The Genesis of Greater Share
By Greater Share co-founder Paul Fletcher
Two problems were occupying my mind as the germ of Greater Share was beginning to form.
The first came from my role as Chair of Trustees for Teach For All, a global education NGO which develops future leaders to teach in under-resourced schools. The results of its work to improve learning for millions of children - especially those from marginalised communities - were impressive. Yet its senior leadership was spending a disproportionate amount of time ensuring its funding pipeline so it could deliver its programmes.
This is the picture for nearly all non-profits - according to a recent study of US foundation giving by Candid, the median grant was a mere $35,000. But with more than 700 million children currently leaving school unable to meet basic levels of reading and mathematics and millions more still dealing with the fall-out of the pandemic, how much more impact could leading NGOs have on children’s learning if they had proper resources to plan long-term?
The second issue emanated from the financial world I had recently left. As rates of private wealth rocketed around the world, I saw many investors who were looking to build their capital, but were unable to get access to the world’s leading private equity firms. It was also clear from my conversations that there was a strong desire amongst many of these individuals to build philanthropic giving into their investing - particularly to help tackle some of the huge social issues our world now faces. But it could feel overwhelming to identify the organisations they could be confident were having real impact on the ground and had the capacity to scale up effectively with significant funds.
Enter the concept of Greater Share - a new philanthropic investment model that would, as later reported by the FT, “provide a way for individuals to gain access to leading investment managers and philanthropic experts”, and at the same time supports those investors to generate sustainable, long-term funding for a set of rigorously-tested NGOs, to help transform learning for millions of children around the world.
The idea for Greater Share’s fund-of-funds was bold and innovative. It would rely on investors committing to donating at least half - and up to all - of their capital gains to a set of high-impact NGOs. It would require all the GPs involved to donate not only their fees, but also the carry, to the same cause. And it would ask these usually singular GP firms (the world of private equity is not typically known for its collaboration) to come together in partnership with each other, with the NGOs, and with a wider community of experts to create real and measurable change for children. We couldn’t know for sure that our desired partners would bite.
It wasn’t long before we had our answer. With one voice, Advent International, Bain Capital, Cinven, Hg, Nautic and Permira agreed to be the founding GPs of our fund-of-funds. Other big names joined our community to provide strategic, financial, legal and logistical support to Greater Share, including Apex, Bain & Company and Simpson Thacher & Bartlett.
Our global panel of education experts, led by the Executive Director of the Education Committee, Lisbet Steer, undertook a painstaking assessment of more than 4,000 education NGOs to identify the eight strongest organisations, all focused on evidence-based child-centric models of education and with a proven track record of transforming learning systems around the world. And in February this year, we launched with a Financial Times exclusive, which heralded the “novel approach” of Greater Share’s “innovative financial initiative”.
Perhaps this industry enthusiasm is not so surprising, if you look at the latest analysis by social impact consultant The Bridgespan Group on the barriers to philanthropic giving: finding the right investment opportunities; surfacing investments with the capacity to effectively absorb significant funds; ability to build the right relationships; difficulties in securing trusted advisors; understanding how to measure social change. Greater Share presents a solution to all of these challenges - and is committed to a shared learning journey that we believe will benefit all involved, from the investors to our private equity, NGO and financial partners.
Greater Share’s first mission focuses on transforming education for children from marginalised communities across the world. But at the heart of the model lies its flexibility: the ability to provide long-term sustainable funding to organisations tackling any of the toughest issues of our time, whether environmental threats, the pervasive rise of disinformation, or the humanitarian fall-out of conflict.
Our hope is that Greater Share’s innovative philanthropic model is the start of a new breed of philanthropic investment. It is clear that the issues facing humanity cannot be answered by individual interventions. The only way we can hope to solve them is through collaboration, through a collective model bringing together powerful ideas, approaches and new learning. Greater Share is an invitation to investors, private equity and NGOs to be part of this journey.
