What’s happening at the moment, especially in Asia, is still quite experimental. One model I’ve seen evolve is something called a social impact guarantee, a very innovative instrument whose looser description is “pay for success”.

In this model, you have three parties. You have the upfront funder who comes in with the risk capital and says, “I’m prepared to take that bet. And if it doesn’t work out, well, bye-bye, money”. Second, you have the charity that does all the work or the heavy lifting of the service delivery. And third, you have the outcome funder who says, “I’m prepared to put in the money going forward if you prove to me it’s a success”.

This is an innovative instrument for younger people who have a greater appetite for risk, and for philanthropists who have built up their own wealth in this generation, because they understand what risk capital is all about.

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I’ll share another model that reflects my personal philosophy: I call it “amplified philanthropy”. I don’t think that there’s a term for this around the world but that’s how I see it.

I started something very small here in Singapore and in Malaysia, hoping to help organisations become more independent in how they grow their donor pools. I give them a certain amount—not large, S$100,000—and say, “With this, you are able to entice smaller donors to donate on a regular basis”. These smaller donors are often young people who give S$10 a month, but when they know that their giving will be amplified because there’s someone who will match it, they are often more motivated to give.

What happens is they get someone who comes in very early on this journey of regular giving and has an enormous earning capacity going forward as they progress in their careers. At the same time, the organisations are not only building up a pool of young givers, they are also building up a pool of regular givers that will grow with them. Their giving is amplified twice: immediately, when the small donors come in, and in the longer term, as the donors stay because they have signed on to a regular donating programme.

I feel very comfortable asking people to support capability-building in organisations or charities because to me it’s a no-brainer. People in charities need good salaries. If salaries are fair, people from the for-profit arena will be more inclined to move into the not-for-profit arena to do good work. The amplification is there: it’s making charities more efficient and more innovative in how they do things.

Some people say, “yes”. Some say, “no”. And honestly, the ones who say, “yes”, trust me. They know I wouldn’t come to them with something that doesn’t work. It’s a question of knowing who they are, what their interests are and whether there’s a commonality because everyone has their own causes. I will approach people whom I feel the cause deeply resonates, and then I will suggest to them how it’s done.

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It’s recognising where philanthropists are on their journey. For some, I still do the traditional ask. It might be funding a building, funding a programme, funding infrastructure.

My father was like that. He only wanted to fund infrastructure, so that’s what he did. He’s a really good example of a traditional giver. And he probably would think the stuff I’m doing is mad.

I was very proud of one thing that he did before he passed away in 2014. One day, he had this harebrained idea of naming a building after my mother. My mum, who has since passed away, had been faithfully giving to Boys’ Town. I remember, as a kid of six or seven years of age, seeing her write a little cheque to Boys’ Town at the end of every year during Christmastime. She did it her entire life. I knew that Boys’ Town was something that she really liked.

I went to Boys’ Town and they had a little building that they had renovated, and we could name it. It was a S$1 million donation to put my mum’s name on the building. We went there and took a lovely photograph of my mum and my dad in front of the Dulcie Fam Training Building. It’s a very small, modest building with my mum’s name on it, and that made my dad very happy.

But where did the million dollars go? This is the thing that I am exceedingly happy about. Boys’ Town wanted a rock-climbing facility for their boys to use in leadership training and adventure-based therapy, so they built this wonderful facility, which they also rented out to other organisations to use, and set up the Boys’ Town Adventure Centre.

That’s where the sustainability comes in. They get a steady flow of income to fund their operations. Corporates and schools go there for team building, and they use it internally for their own boys. And, for me, that is amplified philanthropy.

Public services veteran Anita Fam is the president of the National Council of Social Service (NCSS), an umbrella body for more than 500 member social service agencies in Singapore. The philanthropist guides the government body in its remit to provide direction and leadership in social services, seek out strategic partnerships for social services and enhance the capabilities of social service agencies.

This piece is part of Tatler's series of opinion articles from Asia’s Most Influential honourees, featuring a broad range of voices from across the region offering expert perspectives, advice, forecasts and thought leadership.

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