SPREAD THE WORD

Was the self-assessment helpful? If so, please help us spread the word so that more funders can take the self-assessment and reflect on what more they can do. You can share the self-assessment however you think is best, but here a couple of blurbs for your convenience.

Short Blurb

Funders, have you heard the growing crescendo for more equitable and sustainable systems? And have you wondered what more you can do to help realize this vision? Take the Systems Change Funder Self-Assessment to find out.

Full Blurb

We are hearing a growing crescendo for more equitable and sustainable systems that can support thriving communities. To get there, we need to achieve systemic change across a wide range of regions and sectors. And yet most funders—private philanthropy, impact investors, government agencies, multi-lateral funders, and others—are largely focused on treating symptoms rather than the systems underlying our most urgent societal problems. As we emerge from a generation-defining pandemic, how can the philanthropic field re-calibrate? What can YOU do to help bridge the gap between intention and action?

There is no one recipe that will work for all funders, but there are common principles and practices that various sources—such as Catalyst 2030’s "Embracing Complexity" report and Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors' Shifting Systems Initiative—have converged on. Inspired by these, Catalyst 2030 members created the Systems Change Funder Self-Assessment.

The self-assessment is designed to help you discover the extent to which your organization embraces commonly acknowledged principles and practices, and it offers specific recommendations and resources to help your organization grow even further—even if it is already quite far on its journey. You are invited to take the self-assessment.

"I recognize that everyone in this room is doing extraordinary work, has devoted your lives to this cause, and are making some real difference—but in the main the difference is being made at the margin. The inconvenient truth is that we face a problem beyond politics and reform, beyond good projects and initiatives and campaigns—ours is a systemic crisis at the very heart of our 21st century political-economy … We are trying to go up the down escalator, which is moving faster and faster against us.”

—Ted Howard (Co-Founder and President, The Democracy Collaborative) in his remarks to the Environmental Funders Network in 2018