Grantees were asked to provide any suggestions for how the Foundation could improve. Of the 726 grantees who responded to the survey, 472 shared comments. Per our standard methodology, CEP coded a representative sample of 250 grantee comments, which yielded 227 constructive suggestions. These suggestions were thematically categorized by CEP and grouped into the topics below.

Non-monetary Assistance (20% N=45)

• Facilitate Collaboration and Convenings (N = 17)

  • "Reflective Peer cohort for information sharing along with support and connection between fellows and grantees (ex: annual conveneings with past and/or present fellows/grantees)."
  • "Would love more opportunities as well as grantee lists or smaller events for different types of grantees that might offer chances to network eg by geography, or focus like justice, or orgs interrelated/engaged in character development of youth."
  • "I think additional opportunities to network with other grantees would provide value."
  • "It would be lovely for the Foundation to do more to support communication and knowledge sharing across grantees."
  • "We would love for MacArthur to convene its grantees in the field once per year."

• Building Capacity (N = 14)

  • "Provide additional opportunities for organisations to strengthen management capacities, especially to young, upcoming grantees."
  • "MacArthur should improve in the area of capacity building (training) of project staff of MacArthur grantees."
  • "If they could organise training to their grantees that would be appreciated."
  • "More explicit/formal support and facilitation for DEI initiatives and professional development including management training."

• Assistance Securing Additional Funding (N = 6)

  • "Because the Foundation is such a leader in the field, it would be great if it could proactively make introductions to other funders and/or partners, particularly for smaller organizations."
  • "Help grantees scout for additional funding opportunities."

• Awareness of Available Non-monetary Supports (N = 4)

  • "While in retrospect it makes sense that we could have perhaps reached out to MacArthur to seek support in some of the areas listed as needed, seeing such a list, fleshed out with additional information, could have triggered such action and contributed to organizational growth in improved ways. We suggest if MacArthur offers such resources to future grantees that it make their availability known more overtly."

• Other (N = 4)

Grantmaking Characteristics (19% N=44)

• Grant Length (N = 15)

  • "The first is for the foundation to consider even long-term grants (up to three years) in order to enable grantees to have a longer-term planning horizon and reduce the transaction costs of seeking and giving grants on both sides. The systemic changes we are striving to make in society almost by definition require persistent effort over an extended period of time. Longer grant cycles would simply acknowledge that fact."
  • "Multi-year support always welcome."
  • "Hopefully, to maintain the possibility of extending projects for more years, especially when there are positive results at the level of institutional policies, and which may, therefore, eventually have an impact on public policy. That is, a more strategic plan in the medium and long term."
  • "Another very important aspect is that the funding could be for a period of three to five years because we are always under pressure to give continuity in support of the victims."
  • "Longer commitments to projects such as ours...working with indigenous people in remote areas is particularly challenging."

• Grant Restrictions (N = 9)

  • "Non-profit organizations are greatly in need of general operating support. Providing general operating grants would be a significant improvement."
  • "Providing support for core operations would be extremely valuable."
  • "Shifting more to general purpose or programmatic support rather than restricted grant support would make us more agile and higher impact."

• Covering Grantees' Full Costs (N = 6)

  • "Have a more realistic estimate of the true cost of running an organization."
  • "Consider...at the very least, fully funding the cost of proposed work (ie, covering full reasonable indirect rates)."

• Grant Size (N = 4)

  • "Make more funding to enable us complete the work we started."

• Review 100&Change Structure (N = 4)

  • "MacArthur should re-think it's $100 million grant program to one entity. Similar to its' MacArthur Genius/Fellows program it should identify 10 highly motivated and successful organizations and provide them with a $10 million no strings attached to properly capitalized efforts and be more impactful."

• Other (N = 6)

Funder-Grantee Relationships (15% N=35)

• More Frequent Interactions (N = 16)

  • "Slightly more regular contact would be useful, to make sure staff are satisfied with how things are progressing."
  • "I'd like to have more contact with a wider range of program officers. I feel like I could learn from this and importantly that I could provide additional support to the foundation if this were made possible."
  • "My biggest suggestion would be creating more regular opportunities to engage with foundation staff to develop a more collaborative relationship."
  • "More frequent opportunities to talk to the foundation and/or portfolio managers would be beneficial to both sides."
  • "My only recommendation would be to reach out more frequently to update one another and explore ways to collaborate more closely on common goals."

• Site Visits (N = 9)

  • "I would suggest that would make MacArthur Foundation a better funder are have a greater presence in the communities they serve. Seat at the planning tables with community partners to provide thought leadership and to gain community context firsthand."
  • "Don't only reach out to the south side community, come into the community and meet the "movers and shakers" a couple of times a year."
  • "The staff visits to grantees should be more frequent."
  • "We would love to host a site visit by our program officer...."
  • "Visit organizations in their work or action regions."

• Staff Responsiveness (N = 5)

  • "Improvements to staff communications responsiveness would make things a bit easier."
  • "Improved response time from program officers."

