Perspectives on grants and philanthropy

The future of philanthropy and grantmaking

Most of how grants work was designed for a world where reading was expensive. What replaces it, one step at a time.

1. How will AI change philanthropy? The future of grantmaking

   AI will end the grant application. Today it makes applying faster. Within a few steps, funders will find organizations themselves, a living record of each organization's work will replace the proposal, and money will move when evidence of need meets a funder's stated intent.

   October 3, 2026

2. Will AI replace grant writers?

   It will replace most of the hours. Research, eligibility checks, requirement lists and first drafts are already moving to software. The grant writer's job moves toward what funders weigh most: choosing what to pursue, building relationships with program officers, and judging what is true and worth asking for. Over the next few years the role becomes strategist, editor and connector, and the best grant writers will serve more organizations than they can today.

   October 3, 2026

3. Will there ever be one grant application for every funder?

   Probably never as a single form, and it may not need to be. Regional common applications have existed for decades, but funders accept them voluntarily and often add their own questions. What changes the picture is that adapting one proposal to many formats now takes minutes. Step two arrives as one strong description of an organization's work, read by every funder in the shape it prefers.

   October 3, 2026

4. How will foundations find nonprofits in the future?

   By reading what organizations already publish. Roughly seven in ten private foundations already choose grantees themselves instead of taking applications. As software makes it cheap to read every tax filing, report and published result in a field, more funders will build their own shortlists. Being findable becomes part of fundraising: an accurate 990, a plain description of your work, published results, and board connections a funder can see.

   October 3, 2026

5. What will replace the grant proposal?

   A living record of an organization's work. A proposal is a snapshot written for one funder on one deadline, then rewritten for the next. A living record says what the organization does, for whom, at what cost and with what results, and it stays current because it is kept as the work happens. Funders read the record, and renewals follow from it.

   October 3, 2026

6. What will grantmaking look like without applications?

   Funders will publish what they want to change and what evidence would convince them. Organizations will keep a living record of their work. Software will match the two every day, a person on the funder's staff will review each match and decide, and money will move without a cycle or a form. Grants, contracts, loans and gifts will flow through the same match, so the need decides the kind of money.

   October 3, 2026

7. What are the risks of AI in philanthropy?

   Five matter most: floods of low-quality applications, proposals that all sound alike, biased screening, sensitive data leaking into AI tools, and invented facts and citations. Each has a safeguard. Funders can cap volume and do more of the finding themselves. Applicants can draft from their own material and verify every claim. People, with clear accountability, make every funding decision.

   October 3, 2026