In the Right Hands: Trusting Community to Guide Philanthropy Our New Film, Coming Soon
We’re excited to announce the release of In the Right Hands, a short film that explores the importance of long-term relationships, mutual accountability, and deep trust within the practice of philanthropy.
Our own work would not have been possible without donors who trusted us – and ultimately, trusted communities – to distribute resources when, how, and where most needed. Now, we are eager to be part of the growing movement that makes trust-based funding a norm.
“When you can introduce trust as part of an accountability framework, it enables sincere and legitimate relationship… So if philanthropy wants to really be effective and is sincere about wanting to have relationships with grantees, with communities, it has to introduce trust into the picture.”
— Henry Rael, McCune Charitable Foundation
Fundamentally, trust-based philanthropy is about relationships. Funders come to trust us and our partners through knowing us, well, over time. They trust we are as committed to meeting the challenges as they are. They trust communities’ lived experience and expertise in building the solutions. They trust our accountability to one another goes far beyond paper.
This isn't blind trust. It’s trust built on mutual understanding and shared commitment to a cause.
Donors’ trust grounds the trust we cultivate with partners, freeing us to work from communities’ priorities and follow through in addressing them. Open, long-term funding – an enactment of trust – offers the stability to work across long horizons and the flexibility to adapt within them. From developing a historic agreement in New Mexico, to establishing a National Wildlife Refuge in Honduras – we’re starting to see the big things that can come when we think beyond one-year projects.
These outcomes didn’t happen because we completed detailed applications and exhaustive reports. They happened because donors trusted communities to take the lead, and provided resources to move forward.
“There are these big, daunting, dooming headlines that can be hard for all of us. But when I get to go meet the people doing the work, that is inspiring and that gives me hope. And that is what inspires trust-based philanthropy for me. The people are putting so much out there, and they give me hope. And so, of course I believe in them. Of course I trust them.”
- Jordana Barrack, Mighty Arrow Family Foundation
