What can we learn from the Lankelly Chase experience?
A thematic perspective for thinking about the future of philanthropy
By the Generative Journalism Alliance
Through more than 50 interviews with partners of Lankelly Chase, including grantees, consultants, funder peers, ex-staff and trustees, we’ve been exploring the question:
What can we learn from the Lankelly Chase experience?
Our aim is to decentralise the process by which people get to remember Lankelly Chase, as well as to surface and share learning which unlocks value for the wider philanthropic sector.
We introduce here five distinct but related themes which emerged from our process of generative conversations with people who have been in relationship with Lankelly Chase since 2010. These themes offer a way to conceptualise the legacy stories and learning for the future of philanthropy and systems change funding.
Audacity
Pushing the boundaries of philanthropy
Our conversations with partners have explored Lankelly Chase’s evolving relationship to risk, willingness to think long-term, and funding the ‘unfundable’. Their analysis of the systemic challenges, particularly the interconnectedness of often-siloed fields and problem areas, and the urgency of those challenges, played a significant role in Lankelly Chase becoming increasingly audacious in their approach to funding systems change.
Partners have described Lankelly Chase as ‘bold’ and creating ‘good controversy’ that shook traditional patterns and practices from within the philanthropic sector. In doing so Lankelly Chase contributed to field-building activity, notably pushing boundaries in systems change, devolved decision-making and, most recently, in the total redistribution of its assets.
“I see Lankelly as pioneering, trailblazing, aspirational – willing to go out there, willing to get it wrong, trying hard, not always succeeding, but trying to lead by example.” Dorothy Atcheson, Advisor
As explored more in the themes below, and throughout the legacy stories themselves, such audacity also posed serious challenges when trying to be in right relationship with grantees and shifting the asymmetric power dynamics within philanthropy.
Inquiry
Being guided by inquiries and adapting to the learning that emerges
One distinctive feature of Lankelly Chase’s approach is its approach to learning, specifically its intention to start with inquiries. When seeking to intervene in systems, Lankelly Chase tended towards posing questions rather than answers, especially at the outset:
“If the outcomes that we desire in the world are complex – if they are created by complex systems – what does that look like in terms of how funding works? Lankelly Chase were one of the few funders at that point interested in having that conversation.” – Toby Lowe, Advisor
Being an inquiry-led organisation offered a fast growing theoretical understanding of new terrain, in turn enabling strategic pivoting. The full potential of this approach was constrained partly by the lack of well-developed structures for sustaining learning. Where the distance between knowledge producers and decision-makers is large, such as between a board of trustees and community researchers, learning was often missed, misunderstood or abstracted so that it no longer reflected the field.
In the legacy stories we explore the experiences of people involved in these processes, which offer insights for people seeking to build robust learning-based structures for systems change funding.
Relationality
Practicing a relational approach to systems change
An important part of Lankelly Chase’s approach has been the concept and practice of relationality: seeing the world not in terms of individual actors but a web of interconnected relationships.
We saw this manifest in trust-based funding relationships, commitment to participatory methodologies such as Deep Democracy and Art of Hosting, and thinking what support means beyond money.
Often, however, relationality seemed more like an ambition than an embedded way of being; a well-articulated theory that struggles to be translated into action. In our conversations we’ve heard accounts of relational practices leaving people confused, unsure of where they stood in relation to this philanthropic organisation, and struggling to make sense of why some people and groups get funded and others not.
“There needs to be clear accountability alongside requests for trust. If you’re saying, ‘Trust me, I’ve got your best intentions at heart,’ or, ‘Trust me, this is going to work out,’ then it’s hard to follow-up on any specifics. Also, who are the people who get trusted? And who are the people who don’t get trusted? Who are the people able to be legible as worthy of trust in the ecosystem? And who are the people you would be suspicious of?”– Rose Longhurst, Funder Peer and Grantee
The legacy stories share experiences from a diverse range of people who held relationships with Lankelly Chase, offering both a very detailed and holistic account of relationality on the whole.
Practice
Viewing change as an ongoing process that requires committed practice
The main supportive structure that connected Lankelly Chase’s theory with action was seeing change as a process as much as an outcome – even if this was not always done deeply or consistently enough across the organisation.
There was a commitment, at least in theory, to practicing the ways of being that move us closer towards desired futures. We heard of a real commitment to transforming not only the field ‘out there’ but also the personal and the organisational, seeing systems change at multiple scales.
Yet, while philanthropy often celebrates aspirations for transformation, it too frequently trips over its own timelines and structures, exposing a gap between theory and action. Yasmeen Akhtar, who was an advisor on Lankelly Chase’s governance transition, cuts to the heart of this challenge when she says:
“While it’s a wonderful fantasy to be a transformative funder, I think we are not there, so we are confusing ourselves and the wider communities by not getting the pacing right in terms of, what have I actually learned and what have I actually done with that learning?”
Power
Navigating power dynamics in philanthropy
We have heard stories of real joy and deep impact through Lankelly Chase’s attempts to disrupt the philanthropic model.
We have also heard about a lack of care, of mistrust and dismissal of partners’ efforts and contributions, of an inability to work with the discomfort of holding power, of opaque decision-making and an unwillingness to really listen to and act on what marginalised people and communities needed from the foundation.
One of our interviewees compared Lankelly Chase to “gods on Mount Olympus”:
“They could come across as quite god-like, in terms of if they could change the setting they would, and you’d suddenly find the goal posts had changed.” – Jan Garrill, Funder Peer
Asymmetrical dynamics were a key dimension of what we heard from many sources. A question that remains unanswered is whether or not, had it behaved and structured itself differently, Lankelly Chase could’ve broken down or transformed these dynamics.
A commitment to relational practices and inquiry-led approaches can, as we’ve seen, mitigate some of the unintentional harms caused by asymmetric power distribution. But they seemed unable to liberate both Lankelly Chase and its partners from the harmful dynamics that emerges from this asymmetric distribution of power.
Learning from the legacy
The dozens of stories shared as part of this legacy explore all of these themes in depth, from the perspectives of partners of Lankelly Chase through the years.
Each theme adds nuance and texture to the complex dynamics at play in these relationships. The stories show that rarely is an experience simply ‘good’ or ‘bad’ – and in every experience there is a learning.
We believe that these stories, both on their own and on the whole, could offer insight and guidance to others navigating and seeking to transform philanthropy.
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