The Donor Advised Fund solution seemed more contemporary and more effective to us. It allows us to focus on our philanthropic strategy and leave administrative management to experts. The ease and speed with which a Fund can be launched was also a strong argument for us. Finally, the idea of collaborating in the field of philanthropy, aiming to maximize our impact through leverage, appealed to us; our first financial commitment took the form of co-financing with another Fund hosted by Swiss Philanthropy Foundation.

This notion of sheltered funds is what was still missing from the balance of my end-of-life concept. As long as I stay alive, I can do whatever I want with the capital. I can give personalized directives which will be respected by the management of Swiss Philanthropy Foundation. I found the right path with the right idea. When you directly find the partner that suits you, you shouldn’t hesitate!

Through my diverse experiences in the areas of gender equality, good governance, and political and electoral reform, I have seen that collaboration in philanthropy can be a powerful force in tackling to the most important issues we face and to foster the collaboration needed on the ground. I continue to apply this teaching at the Open Society Foundations, where we regularly partner with other foundations to take collective action, such as the donor collaboration for regional early childhood networks ( Early Childhood Regional Networks Fund), hosted by Swiss Philanthropy Foundation.

I support two organizations in France through Transnational Giving Europe. I donate primarily to the Association pour le Rayonnement de l ‘Opéra de Paris (AROP). I have made a three-year pledge to AROP to fund initiatives that aim to improve the health and working conditions of dancers at the Paris Opera. For example, I helped pay for an on-site psychoanalyst, the purchase of new gym equipment, and a new floor in one of the practice rooms to prevent injuries. Through TGE, I also give to the What Can Dance Do Project, which brings dancers to perform in hospitals. I chose TGE because I needed a way to give abroad while living in Switzerland. Swiss Philanthropy Foundation offers an excellent service through the TGE network. I can rely on the fact that my donations go directly to the projects I have chosen.”

Swiss Philanthropy Foundation allows philanthropists to benefit from the structure that you have, the very professional way of managing funds, and the due diligence that you do on grantees. If each of the donor wanted to do that work themselves, it would be hugely time-consuming and with a different level of quality. At Swiss Philanthropy Foundation, you have a great way of making things effective and easy from our side. The donors can be very different, but your system makes it easy for us to manage that. This is really a great advantage for organizations like ours.

Our mission is to keep vulnerable families in Bulgaria together. We want a Bulgarian society where children grow up in families and have the support they need to thrive. At present, around 2,000 children enter the care system every year in Bulgaria. We also support advocacy at the European level to influence how EU funding is prioritized and invested in Bulgaria to ensure children can grow up and thrive in families. Swiss Philanthropy Foundation allows us to stay focused on our mission by providing administrative, financial, and human resource support.

We had been supporting families in need for many years on a modest scale, when a change in our personal circumstances made it possible for us to do so on a much larger scale. We looked into the process of creating a foundation, but, in the end, we decided a personal philanthropic fund was the best option for us from an administrative, legal, and cost standpoint. We chose to set up a fund with Swiss Philanthropy Foundation. Our objective is to help disadvantaged families for a minimum of two years. We communicate regularly with the non-profit organizations we support. We are active in Switzerland, Italy, Somalia, Cambodia, and Tanzania.

We have extensive experience in implementation but managing grants to other organizations is something new for us. We were looking for a partner with the right expertise to make our proposal to the Botnar Foundation stronger. Swiss Philanthropy Foundation has been an excellent partner; they provide an efficient, reliable solution, which allows us to focus on the content, strategy, and operational management of the programme.

We are immensely grateful to the UN Foundation and the Swiss Philanthropy Foundation for coming forward to help us set up this fund. A lot of people and institutions have been saying they want to contribute to the fight against the novel coronavirus. Now they can.

Swiss Philanthropy Foundation provides hosted funds like ours with a unique legal structure and administrative support. This has many advantages: it keeps our running costs low, and by delegating many of the less rewarding aspects of managing the fund to SPF, we get to focus on the pleasure of giving.

The study of philanthropy has an important practical element. I got in touch with Swiss Philanthropy Foundation and suggested that we complement the centre’s more theoretical approach with their on-the-ground experience. Our collaboration in the frame of the Master Class in foundations management has been very fruitful: we have been able to make valuable new contacts, learn from each other and test the validity of our models

Swiss Philanthropy Foundation is an invaluable resource for people who want to do more than write a check to an established organisation, but don’t want to go to the trouble of creating their own foundation. The Foundation, thanks to its expertise and network, enables them to reach their objectives with total confidence. It also offers a fiscal advantage.