Q: Tell us about your background and how you came to focus on philanthropy.
I began my career on Wall Street, working as an investment banker at Credit Suisse for nearly a decade. This gave me a strong background in corporate finance and a lot of deal experience but I was unfulfilled as an advisor and wanted to be an operator, a creator if you will. Laureate Education provided me with the right mix of entrepreneurialism, business building and broader social impact. At that time, Laureate was the largest provider of higher education in the world, providing accessible, quality higher education to a million students globally.
The intersection of innovation, social impact and finance ultimately brought me to philanthropy technology. I co-founded Giving Place to help family offices and private foundations make their philanthropy more effective. When TIFIN Give acquired Giving Place, it was a natural progression—combining wealth management expertise, innovative technology, and a commitment to impact. At TIFIN Give, we’ve reimagined donor-advised funds (DAFs) and intentionally and strategically integrated philanthropy into wealth management in ways that have been underserved to date.
Q: What is the primary challenge that TIFIN Give aims to solve?
TIFIN Give addresses a key gap in philanthropy: making impactful giving accessible, efficient, and tailored to advisors and their clients. For many high-net-worth families, charitable giving can be complex, with limited options for multi-generational involvement, tax efficiency, and personalized investment strategies. Advisors are critical thought partners to these families, and we’re here to support those trusted advisors.
Philanthropy-focused technology has been slow to keep pace with innovations in other areas of wealth management. TIFIN Give reshaped the DAF experience by providing a flexible, tech-forward platform designed specifically for wealth enterprises, including family offices, and their clients. The family office and advisory teams play a central role in the TIFIN Give ecosystem, given their role in facilitating philanthropic planning and execution. Our platform reduces the administrative burdens around philanthropy while enhancing client engagement and family involvement.
Q: From your perspective, what are the biggest shifts you’ve seen in the way UHNW and HNW donors approach giving?
Charitable giving has remained consistent for decades, hovering around 2% of total gross domestic product since the early 1970s and spanning various tax policy environments. But the ways in which people give have shifted.
Nearly 90% of affluent households give to charity, and one in five use a charitable vehicle to manage their giving. While private foundations have historically been the preferred structures for large-scale giving, we have seen a substantial increase in donor-advised funds over the past decade as both a supplement and viable replacement to manage large-scale philanthropy.
When we look at the history of philanthropy, we see that circles of giving, crowdsourcing, and similar forms of collaboration exist alongside individual generosity. Traditionally, UHNW donors have been the most active with these techniques. Over the last 15 years, technology has facilitated their extension to a broader market base, taking the power of one and extending it to the power of many for greater impact. It’s a natural extension to include these ideas in donor-advised funds, given their growth.
One of the biggest shifts is the rise in multi-generational philanthropy. More families want to involve the next generation, not just in the distribution of wealth but in making values-based giving decisions together. Younger generations tend to prefer impact-oriented investments and increasingly want to align their charitable dollars with their investment strategies.
Plus, philanthropy connects advisors with multiple generations, a critical dynamic given that only one in five heirs retain their parents’ advisors. With $18 trillion of the $124 trillion Great Wealth Transfer projected to go to charity, philanthropy provides a natural bridge to involve the next generation in family wealth conversations.
Q: Few wealth professionals consider themselves experts in philanthropy. What role do you see wealth professionals playing in supporting their clients’ philanthropic goals, especially as they become more complex and intertwined with financial plans?
Philanthropy has become a cornerstone of holistic wealth management, particularly for family offices, ultra-high-net-worth and high-net-worth families. However, many family office professionals and wealth advisors feel unprepared to lead these discussions, particularly given the complex nature of philanthropic planning at the HNW level.
This is where technology plays a transformative role—empowering advisors with the tools to navigate complex philanthropic strategies seamlessly. Technology can remove the mystery of philanthropy by making it more accessible and provide insights on giving so that advisors can enhance their client relationships.
Advisors can draw key connections between financial goals and philanthropic ones. These discussions elevate the advisor’s role from financial manager to family steward, providing unparalleled value in a competitive market. By more strategically incorporating philanthropy in their services, advisors can differentiate themselves as indispensable partners in legacy planning.
Q: Why have technology solutions for philanthropy not advanced as much as tech in other areas of wealth?
Developments in philanthropic technology have primarily focused on direct-to-donor solutions or tools for non-profit organizations. There is a gap in the market, as we see it, on serving donors through wealth intermediaries, such as their financial advisors or workplaces.
Many of the existing wealth-focused solutions haven’t been forced to innovate because philanthropy was typically seen as “excess capital”, not a core part of a family financial strategy. Given the market shift I described, TIFIN Give was built to fill this void, enabling advisors to make philanthropy a central and impactful part of the client financial journey across generations.
Q: How does TIFIN Give differentiate itself from traditional philanthropic technologies?
Unlike traditional philanthropic platforms, we emphasize collaboration, allowing advisors and families to work together to align giving with values and financial goals. Our software enables a personalized experience, helping donors discover causes and strategies that resonate with their values.
We’ve created innovative features, like community-focused giving campaigns, that allow donors to raise funds for non-profits that might otherwise not have fundraising pages. The added benefit is that donors can see their impact in one place and platform, a frequent challenge for family offices.
We aim to be the most flexible DAF provider in the market to personalize the giving experience for firms and their clients. Notably, we offer multi-custody options, low SMA minimums, and investment flexibility so firms can embed their own strategies. Our white-label solution is designed so that firms can own the experience while removing the administrative burdens of offering philanthropy to their clients.
Q: How does the TIFIN Give platform help families and their wealth professionals align charitable giving with personal goals and values?
By leveraging platforms like TIFIN Give, advisors can position themselves as trusted guides, aligning clients’ charitable goals with tax efficiency, portfolio strategies, and long-term wealth planning. Advisors gain access to real-time data and analytics, while families can more effectively define and act on their philanthropic goals through collaborative tools like family giving dashboards, values-aligned investment analysis, and community-oriented campaigns.
Q: What additional features or improvements can we expect to see from TIFIN Give in the future?
As I previously mentioned, we recently launched a collaborative campaign feature, enabling donors to involve their communities in giving through shareable links and QR codes. Soon, we’ll introduce advanced tax-optimization tools to help advisors maximize the financial benefits of charitable contributions for their clients and address this intersection of philanthropic and financial planning.
Looking ahead, we’re exploring even more ways to personalize the giving journey through AI and deeper integrations with wealth management systems. Our focus remains on making philanthropy intuitive, impactful, and seamlessly integrated into holistic financial planning.
TIFIN Give enhances the traditional donor-advised fund and other charitable giving journeys in a way that places family offices and wealth management firms at the center of their client’s philanthropic needs.
