Latest news with #GatesFoundation
Business Insider
2 hours ago
- Entertainment
- Business Insider
Bill Gates' summer reading list this year is all about memoirs
"Chasing Hope" by Nicholas Kristof Gates said he's been following the work of Nicholas Kristof since 1997, when the veteran journalist published an article about children in poor countries dying from diarrhea. It changed the course of his life and helped him shape the Gates Foundation, Gates wrote in his blog post. "In this terrific memoir, Nick writes about how he stays optimistic about the world despite everything he's seen," Gates wrote. "The world would be better off with more Nick Kristofs." "Chasing Hope" came out in 2024 — after Gates finished writing his own memoir. However, Gates said he felt he had to include it on the list. "Personal History" by Katharine Graham Gates said he met renowned newspaper publisher Katharine Graham in 1991 on the same day he met Warren Buffett. Kay, as Gates affectionately called her, is best known for presiding over her family's paper, The Washington Post, during Richard Nixon's Watergate scandal. "I loved hearing Kay talk about her remarkable life: taking over the Post at a time when few women were in leadership positions like that, standing up to President Nixon to protect the paper's reporting on Watergate and the Pentagon Papers, negotiating the end to a pressman's strike, and much more," Gates said. "Educated" by Tara Westover Tara Westover's "Educated" debuted at No. 1 on The New York Times bestseller list after its 2018 release. The tale of her upbringing, which included an unconventional father who banned her family from going to hospitals or attending school, led Gates to leave a 5-star review on Goodreads the same year it came out. Westover taught herself math and self-studied for the ACT despite not setting foot in a classroom until she was 17. Today, she has a Ph.D. in history. "I thought I was pretty good at teaching myself — until I read Tara Westover's memoir 'Educated.' Her ability to learn on her own blows mine right out of the water," Gates said in his review. "Born a Crime" by Trevor Noah Comedian Trevor Noah released "Born a Crime," a memoir about his childhood in South Africa, in 2016. As a biracial boy growing up during apartheid, Noah was the product of an illegal interracial relationship and struggled to fit in. Gates said he related to the feeling of being an outsider. "I also grew up feeling like I didn't quite fit in at times, although Trevor has a much stronger claim to the phrase than I do," he wrote in his blog post. "Surrender" by Bono Gates shouted out the vulnerability in "Surrender" by musician Paul David Hewson, better known as U2 frontman Bono. The full title, "Surrender: 40 Songs, One Story," sums up the 40-chapter autobiography that has each chapter named after a U2 song. According to Gates, Bono opens up about his upbringing with parents who "basically ignored" his passion for singing, which only made him try harder to make it as a musician. "I went into this book knowing almost nothing about his anger at his father, the band's near-breakups, and his discovery that his cousin was actually his half-brother," Gates said.
Yahoo
4 hours ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Inside Bill Gates' meeting with his foundation's staff after his $200 billion bombshell: ‘How do we get people to care?'
