Time, talent, and treasure. Encouraging people to give that full triad of gifts has long been a common maxim. We know Gen X and Millennial donors consider it essential to give all three in their own ways. But next gen donors believe they have a fourth valuable asset to offer: their peer networks, their connections to fellow philanthropists who have their own assets to give. So moving forward, we need to add one more T to the mantra: time, talent, treasure, and ties.

The next generation, especially Millennials, are seen as more highly networked than any generation in history and fundamentally peer-driven. This is the Facebook Generation, the generation that thinks of “friends” as the extended network they connect with daily around the country or even the world, not just the people they hang out with in person.¹ Their ability to communicate, advocate, and congregate through an online click, a text, or a tweet has had impressive consequences. It has helped candidates get elected and activists mobilize thousands for movements like Occupy Wall Street. These young Gen Xers and Millennials stand on the leading edges of our networked society.

As one next gen donor reflects, “Being a networker, and being networked, is now seen as something really respected, whereas in the previous generation, it was something that was respected, but people were a little dubious of it. If you were pushing too much and networking too much, you were looked at with disdain, but now it is something heralded. There is a cultural shift in how we view people who are networkers or who are connected.”

Another donor tied this cultural shift to the work of social change, saying, “Our generation, in the digital age, we recognize the power of bringing everyone along with us and building movements.” In this way, next gen donors' reliance on ties is both personal and strategic, beneficial to their own growth as well as to the causes they support. Their networks fuel their impact.

Transformation Not Transaction

Of course, we all have networks—people we're connected to and people we call when we want their support for something we're working on, be it a cookie sale for Girls Scouts or a walk for multiple sclerosis. But these networked relationships are more powerful and meaningful for the next gen. Understanding these relationships requires that we understand how the next gen think about and uses its peer connections as assets.

For one thing, peer relationships help next gen donors build their identity, like Jenna Weinberg will illustrate in the feature in this chapter. We found many next gen donors whose key identity formation experiences came from peer giving networks. The following donor describes an experience similar to what we'll hear from Jenna:

The appeal of giving in a group with peers is to be able to take my family out of it. It was the first time I've had to grapple with, “What do I care about, and how do I talk about that?” The process became more important than the actual gifting. We made our own plan for how we were going to do our giving. We developed criteria together. I found that knowing myself better, being able to articulate that, and having the experience of acting on it prepared me for when I work with my parents on family philanthropy. It also gives me the experience, validation, some authority, and agency to be able to go back to my parents and say, “I've done this. I have opinions of my own to bring to the table.”

For those who are further along in the identity formation journey, next gen peer groups and giving circles can still feel like a place to belong and to find others facing similar opportunities and challenges. One woman we spoke with admitted, “I didn't realize how much I craved talking to people in a similar situation as me.” Having significant wealth and access to philanthropic resources made this woman feel isolated, unable to ask the questions she had about identity, values, and effective philanthropy to just anyone for fear they would think she was, at worst, bragging, or at best, ill-prepared. Finding peers with whom she could talk candidly helped her work through her identity as a donor. A self-made donor concurs, saying his peer giving experiences helped reinforce his identity. “I need those connections with people who can both understand what I'm trying to do and keep me accountable to the values I'm trying to base it in.” Another agreed, “I am continually trying to find my peers and set up ways to be in conversation with them on a regular basis so that I continue to forge the path I want to.”

Using peers for identity-building purposes and personal support are good examples of how the next generation see their engagement with peers differently than past donors. While they observe previous generations often treating philanthropic peers primarily as people who can write checks to their causes, like the quid pro quo “you give to my cause, and I'll give to yours” arrangements in typical old boys' networks, next gen donors see their engagement with networks as less transactional and more transformational, both personally and strategically. They are hungry for meaningful connections with peers in similar situations of philanthropic affluence so that they can connect personally, to learn and grow together and be more effective in their giving.

Funding and learning with peers allows next gen donors to strategize together, to assess impact with one another as well as to pool their expertise and passion in service of the shared cause. “We are not doing this to be in some big club together! It's not for a sense of belonging that we want to be part of a next gen network; it's for a sense of equality and impact. You might be giving a billion to my million, but we both want to achieve the same goal. We are not just doing this to meet once a year and to go to a conference. We are doing this to accomplish long-term change.”

In this way, peer ties become another valuable resource that next gen donors feel they have to give. “We value these ties as an asset, just like the time, talent, and treasure. And we are very careful how we use this asset. Nonprofits sometimes assume next gen donors have a network filled with other potential funders that they can tap into. This might be true, but we take great care in how we use that network.”

