Moving a donor/grantee conversation from grantmaking to other types of capital can reveal opportunities that neither the funder nor organization initially considered.

Funders provide grants to help address certain challenges that alone, would be impossible to overcome. Grants are an essential part of helping our world become a safer, more prosperous, cleaner and better place for all of us to live.

And yet, increasingly foundations, family offices, corporate foundations, impact funds and even individual donors are starting to realize that grants, alone, may not address the impact gaps of our time.

Philanthropic funders are accustomed to certain questions before making a grant. So for example, they may ask whether the organization's mission is effective. Or if the work aligns with the funder's priorities.

Evidence of impact, leadership support, geographic reach and potential for scale also arise.

But there is one even more critical question funders should be asking themselves before funding a partner:

Is a grant actually the right form of capital for what this organization is trying to accomplish?

When Stephanie Beasley of the Chronicle of Philanthropy took a look at the research brief I prepared on philanthropic foundations using non-grant capital, she was as surprised as I was at the results: just 115 foundations using non-grant capital (alongside grants) on a repeated basis.

She asked me my thoughts on why this number wasn’t higher.

Corporate philanthropy is changing.

For decades, companies have measured their grant-making primarily through their corporate foundation's philanthropic giving, or in some cases, the grants they make as part of sustainability programs. Additionally, employee volunteerism and engagement have been calculated to help augment a corporate philanthropic funding target.

Putting too much pressure on philanthropy to solve all of our systemic challenges facing the planet is not going to help make any of those problems disappear, nor will it encourage donors to ante up more resources.