used to make that money are not the same ones you use to give it back.’
    • What if your legacy was actually not just how you started and how you made the money but how you finish? How would you move?

Armando Castellano, Trustee for the Castellano Family Foundation on how foundation staff and trustees can start conversations about sharing or relinquishing power within their organizations:

  • Understanding the emotional complexity of relinquishing power: When in positions of power, like board or trustee roles, acknowledging the feelings associated with giving up power is crucial. Sometimes, the difficulty lies not just in the act itself but in the lack of vocabulary to express the anxiety or fear it might evoke. By navigating emotions tied to power dynamics, fostering transformational engagement within boards, and prioritizing trust and diverse leadership, organizations can journey toward more inclusive, community-driven philanthropic practices.
    • How do you practice listening to your body and staying present in your feelings?
  • Facilitating Board Awareness through Activities and Scenarios: As staff members, introducing activities, thought experiments, or hypothetical scenarios during board sessions can be a way to gently immerse your board in the experience of relinquishing power or considering alternative perspectives. These exercises create spaces for incremental shifts in thinking and provide a safe environment to explore diverse viewpoints.
    • As staff, what are ways you can introduce activities, thought exercises, hypothetical scenarios, probing questions to your board to try something on in a small way?
  • Impact of Trust-Based Philanthropy and Diverse Leadership: By fostering trust and empowering diverse leadership, foundations can usher in significant changes. Embracing trust-based approaches can lead to solutions that authentically resonate with and cater to the needs of specific communities, allowing for more culturally competent and inclusive outcomes. Acknowledging the nuanced difference in how organizations operate when BIPOC individuals lead and when teams embrace diversity in leadership underscores the potential for authentic community representation and empowerment.
    • How is your organization actively fostering trust and embracing diverse leadership to authentically engage with communities and ensure culturally competent and inclusive outcomes in your philanthropic efforts?

Nina Blackwell, former Executive Director of the Firelight Foundation on what it’s like to deliberately cede your own white-held space as a foundation Executive Director and her advice for other white foundation Executive Directors:

  • Start with language: We utilize so much language that is both colonialist and violent. ‘“international development'' describes folks from a global north or western point of view, which describes folks as underdeveloped. “Intervention” is a violent way to talk about intervening in somebody else's system or from a savior point of view, such as “we need to intervene.” And, “impact” is what happens when two hard objects hit each other, done by one person to another, deeply violent and disempowering.
    • What are small changes you could make in your daily language that you could address and change? At your org?
  • The work starts now: “This is not about just shifting or replacing a White leader for Black leader but about how we can shift decisions, power, and directionality. Firelight went from majority non-African staffed and governed organization to majority African staffed and governed institution.” The work started before this transition to pave the way to ensure once staffing changes were made people were well resourced and set up for success.
    • How can you and philanthropic organizations prioritize shifts in decision-making, power dynamics, and values today?
  • It is entirely possible to move forward with the power we have: We all tend to feel overwhelmed, like “I have to change everything, I need to deconstruct everything,” but the timeline looks different for every organization. It is possible to just begin. There is a need to understand power structures that exist in our institutions 
    • How might you and your organization initiate meaningful change today?

Thank you to all of our guests and partners who remind us that this work is us. To listen to future conversations, follow Camelback Ventures on LinkedIn.

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The Capital Collaborative by Camelback Ventures works with white funders and social impact investors who want to deepen their individual and organizational commitment to racial and gender equity in philanthropy — but may not know how. You can learn more about how to get involved by submitting an interest form for the Capital Collaborative’s next cohort or signing up for the newsletter.