Next gen donors clearly do not want to be too crass in thinking about the value of ties, either to themselves or to nonprofits. A few cautioned against thinking of their peers in transactional ways, including letting money become the central focus of their interactions.

There is a sort of unspoken nonsolicitation clause that we are in a safe space to air these things because we all know we have significant resources. So, yes, a fundraising ask [in a peer group] can be powerful, but if I am going to make it, I better really need it or see the alignment with the other person's funding. And I'll say, “Look, you know normally I wouldn't do this, but this is so well-aligned with what you do that you should know it exists.”

But peer networks can become insulating if participants lose sight of the fact that their work together is meant for a larger purpose and takes place in a social context. One donor was quite blunt about this caution, noting that, in general, “Today we ignore the people who live right around the corner from us and instead have these global virtual networks. I don't think that's progress.”

Valuing our ties to one another in our extended families and across the globe is certainly not a next gen idea. Kin groups and tribes have been the essential networks holding societies together since the beginning of time. However, the way in which the current next generation connect with, rely on, and tap into their peer networks seems different. If properly harnessed, next gen peer networks can be game-changing for the organizations these donors support.

Jenna Weinberg embodies this new way of using and benefitting from her peer ties. Still in her mid-twenties, Jenna currently serves as the chair of the grants committee of the Nathan and Lillian Weinberg Foundation, a supporting foundation of The Associated: Jewish Community Federation of Baltimore, which she stewards with her siblings and cousins. The donor-advised fund was set up by her great-uncle, Harry Weinberg, who established a handful of philanthropic funds in the name of each of his siblings; this one is in honor of Jenna's grandparents. Otherwise known as “Honolulu Harry” from having earned much of his fortune from pineapple groves in Hawaii, Jenna's great-uncle left the majority of his estate to the Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Foundation, one of the largest private charitable foundations in the United States, assisting low-income and vulnerable individuals and families.

Jenna's story illustrates the ways in which ties are critical for next gen donors, from the next gen peer network that helped her come to terms with her philanthropic identity to the peer giving circles whose members helped her learn, grow, and become more strategic as a donor.

Filling the Learning Gap

Not only do next gen donors want to offer their peer connections as a resource to organizations they support, but they also greatly value these ties for helping them become better donors. Next gen donors see that, through their connections, they learn how to use their other resources of time, talent, and treasure more effectively. Many of the donors we talked with pointed to their peers as a key source of learning how to be more effective donors, especially when they had few other opportunities for the experiential learning that we know (from Chapter 5) they find so helpful.²

Next gen donors who lament the lack of access to philanthropic education appreciate that learning from peers can fill this gap while also letting them get involved in giving experiences right away. Many inheritors are waiting for their families to welcome them into the family foundations and to provide opportunities for learning and giving, which in many cases could take years to happen. Earners, too, have to search the Internet or comb through the offerings of philanthropic infrastructure and resource groups to find the help they seek as they decide what to become invested and involved in. For both types of donors, locating a next gen network or peer giving circle gives them access to knowledge and know-how. One donor explains how he struggled in his search for help before finding a philanthropic peer group:

I was 31 when I was starting to get involved, and I thought, “What exactly am I doing?” I don't want to be in the shadow of my parents. I want to have a say, and I want to use this opportunity in a powerful way. I wanted to meet other people who were in the same boat, and I wanted to learn—to meet [other donors] who are doing this in a way that I respected and to meet those who were not doing it in a way that I admired and respected to see the distinction. I wanted to create a community around me that I could learn from. Which are the nonprofits that are really driving change here? I hadn't had access before to peers, so I had not realized how many other families were years, even generations, ahead of me, which I could learn from. Other families had created processes that I could draw from as I created my own; other families had made mistakes that I could avoid; other families could share what worked and what did not. And I could apply some of those “lessons learned” to my giving and my family foundation's practices.

Another next gen donor, who is also a person of color, shared a similar challenge, but he has yet to find the peer group to fill his learning gap. “There's little knowledge of how different families [of color] are giving. We've got to figure out if there's some special knowledge that people of color could benefit from so that we aren't in a vacuum innovating.” This donor's need for peer experiences that more closely match his own and for connections for shared learning is palpable.

