How Family Offices Are Redefining Charitable Giving
Philanthropy is entering a new era of more international generosity. Across the world, family offices are reimagining what it means to give. Their focus slowly shifts from sporadic generosity or reputation management to designing systems for lasting impact.
This evolution is inherently transgenerational. As Nordqvist and Zellweger show, enterprising families renew themselves by creating new streams of social and economic value across generations1. In this light, philanthropy is not separate from entrepreneurship: it is one of its most visible modern expressions, a way for families to sustain their generative capability and sense of purpose.
For family offices, this shift opens both a responsibility and an opportunity. As M. B. T. de Groot’s research highlights2, today’s family offices increasingly carry non-financial mandates, like philanthropy, education, and conflict management, alongside traditional wealth management. These functions are no longer peripheral; they are the connective tissue that holds multi-generational families together.
The modern philanthropic mandate, then, calls for family offices to support this evolution: helping families move from generosity to governance, from charity to strategy, from giving away wealth to investing it with intention.
From Checkbook Giving to Strategic Systems
For decades, philanthropy often meant writing cheques in response to immediate needs or emotional appeals. Advisors would set up donor-advised funds, and the work was considered done. But as Nick, The Cecily Group Founder and CEO, observed in his Closer Look article, “A DAF gives you the engine, but no map.” They might be efficient, practical, and tax-friendly, but they still remain a simple tool in a larger system of purposeful governance.
Families who want to create meaningful change must start elsewhere: with conversation. The first step is to ask why they are giving before deciding how. These dialogues, sometimes facilitated by a neutral outsider, are governance work in disguise: they surface values, reveal tensions, and forge alignment.
Bakiewicz’s research on the cultural embeddedness of family enterprises supports this3: next generations commit more deeply when their roles resonate with identity and purpose. In philanthropy, that means moving beyond financial logistics to craft a shared moral and emotional narrative.
The Family Council Canvas, developed by The Cecily Group, offers a framework for doing precisely that: mapping journeys, values, goals, and commitments side by side so families can see how their stories translate into strategy.
The Entrepreneurial Turn in Philanthropy
In the 21st century, philanthropy is acquiring an entrepreneurial rhythm. Family offices, accustomed to calculated risk-taking, now deploy that same discipline in the social sphere.
Nordqvist and Zellweger call this transgenerational entrepreneurship: the family’s ability to renew itself through innovation and experimentation. Where earlier generations built factories, newer ones fund social enterprises or clean-energy ventures. The aim is the same: to create new streams of value, economic and social alike.
This shift reflects an underlying psychology. Studies by Sussman and Shafir on perceived wealth show that people’s attitudes toward assets and debt shape their sense of security and willingness to act4. Families mirror this duality: some seek preservation — reducing their “social debt” — while others seek visible contribution — building the “assets” of reputation and impact. Effective advisors recognise these hidden motives and design philanthropic strategies that satisfy both.
The result is what some call venture philanthropy, a model that blends entrepreneurial creativity with measurable social purpose.
The Architecture of Purpose
Purpose without structure dissipates. Governance provides the architecture that transforms values into decisions.
De Groot’s findings are clear: families that invest in governance, communication, and education not only perform better but report higher satisfaction. Philanthropy thrives in this environment because it gives values a stage on which to act.
Well-governed family offices establish clear committees, transparent processes, and shared metrics. They transform philanthropy from a private impulse into a collective practice, an arena where generations learn to listen, negotiate, and lead together.
Bakiewicz’s work shows that such involvement strengthens legitimacy for next generations; they feel they are carrying forward a living legacy, not merely preserving an inheritance.
Advisors become facilitators of this alignment, helping families institutionalise empathy without losing spontaneity. The Family Council again plays a bridging role, turning emotional complexity into structured dialogue.
Purpose with Performance
The line between investment and giving is blurring. Family offices are pioneering impact investing: deploying capital in ventures that pursue measurable social or environmental good alongside financial return.
A survey by Northern Trust and the Wharton Global Family Alliance reports a strong rise in ESG and impact initiatives among family offices, reflecting a global trend toward responsible ownership.
For entrepreneurial families, this convergence feels natural. They are accustomed to building, testing, and iterating. Impact investing extends that mindset into the public good: funding climate technologies, sustainable agriculture, education access, or social inclusion.
Psychologically, it satisfies the need for continuity: it allows a family’s wealth to evolve while its values remain intact. As many next-generation leaders express, they want their portfolios to look like their children’s future, not their grandparents’ past.
Education and the Next Generation
Philanthropy is also a powerful classroom. It teaches judgment, humility, and the balance between idealism and accountability.
De Groot highlights this educational function of the family office: preparing successors to participate in all aspects of family life, including giving. Closer Look 16 echoes this finding: inviting the next generation to “recommend grants” is not enough. True engagement means shared governance, site visits, and co-designing strategies.
Bakiewicz adds that readiness and relationship quality matter as much as competence. Involving young family members early, through junior boards or dedicated funds, helps them develop stewardship, not just sentiment.
When philanthropy becomes a training ground for leadership, it preserves both wealth and the wisdom to use it well.
Measuring What Matters
Modern philanthropy borrows tools from business, but numbers alone cannot measure meaning.
As Sussman and Shafir remind us, perceptions of wealth — and by extension, of success — are emotional before they are rational. Families, therefore, need systems that measure both impact and insight: tangible results in communities and intangible outcomes such as family cohesion or intergenerational trust.
Advisors encourage regular “learning reviews” rather than compliance reports: moments to ask what worked, what didn’t, and what the family learned about itself. In these feedback loops, philanthropy becomes a mirror of identity and a rehearsal for renewal.
The New Mandate
The most progressive family offices no longer see philanthropy as an afterthought. They see it as the core expression of stewardship, the practice through which wealth, values, and world connect.
Research confirms this evolution: families that balance personal wealth with entrepreneurial creativity, philanthropy, and social leadership are both more effective and more fulfilled. Governance, education, and empathy reinforce one another.
For advisors, this marks a profound shift. The task is no longer to move money efficiently but to help families design coherence between purpose and portfolio, vision and governance, and between generations and the world.
In that sense, the essence of the modern philanthropic mandate is giving with structure, learning with humility, and leading with purpose.
References:
- de Groot, M.B.T., 2021. Modern family offices and non-financial functions. Master’s thesis. University of Amsterdam.
- Nordqvist, M. and Zellweger, T.M., 2010. Transgenerational entrepreneurship: Exploring growth and performance in family firms across generations. In: M. Nordqvist and T.M. Zellweger, eds. Transgenerational entrepreneurship: Exploring growth and performance in family firms across generations. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar Publishing, pp.1–25.
- Bakiewicz, J., 2020. Cultural embeddedness of family business succession: The perspective of next generation. International Journal of Contemporary Management, 19(1), pp.67–85.
- Sussman, A.B. and Shafir, E., 2012. On assets and debt in the psychology of perceived wealth. Psychological Science, 23(1), pp.101–108.
