Perhaps because of recent cuts in foreign aid, perhaps because decades of project-based funding have struggled to move systems, the importance of scaling through government is getting significant attention in the development world. It was the subject of numerous panels at and around Skoll in April, the focus of Kevin Starr’s latest musings for SSIR, and fodder for Spring Impact’s case studies on scaling with government. It’s also long been the ultimate goal of the Scaling Community of Practice, which recently put together a series of case studies on how funders approach scaling impact. Echidna wrote a case study on our work, which we also shared during a recent webinar. Here we offer a (hopefully) digestible synthesis of how we are thinking about funding lasting impact at scale.

At Echidna Giving, we realize that delivering the promise of girls’ education requires more and better use of resources by many actors, principally by governments themselves, which are the largest funders of public education. Low-income countries spend about $270 billion a year on education. In contrast, the top private funders of education in low-income countries fund perhaps $2 billion annually at best (less than 1%). Even collectively, top donors can only achieve significant impact if we influence the flow of major funding sources — governments.

For that reason, Echidna Giving focuses on government systems. Below, we reflect on the practices we think are critical to success, the new efforts we’ve been experimenting with, and the tensions we face in this work.

What We Know Matters

1. Making a long-term commitment

Influencing systems does not happen on a 3-year project cycle. Echidna commits to our strategy areas and, often, individual grantees, over 8 to 10 years or more. Private funders are fortunate to take a long-term view, as they do not face election cycles. If foundations do not stick to their strategic priorities over the long haul, they are squandering a critical comparative advantage.

2. Taking a portfolio approach

No single organization is likely to have all the capabilities needed to advance system change. Echidna sees the value of building a diverse portfolio of organizations: some doing deep work with communities to understand issues of marginalized populations; others emphasizing system strengthening, etc. This balance allows organizations to do what they do best, learn from and build on each other’s work, and explore multiple pathways to impact.

It also allows us to take advantage of opportunities for systems change work, while simultaneously doing field-building work that can help generate windows of opportunity for system change and sustain political will for these efforts. We see field building and systems change work as two tools working on different time scales towards the same objective of scaling impact. (Here is another simple framework that articulates how these two tools relate to one another.)

3. Funding organizations primed to enable lasting impact at scale

When scoping potential grantee partners, we look for organizations that align with our ambitions to influence government systems. We prioritize funding organizations based in and led by leaders from the contexts in which they work, because actors who are proximate to government have the deepest understanding of the system, the most credibility to influence it, and a greater stake in it.

A core component of scaling is learning: organizations need to figure out not only what models work, but what can work within government systems at scale, how to incentivize adoption, and so on. Because we want to incentivize scaling, we look for organizations with a learning culture and also incentivize learning through our funding and internal ways of working. For example, we reiterate to grantees and staff that what matters is learning from failure, not avoiding failure altogether.

4. Providing flexible support and building trusting relationships

A big part of enabling lasting impact at scale is ensuring deep, sustained ownership and motivation among the folks actually leading the work. Since Echidna Giving is a funder, not a doer, the best way to support ownership and motivation is by funding what doers themselves define as the most important strategies. Trust-based practices enhance our ability to achieve outcomes by giving organizations the flexibility they need to adapt to realities and ownership over results. They are foundational to scaling impact. They also model the type of relationship organizations need when interacting with governments. For this reason, human relationships are as important as the technical pieces of what we fund. We work to create the cultures and mindsets that enable ownership and motivation for sustained change.

5. Hiring a team expert in theme and context, empowered to make decisions

We have hired Program Leads who bring expertise in both the education themes they work on and the geographies where our grantees work. This technical and contextual expertise facilitates an understanding of opportunities for scaling. We work to build a culture that empowers Program Leads to be decision-makers, maximizing the expertise they bring.

What We Are Experimenting With

The five practices above are fairly well institutionalized within Echidna Giving and its principles. There are several other approaches we’ve been experimenting with to see whether and how they help advance our ambition towards lasting impact at scale.

First, we have been funding several collaborative efforts that deliberately bring organizations together to work on areas such as measuring life skills and values, advancing supportive childcare policies and regulations, and promoting critical thinking about gender and power among adolescents in schools. These collaboratives have helped organizations tackle big issues collectively, drawing on the unique strengths each brings to the table. They have also taken a lot of time, effort, and intentional resourcing. We’re working to learn where these efforts are bearing fruit and what conditions are required for success.

Second, in limited instances, we have directly funded semi-autonomous government agencies. These organizations already operate at scale but often lack the resources to innovate and adapt. We are learning about the unique opportunities and constraints of working directly with these entities.

Tensions We Face

As we work towards the worthy but difficult goal of lasting impact at scale, three tensions stand out.

First is the tension between scale and equity. Echidna’s mission is to support education, particularly for marginalized girls. It is easy for these populations to miss out as programs scale through systems that are not designed to work for marginalized populations. We have productive debates about where we lean in with our grantmaking, given these tensions.

Second is the question of how much to take the lead as a funder who seeks to elevate grantees. We default to supporting and amplifying existing efforts and momentum in the space, but given our positionality, sometimes identify gaps no one is filling and/or are asked to fill these gaps ourselves. 

Third is the challenge that success sometimes does not come in the form of major advances, but in maintaining ground and preventing backsliding in the face of opposing forces.

In the full case study, we provide more color on how we have tried to institutionalize these practices within Echidna Giving and on the results of this work in our grantmaking. We remain committed to our principle of iterating and learning around our approach and look forward to further engaging with others in the field on these important issues.