Giving Circles: A Womanly Approach to Philanthropy.

By Deborah McManus

In November, 1998, I read a People Magazine story about Colleen Willoughby who, with a few friends, started a women’s philanthropic group called Washington Women’s Foundation. Their Seattle organization and their mission were straightforward, effective and inclusive: finding local organizations to support and helping them succeed. I immediately thought: Why can’t I replicate this in NYC? And so with two other friends—me, an architect, a historical preservationist, and a jack of many trades—we did just that and WellMet was born.

With 35 like-minded women of varied ages and backgrounds willing to commit to giving ($5,000 a year), our biggest challenge was to agree on our focus. Where could we truly make a difference? What organizations should we support? There are a LOT of charitable organizations in New York City, and WellMet needed to find its own special niche.

We decided to target relatively new organizations limited to the five boroughs (so we could make site visits) that were still too small and untested to attract larger foundations but were empowering their communities and taking informed and measured risks to innovate, experiment and engage in finding solutions to New York City’s most pressing problems. We embarked upon a journey to identify our city’s rising stars and give them an unrestricted grant to help them succeed. As Robin Hood told us, we are one of the few NYC organizations that targets this vulnerable yet extraordinarily important class of non-profits.

We are proud to report that we are still going strong. Twenty-one years later, we will have granted, with our invaluable partner The New York Community Trust, more than $3,000,000 to some 200 mostly-nascent 501(c)(3)s whose work is directed to:

• Education and Youth. Supporting high school and college education and providing after school programs, mentoring, STEM and technology development as well as personal development.

• Community Development. Supporting people with disabilities, immigrants, health, hunger and food security, intergenerational initiatives, women, senior citizens and the LGBTQ community.

• Employment. Job training and placement.

• Criminal Justice. Decreasing the recidivism rate, supporting victims of crime, the formerly incarcerated, and children and families in the foster care system.

• Covid 19. In response to this plague, we immediately pivoted away from our traditional grant-giving and, instead, reviewed past grantees to see who was fighting on the front lines, giving 31 unrestricted grants in three tranches from March through June, typically of $5,000. We will continue to monitor how WellMet might help.

Giving Circles founded by women have turned out to be a major source of philanthropy, engaging over 150,000 people and giving as much as $1.29 billion. Colleen Willoughby alone inspired women to start groups in Ohio, North Carolina, Texas, California, Massachusetts and Minnesota. Some have over a thousand members, most have annual dues that are less than ours. Others have extensive education programs to offer their membership. Some are professionally run and some, like ours, depend on volunteers. As the Deputy Director of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation told Forbes, “women are the driving force behind the increase in giving we are seeing right now.”

Think about it. You can do this too. Here is a treasure trove of excellent ideas for existing and new--maybe your--giving circles. It is incredibly fun and rewarding to work with other women to find wonderful, important things to do together. Women drawn to this collaborative form of philanthropy are smart, generous-hearted and most of all, curious. We are a mighty band of sisters!

Come join us at Wellmet or start your own group in our mutual quest to better our world and, by extension, ourselves.

Deborah McManus is an architect with a Masters in Urban Planning who practiced for over 25 years. She loves everything French (especially the food), playing the piano and the ukulele, and dancing. She also loves philanthropy.