The American Foundation: Family Foundation: About The American Foundation

Turnkey Family Foundation Program

About The American Foundation

With a family foundation, everyone benefits! Donors have the opportunity to protect assets, increase income, and reduce tax burden; more money is passed on to heirs; and society benefits from annual support to family-selected charities.

The American Foundation is a 501(c)(3) public charity. We have the same status as most churches, youth organizations, and universities. We are a nonprofit organization and, as such, we have no "for-profit" element in our operations.

We achieve our charitable mission by helping individuals, families, and corporations create foundations that give financial support to their favorite charities. The American Foundation becomes one of the charities that the family foundation supports, but only at the nominal amount of 1% of foundation value, or 0.5% in the case of charitable trusts, per year.

The annual gift allocation to the American Foundation first pays for the actual cost of foundation or trust administration. Remaining money is used to develop and expand our charitable mission, which includes: promoting and helping to create vast amounts of new and more effective philanthropy; helping charities and foundations with their operations; and supporting selected charitable projects.

We strive to make the entire process of philanthropy easy and rewarding by providing simple procedures, ongoing education and the greatest amount of donor direction allowed by law.

Our Mission
Our mission is to energetically promote and help create vast amounts of new and more effective philanthropy. We accomplish this mission in three ways.

First, we help individuals, families and corporations establish charitable trusts and foundations under unique and greatly improved operating formats.
Second, we help foundations and other charities become more efficient and successful in their operations.
Third, we build networks of cooperation, mutual assistance, and support among charities, foundations, and donors to accelerate good in the world.

Foundations in support of the arts can make a big difference in young people's lives.

How We Empower Our Vision
Philanthropy has been around as long as there have been people in need. However, the philanthropic community has not kept pace with new and innovative developments adopted by successful for-profit corporations. While tax laws and the global economy have been changing with dizzying speed, the structure and operation of most foundations and charities have not been altered significantly in more than a century.

The American Foundation works with individuals, families, corporations, communities, and financial advisors to establish charitable foundations and gift plans of all kinds. Our goal is to revolutionize the structure, governance, and operations of charities and foundations. With better guidance, charities and foundations can greatly accelerate their good works. Our growing American Family of Foundations offers the complete spectrum of exciting ways to maximize the social, tax, and financial benefits of charitable giving.

Governance and Organization (Structure)
We believe the control and direction of charities and foundations most appropriately belong in the hands of those who make it happen. We have developed organizational structures that put greater direction in the hands of donors who fund foundations and the visionaries who create charities. This proper structure can also ensure that successors are those who demonstrate a loyalty to, or a bonding with, the organization's original vision and mission. Processes can be established that also ensure greater direction and cooperation among governing bodies, while eliminating most of the inherent problems that historically plague the "Board of Directors" or "Multiple Trustee" style of governance.

Operations
Most charities operate with hand-me-down equipment and facilities. Many charities go out of business because they can't compete with more competent and efficiently run operations. Also, inefficient operations do not attract donations from the general public. No one likes to give money to a charity when there is a high risk of the charity losing the money through mismanagement, excessive overhead, or inadequate facilities and equipment. Access to high technology and leading edge equipment and procedures will help any operation become more successful. The American Foundation advocates increased grant making and financial support to operating charities that need assistance in this area. Under this program, those who work with charities can receive assistance and training in business management, computer use, marketing techniques, and other areas that will help them be more efficient and effective.

Human Resources
The success of any operation is directly related to the skill level and expertise of its staff. This valuable resource is often neglected in charities. When highly competent individuals become highly motivated in a worthwhile endeavor, an empowerment develops that leads to extraordinary success. We encourage all charities and foundations to increase their efforts to identify, recruit, and hire the most outstanding people available. Good leaders are the geese that lay golden eggs. Instead of funding grants for charitable programs that struggle because of inefficient leadership, the American Foundation believes that grant makers should direct more funds to stimulate and enhance "charitable production capacity." Finding those leaders and attracting them to the field of philanthropy is critical to the success of what is arguably the most important endeavor of humankind.