Future-Proofing Your Portfolio: A Quick Guide To Scenario Planning For Foundations

As our world becomes more uncertain, planning for the future becomes more important, but also more difficult. This interactive workshop will introduce fundamental tools used in scenario analysis and risk management and show how foundations can apply these tools to predict how economic, social/political, and environmental changes might affect their grantees and their beneficiaries. It will also provide guidance for making contingency plans to respond to possible dramatic changes in their operating environment.

Two-thirds of foundations in the US cited “difficulty in predicting future scenarios” as their biggest operational pain point and more than 8 in 10 foundations said that they are “considering new grantees and/or programming areas,” according to a survey of ~250 foundations conducted for the 2020 Shifting Practices, Sharing Power report by Council on Foundations, Philanthropy California, and Dalberg Advisors. Many foundations are also centering racial equity in their work.

About This Series

To support our members in meeting these challenges, the Council on Foundations and Philanthropy CA are teaming up once again with Dalberg to offer a series of complimentary training workshops for foundation staff.

All three workshops will be interactive, with opportunities for participant engagement and sharing, and practical, with live, small-group exercises.

Each workshop will be led by senior Dalberg Advisors partners with experience working with a wide range of foundations in strategic planning, scenario analysis, and racial and gender equity.

Target Audience

This program is open to members of Catalyst, Northern California Grantmakers and Southern California Grantmakers.

In Partnership With: