Ben Morton Wright founded Global Philanthropic in 2002. He has supervised the establishment of Global Philanthropic operations in the UK, Australia, Hong Kong and Canada. As Group CEO, Mr Morton Wright has gained recognition as a leading thinker on Philanthropy and giving a major gift strategist, an expert in structuring international campaigns and higher education fundraising.

Mr Morton Wright also advises a number of private individuals UHNWI around the world to develop meaningful philanthropic giving strategies for some of the world’s leading philanthropists.

Since founding the Group in 2002, Mr Morton Wright has served as senior strategy consultant to several thousand organisations across the world including a number of Cambridge and Oxford University Colleges, the London School of Economics, St Andrews University, Oberlin college ; the United Nations Foundation; and a number of development charities including UNICEF and Action Aid and schools such as St Pauls and the International School of Beijing.

Ben also co-authored ‘Talking Philanthropy. Volume 1’ book which was published in 2017 and developed an international Talking Philanthropy Forum that has become the annual event for philanthropists and professionals in the field across the world. A frequent speaker on the topic, he is regarded as a leading expert on Asian philanthropy.

Video Transcript

0:58
Hey, good afternoon. This is Jay Frost speaking, and I’m so happy to welcome you to this latest in the Flash Class series from DonorSearch, of course, you can see from the fancy new logo that DonorSearch just recently adopted right there on the corner of your screen.

1:13
Once again, this is Jay Frost and, in the background, silently making sure that we don’t veer off course is Hannah Krobock and we are here to bring you another in this series of classes that try to bring you the top voices in philanthropy and fundraising not just domestically in the United States from which we are broadcasting if you wish to call it that but also around the world. We are dedicated to bringing you some of those folks when they have time to share with you and we are definitely doing that today with been more right but I have the pleasure and privilege of introducing in just a minute.

1:44
But before we do that, I wanted to welcome you here, encourage you to grab your colleagues and friends gather on your favorite electronic screen get something nice to drink and make yourselves comfortable for a great session. Also take just a couple of minutes to reintroduce once again this platform because inevitably some of you may be new to ooh to it others may not remember and still others just need just a second to gather your forces. So, we’ll start with how you can get the slides and the recording in the case of the slides today. What we’re going to encourage you to do is let our presenter know that you’d like a copy with your email address and he will be happy to send them to you so you can do that by using the questions tab us all explain in a moment. You’ll also prompt you to do that again later. So again, to get the slides you’ll contact the presenter and he’ll be happy to share with you.

2:34
The recording however, as with all of our sessions, will be posted right to the Flash Class Library. So, if you want to the donorsearch.net site to the resources tab, just like you see on your screen. The third item down is the Flash Class library and that is where you see if being just like this one and that includes all the sessions that have been recorded going back to mid-2016. We have no idea how many there are now. I know it’s north of a hundred sixty and growing only two have not been recorded. So, there’s lots of content to choose from and this session one of the few we’ve had an international fundraising will be there in just a couple of days. So do be on the lookout for it and please do share it with colleagues as we’ve often said in the series which set off line and other places the majority of the wealth of the world is outside the borders the United States and we have one of the top experts to address a big part of where philanthropy is really booming in Asia today. So that really recording once again right there under the resources tab and just a couple of days be on the lookout.

3:34
Now we do want to encourage you to interact just as I said starting with requesting a copy of the slides if you like them but also to ask any questions or make any comments you want at any time. I’ll be providing those to our presenter at the conclusion today. So do take a look right where the bouncing Arrow just landed in the questions tab, go ahead and enter any question any comment and that request for the slide deck and I’ll make sure to share those with a presenter when he finishes up so we can answer those questions as in turn.

4:04
If we don’t get to anything everything rather today, then we’ll make sure to forward your questions on so he can answer them directly with you.

4:12
Today’s session of course is Principles of Fundraising Asia and we have the right person to talk about this with you and that is Ben Morton right near here. So, you may already know Ben is but it’s possible that you don’t and when people have asked in the past me about who to turn to in the world on these issues, Ben is a go-to person but so is his firm, Global Philanthropic. He founded Global Philanthropic in 2002. I can’t believe it’s been that long now. He supervised the establishment of the operations of the firm in the UK, Australia, Hong Kong and Canada and as group CEO he’s gained recognition as a leading thinker on philanthropy and giving and a major get strategist, expert in structuring international campaigns and higher education fundraising but it is work also extends into advising private individuals ultra-high net worth individuals specifically globally to develop meaningful philanthropic giving strategies for some of those folks and their interactions with our charitable organizations very key in this booming marketplace. Since founding of Global Philanthropic in 2002, he has served as a senior strategy consultant to several thousand organizations across the world including a number of Cambridge and Oxford University Colleges, LSE, St. Andrews, Oberlin, the United Nations Foundation, a number of development charities, also including UNICEF, Action Aid and schools such as St. Paul’s and the International School of Beijing.

5:37
So, he really does know Asia in addition to every other part of the world. Ben is also a co-author Talking Philanthropy, Volume One book, which was published in 2017 and developed an international talking philanthropy forum that’s become an annual event for philanthropists and professionals in the field across the world. He speaks frequently on this topic, but not necessarily in this way. So, we are really honored to have him here today. And with that I’ll pass the baton to Ben Morton Wight then. Thanks for being here today.

6:08
Well, thank you very much. Jay and Hannah. I assume this is all working as Jay said it’s a technology is not my forte. So, this is relatively new medium, but I will try and keep to the script and try and keep to my time and thank you all for diving in to him more about my favorite subject which is around principles of fundraising in Asia. Why is it my favorite subject? Was it something that I get super excited about? Well for a number of reasons, it’s the most exciting subject I think in the world of moment and it’s also a massive subject with pretty profound implications in terms of what could happen over the next 10 to 20 years and it’s very important to stress that these are these are principles in a market that’s rapidly changing and has changed but there’s issues that we should look at for the long-term. It’s not just the short-term and it’s very much that long term so we might be see day-to-day Vera’s press articles of trade war issues, but I’m looking interested in the long term context of how philanthropy is going to develop over the next 20 years and how it’s developed over the last 20 years and as fundraisers in that context, how can we actually access this market and operate it in that market in the most professional way and I come at this from a position where I can safely say I can put hand on my heart and say that I made all the mistakes for sure.

7:33
I moved out to Hong Kong 16 years ago to set up a company and founded it and if there was mistake to be made in Asia. I sure enough did it lucky for the people who advised now I can bring that to the table but it really is so complex that it is and that’s what’s fun. It’s quite hard. If you’re not approaching this from an informed perspective to do it in a way that is not going to upset donors and in a way that isn’t going to cause you embarrassment as a professional so from someone that’s made all the mistakes possible.

8:03
I’m going to share some of those the right ways of doing things in the next turn 45 Minutes, I want to leave a pheromone a time for questions at the end, which I think Jay is and hands going to facilitate do would like to repeat if you’d like a copy of the slides or if you’d like to any other further questions. If you put B dot MW at the beginning of a global philanthropic will make sure that you get a response and we’ll make sure that you get a clean the slot.

8:36
The first issue I just wanted to mention was obviously the phone the company I set up as I’ve haven’t been involved as a professional fundraiser for way over a decade working in the field. I set up. I will philanthropic actually in Hong Kong. We have a fairly major operation in Asia out of Hong Kong but work across China southeast Asia and also have worked in India. So Global philanthropy work is the company we’re set up to give strategic advice but that’s the commercial advert. So, I’ll stop there needless to say that if you do want professional help on this., please do to come to us or a specialist in this area because it’s very important that you do actually engage with external specialist help.

9:24
So today what I want to do is I want to give an overview of Asian philanthropy.

9:34
I want to talk about well transition and integration generational giving how Asia is actually different from the West?

9:46
Some of the challenges and opportunities.

9:49
And then we get into question and answers. So that’s the context of today. It’s what we’ve build that there are different segments of today. So, let’s get cracking. First thing. I want to point out is actually very, very little data about philanthropy in Asia. And of course, Asia is a massive region of the world, but the reality is we’ve had very little research undertaken on philanthropy.

10:19
It’s not like many other parts in the world where you actually fill in your tax return the tax return goes to a central government. They extrapolate what the tax return is you then come up with a big numbers of what the GDP of the country is. How many people have given what the average level of gift is?

10:39
What kind of organizations are given to in Asia that just simply doesn’t exist mainly because you don’t have tax advantages generally in Asia and if you do If they’re so small normally people don’t want to take advantage of them or they want to keep an anonymity? So, you don’t have the Gathering of the data at that level and you don’t have the research universities actually researching the subject. So, five years ago. I would have been even more press to describe what was going on in terms of Asia other than my experience on a day-to-day basis. Luckily over the last five years.

11:14
We’ve had some wonderful initiatives and one of them is an organization called the Center for Asian philanthropy in society cats. It’s cooked called if you Google it and I think it’s also down as our reference. You’ll see their website. There are a few other links within that website that I’m going to point you to but that is a wonderful organization that’s been established by philanthropist looking at Asian philanthropy.

11:40
And I do really urge you to actually go there first it when you’re actually approaching this issue of giving and how to Access this incredible Market because it tells you about the new cultural nuances.

11:54
It gives you an overview of the of the actual history of philanthropy and it tells you all the drivers the tax regime and some of the summary’s country-by-country and it goes across Asia within that there’s a great book which has been recently published which you can get on an e-version and if you dive into the website, you’ll find Cool pragmatic philanthropy again in the beginning of each chapter on each country. You’ll see the summary of the philanthropic history of Asia and that’s a very important thing to emphasize, you know, philanthropies deep in Asia. It’s been around for a long time. It’s not something that’s new. It’s something that’s been around for many centuries for a lot of these civilizations in Asia. So, it’s very important when we’re approaching it as a professional not to assume that it’s just something that’s popped up.

12:49
And it’s something that’s new actual fact, it’s deep and you need to understand the histories of pragmatic philanthropy is a great way of actually giving you a sign post on some of the issue’s country by country. Now, we all know that there’s this massive wealth transfer that’s going to happen. I called it the caniggia moment in the US. It’s pretty well taken care of. So, congratulations because of the 460 families in the next 20 years.

13:15
They’re going to transfer I think something like twenty one two, A two trillion those families in the US of pretty much most of them have any way that the enlightened ones have signed the giving pledge have already started to create future foundations to make sure that that transition from their generation to the Next Generation comes through philanthropy the great opportunity in Asia.

13:42
Is that pretty much a third of those families live in Asia and everything’s to play for your Find both in Europe and Asia very few people have signed the giving pledge. Those families are planning to give significant sums, but it’s very early days. So, you know be mindful and this is something that has already been mentioned that there’s a huge amount of wealth outside the US that’s got to go somewhere in the next in the next 20 years.

14:13

The stats also shows that Asia is home to the third of the wealthiest people now, you know depends on which state you want to look at Ultra high-net-worth middle-class Rising middle class pretty much everywhere. You look now, we’ve pretty well neck and neck. So, the way I look at the world at the moment is a third of them live in the third of the wealthiest individuals live in the US I have done for significant time.

14:40
Make it slightly more than the third but certainly the bulk of of the wealthiest cluster of individuals in is around the US has been for some time will continue for sure. But the reality is that Europe’s caught up and ministers in the recent stats and Asia’s motor from a very weak position right up to being the being the third that we really want to look at today.

15:05
So this wealth creation is something that’s new is only happened if you China is having particularly the last 10 to 15 years. But as a mass, you know you I see the world as a world of 1/3 1/3 of the wealthiest in Asia third in Europe and third in the US. So, these are fairly equal measures and you can debate to the nth degree, but it’s a pretty simple way of looking at this Market is that it’s a third of the world and yet how many of these individuals have had that discussion around philanthropy.

15:37
If you look at China, which is an area, I’ve been a China I think three times last six months and Beijing you find the last stats again these reference 500 Chinese billionaires that’s gone up since this stack. This is every year it goes up. Very significant. This is a few there’s a few years old if you actually extrapolated a 2% GDP, which is where we are in the US which is the gold standard. It’s the highest level of GDP given in the world.

16:04
You’re a 2% if you extrapolate, It and the doing good survey. Does this extrapolate that number to 2 percent of GDP in just China alone would give you 500 504 billion that I’m told would pretty much sought out most of the sustainable goals the UN sustainable goals. That’s just from China alone. Now, of course, it’s not 2% of GDP.

16:30
It’s remotely anything near that but the economy if it was reflective in the Types of one to two percent of GDP which is amateur philanthropic Market. This is the kind of numbers you’ll be talking about. So, if you go down a line that eventually China could catch up with the gold standard of to 2% of GDP. These are the kind of numbers that were looking at in terms of the private individuals were finding many, many now are creating our own private foundations particularly again in in China specifically around China. This that is not is 2016. So, it’s a couple years old.

17:07
In the previous four years to 4.6 billion a month those top high net worth individuals tripling in four years. This is incredible growth in the marketplace within China and is reflected also across southeast Asia and India now the issue that you want to be considering in terms of accessing that money as well is that in Asia that third of those ultra-high net worth individuals are not in their 70s.

17:36
As they are in the US They’re not in their in their seventies as they are in Europe, but they’re actually in their 50s. So, the Billionaire’s the wealth is Young, which means that they’re going to be doing lifetime giving it means that they’ve got you’ve got a journey ahead of you of a long-term relationship in terms of your fundraising so I know this is very much. The macro is the big issues.

18:01
It’s the you know, that the big the big context but I It’s really important to understand that because if you understand the context you understand what why I get excited about this because it is truly mind-blowing the potential for philanthropy within this context.

18:19
You’re the one of the first questions probably is going to be our students often ask to me is to say well will it happen, you know will individuals give is philanthropy part of the DNA of these societies of these communities now again, you can’t Generalize because if you’re going from India to China, they’re very different communities. But what you do see is huge amounts of giving happening particularly the last 10 years particularly in China and particularly. The Chinese communities hundred million US Dollar gifts are not uncommon in increasing the universities in those communities are getting significant support.

18:59
So, you’ll seen incredible growth in the in the last decade and the growth seems to extrapolate so Let’s say to me that this is in the DNA the that as long as Society encourages it and gives the context and as well as professionals help unlock this Market. There’s no reason why it can’t Boom the other wonderful thing about this Market is that you’re pretty much the first in the market. I was just with some billionaires in Asia the last few weeks and you know, when you have discussions, you’re often, the first person is asked.

19:34
Those individuals to consider making philanthropic gifts now just think of that and most billionaires most ultra-high net worth individuals have usually committed a substantial part of their resources in the west and a probably been asked by several thousand fundraisers. Let alone being the very first to ask for gifts. So, it’s that exciting. It’s that young.

19:55
It’s that new and it’s and it’s incredible the potential ahead so as practitioners What is this get us? How do we actually approach this whole Market? What is it that we need to do that’s different in terms of approach in this market and I’m a great believer that there are and based on all those mistakes I made all those years ago.

20:18
There’s actually a really profound issue that we need to reflect and we need to think about very carefully before we go into Asian communities and start fundraising and I’ve gone round this with many, many times in my colleagues and thought long and hard about what it is based on my own experience and how we advise our clients and what works and I’ve come pretty much down to what I would call the two word presentation and I think as professionals that are approaching this market and even Professionals in the market and people that are farm-raised it in the market particularly at the high end particularly major gift level.

21:01
So, I’m talking very much around the high end as well, but I think This is true across philanthropy. There’s two words that you need to understand before you approach these markets and that I in my view the two words Drive philanthropy and fundraising and how you ask and in many ways. What I’m going to ask you to do in a many ways is to leave at the when you board the plane and you’re flying to Asia yet. You kind of have to reprogram yourself. If you’re a professional fundraiser, you kind of got up stop and reprogram.

21:33
Yourself and when you come off the plane on the other hand step onto the to the Earth of the country that you’re in in Asia, whatever country that is because these two words are absolutely consistent across Asia in my view it more extreme than others. You have to think of these two guiding principles. So, what are they?

21:51
What’s the secret source that we need to apply for successful fundraising for the first issue is pretty obvious actually if anyone if you’re if you’ve been working in Asia if your way You know, if you worked in those communities, you will be very aware.

22:08
That status is an issue that you need to be aware of and it’s particularly important when you’re fundraising because if you’re with a CEO or a senior trustee or someone that is seen as the head of the organization, that’s a very, very important moment that moment it is a very important issue for whoever you’re talking to secondly, you know, there is this state Has issues and it depends Again country by country, but and it’s a very complex subject but there are state has issues and you’ll find that for the big gifts and the really big gifts that often the wealthiest individual gives the largest gift because other people’s people in that Community won’t want to look as if they’re trying to outmaneuver that recognize positioners as the lead key individual in those communities.

23:03
Again, this is a gross generalization but is very, very important. So, when you’re can when you’re approaching fundraising you need to use your assets and your key people and the understand what stages they may have in the communities and in those environments and you need to also realize who you’re approaching particularly with high net worth individuals. It’s often and I’ve written about this. There’s often a what I call a domino effect.

23:33
It which you’ll see particularly in educational fundraising where someone gives a very large gift first and everyone then follows behind and will give away slightly smaller and it will it will fall according to how people perceive each other’s satyrs and the community at large and therefore you have to you have to play that game.

23:55
You have to play that out in terms of how you approach your communities and your fundraising and you have to make sure that You do things in the right order and ask the right people in the right order and that’s quite different and there’s quite a different driver.

24:12
The other issue and so that by the way affects obviously you how you approach those markets. But also, how you ask and the other issue is the whole issue of face. This is a real issue for fundraising. I mean your talk and I was taught from day one face-to-face peer-to-peer person to person that is the Mantra that we use now the problem is that this conflicts if you’re in a high state is position you and you have a certain amount of face. How do you ask for money?

24:42
One of the answers could be no. How does someone tell you that they’re not going to support you if they’re if they by doing that I’m going to lose face. So, this becomes very problematic when you are asking and using the normal formula or peer-to-peer face to face and person to person.

25:01
So what we advise very heavily is that you think about this issue and you actually try to avoid embarrassment and you try to avoid the issue where some I may give you what I call a kiss-off gift or a smaller gift because they’ve been asked directly and you also deploy intermediaries there in Asia intermediaries are loved they do all sorts of aspects of work in all sorts of sectors their work with a family and one of the reasons that intermediaries are so important is because they can be the go-to person both sides of the equation and asked to make sure that face.

25:42
Is preserved and that no one has lots of face? No one is asked for a gift That’s too great that they wouldn’t want to do it or if they ask then it’s been agreed already through the use of intermediaries or it could be the family members. It could be the second or third generation that acts as an intermediary, but it’s been aware of the importance of that. It leads to what I call that, you know the large game of chess that everyone has to play.

26:07
And I’ll elaborate this on the next slide which goes into more detail. I’m not going to go into every single element of this but what this does this slide is to try and tease out the next slide.

26:20
I’m going to show you a more in-depth version of this very simple status and face my advice to you is maybe just think about these two elements as I say when you get into the idea of Western versus Eastern and wet and the Implications which I’ll talk about in the middle. It gets slightly more it gets slightly more Technical and it will also do vary depending on which region of Asia you’re in. So, when we when we look at these you can you can get into these different elements of these given implications now again, I would say these are you know, big generalizations.

26:58
They’re not meant to be a definitive answer about where you have to go in terms of your giving and giving them choices and hierarchy and how I argue seen these will vary depending on which country you’re in and some countries are much more much more hierarchy driven than others. This is changing as well.

27:25
So some countries and slightly more Progressive where you don’t have these tensions but this this diagram here is just a way of beginning to actually think about these two Western eastern approaches again a very general you could take issue about the whole collectivism and constitutes Confucianism and whether there is that and whether Western individual tradition is what it is as it is described in this all these issues are things you can discuss but what we’re trying to do here is to think about what the individual might want in terms of their societal position and how that they’re giving is seen.

28:06
So certainly, I think one thing that is very, very true in my experience is about, you know, certainly honoring parents or honoring others the Desiring the desire to on others. That’s a huge issue in Asia. You’ll find often things are named in honor of others and in the west it’s more of an individual expression and also the things that are popular to support us are often around education or slightly more.

28:37
What I could say slightly more low-risk options for philanthropy and I think so.

28:44
These are all different drivers and Dynamics and as fundraisers, we should just at least give some thought to how this whether there’s an implication on who are asking and in which country are asking now great bit of research. Now, this is Harbor – back into the stats into the hardcore stats of of the kind of things that people are looking to support in in Asia. Now this obviously is China but in my experience is is pretty consistent across Asia education is a massive driver in Asian philanthropy at the moment most universities in in China and in Hong Kong.

29:28
And in and East Asia have enormous support already through major philanthropic programs. And the reason is because people like to support education arts and culture you see down there at 13% is a lower figure, I would bet that that’s going to grow and it will develop we’ve done a lot of work around arts and culture.

29:51
It’s a very new area and it’s an area that’s pretty much in an early stage, but it’s going to mature and develop and I you’ll see that chunk grow but these are the priorities for Chinese philanthropist, but I think it’s applicable across Asia again, if you look at the doing good index you’ll see this is reflected across Europe across Asia, you’ll find that different countries have different emphasis.

30:17
There’s also a philanthropic index has been produced which is also worth looking at the B&B paribus wealth index which also shows the drivers and the If you Google that shows the drivers of what people actually want to support in Asia. So, the good news if you’re in education, that’s a that’s a great spot to be just at the moment, but I think these will these things will develop and progress as the market becomes more mature. And as also people become less risk-averse because education is a low-risk philanthropic opportunity.

30:51
Conversely being a high brand in education whether it’s school or University is also or a pipe a Big Brand in in that field is also a great opportunity globally because people will want to support that so in terms of the next issue, which is the complexities.

31:08
I want to talk a little bit more about some of the complexities those complexities around making the ask which I’ve touched on and some guiding principles that you can try and deploy when you’re getting off that plane, but there’s also Like cities around so many other issues one of the big issues that they’re doing good survey highlights is the what they described. Well, they describe it around the trust issue.

31:34
Right and I would describe as the lack of trust and that’s the lack of trust around organizations within Asian communities and the research has shown that that’s a big constraint for why people with full pull back from giving Two organizations within their communities in Asia and it could be the driver why there has been such support out with the communities for big Brands big names that is one of the issues and one of the one of the concerns around this is how do you actually instill trust? How do you convince people that are these all the NGOs are well-managed which many, many are and you can trust these organizations to deploy your philanthropic resources effectively?

32:21
So, it’s a big issue and it’s something that we need to address within the marketplace to encourage philanthropy the next piece which is a seminar in itself is the whole issue of legal constraints. It’s a fast-moving subject. I do suggest you employ a good legal counsel around what you can do in different contexts different countries and what kind of organizations legally you can fundraise for and from and help.

32:51
You can construct gifts. There are a number of legal constraints not always straightforward not always clear. You may get many different levels of advice and so it’s not always straightforward but it’s something that you should be thinking about as you move forward making sure that your entities and your conduct is obviously within the appropriate legal constraints.

33:16
There’s also an issue which is quite fundamental which is around movement of money.

33:21
And obviously India and China both have this issue about actual currency movement and that can become a major issue for big gifts that maybe transnational I’m the other point here is just Asia is so diverse. And again, this research the doing good research the philanthropy index all reflect. Just that diversity. It’s a massive part of the world. You can’t just talk about it. As one word Asia. It represents such incredible diversity such immense, immense richness and cultural richness that it would be foolhardy just to see it.

34:03
There’s one market. So, it really is about doing your homework on those countries that you’re approaching. And also, just Reading literature on what is culturally appropriate how to conduct yourself and not embarrass yourself as a very basic level before you then get into actually how you ask for money.

34:23
I talked a bit about opportunities and I think this is where I get super excited again because this is Hope I’ve demonstrated to everyone. This is a massive Market long term. It’s phenomenal what could happen in philanthropy? If we went anywhere near that two percent just in one country let alone the whole of Asia will it happen? I’m a great believer. It will I’m a great believer in the long term. You’ve got huge creation of wealth.

34:49
You have to redistribute that It back through philanthropy. We’ve got a situation where many of these countries have moved from the last 40 years from very strict communist. Very rigid rules, which don’t even allow wealth creation to a situation where you have individuals that are almost so wealthy this they called The Sovereign individuals now there is largest small countries. So you’ve got a very different landscape and the reality is with so much need within Asia. There’s so much there’s so many things.

35:21
That need to be done that the that philanthropy in my view Will Will just grow and develop like we’ve not seen before and it could be absolutely phenomenal what philanthropy can do for for the for the people of these countries and what it is and how it can be developed across Asia.

35:40
So as you’re approaching that particular if you’re approaching from the US or Europe, there is what I would call the first mover Advantage which is and I and I always envisaged this as a cue and if you have when you when I are in the US, which I have been particularly recently quite a lot when you talk to donors, you know, they generally are have been asked by several people that week. They’re already giving to their Church their school their children’s School the university their chosen charity Etc and have been doing for a long time. And you go to Asia, you’ll find that you’re the you’re the first person happened.

36:21
Action often about gifts. So there’s a first mover Advantage. We know that our existing donors are our future donors. We know that acquisition for donors is the most expensive thing to do so by getting into these markets although their complex and they’re difficult and they’re challenging. Actually you can get first mover’s advantage.

36:43
the next piece I think is about employment opportunities and I think as as a profession the need for Professionals in Asia and across Asia that have high good moral codes and high effects and it cannot conduct themselves in a way that will build that trust is critical and the challenge for organizations to actually deploy an employment training is just Bugling it’s absolutely mind-boggling. There’s so few people in these in these countries that we talked about that actually know how to farm raised properly.

37:24
So there’s a huge there’s a huge opportunity there to actually develop and help develop a really professional capacity in each of these countries around fundraising but it’s going to require training and developing literally thousands or fundraisers which are the moment are not there.

37:46
I’m which comes on to this final Point here in terms of the opportunities, which is really this is yet to be shaped. I think the most exciting thing about this whole area is that what we’ve seen in the last five to ten years is just the beginning in my view and if it does take off as I predict it will do continues to grow particularly amongst the top end and the high-net-worth sir.

38:15
They continue to do more and more in this space. Then the whole environment needs to be shaped.

38:20
So it we need to help shape this in terms of Code of Ethics in terms of the trust issue in terms of profession professionals working within the space in terms of governments understanding what philanthropy can do and how it can help in terms of the appropriate Regulatory and Fry framework being developed that isn’t actually so Onerous that is snuffs out philanthropy, but actually encourages and fosters it and then you have the whole piece around actually encouraging ultra-high net World soar High net worth individuals or wealthy individuals within the communities to actually see philanthropy as something that should be done as part something that should be celebrated should be applauded and the government should support that Civil Society should support that. So there’s a whole series of dynamics that we need.

39:15
To consider in terms of shaping that philanthropic environment and it can easily go wrong as we’ve seen, you know scandals in Asia can cause real problems for the whole Marketplace.

39:26
So helping shape that and acknowledging that it’s there to be shaped and trying to make sure that that’s done in a positive way actually comes back to the first point, which is if we as professionals are either working in Asia as fundraisers or approaching that market as fundraisers and trying to unlock this This New Wealth that they’re you know, we have actually a humble responsibility in a moral responsibility to do that in a way that is ethical and is going to help set the pace for everyone to really shape that in the right way.

40:02
So that kind of concludes my presentation. So I would maybe open it up Jay for questions. I think I’ve got 15 20 minutes left and I think J if you could facilitate that that would be great. I will give my email address. Just again. Please do email me. If you’ve got specific questions. We’d like to slide deck So it’s b dot MW at Global philanthropic.com. Obviously, we as a firm or all over the world, so we’re always happy to talk.

40:32
That’s my commercial break over and done with but I think you are hopefully see that this is a super exciting Marketplace, but it’s super complex, but it really is so exciting as fundraisers going into this that it’s worthy of getting some thought about how we shape that Marketplace and how we approach it as fundraisers.

40:54
Thank you so much been really, really do appreciate it. Great content. And for everyone I’m going ahead and putting Ben’s email address into the chat section. So you can look that later. If you did not hear that that it been I’m just going to repeat it to make sure I have it correctly. Is that b as in been dot m, w as in Morton right at Global philanthropic.com. That’s it. Okay, so you can look for it right there and click on that to send him a note.

41:24
Out and as I mentioned if you would like a copy the slide deck as he just said just make sure you post that right now in the questions tab along with any other question or comment you might have and we’re going to go ahead and give you a minute to write those in and I have a few questions of my own as well that I might interject. But first. I’m going to go ahead and take a look and see what we have coming in. And we do have a number of people requesting a copy of the slide deck.

41:49
One of the first comments here was about asking This is from Carl who says can you please share more about moving money transnationally? Yeah. Well, that’s a great subject reality is it can be problematic? And as I said China and India, it’s always been an issue. You got to bear in mind that if you know that the context of even currency exchange for the RMB for example in China.

42:24
It has only been something that’s actually you know, it’s only been allowed to be exchanged in the relative recent history. Let alone the idea of using it as a currency that you can control spher between countries. So, we’re actually it’s always moves a lot and I think it will inevitably could go one of two ways. It could retrench and they could be more currency exchange regulations or it could open up even more.

42:48
I suspect it will open up even more and the reality is where that affects your You’re giving is that if you want to have a major gift and you negotiate and someone wants to give you a large sum of money just the actual physical moving the money from one country and out of the country can be a legal challenge. So, it’s just to be aware of that. Now most ultra-high net worth or philanthropists that are in that sort of 1 to 10 billion range at say the top-end normally have funds all over the world. They have property they have investment have businesses.

43:24
Normally, there’s that they are accountants and their advisors can work out how to do it. But it’s just a case of being aware of that. So, it’s about currency. It’s about restrictions on currency movements in and out of the country.

43:40
So a natural fact lot of Western countries also have this as well but and the amounts of the mood the other issue should be aware of is that the banking sector the whole sector is more license as we all know the banking sector is even more sensitive around quite right, they in many ways because I personally liable in many countries. So there there’s also sensitivities around large sums of money moving around within Banks and you often have to make sure that they’re aware that other gift agreements and make sure that you’ve got your bases covered.

44:12
So there’s no concerns around that as well because large movements of money into company inter-country can actually alert all sorts of things now that in the past Maybe Once aware of, I’ve been a that brings me to one of my questions, which is what do you recommend people turn to for advice and legal constraints such as the movement of money or he’s our tax implication for giving a gift. Sometimes that happens in other countries. Where is there a place that you turn to either is a print resource or the best resource for just the basic tax question, which is a really good question is actually the doing good survey.

44:52
There’s a there’s a there’s a percentage graph on each country that goes through the you’ll see chose what tax relief you can get in each country including China and there is tax relief is cause it’s very difficult to get it’s not straightforward because even giving to an it at or nonprofit and China doesn’t get you your tax relief you often have to do it through an agency. So it’s not as straightforward as it looks but the point is at least gives you a guide on whether it is a tax incentive on you should be looking at that reality is that you know what another thing I didn’t really mention for.

45:24
Malaysia is that and it’s maybe stating the obvious but isn’t so obvious is that when you’re talking with individuals you also talking to that private family. You also took into their trust and you also took him to the company they are as one so the there isn’t often that the dish of tax really isn’t in there often. It’s very different than the you know, end of year tax deadline.

45:47
We’re all furiously filling in all forms to make sure that we maximize our tax benefit the level of X naught the same the need for reporting. It isn’t the same and the governments aren’t giving the relief as well which isn’t the same. So, there’s it’s much more complicated than just the issue of whether there’s a tax relief. It’s also how can you engineer it to get it?

46:11
So I think that’s a good starting point when we’re not lawyers or tax advisor’s goodness me and it’s very it’s very important that we state that so we really can’t give advice on these issues, but I’m afraid we you know, I can point you to lawyers and tax advisors. So at least you have your bases covered and you certainly should have that you should have that on your speed dial to make sure you do you know, you do have a chosen advisory in each of those. It’s actually very important from the donor’s point of view not just from the recipients and that’s often eyes. It’s as much a concern for the donors in those countries to make sure that their right as it is the recipients so it’s the best.

46:53
It’s a Stood interest for your donors to understand what they’re doing and to make sure that it’s legal and compliant right? Well and it’s probably important to note that if as you said there’s a big opportunity out here. You’ve been talking about that throughout the presentation, but that also means there are a lot of big opportunities. I’m on individual donors. So, if you’re at an institution where you don’t have this legal advice yet and you think it might cost you some time and some money to get it. It’s good to put it in perspective.

47:23
These are people who are as the people been advises often ultra-high net worth individuals were talking about people with 50 million dollars or above US Its these are very significant opportunities for people who are not overly saturated necessarily by appeals to things that matter to them. So, this is well worth the investment. We have a we have a question from Pam saying what is the classic mistake that you see companies? Perhaps you also mean organizations making what’s one of those classic mistakes?

47:54
Classic mistake is to not understand those fundamental two words, which is database and I you know, I when I first turned up in Hong Kong, for example, which by the way, I think the current estimates are that Hong Kong gives where depends how you look at it, but I would argue that it gives more million-dollar-plus gifts than the whole of the United Kingdom because the ones that we know about if you compare it, they’re the ones that are as opposed to ones they reported that the ones We found out about so if you had in the ones that the probably on aren’t actually reporting as they don’t have to report them you’re way over whatever the 800 millions of billion which is larger than the whole of the United Kingdom. So, you know, these are this is this is a huge is a huge amount of giving that’s happening.

48:47
So I think those two issues of states and face and we go back to Hong Kong when I first got there the amount of times I had And he will say to me. Well, you know my University or college very good brands, very good organizations have just been through and the head of it stood up waiting to check book saying we’ve got it, you know, we got you got to put in your money. We need your money help us now, you know, it’s just so wrong. It’s just there’s just so wrong culturally to do that or two of us very light very large sum of money in the middle of the first dinner that someone’s had with no relationship. I’ll be by the way the third word.

49:23
Hannah’s relationship strained relationship, whatever the whatever the approach you need, uh have known the person and actually they and trust and they need to trust you. And that’s how it works in many ways. So say some face of the two issues and so many people just don’t get that and they rush in and they and they really embarrass themselves and they upset everyone. So, I think it’s just reflecting. You can’t rush it, you know, everything can Asia which is the beauty of it.

49:49
So we’ll about a long game that you know, the investors all a long view, families take a long view, governments take a long view, everything’s on a long view and philanthropy needs to be the same. You need to build relationships before you make asks, you need to use intermediate. So, the asks on embarrassing anyone. This is all long-term play. I always say if you want to if you want to be in Asia, don’t just turn up and go once that’s more insulting than going, you know, then they’re not going at all. So, you got to commit to it and it’s got to be a long-term. Peace.

50:24
We have a question from Susan who asked something. I wanted to ask. How can we engage an intermediary for fundraising? Well, I’m afraid this isn’t balance is you can look at Global philanthropic, but I would say that no actually isn’t joking aside. We do a lot of intermediary, but you know, it doesn’t actually have to be a professional advisor. It could often be I always say when you when you meet with a high net-worth family and find out who’s in the room and often you’ll have people that come along.

50:53
Meeting then you wonder why they’re there, you know, they could be a friend or they could be a lawyer or they could be a friend of a friend but quite often that the intermediary that the chosen want to do the deal with so it doesn’t have to be a paid for intermediary. It can be actually an intermediary. That’s actually brought to the party by the other donor, but you need to be aware that spot that and to try it out. I think second generation third generation or really critical.

51:23
Players I’ve done many deals with Children of billionaires because that’s how it’s done. And it’s put back up to the to the to the head of the family and when a deal’s done you go and thank them the Oscars actual actually made it’s a negotiation between the children.

51:41
It is really the family like you said and sometimes the family and the company they’re all tied together in family companies, you know, all this into woven. Absolutely. Someone asked what in fact. I want to just add one question to that which is if you don’t have the Good Fortune of working with global philanthropic or let’s say you’re trying to set up a relationship with an intermediary perhaps it’s close to your name at work.

52:05
I’ve heard universities do this in the past you have alumni there in the country from Peter Cetera, how do you vet an intermediary?

52:15
Now the tricky question, you know, I think you know, the best way of doing good fundraising in Asia is to is to is to build relationships is the there and is to get trusted relationships and then you can ask around frankly innovate discreet way and it becomes pretty obvious. Who’s seen in a good way and who isn’t who’s safe and who isn’t and you know, you can do all the research in the world.