Bill Gates had a question for the employees of his charitable foundation, which he recently announced will spend $200 billion to reduce disease and death among the world's poorest. 'How do you get people to care?' the Microsoft founder asked at the Gates Foundation's annual meeting this month. 'We're going to have to up our game quite a bit.' Hundreds of Gates Foundation employees—many flown in from the foundation's country offices in India, China, South Africa, and elsewhere—filled an amphitheater across the street from the world's largest private philanthropy's two-winged headquarters in Seattle. This year's event came at a remarkable moment: Employees had just learned that the operation they work for will no longer exist 20 years from now. On its 25th anniversary, the Gates Foundation announced that after doubling its spending in the next 20 years, it will shutter operations. The $200 billion it will spend is the largest philanthropic commitment in modern history. Walking into the dimly lit auditorium, Gates received a standing ovation from the mezzanine down to the front row. 'We are at an amazing milestone,' said the foundation's cofounder. Gates began by celebrating the progress made in the foundation's first quarter-century, including the reduction by half of childhood deaths, and successes fighting malaria, polio, and other infectious diseases. He teared up as he mentioned the people—his mother, father, fellow philanthropist Warren Buffett, and ex-wife and foundation cofounder Melinda French Gates—who have influenced him the most in his philanthropy. The tone was far from triumphal, however. Even as Gates laid out the foundation's big ambitions—including eradicating polio and malaria, and reducing deaths from tuberculosis and HIV/AIDS by 90%—he warned of how far there is to go, bemoaned the sector's fragility, and said the recent drastic cuts to foreign aid from the United States and other top donor countries are already threatening the last two decades' progress. 'It's going to take our very best work to get this reversed, our advocacy to get the resources restored,' Gates told the foundation's staff. And he said, he's looking for 'amazing, low-cost innovation, so we can take what remains and actually get those figures going back in the right direction.' CEO Mark Suzman spoke for many when he expressed rage at the cuts in aid from wealthy countries. Gates and his foundation had made the decision to pursue these ambitious public health goals before the Trump administration's gutting of the United States' main international aid agency, USAID—and several other countries are also cutting their international aid budgets. 'Make no mistake, we are entering a new era, one in which, as you've heard, the world's poorest people can no longer rely on strong, steady support from the world's richest nations,' Suzman said. 'It is okay to be frustrated… We never thought we'd have to fight so hard to justify the importance of our work.' But, he continued: 'This is a fight we are ready for.' Reached after the gathering, one staff member at the foundation said that colleagues' mood has been 'pretty optimistic and enthusiastic' after the $200 billion announcement. 'We are super energized thinking about what legacy building looks like and how we can work ourselves out of a job by building local capacity and empowering our partners to continue the mission,' the staffer wrote to Fortune. Suzman said the foundation's goals have not changed. 'When critical coalitions seem to crumble before our eyes, we cannot just shrink our ambitions,' he said. 'When the very idea of hope for a better future starts to sound naïve or out of date, we must remind people that our optimism does not come easily. It has been hard-earned. It is not based on blind faith, but concrete, measurable results.' Gates asked his employees to reinvigorate their drive to achieve the foundation's core mission, bring new partners along, and invest in the potential of AI to help alleviate poverty and play a key role in drug discovery. 'I really believe, and I hope it's not a naive belief, that we can achieve—despite the headwinds—even more over the next 20 years than we did in the first 25,' he said. This story was originally featured on
Forbes
a day ago
- Business
- Forbes
How To Navigate The Future And Not Get Lost
By cultivating your navigational skills you'll be able to prepare for what's next while others are ... More still reacting to what just happened. When the Trump administration abruptly withdrew from the World Health Organization in January, the Gates Foundation was thrown into turmoil. Years of investment in global health infrastructure—vaccines and medicines developed in Gates-funded labs—were suddenly jeopardized. 'We tried to anticipate what the new government might bring,' Gates Foundation director Mark Suzman told The New York Times. 'But we did not foresee the scale of the change.' They're not alone. From boardrooms to bedrooms, individuals and institutions alike are struggling to stay upright in what can only be described as a sea of unrelenting change. As a futurist, I observe that we are living through a rare historical inflection point. The old order is dissolving. New rules are being written. Established ways of operating—many of them holdovers from the Industrial and Information Ages—are quickly becoming obsolete. AI and automation are reshaping work. Climate disruptions are transforming industries and business models, such as insurance, upside down. Institutions are groaning under the stress of unrelenting pressure to adapt. Welcome to the Age of Acceleration. To survive—and yes, to thrive in—the emerging future, we must develop new mindsets. We need new tools for navigating what I call the MegaForces of Change. These are not fads or short-term trends. They are seismic, global-scale shifts that have the potential to reshape our lives, careers, and communities – and indeed, the planet itself. Just consider what we're likely to witness over the next decade: The coming decade will confront us with unprecedented challenges—and open the door to equally unprecedented opportunities. We'll face existential threats to our health, security, and planetary future. And yet, at the same time, we will unlock scientific, technological, and social breakthroughs with the potential to solve our most urgent problems. But we won't get there by clinging to yesterday's mindsets. To flourish in this new landscape, we must develop future preparedness—the capacity to see change coming, make sense of it, and act before we're forced to. This isn't just about forecasting. It's about cultivating what I call an Anticipatory Mindset: the ability to scan the horizon, decode signals amidst the noise, and prepare for what's next while others are still reacting to what just happened. It's time to embrace the mindsets that will allow us to navigate the turbulence but also ride the waves, and not be capsized by them. The future isn't something that happens to us. It's something we help create.
