The Value of “Big Bets”
This month I attended my first Mission Capital Conference as a member of the Mission Capital staff, and, in fact, my first conference specifically focused on solutions to social change. As someone with experience in public sector consulting and attending national conferences focused on ways government can improve the lives of the people they serve, I was excited to look at social problems through a different lens.
The session titled “Making Big Bets for Social Change,” examined challenges in “social-change bets” and what “big-bet donors” and recipients have learned from going through the process. Alison Powell, Senior Director of Philanthropy from The Bridgespan Group was the lead presenter and she also brought a panel comprised of philanthropic “big bet” makers and leaders of organizations that executed on the big bets they received. The panel included Dr. Anthony Hassan, Executive Director of Cohen Veterans Network, Dr. Mike Feinberg, Co-Founder of KIPP, and Dr. Ben Kerman, Head of Strategic Learning and Evaluation from The Atlantic Philanthropies. The group made for a well-rounded and informed conversation.
What Are Big Bets?
Big Bets are a different way to solve some of our most complex problems. The concept of “big bets” is not a new one. Organizations like The Atlantic Philanthropies have been making big bets around the globe since 1982. Big Bets, as defined by The Bridgespan Group, are “Significant philanthropic donations with an ability to catalyze meaningful change for organizations and social movements.”These Big Bets do not only serve as a financial driver in solving societal issues, but they also can drive movements forward by rallying additional funders, advocates, and policy makers to broaden the impact. An example they gave was Atlantic’s work in abolishing the death penalty in the US. From 2003 to 2014, Atlantic granted nearly $60 million in fighting for this cause. In that time, seven states have abolished the death penalty and an additional four have placed moratoria on executions in the future.
Key Takeaways from “Making Big Bets for Social Change”
Big Bets require three levels of trust. Trust in the leaders of the philanthropic organization to deliver on what is expected, trust in the organization’s leader’s vision for executing and implementing the initiative or effort, and trust in the delivering and executing on that initiative.
Big Bets offer organizations the gift of time not only the gift of financial sustainability. The leaders of organization are no longer overly burdened with chasing dollars and can focus time and energy in building scale of the effort or initiative more effectively.
Big Bets can make a difference in the world of social change. While this one seems fairly obvious on the surface, the data presented by Alison at Bridgespan just did not reflect that. According to Bridgespan’s research, 80% of donors want to solve “huge and ambitious societal problems” like providing better educations for the needy, economic challenges, and health problems, but in reality there are barriers in the donor world that leads to an “Aspiration Gap.” This Aspiration Gap shows that 80% of donor funds go to institutional causes compared to social change ones.
Big Bets cannot solve our social problems alone. While this did not come up explicitly in this session, social change organizations are out here doing all of this work due to a “market failure.” That somewhere “The System” did not live up to it’s promise.
While Big Bets can be a significant force behind funding and mobilizing social change, the ambitious and aspirational goals we have for our community (locally, nationally and globally) cannot be resolved on the backs of Big Bets alone. But instead require the mobilization, coordination, and dedication of all sectors to make a long-lasting and inter-generational change.