Tools for AI Grantmaking
AI is reshaping the social sector. Philanthropy will play a critical role in defining how. Below you’ll find resources from Fast Forward and trusted ecosystem partners designed to help grantmakers fund AI-powered nonprofits with clarity and confidence. Whether you are exploring AI for the first time or already investing in AI grantees, these resources are meant to help you move from inspiration to action.
AI Philanthropy Workshops
Fast Forward offers AI Philanthropy Workshops for grantmakers interested in going deeper on AI and impact. These sessions explore how AI is being used across the social sector, how to evaluate AI-powered nonprofits, and how AI tools can strengthen operations within philanthropic organizations.
Interested in bringing an AI Philanthropy Workshop to your team or talking through how to fund AI responsibly? Get in touch by emailing partner@ffwd.org. We’d love to talk.
Fast Forward and Google.org
The Philanthropic Reset: How Philanthropy Can Lead in the Age of AI
Patrick J. McGovern Foundation
Grant Guardian is an AI Tool for Grantmakers to Streamline the Grantee Financial Review Process
Project Evident and TAG
The Responsible AI Adoption in Philanthropy Guide Helps Grantmakers Consider AI Adoption in Their Own Organizations
Bridgespan
A New Funding Approach to Unlock Greater Efficiency, Scale, and Mission Success for Grantees
Fortune
Philanthropy Can Help Nonprofits Solve 21st Century Problems With 21st Century Tech
Fast Forward
Key AI Diligence Questions to Ask Potential Nonprofit Grantees
Fast Forward
Build an AI Policy for Your Foundation or Nonprofit
Fast Forward
AI for Humanity Report, Including Takeaways for Funders on AI Grantmaking
AI for Humanity Substack
How Funders Can Steer AI Toward Good, with NextLadder, Siegel Family Endowment, and more
Center for Effective Philanthropy
Philanthropy Report Maps How Foundations Understand, Feel, and Engage with AI
Patrick J. McGovern Foundation
The AI for Good Diligence Guide Synthesizes Themes From Hundreds of AI, ML, and Data-Focused Grant Proposals
Directory of AI-Powered Nonprofits
A Repository of Case Studies and Examples of AI-Powered Impact
Center for Effective Philanthropy
How Funders Can Vet AI in the Social Sector
Project Evident
Funding the Future: Grantmakers Strategies in AI Investment
Center for Effective Philanthropy
Jared Chung on Why Funders Freeze on AI — and How to Break the Paralysis
Fast Forward
Five Big Ideas from Fund.AI — and What They Mean for the Future of AI for Humanity
Stanford Social Innovation Review
Key Ways for Funders to Think About Investing in Data and AI
“AI is now table-stakes infrastructure in most industries, yet the nonprofits charged with protecting society’s most vulnerable are years, sometimes decades, behind. That gap isn’t about imagination or innovation. It’s about the norms funders created – and can reshape. Closing this digital divide is one of the highest-leverage moves a philanthropist can make this decade.”The Philanthropic Reset: How Philanthropy Can Lead in the Age of AI, Authored by Maggie Johnson (Google.org), Stuart McLaughlin (Google.org), Brigitte Hoyer Gosselink (Google), Shannon Farley (Fast Forward), and Kevin Barenblat (Fast Forward)
Want to talk grantmaking and AI?
Reach out to Sophie Owens, Fast Forward’s Senior Director, Strategic Philanthropy, at sophie@ffwd.org.