Badr Jafar
Investing in collaboration and knowledge sharing to advance philanthropy
Badr Jafar has long believed that philanthropy – particularly in the Middle East – can make a bigger difference in the world if it is open and collaborative, with like-minded donors joining forces and learning from one another. That is why he joined the Giving Pledge, so he can learn from his philanthropic peers around the world, and why he funds multiple initiatives to advance knowledge and research about philanthropy, such as the Centre for Strategic Philanthropy at Cambridge and the Strategic Philanthropy Initiative at NYU Abu Dhabi.
Transcript
Anyone can give away money. Giving away money in itself is not the difficult part. It’s making sure that that money achieves its intended purpose, and that’s where strategic giving really comes in.
I was spending time with third-grade students, teaching them maths in hospices, in terminal wards. That was my first really experience with giving.
With giving time, giving yourself, which can be, in many cases, the most important part of giving. It helped to create much more connectivity with my giving, really making sure that you understand the problems that you are trying to address.
Going out into the field, really understanding what’s happening on the ground, not being presumptuous.
And then, of course, making sure that you keep yourself informed over time, because none of these problems are static.
The potential to combine that philanthropic capital with business capital and government capital to create and generate that multiplier effect that we desperately need if we’re going to solve and address many of the systemic challenges that we see across the world.
That’s the opportunity.
Dear Tsitsi, you are an extraordinary philanthropist and social entrepreneur.
So for me, it’s really the people that I’ve met along the journey that’s helped shape my giving and also my passion for wanting to help to lift philanthropic infrastructure in different parts of the world.
When I want to understand and be inspired by a particular cause or a particular opportunity to give and to help and to address, I always try and track down people who are most experienced in that field, and if they let me spend time with them, so I can learn from them and be inspired by them.
There’s so much more that can be done.
And of course, there’s no way that I can do that on my own, and I have been working with others, including within The Giving Pledge.
The power of the community in being able to learn from each other, not just across sectors, but also across geographies and across generations, is really where the exciting momentum is both coming from and will continue.
