Ahead of the Grain in Puerto Rico

Alexandra Hertell, Executive Director, Fundación Segarra Boerman

I came to trust-based philanthropy before I knew the term. It’s intrinsic to our mission and our vision at Fundación Segarra Boerman. We believe our foundation should be in constant development, a learning process that should evolve based on the information we’re receiving from the communities and the people of our country. We who work in foundations come into that exchange and relationship with privilege, and it is our responsibility to counter that power inequity. Our most common question to our grantee partners is, ‘How can we support you more?’

Through feedback and suggestions from our grantee partners we've come to learn that there is so much more needed than just receiving a grant, and every single instance of support beyond the check is extremely appreciated. Three years ago, we got all our environmental and ecological grantee partners together in a feedback session and they all said the same thing: they’re in silos, and it’s hard to know what others in the field are doing. So we got them together with a facilitator, so they could have a day to collaborate. Now, three years later, they still meet monthly. We have someone from our staff facilitate and do the agendas, because the partners are all understandably busy. The collaborative projects that come out of those meetings have been amazing. So many funders want to see nonprofits collaborating, but often it happens from the top down – and rarely do those collaborations sustain or succeed. In this instance, we’re seeing meaningful collaborations because we made a point to act on feedback directly from our partners.

During this journey, I have seen barriers by some in the philanthropic ecosystem in this process of actively listening to the organizations and communities. But if we genuinely listen, there are no boundaries to what can be achieved. Change isn’t going to happen if it’s not trust-based. If we really want to support these organizations to their fullest potential, I believe there’s just no other way. The philanthropic ecosystem in general can have a lot of tokenism, a lot of listening without any substantive change. It’s a disservice to its own mission, and to the communities it serves. During my first year as the foundation’s executive director, I remember talking to the president of another foundation that had a huge endowment. We were talking about giving unrestricted multi-year grants, and he was in shock. He said, “Oh really? I don’t know if you are way ahead or way behind.” I told him, “Ahead.”

My plea for philanthropy is to come along, join us on this ride! I’m sure that every single foundation, if they open themselves up to working like this, will never look back. We don’t want to be the lone ranger in trust-based philanthropy; just the opposite. I was thinking about the snowball effect, but that analogy doesn’t make sense in Puerto Rico, so here’s a better one: a grain of sand. With one grain, another grain, and another grain, you have a resilient beautiful playa, but it only exists with everyone collaborating together. I don’t want to be a solo grain of sand. I want us to be the whole playa.