Visionary Voices is philanthropy.org’s editorial forum for serious ideas, hard-earned lessons, and informed perspectives shaping the future of philanthropy. It is a place for practitioners, leaders, and thinkers to examine what works, what doesn’t, and why.
Contributions explore strategy, governance, donor engagement, ethics, and the structural forces influencing philanthropy today. Articles are grounded in experience, analysis, and reflection—not promotion.
If you’ve developed insight through practice, research, or leadership, we welcome thoughtful submissions that advance credible dialogue and long-term thinking in the field.
GIVING Magazine
For those who drive change — not watch it. Join the top 1%.
The IRS made your Form 990 public — and donors, advisors, and watchdogs are reading it. So why settle for a dull tax form? CPA Andrew Gray lays out three ways nonprofits can turn the 990 into a marketing asset: know your audience, treat the first pages like a brochure, and file a clean, accurate return that builds trust.
The Vivo Crónico Foundation, which works to provide support for those with chronic illness, is leaning into storytelling, community-building, and digital engagement to boost visibility and attract potential donors, strategic partners, and funders.
You’ve given to this cause for years. Now you’re weighing something far larger — a bequest from your estate. But a planned gift isn’t simply a bigger check, and a charity that can ask for one isn’t always built to receive it. Before you sign, learn the questions that reveal whether your charity is genuinely ready for your legacy — or merely ready to request it.
It is extraordinary how commonplace AI use has become. It is also extraordinary how normalized it is becoming. But an AI tool cannot create a program that is authentic to who you are and to whomever is the focus of your nonprofit work.
Most trustees think board fundraising means writing a check they can’t afford and begging strangers for money. Wrong on both counts — and that misunderstanding is quietly costing your organization its largest gift. The real duty isn’t giving or getting. It’s governing: setting the vision, funding the work, protecting the long horizon. A board that thinks only about this quarter starves the gift it will never see coming.
Modern tools have solved access, cost, and complexity — yet donor retention stays low and giving stays episodic. The limiting factor is no longer capability; it’s consistency. Over twelve months, one zero-staff nonprofit reinvested the time tools saved into relationships, reaching 98% donor retention and 81% recurring giving on a $10,000 budget. The deeper lesson reaches all the way to planned giving: tools enable the work, but only people build trust.
Thoughtful, measured estate planning takes discipline and a plan. The intentional transfer of values begins with establishing a family narrative and helps to create a lasting family legacy. When families define their “why” and articulate a shared mission, they connect generations to a deeper purpose that extends beyond wealth preservation.
The FEP just reported the strongest giving growth in five years. The sector exhaled. I didn’t. Revenue is up because a smaller group of major donors gave more. The donor base shrank again. Concentrated revenue is brittle revenue. The money is concentrated at the top. The mission lives in the many. That gap is the work.
For decades the nonprofit sector optimized for the first gift. We mastered the handshake. But sustainable fundraising depends on what follows. The GIVE Framework — Gratitude, Impact, Voice, Engagement — argues that recurring giving is not a payment mechanism but an identity shift, built through consistency rather than urgency. From a physician-run foundation that converted a majority of donors to recurring giving without staff or overhead. A clear-eyed account of where the model works, and where it doesn’t.