What next gen donors learn from peers is not just a general sense of how to be a better donor, but as Jenna points out, specific information about potential grantees or about fields in which they might want to give. In fact, next gen donors trust the strategic analysis of their peers more than the wisdom of older generations in their own families or foundations. They trust authentic and direct experience with organizations, even if it is not their own personal experience, and so they connect with a plugged-in network of peers who have had their own hands-on experiences to bolster their knowledge. This sort of practical sharing and learning within peer networks is another way next gen donors think about their ties as a valuable asset they bring to the philanthropic table.

A Little Inspiration

Sometimes the value of peer donor networks is less complicated. Before next gen donors know what help they need, sometimes they just need a little direction, a little inspiration. One donor gushed about his first experience connecting with other next gen donors in a group organized by his family's financial institution:

Going to the next gen program was incredibly inspiring for me. I realized maybe I wasn't as alone as I thought, and maybe there are some risks worth taking here that I should consider going for. I was able to grow my understanding, but I think the biggest part was the empowerment for me that came out of it—allowing me to watch peers, to hear from other people who are making these decisions and living into who they are and doing it bravely and with enthusiasm. That's motivating.

Other rising donors were similarly energized by peers and expressed the effects of meeting inspiring peer role models. One donor said, “I felt pushed to think harder and better.” Another explained, “Once you get involved in a peer group, there's a lot of momentum behind that. If you want to become a more philanthropic person, spending time with more philanthropic people will just end up doing that.”

For next gen inheritors, particularly those who feel like they are toeing the line of their family's traditional grantmaking approach, having access to innovative ideas through peer donor networks—and seeing what others have accomplished with those ideas—can be especially inspiring. A next gen woman who works with her family foundation explained it this way:

Because most of my work tends to be more traditional—given that it is within the larger foundation—it is amazing to hear about Tanzania and a pioneering microfinance model that others have been working on. It is like peer pressure but more about inspirational peer pressure because after I hear a peer who has lived in Tanzania for the last eight months and has managed to affect X amount of change with this really incredible model that the peer is helping to pioneer, I leave with an urgent sense of, I need to get going and do something as well. I learn from others, but key is the inspiration from all of the incredible work that everyone is doing and at such young ages.

Some donors even worried about the lack of giving by wealthy peers who were not in a peer group that could inspire them, as they saw specific examples of behavior that changed when their peers did engage with each other. One complained about how “there is a tremendous amount of wealth being created” in the high-tech industries “but they don't do as much as they could, or they are waiting to become a billionaire before they give significant funds away.” He contrasts this with high-tech entrepreneurs who are engaged in peer giving processes, donating more and being more engaged donors. “I have been pleased to see that a lot of those individuals in [a] peer group stepped up and really joined boards or took grantmaking opportunities quite seriously and engaged with recipient organizations.”

This inspirational peer pressure is probably the biggest reason next gen donors insist that their peer networks are a highly valuable asset for philanthropy. They can not only give their own time, talent, and treasure, but also inspire their peers to do so as well.

Peer Giving Is Strategic Giving

In Chapter 3, we saw that next gen donors identified “recommending a cause or organization to others” as one of the top five most important components of philanthropic strategy. Of course, this priority shows again how much these donors trust each other's recommendations, but it also suggests that the next gen consider sharing recommendations with peers—and even making decisions or giving with those peers—a part of more strategic giving.

One longtime member of a giving circle described why the giving decisions she makes with her peers are more strategic than those she makes alone: “Giving is so much better when there are 20 other people around the table. And on the conference call, then, you have to be strategic. You don't have a choice. You have to present an objective reason as to why an organization should get your grant, as opposed to the next organization on your pile. So the communal and conversational aspect of it has forced me to do what I don't have to do when I am by myself.”

Giving circles that involve pooled funds as well as pooled human capital and joint engagement in the giving processes further exemplify how collective giving can be strategic giving. Members read proposals and conduct site visits together. They analyze together how their collective funds can make the most impact on an issue or a system, not just on an organization. In short, they use their ties to combine their time and talents, not just their treasure. A good example of this innovative sort of peer giving process is the Maverick Collective, a philanthropic and advocacy initiative started by the nonprofit Population Services International and designed to build a peer group of engaged next gen women looking to end extreme poverty in their lifetimes. The Maverick Collective leverages not just the money, but the expertise, skills, and talents of the next gen women in the group and uses these combined assets to enhance each grantees' success.

What Does This Mean?

Donors throughout the history of giving have been influenced by other donors.³ But next gen donors are taking this peer influence well beyond the quid pro quo approach that they saw widely practiced by previous generations of big donors. For Gen Xers and Millennials, peers influence not just where they give or how much but also how and how effectively. Peers are a primary source of learning, inspiration, and strategic advice, and some donors prefer to give with their peers rather than alone.

