What We Mean When We Say We Fund Systems Change

The focus on systems change is driven by empathy, purpose, and hope.

One reason we adopted a grantmaking framework that advances social, racial, and economic justice stems from our intentional efforts to listen to and learn from our grantees. We heard loud and clear that to support grantees’ efforts to thrive on their own terms, we needed to think bigger because the effects of centuries of racism and other injustices are still actively holding them back.

These injustices continue to do harm because they’re embedded into many current-day policies, customs, mindsets, and power imbalances—in other words, the systems that guide our lives.

Systems change refers to efforts to root out injustices from our systems so they truly serve the needs of our priority communities, and all communities.

We want to support more of these kinds of efforts.

Systems change removes major barriers to justice.

For example, unjust mortgage practices—such as redlining, or refusing mortgages to people in predominantly Black neighborhoods—have denied families the stability of homeownership and the accumulation of generational wealth.

It’s one of the root causes of the racial wealth gap, a gap in the wealth between Black families and white families that will take more than two centuries to overcome at the current rate of change. However, efforts that target Black families for financial assistance and training—specifically tailored to their needs—can close the gap more quickly.

And that changes the system by removing barriers.

The Foundation works with organizations that are taking a big-picture view of systems change. But our average grant size is about $180,000—an amount that’s relatively small when compared to the massive systems that shape our lives, such the financial systems that lead to homeownership and create generational wealth.

Still, we know we can make a systems-level difference by finding the right grantee partners and by trusting their insights and experience. Another way we can help foster justice within systems is by being transparent about our discoveries and our revised process so other funders can see how we’re implementing change—specifically, change informed by experienced community leaders who are on the front lines of addressing systemic inequities.

Grantees are defining the work that leads to systems change.

Our grantee partners have been our teachers over the years, helping us evolve our understanding of how we can be a better ally by building reciprocal relationships and providing more flexible funding based on mutual trust.

In practice, that means more funding for general operating expenses so grantees can be more flexible and agile in determining where grant funds will have the most impact in that moment. It also means more multiyear grants, allowing our grantees to plan ahead with more confidence and reduce the administrative burden of reapplying year after year.

Here are insights from three—among many—current grantees who are shaping systems-level change in their communities. Conversations with them and many of our other change-making grantees helped us come to a new understanding of how we can adjust our policies and practices to be better partners and allies in their work.

As a society, we appear to be more open to justice-focused change than ever before.

According to Atum Azzahir, CEO of Cultural Wellness Center, a Minneapolis-based grantee, systems change through transformational leadership has been a central goal of the community organization since its founding 27 years ago. Right now, Atum is seeing not only a desire for change but a genuine pursuit of how to make change happen.

Mother Atum, as she’s often called, describes systems change as “changing core beliefs about us in relationship to other people.” In her work of healing her own cultural community systems, culture is a resource for building a collective societal culture of harmony—focusing on community connectedness beyond individualism. Cultural Wellness Center uses personal experiences as opportunities to help improve well-being, relationships, communities, and bidirectional mentoring and coaching of organizational leaders.

“Collective spirit” is a powerful way to frame why justice and equity matter so deeply.

“Since our founding almost 30 years ago, First Peoples Fund has been supporting systems change through our community-based, grassroots approach to building collective spirit—that which moves each one of us to stand up and make a difference, to pass on ancestral knowledge, or simply to extend a hand of generosity,” says Lori Pourier (Oglala Lakota), president and CEO of First Peoples Fund based in Rapid City, SD.

“We begin changing broken systems by investing first and foremost in system change for individuals—particularly artists and culture bearers,” Lori continues. “Artists and culture bearers play a significant role in bringing spirit back to community. I believe everybody’s an artist. Creativity and ancestral knowledge—all those aunties making things around the kitchen table—that’s art. That’s collective spirit. And it ripples out in concentric circles: first to their families, then their community and region and, ultimately, nationally.”

Broken systems aren’t abstractions, they have daily impacts.

“It’s a struggle,” says Angie Main (Fort Belknap Gros Ventre), executive director of NACDC Financial Services, Inc., a Native community development financial institution (Native CDFI) based on the Blackfeet Reservation in Browning, MT.

“The systems we’re dealing with are decades old for one reason or another. And we keep wasting time on antiquated systems that challenge our actual work: providing loans, training, and technical assistance.”

That means Angie finds herself questioning how useful going after or accepting certain funds actually is and finding ways to educate funders about the various ways they’re applying “white-stream” thinking—i.e., rules and parameters that fail to account for cultural circumstances—to Indian Country institutions. “It’s important to change those systems rather than change our missions just to fit those funding streams,” she says.

Meanwhile, despite the biased systems in place, Native CDFIs are building a successful and expanding Indigenous finance system that reflects their values and cultures. They’re continually demonstrating their efficiency and efficacy in underbanked Native communities.

Many past discussions and continuing conversations are shaping our approach.

We’re continually looking to support the creative perspectives of our grantees as they aim to restore justice that has been systematically and intentionally withheld for hundreds of years from Native communities, communities of color, and the other priority communities we serve.

Learning from grantee ideas—such as the “collective spirit” approach described by Lori Pourier and focusing on a future beyond our individual selves as Mother Atum advocates—we can represent powerful cultural thinking of the past and, I hope, of our shared future.

This is an ongoing dialogue. I invite you to join us in discussing how funders can support justice and systems change.

Let’s talk.

Learn more about our grantmaking approach from my earlier blog: