PurposePhil was created as part of a collaboration between Vancouver Foundation and social design organization InWithForward. Between 2019 and 2024, we worked to address entrenched inequality by applying systems thinking to ourselves.

This site now serves as an archived resource. To explore how to use these resources in your own context, get in touch at hello@inwithforward.com.

On PurposePhil, you can

• Gain exposure to big ideas behind philanthropy
• Reflect on underlying values, beliefs, and logics
• Probe alternative assumptions and philanthropic models
• Find case studies, reflective prompts, and tools to bring to your own context

We are steeped in a productivity focused culture with little time or space to ask big questions and experiment with big ideas. “Less talk, more action” is a common refrain. We’ve come to see learning as action, and have designed PurposePhil as a learning resource to strengthen our individual and collective capacity for critical thought and active imagination: two conditions for deep systems change. Why do we believe systems change is necessary? Here’s our logic:

• Inequality is systemic.
• Philanthropy is itself a system.
• The system of philanthropy is intertwined with systemic inequality.
• Systems don’t just live out there, but within each of us.
• Systems change requires critical thought and active imagination.