Some might say the advent of social networking or peer reviews on products leads next gen donors to seek this kind of peer input in every aspect of their lives—so why not in their grantmaking? However, these donors are also responding to the paucity of other sources of learning in the philanthropic field.⁴ There is no road map for being a funder, and most donors don't know where to find the support they need and want. Plenty of philanthropic infrastructure groups serve donors, but many next gen donors feel those institutions are geared to support the existing donor base of Baby Boomers and older givers. The next gen don't see a place for itself in these infrastructure groups, causing these donors to turn their focus more intensely to finding or starting their own peer networks and sources of learning. Similarly, these organizations themselves worry that their membership rolls have few next gen donors in the pipeline, and they are uncertain how to recruit the next gen.

A few organizations in this field—including our own—have been trying to meet this need, but we are only addressing a small portion of the demand. The 21/64 team has developed educational programming such as its Next Gen Donor Retreats and Training series, peer learning networks like Grand Street and Ripe for Change, giving circles such as Natan and Slingshot, and other resources geared to new and next gen donors as well as their families and the advisors supporting them. The Dorothy A. Johnson Center for Philanthropy offers The Grantmaking School trainings and the LearnPhilanthropy online portal of learning resources. A few graduate degrees and certifications also focus on giving and grantmaking, and programming and donor education materials are available from several other organizations.⁵ But much more is needed.

In our experience at 21/64 running next gen peer groups and giving circles, we have seen both the benefits and challenges of peer giving played out in ways that mirror many of the statements quoted in this chapter. Some next gen donors can't get past the idea of transactional giving and in the end agree to give a grant to each member's favorite organization. But we have found that, in the majority of cases, next gen donors have not only a personal experience but also an educational one in their group giving. And when they do, their individual grantmaking becomes bigger and better because they now know how and what they want to fund. The group's collective giving, too, becomes more strategic because of the “collective genius” that arises through the collaborative grantmaking.⁶

For some nonprofits and advisory firms considering setting up next gen peer groups to meet this clear demand, we can imagine it may feel like a lot of effort to retool a method of engagement when older donors and clients are fine with the current setup. Others may be skeptical about whether these cohort groups are really needed. However, we like to remember that the Baby Boomers—the leaders of nonprofits now—often spent at least a decade serving on committees before stepping into leadership roles. Similarly, next gen peer cohorts give relatively young donors an opportunity to craft their philanthropic identities alongside their peers, building in checks and balances for the hubris of those starting out who may think they know everything but are hungry for strategy to make themselves better donors. If nonprofits can offer their newer and younger donors the chance to learn and grow together within their organizations, they may find themselves with a rising group of donors who are loyal philanthropists for a long time.

On the flip side, nonprofit organizations should caution themselves against seeing next gen donors and their networks as nothing more than trees to shake. Nonprofit professionals can no longer assume that making an emotional ask will be enough to inspire Generation Impact. Next gen donors expect strategic advice from their peers. Therefore, nonprofits that rely on their board members, development committees, and peer-to-peer fundraising teams need to arm their volunteer solicitors with this new information. In the Impact Revolution, next gen donors expect those who reach out to them, even their peers, to bring an analysis of how an organization is making an impact. Only by finding those next gen donors whose interests genuinely align with an organization's mission and impact will nonprofits succeed in involving more Gen X and Millennial donors.

We have insisted throughout this book that these next gen donors have the potential to be the biggest, most significant donors ever, in part, because they have unprecedented resources to give, but also because they insist on maximizing the impact of that giving. But next gen donors insist that if they are to become historically significant donors, it won't be simply because they are amplifying their individual giving by giving more or more effectively; it will also be because they are revolutionizing philanthropy by giving better together. And given that they are the most connected and highly networked generations in history, the amount of good that can be done as they give and learn together is truly exciting.

Sara Ojjeh, a founding member of the Maverick Collective—and a donor featured later in this book—shares our excitement:

The same way that the Gateses blew the Robber Barons out of the water with their philanthropic giving, I think that this next generation is going to blow the Gates Foundation out of the water with our giving. But for that to happen, I think people need to know that they are not alone standing up on a soapbox. We have to be there together, share a common idea or innovation with others, and commit to having an impact on the environment, or animal welfare, or human rights, or whatever, but we have to rally about it and make a difference by doing it together.