• Recognition of Power Dynamics (N = 3)

  • "Become more of a partner and less of a dictator. We recognize its "your" funding but we play a role in helping to address the concerns you care about as well."

• Other (N = 2)

Proposal and Selection Processes (11% N=25)

• More Transparency around Proposal Evaluation (N = 9)

  • "We hope that the Foundation will more transparent in the reasoning behind grant applications (both positive and negative) and seek to support creative artists directly, as well as organizations."
  • "More transparent proposal processes (including timelines, themes, amounts and partners)."
  • "More transparency during evaluation of a grant proposal."

• Clarify Guidelines (N = 5)

  • "Even on the website there is no explanation of criteria, framework, or how best to go about engaging with the foundation. Just platitudes of organizations that have been selected based on their access and relationships. It would be good if there was a community framework and criteria for how organizations can engage with the foundation."
  • "MacArthur should provide clarity on other parties and organisations that it expects grantees to work with from the inception of the projects."

• Streamline Processes (N = 3)

  • "The application process was extremely time-consuming for a very small nonprofit."

• Provide Feedback on Proposals (N = 2)

  • "Provide more feedback when a new grant application is declined."

• Other (N = 6)

Impact on and Understanding of Grantees' Fields (8% N=19)

• Continue Exiting Strategies (N = 7)

  • "Moving back into the climate change adaptation space."
  • "Restart the democracy program."
  • "We suggest not closing the Foundation's reproductive health programs, nor the country office."

• Expand Focus Areas (N = 5)

  • "The foundation could be a better funder by expanding their grant activities to cover other diverse areas of research."
  • "They could increase their thematic focus."

• Advancement of Knowledge (N = 3)

  • "It would also be interesting if the foundation were to share, from its perspective as donors in Mexico, the changes it has seen in the field, and which strategies worked and which did not. Basically lessons learned from the field."

• Other (N = 4)

Foundation Communications (7% N=16)

• Communications during Strategy Transitions (N = 8)

  • "I think it would be good if they give their grantees a bit more warning about major programmatic shifts so there is time to transition the work--either close it, change it or find new donors to cover some of the costs. The last shift was rather abrupt and not well communicated."
  • "If funding directions change, continue to keep up communication and make direction clear."
  • "Abrupt changes to funding is disruptive to nonprofits, which are typically already vulnerable. If a funder has the best interests of nonprofits in mind, it would show greater sensitivity to staff capacity and resources, which typically are already stretched."

• Clarity of Foundation's Goals and Strategy (N = 5)

  • "On the Chicago strategy in particular I think they could do a better job at communication. I really couldn't articulate what the Chicago strategy is for MacArthur, and our work is presumably part of it."
  • "More opportunities to hear from MacArthur foundation staff on their current thinking and approach would also be appreciated."

• Other (N = 3)

Reporting and Evaluation Processes (6% N=13)

• Streamline Processes (N = 9)

  • "The reporting process was a bit confusing because we had to do an annual report and a final report at the same time. This could be condensed into one, cumulative report."
  • "A couple of years ago, the foundation switched the format which has made reporting more burdensome, in particular because of word limits on sections that give us limited opportunities to share details about our journalism and its impact."
  • "Simply removing all character limits, while keeping guidelines, from fluxx report platform would help us enormously. For whatever reason our offline docs do not count characters the same and we always spend unnecessary time cutting text."

• Other (N = 4)

Impact on and Understanding of Grantees' Organizations (5% N=11)

• Understanding of Grantees' Organizations (N = 7)

  • "[Staff] are lovely people who are generally very respectful of grantees. However, they are a long way from understanding the pressures nonprofits face."
  • "Consider engaging grass roots NFP leaders to better understand their work, and the experience with growing an organization. Also better understand the challenges with growing resources ..."
  • "Would like them to know our arts better and the scope of our work."

• Orientation Change (N = 4)

  • "It's understandable that the foundation shifts the focus to bigger grants with major impacts. Nevertheless, there are many problems on the ground need[ing] efforts of many organizations and communities, which at individual level are small but their combining impacts are substantial. Therefore, the foundation should also look at possibilities and initiatives to support smaller civil society organizations and communities."

Impact on and Understanding of Grantees' Communities (4% N=10)

• Orientation Change (N = 5)

  • "Creating a funding program to support immigrant justice organizations."
  • "Holistic donor programmes tailored to specific geographies (overseas countries), rather than arranged thematically...."

• Understanding of Grantees' Communities (N = 2)

  • "A specific improvement would be for one or two top executives to attend a meeting, or hold a conference call, or invite legislators to their offices, so they can best understand their impact with the direct beneficiaries of their philanthropy."

• Understanding of Grantees' Contexts (N = 2)

  • "For Chicago to take local contexts into account and not just make general decisions."

• Other (N = 1)

Other (4% N=9)

• Other (N = 9)