When We Return to Our Foundation Offices, Let’s Make Them Spaces Where We Collaborate With Grantees

Illustration by Maria Mottola

Editor's Note: This is Lisa’s 13th piece in a Chronicle of Philanthropy series that originally focused on grantmaking in the coronavirus era. Recent pieces explore philanthropy's role in dismantling a system of racial injustice and evolving to adapt to the political landscape. You may view the original piece here.

Today, number 160-something of working from home, I am thinking longingly of my office. Remember offices? Remember showering in the morning, getting on the subway, fighting for a seat? Remember drinking too much mediocre office coffee and admiring co-workers’ shoes and eating overpriced deli salads in plastic clamshell containers for lunch? Remember seeing different people each day? I do — vaguely.

I remember going to a surgeon’s office near the United Nations in New York City. It was about eight years ago, when I had to have reconstructive surgery. The office was elegant and quiet. It was spacious — with white marble floors, stunning orchids, and designer sofas. I was ill at ease in the waiting room, nervous about my appointment, sweaty after my walk east from the subway, schlumpy, and underdressed.

The feeling carried into my appointment as I listened to and agreed with whatever the well-dressed surgeon suggested. It seemed clear from the elegance of her surroundings that she was successful and smart. So even though it was my body we were discussing, I did not ask questions or express my thoughts and concerns. The surgery was straightforward and went fine, but I never felt quite right about who was in control.

I was not thinking about that experience when I redesigned our foundation offices years later. For years, we had a huge, dark wood conference table with high-backed red velvet chairs, wall-to-wall carpeting, and dim lights reminding me of my grandfather’s office. Here was a chance to make it more modern and welcoming, and so we hired an interior decorator and went to town. We painted everything in lighter colors, pulled up the wall-to-wall, got a giant modular table, modern chairs, wool carpets, and cool art deco lights and mirrors. It looked and felt spacious, modern, and elegant in the end.

White and Moneyed

But not having been to my office for a while, I am thinking again about what it is like to walk into our Upper East Side New York City foundation. It is not as fancy as my surgeon’s office was, but it conveys the same sense of authority, displays wealth, and feels like a place where you come to see the experts. It displays a very distinct cultural aesthetic — white and moneyed — which is not the aesthetic or taste of many of the people and organizations that we fund, and is in fact a set of standards and behavior that we are striving to challenge in our grant making.

What kind of a work space would really make sense for what we are trying to do? I imagine a place that would be welcoming to all the people we work with — where they could feel comfortable, at ease, and inspired. Maybe a fridge full of different kinds of food, cozy couches where you could take your shoes off and read or talk, open doors for all to come in whatever they are wearing, with anything on their minds. Space for brainstorming and conversation. Music and art that reflects and inspires the work we are doing. I think we need a space that inspires open collaboration, not expert consultation.

Show Who We Want to Be

The way we decorate our office is just one of so many ways we display and share our values and worldview. While decorating the office, I was trying to make it look how I imagined a foundation should look — I was not thinking deeply about what we wanted it to do and be. The same goes for so many of the structures we have set up: the language we use in our organizations (think “program officer,” “superior,” etc.); the food we serve at meetings (I was once at a meeting where a colleague said to me, “It’s going to be white-people food for lunch” — cold sandwiches); the hoops that we ask prospective grantees to jump through to gain entry to our world and that many foundation staffers go through to gain entry into their boards’ world.

I hope to get back on a subway and drink a lot of mediocre coffee in my office again in 2021. Once I get there, I hope I can be part of a movement that rethinks the trappings of foundations as well as our basic functions and creates spaces and places that welcome and celebrate all of our work together.

PS: While on the subject of intentional office design, we wanted to share this piece from our grantee partners at the Laundromat Project. They've engaged in a highly thoughtful office design process, with great takeaways for us all!