This family foundation has a social justice program that promotes progressive social change through broadly shared economic opportunity and sustainable environmental practices that serve Southern California and New England communities.

The Angell Foundation engaged WPA to develop their social justice program from an exploratory state to a focused strategy with long-term goals. WPA conducted interviews with the Board and staff to understand the anticipated objectives for strategic planning. WPA then facilitated planning sessions and presented several models for future grantmaking in this area.

First 5 LA is a public agency grantmaker and unique child-advocacy organization that has invested over $500 million since 1999 in grants and programs to champion the health, education, and safety causes of young children and families in Los Angeles County.

First 5 LA retained WPA in 2008 to provide support for creating a new 5-year strategic plan to shift the agency’s grantmaking from an initiative approach to a place-based one. The project began with stakeholder and staff focus groups, as well as intensive planning with the appointed Board of Commissioners, to create a theory-of-change for the agency.

WPA then helped build strategic planning work groups and facilitated the work of these groups in order to develop an implementation plan. In the implementation phase of the process, WPA will provide training and support to staff for effective transition to the new organizational and governance structure. WPA will be working with F5LA by providing change management, facilitation, and training assistance through 2010.

As a corporate foundation, SJHSF improves the health and quality of life of the communities it serves through its hospitals, home health agencies and physicians group partners in California and Texas.

In 2009, SJHSF hired WPA to perform an organizational audit, including an analysis of the foundation’s grantmaking since its inception, which formed the framework for assessing the foundation’s strategies and impact. WPA is leading the foundation staff, its Board, and key internal stakeholders through a planning process including aligning the foundation’s goals with the health system’s and the ministry community benefit plans. The final recommendations will include retooling, updating, and revising SJHSF’s general management practices as well as detailed work plans, budgets, and timelines.

This unique public/private funders collaboration is comprised of 35 of the county’s largest private foundations and impactful family foundations and five public funders of early childhood development. Founded in 2003, the Partnership mission is to invest in and promote innovations that advance the lifelong health and well-being of children age prenatal to five.

WPA principal, Gwen Walden, was hired in 2009 as the part-time Executive Director of the Partnership to create a new strategic framework for the organization and to lead its theory-of-change planning, program design, and implementation. This process has led to the Partnership’s new focus areas: family strengthening, leveraging state and federal resources for P-5 issues in Los Angeles County and garnering the support of the business sector to raise the awareness of P-5 issues for workforce development. The Partnership will use education and learning, joint research and investment, and policy and advocacy to pursue its goals in these areas..

The Getty Foundation, a private arts foundation, fulfills the philanthropic mission of the J. Paul Getty Trust by supporting individuals and institutions committed to advancing the understanding and preservation of the visual arts locally and throughout the world. The Foundation’s strategic grants and programs strengthen art history as a global discipline, promote conservation, and develop future leaders in the visual arts.

The Getty Foundation hired WPA to assess and analyze the administrative, management, and staffing changes needed to maximize the impact of the foundation’s grant programs and to assist the Foundation in determining the optimal realignment of its operations. The work included interviewing management, program and administrative staff; reviewing grant programs, organizational structure, policies and procedures, and job descriptions. WPA then created a detailed “mapping” for adapting three new operational objectives which were carried out in grantmaking and administrative procedures, reporting structures, job responsibilities, and staff training sample cases.