Introducing Chantias Ford
3/8/2023
The Trust-Based Philanthropy Project was thrilled to welcome Chantias Ford to our team this year as the new Director of Programs. Chantias brings an abundance of skill, passion, and heart to the role. Get to know her more in the Q & A below.
Can you share a little about your journey to this role?
My journey hasn’t been explicitly linear, but I have had some complementary experiences that have built on each other and blended together to create a depth of social sector perspectives. I have always been intentional about prioritizing three personal pillars: 1) diversity, equity, and inclusion; 2) research and data; and 3) social impact. I have aimed to ensure any professional opportunities are aligned with my personal pillars, and I am in my happy place when you can find me at the intersection of them.
I’ve held many roles in the social sector, both on the nonprofit side and on the funder side (and in-between). On the nonprofit side, I’ve worked in afterschool and summer school programming, college access programming, and K-12 education spaces. On the philanthropic side, I served as a consultant and evaluator for funders, helping develop and execute strategic plans, theories of change, and evaluation metrics. I served as a research analyst for a foundation program to increase diversity in higher education, offering professional development, research grants, and programming to diverse researchers. I’ve served as a program officer at a family foundation, managing grantmaking for a portfolio of education, literacy, and arts programming grants.
Through various positions, I realized a lot of the things that I was passionate about – like program design, facilitation, resource development, and convening funders – weren’t actually an explicit part of my job responsibilities, but rather my own adjacent priorities because I cared about them. So I eventually transitioned to a position that allowed me to do more of what I enjoyed in the PSO (philanthropy-serving organization) world, where I got to do program design, resource development, conference convenings, peer groups, affinity groups, communities of practice – really a mixture of everything I loved. It was in the PSO world that I was introduced to the Trust-Based Philanthropy Project and when the position opened, I saw it as the perfect opportunity to dig deeper into this line of work with an organization and a practice that I strongly value.
Through all the positions you’ve held in philanthropy, what core values continue to drive your work?
I’ll always lift up diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) as a core value in my work, and in the work the sector should be prioritizing – not just as a timely trend but as a core tenet. DEI practices and values should be uplifted and embedded across the grantmaking lifecycle and across all organizational practices and procedures. It's at the core of who I am and the work I've done. If we're talking about caring for people, we have to think about the people that are most marginalized and systemically affected by all of the different issues that we're aiming to solve.
Part of how we build more equitable relationships and systems is through transparency, which is another core value of mine. I like to lead in transparency, even when it may not be the most strategic for me personally. I have a colleague who jokingly tells me that I can be too transparent in professional settings. Capitalistic culture teaches us that vulnerability is “inappropriate” in the workplace, but I think vulnerability is one of the main illustrations of trust, and I believe in order to cultivate it you have to lead by example.
Can you say more about what trust means to you in this context?
Trust means mutual respect and mutual value. It’s the feeling of not having to prove anything, or jump through psychological hoops to prove worth or value. It means holding reciprocal relationships that you don’t fear being harmed in, which are sadly not the norm in our sector.
What excites you most about this work and the future of this movement?
Personally, I really feel like I’m in the right place at TBP. I’m excited to apply my specific skills and passion in a movement I care deeply about. And I’m glad to continue getting reminders that this is work that I can be a value-add in!
In the wider context, this movement is so imperative and so impactful. I get excited when I think about a sector that takes off the guardrails and leads in a more trust-based manner- it’s more rooted in the love and care that communities deserve. I see a future where the sector heals the harm that structural inequalities have produced – rather than adding to it. I’m so grateful to be doing work to help us get there.