Forbes
a day ago
- Business
- Forbes
What Nonprofit Leaders Can Do In Light Of The Bill Gates Announcement
NEW YORK, NEW YORK - SEPTEMBER 26: Bill Gates speaks onstage for a special conversation during ... More "What's Next? The Future With Bill Gates"at The Paris Theater on September 26, 2024 in New York City. (Photo byfor Netflix) Bill and Melinda Gates built a foundation that has given over $100 billion to nonprofit and nongovernmental organizations around the world for the past 25 years. It is one of the nation's largest and most successful foundations, and many nonprofit leaders have come to depend on it for vital resources and thought leadership. To the dismay of some, and the thrill of others, Bill Gates recently announced his decision to sunset the foundation in 20 years and distribute $200 billion of its assets – and his personal fortune – to achieve three goals: In order to accomplish the goal of distributing so much money in such a short period of time, the Gates Foundation will be forced to substantially increase its annual giving (about $9 billion a year), which is good news for those organizations who are toiling in these vineyards and desire faster change, but obviously concerning for those who see these global challenges as long-lasting and resistant to quick wins. What does this mean for nonprofit organizations and what should their leaders do now? MIT Solve is an initiative of MIT that supports innovators that use tech-based solutions to solve big problems. Its executive director, Hala Hanna, notes that the Gates Foundation has been an important partner for MIT Solve for many years, and 'we both share the belief that innovators are critical to solving global challenges and require targeted support to achieve scale.' Together the Gates Foundation and MIT Solve have collaborated on custom philanthropic programs such as the AI-Enabled Assessments Challenge and have secured additional funding for its innovators. 'While the Foundation's planned wind-down represents a significant shift in the philanthropic landscape, its impact on Solve will be more evolutionary than disruptive,' stated Hanna in an email message to this writer. 'Every year, we work with over 80 supporters and investors to help them achieve their social impact goals. The Foundation's partnership has certainly validated and strengthened how we design innovation challenges, select winners, and deliver entrepreneur support programs. The ultimate vision – which both our organizations share – is that in 20 years this type of risk capital becomes both more available as other funders follow suit and less necessary as capable governments, scaled innovations, and functional markets flourish.' Indeed, fundraising experts such as Ann Fellman, the chief marketing officer at Bloomerang, think that nonprofits need both short-term and long-term fundraising strategies and the flexibility to change those strategies over time. According to Fellman, the Gates Foundation announcement represents an opportunity for nonprofits. Because the Foundation will be more aggressively distributing its funds over the next 20 years, Fellman believes that nonprofit leaders need to ask themselves: do you have a mission and a vision and a connection – not just with the Gates Foundation but also other family foundations who might follow Gates's lead and wind down their operations? Fellman suggests leaning into family foundations to understand how they are governed, how they are distributing their funds and over what period of time. She sees the Gates announcement as signaling a change in how philanthropic institutions see themselves and she believes that this shift might be accelerating faster than what we've been used to in the past. 'There is going to be a $70 trillion transfer of wealth happening over the next two decades, and nonprofit organizations need a strategy to navigate that shift,' stated Fellman in an interview with this writer. 'Nonprofits shouldn't make the mistake of pulling back, deciding for the donor that the time isn't right – now is the time to make the ask. Now is the time to lean in.' Communication between the fundraiser and donor is key according to Fellman. Research that Bloomerang has conducted shows that 65 percent of donors value frequent impact updates on what is happening to their donations but only 36 percent of nonprofits are providing these kinds of regular reports. Fellman believes that as wealth is transferred to younger generations who are used to more real-time, shorter bursts of information, these kinds of updates will become more critical to the fundraising landscape. Transparency is also important. If nonprofits are experiencing a gap in revenues for whatever reason -- changes in government or institutional funding, increased expenses, a crisis of one kind or another – it's critical to identify the gap, make the ask, and communicate the results according to Fellman. Bill Gates has been a legendary corporate leader and philanthropist, and his thought leadership and resources have been an outsized part of the philanthropic landscape for the past 25 years. The next 20 years will see an enormous generational transfer of wealth in this country and nonprofit leaders need to be prepared and willing to shift as the fundraising environment changes with it.
