Please visit strategy.effectivephilanthropy.org for information on CEP's research on foundation strategy.

Strategy is a given for most organizations. Leaders of organizations of all kinds – including corporations and nonprofit charities – rely on strategies to help them to meet their goals.

Endowed private foundations are different. These organizations do not face the competitive pressures that influence corporations, nor are they challenged by the fundraising imperatives of nonprofit charities. Further complicating matters is that the very notion of “foundation strategy” needs to allow for foundations with more than one grantmaking program, each with necessarily distinct strategies that are designed around widely varying goals – as we suggest in our framework of overall performance assessment.

Phase I of CEP’s research on foundation strategy seeks to understand how private foundation CEOs and program officers view strategy. In a series of in-depth interviews with 42 CEOs and program officers, we explore three related questions:

• Do foundation CEOs and program officers see strategy as important?
• Do they believe that having a strategy will enhance their ability to achieve social impact?
• If so, how do they develop and use strategy within their organizations?

CEP’s new report on this study, Beyond the Rhetoric: Foundation Strategy, is now available for free download or purchase. To experience this research, please visit our strategy subsite, strategy.effectivephilanthropy.org.

Click here to download CEP's working paper, Foundation Strategy: Distinct Challenges. This paper outlines CEP’s review of literature on strategy from various sectors and describes how conceptions of strategy – and its usefulness and necessity – vary for foundations.

CEP is currently planning for Phase II of the Foundation Strategy Study. This phase will focus on the development of self-assessment tool to assist foundation staff members in reflecting on their own decision-making approaches, and will further explore the relationship between strategy and social impact. Phase II research will entail a large-scale survey of CEOs and senior foundation program staff from the largest 450 private foundations in the United States and will include further interviews with selected foundation leaders.

For more information, contact Vice President – Research Lisa R. Jackson, PhD.