52:45
Helps obviously, I’m not saying you shouldn’t do that. But unfortunately, it’s back to the old shoe leather, you know, there’s no way around gotta get out there and you got to talk to people and build relationships and have lots of dinners and lots of meetings and you’ve got and you’ve got to get to a point where everyone trusts you and then you’ll then you will be able to ask those kind of questions and I think really it’s very hard to do any other way. You can brush this stuff. I’ve been on the same token I mentioned earlier.

53:15
Chance of getting to know the marketplace and often times in the past. It’s been an issue with vetting the donor and as you pointed out in the beginning getting that kind of research done is not an easy task. But if one it’s sometimes it’s not easy to know on the face of things that a donor might be radioactive locally.

53:34
I think of the old Sasakawa issues when when he was alive the father was alive and it would problematic for other Japanese donors, but they wouldn’t say that publicly but You knew if you went and you got that money from them at that time. This was decades ago that you might not be receiving money from other Japanese donors. How does one go about the process of properly assessing whether or not the donor is an appropriate relationship for you?

54:01
You know, you just touched on something that demonstrates my point. It’s all about face. You know, people wouldn’t tell you that that’s a problem. Right and the issue of Association becoming an issue of face. So you just absolutely beautifully demonstrated wife understanding face is so important. Now, how do you find out now, you know, this isn’t just an Eastern problem. We all know this this is a western problem.

54:25
This is a problem in philanthropy, which is about how do you how can you make Sure that you will donors are going to enhance your brand and it’s not just an Eastern issue. We have it across the world. You know, I mean, it’s size of the coin one side is you can’t control what your donor does for the rest of their lives, right? So as soon as you take money from anyone you are also vulnerable. So obviously you want to make sure in your gift agreements that you can remove names. You can do that in a way that that is that it that, you know isn’t going to end up on a Cold Case.

55:01
Thought that through in the donors very clear about that. I think you know the advantage of my experiences of of fundraising in the East is that often people will want to honor their father or their mother or academics if it’s universities or great people or whatever. It may be or prime ministers or whatever maybe and you’re on safer territory. They’re obviously because what’s going to happen has happened already. So, you know, you can take a view on whether you want to be associated.

55:31
Waited with that individual as well. But you know, the reality is is you know, are you can ask about I think you know, if you get good trust that people will in a roundabout way indicate, what is a good idea and what isn’t but it’s all in code often because of the face issue and it’s understandable, you know, people won’t it’s, you know, it’s not often. It’s not a about bad-mouthing people or it’s just it’s just not right to be talking about people in that.

56:01
Way, so you do have to read the you do have to read the code. You have to goes back to my point of this being a huge game of chess, right? It is risky. But then again, it’s risky to take money also with many as we found, you know, and there’s been many examples of names of had to come off the buildings because of people involved in all sorts of scandals. So, it’s not just an Eastern issue, but it’s harder you’re right, you know, it’s harder to take of your neck because research is harder, but I would ask about I would also trust gut instinct. I mean, I’m a great believer in walking around the block.

56:31
You know things don’t feel right, then they’re probably not right and I know that’s totally unscientific. But that’s my best rule of thumb well, and that may be a perfect place to end and also to make the point that we never do these sessions saying you should turn to these people because they’ll tell you what to do. But in this case, we have to say you should turn to these people because they know what to do building the gut for doing something right in a market also means that you’ve been eating a food and you know that it’s this way with your stomach. So, if you’re going to trust your gut, you better know somebody who can tell you what to eat.

57:08
As well as everything else and that’s certainly been and his team at Global Village. So, thank you very much ben for being willing to share some of this and hopefully we can have you back to talk maybe even about another region of the world in the not-too-distant future. She’s always been an absolute pleasure and thank you for asking me and I hope that skin some insight, you know as a massive subject and doing it justice in an hour’s is probably a bit of a bit of a stretch but I’ve got some references I left you at the end here.

57:35
There’s some really good work out there that you can Google and search and is a good starting point, but thank you very much for taking the time to listen to us and hopefully you found that and the people of darting and found that of help and I want to encourage everybody again. If you have not said you want these slides you won’t be able to click these hyperlinks unless you get the slides and the only way in this case that he can send them to you as if you request it. So, it’s just making sure we’re honoring both the principal and the and the facts of protection. So, in this case, we are encouraging you to go ahead and post a note in the questions tab with your email address and then he will be able to see it and send this slide deck to you. And if of course you’d like to share the recording you’ll find it as always in the Flash Class library donorsearch.net and that’s donorsearch.net under the resources tab Flash Class library is still be here there rather than just the next couple of days. So be on the lookout.

58:29
Also, I want to encourage you all to come back again tomorrow when we have Kathleen Lore, the author of really important work in the recent month on women in philanthropy here. She will be doing session tomorrow at 3 p.m. Eastern on Gender Matters a Practical Approach to Grow Women’s Philanthropy and just as we’re talking about Asia half the population of the world. It’s an important market place. It’s also just an important place to be aware of in the world of philanthropy. We had better be aware of women in philanthropy. That’s 51 % of the US market and understanding and being sensitive to the differences within that market.

59:07
Place are extremely important and we’ve got a person to address them in a very, very in-depth manner tomorrow. So please do join us at 3 p.m. Eastern for that. We want to thank as always, our friends at DonorSearch providing this platform so we can have sessions like these with you and of course, they’re in the background, of course our stalwart producer who’s making sure that we’re on time and we are on time to close. Thank you all very much.

59:37
This has been Jay Frost speaking. It’s been a pleasure having you will look forward to seeing you next time. Take care.