Yahoo
2 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Inside Bill Gates' annual employee meeting after his $200 billion bombshell: ‘How do we get people to care?'
Bill Gates had a question for the employees of his charitable foundation, which he recently announced will spend $200 billion to reduce disease and death among the world's poorest. 'How do you get people to care?' the Microsoft founder asked at the Gates Foundation's annual meeting this month. 'We're going to have to up our game quite a bit.' Hundreds of Gates Foundation employees—many flown in from the foundation's country offices in India, China, South Africa, and elsewhere—filled an amphitheater across the street from the world's largest private philanthropy's two-winged headquarters in Seattle. This year's event came at a remarkable moment: Employees had just learned that the operation they work for will no longer exist 20 years from now. On its 25th anniversary, the Gates Foundation announced that after doubling its spending in the next 20 years, it will shutter operations. The $200 billion it will spend is the largest philanthropic commitment in modern history. Walking into the dimly lit auditorium, Gates received a standing ovation from the mezzanine down to the front row. 'We are at an amazing milestone,' said the foundation's cofounder. Gates began by celebrating the progress made in the foundation's first quarter-century, including the reduction by half of childhood deaths, and successes fighting malaria, polio, and other infectious diseases. He teared up as he mentioned the people—his mother, father, fellow philanthropist Warren Buffett, and ex-wife and foundation cofounder Melinda French Gates—who have influenced him the most in his philanthropy. The tone was far from triumphal, however. Even as Gates laid out the foundation's big ambitions—including eradicating polio and malaria, and reducing deaths from tuberculosis and HIV/AIDS by 90%—he warned of how far there is to go, bemoaned the sector's fragility, and said the recent drastic cuts to foreign aid from the United States and other top donor countries are already threatening the last two decades' progress. 'It's going to take our very best work to get this reversed, our advocacy to get the resources restored,' Gates told the foundation's staff. And he said, he's looking for 'amazing, low-cost innovation, so we can take what remains and actually get those figures going back in the right direction.' CEO Mark Suzman spoke for many when he expressed rage at the cuts in aid from wealthy countries. Gates and his foundation had made the decision to pursue these ambitious public health goals before the Trump administration's gutting of the United States' main international aid agency, USAID—and several other countries are also cutting their international aid budgets. 'Make no mistake, we are entering a new era, one in which, as you've heard, the world's poorest people can no longer rely on strong, steady support from the world's richest nations,' Suzman said. 'It is okay to be frustrated… We never thought we'd have to fight so hard to justify the importance of our work.' But, he continued: 'This is a fight we are ready for.' Reached after the gathering, one staff member at the foundation said that colleagues' mood has been 'pretty optimistic and enthusiastic' after the $200 billion announcement. 'We are super energized thinking about what legacy building looks like and how we can work ourselves out of a job by building local capacity and empowering our partners to continue the mission,' the staffer wrote to Fortune. Suzman said the foundation's goals have not changed. 'When critical coalitions seem to crumble before our eyes, we cannot just shrink our ambitions,' he said. 'When the very idea of hope for a better future starts to sound naïve or out of date, we must remind people that our optimism does not come easily. It has been hard-earned. It is not based on blind faith, but concrete, measurable results.' Gates asked his employees to reinvigorate their drive to achieve the foundation's core mission, bring new partners along, and invest in the potential of AI to help alleviate poverty and play a key role in drug discovery. 'I really believe, and I hope it's not a naive belief, that we can achieve—despite the headwinds—even more over the next 20 years than we did in the first 25,' he said. This story was originally featured on
