This survey should take approximately 15 minutes to complete, and you will need your annual grants summary and community investment or ESG data on hand for your responses.

Please complete the survey by Friday 1st September 2023.

The data collected will help your organisation understand and, potentially, improve the equity and impact of its giving program.

For the first time, it will enable you to compare your organisation’s investments in gender equality against a sector wide benchmark. Each participant will receive a report for their organisation. Public reporting will be in aggregate form only.

This data will also equip you with insights that you can use in your communications with staff members and external stakeholders.

AIIW is inviting AFR’s top 50 corporate and top 50 philanthropic donor organisations, to take part in this research.

An open link is available for other philanthropic organisations who wish to opt into the survey to track, share, celebrate and promote their commitment and achievements in gender-wise giving.

AIIW guarantees the confidentiality of the information supplied and will aggregate data for reporting purposes.

The aggregated data collected will help organisations to understand and, potentially, improve the equity and impact of their giving program.

The results of this survey will, for the first time, enable orgs to compare ESG investments in gender equality against an emerging sector wide benchmark, in individualised reports provided to the company.

Our final report will be circulated to participants, not-for-profit leaders and policymakers across Australia and include names of participating organisations to celebrate their commitment to gender equality.

For every critical issue facing our communities, there is a gender dimension: women, men and gender-diverse people face different challenges.

By being intentional about understanding the needs, interests and circumstances of women and girls in every cause, organisations can, in their giving program(s), contribute to initiatives that are more targeted and effective.

Building gender analysis into every cause maintains a focus on women and underrepresented genders as social priorities shift in response to evolving community challenges. Considering and designing for everyone from the outset builds inclusion into the system and maximises impact.

In order to assess whether the giving is gender-wise we need to consider both intention and impact. We hope the examples below are helpful. You can refer to our Gender-wise resources for more information.

Some examples:

• Initiatives such as Women for Election Australia and Pathways to Politics are intentionally designed to increase women’s political representation and so 100% of giving to these initiatives’ targets women and girls.
   
• If your giving was to a NFP that provides scholarships that are open to everyone, but they have a policy of preferencing female applicants to address existing inequality and have a quota that 60% of scholarships will be allocated to young women, then 60% of this giving would be included in giving that targets women and girls.

As Australians Investing In Women, our primary purpose for the Survey is to quantify and track philanthropic investment in women and girls. The research findings will focus on insights for women and girls.

When we refer to ‘women and girls’, we include all people who identify as women, including cisgender, transgender, non-binary, and intersex people.

However, recognising the importance of diversity and inclusion, the survey enables tracking of giving other sex and gender identities as follows:

• Women and girls
• Men and boys
• Diverse gender identities (e.g. gender queer, non-binary, gender non-conforming)
• Diverse sex characteristics (e.g. intersex)

The list of cause areas is based on the Australian Charities and Not-for-profits Commission’s (ACNC) program classification system. It aligns to how NFPs and charities report on their programs. ACNC developed the system to assist informed decision-making, to help supporters match their cause to the most appropriate charity, making it easier for donors, grant-makers, volunteers and the public to find charities that deliver the types of programs they are interested in supporting. Learn more

The list of industries is based on the Australian and New Zealand Standard Industrial Classification (ANZSIC), jointly developed by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) and Statistics New Zealand (Statistics NZ). An individual business entity is assigned to an industry based on its predominant activity. Learn more

We are aware that there are different ways of measuring corporate giving, depending on what is included, and that companies are not required to report donations in a consistent way that allows direct comparison or gender analysis.

However, there are an increasing number of companies reporting activity in separate sustainability reports. The various ways companies invest for social impact as part of their sustainable social and environmental priorities are identified in the report, Sharpening Our Focus on Corporate Giving: Keeping Gender Equality in the Frame. It was developed in collaboration with the Champions of Change Coalition to set out a framework to assess corporate giving and community partnership programs through a gender lens and accelerate progress towards gender equality.

Community investment is a way companies invest for social impact when they work externally with community organisations to address a social issue. Community investment programs can include financial support (charitable donation of money), in-kind support, community partnerships (funding specific programs or initiatives), workplace giving and employee volunteering.

We do not consider commercial sponsorships part of corporate giving. The focus of corporate giving programs is charitable giving to priority social issues to benefit the community and society. For more about corporate giving, please refer to page 10 of the report, Sharpening Our Focus on Corporate Giving: Keeping Gender Equality in the Frame.

We can accommodate this request by sharing a word document for your team to refer to. Please make your request to AIIW at operations@aiiw.org.au.

Not all the questions are compulsory. You can pass any questions you are unsure of. Unanswered questions will not affect your submission of the survey. If you are unsure of how to respond, you can also contact AIIW at operations@aiiw.org.au or by phone 0439 975 813.

The survey has been developed by Australians Investing In Women and The Evolved Group in collaboration with philanthropic funders and with input from Social Ventures Australia, CPR Communications, and a group of industry experts.

Australians Investing in Women is a leading national not-for-profit advocate for gender-wise philanthropy. The AIIW Board comprises Chair Sam Mostyn AO, Deputy Chair Cathy Scalzo; Doug Hilton AO, Catherine Fox AM, and Steve Rothfieldand. Our CEO is Julie Reilly OAM. 

See Our Supporters page for more information on who funds Australians Investing In Women. We are 100% empowered by philanthropy.

For other questions, please contact AIIW at operations@aiiw.org.au or by phone 0439 975 813.

If you need technical support, please contact gisela.kennett@theevolvedgroup.com

We welcome your feedback. Please contact operations@aiiw.org.au