Grant Management Insights | GivingData

A Message from Our Team: We Must Fight for Social Justice

Written by Alf Gracombe | Jun 9, 2020 5:57:00 PM

As a purpose-driven company with a mission to strengthen the work of social impact organizations, we stand with those fighting to end systemic racism and white supremacy in all its forms.  

We are deeply disturbed by the senseless killing of George Floyd, the result of a culture of racism specifically against the Black community. We don't presume to know how this tragedy, and many before it, have affected the lives of Black Americans, but these actions have fueled our outrage and prompted us to take a more forceful stand against racism, white supremacy, and inequality.

And today, more than ever, they compel us to come to terms with where our own actions as a purpose-driven company have fallen short of our values.

Like too many technology companies, GivingData’s ownership and leadership is by no means diverse enough. This is antithetical to our core values. And yet recognizing this is not the same as addressing it. We know we need to confront the ways in which our structure has reinforced inequities that do not reflect our commitment to social justice.

In response, we are committing to take several steps, including:

  • Implementing hiring and promotion practices that are more intentionally grounded in principles of diversity, equity, and inclusion
  • Pursuing opportunities to work with vendors that are minority- and women-owned, and seeking out partners that support those companies
  • Providing training and resources to our team to help everyone understand the implications of institutionalized racism, as well as the steps we can take to confront it
  • Accelerating our work with our foundation partners to develop new tools to support DEI initiatives among grantmakers and their nonprofit partners

In addition, we have made a donation to the Equal Justice Initiative to support its work fighting racial and economic injustice, mass incarceration, and excessive punishment in the United States.  

We are a small company, but we believe our contribution to positive change should be bigger. The work is underway and it will be ongoing. We intend to hold ourselves accountable and ensure we do not return to a state of complacency. We owe nothing less to our team, our foundation partners, and to the activists and protestors in all BIPOC communities.