Now an employee of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Mr. Rea wanted to use the disaster’s 10th anniversary to investigate what had become of the millions of dollars his group contributed and the many people it aspired to help.

Then he learned that Hollywood was producing its own retrospective (of sorts) on the tsunamis. Even better, he thought, for educating people about a once-devastated land and ways to respond effectively in the wake of natural emergencies.

So Mr. Rea fast-tracked his plans for his “Tsunami Plus 10″ Project to coincide with last month’s release of The Impossible, a film starring Ewan McGregor and Naomi Watts.

Mr. Rea traveled to Sri Lanka in August where he filmed a “mini-documentary” called “To Sandy From Sri Lanka: Lessons in Diversified Disaster Giving.”  He reached out to the producers of The Impossible, who invited him to the premiere of the film and enabled him to interview its director, Juan Antonio Bayona. Mr. Rea also released a “viewer’s guide” to the movie; so far, it’s received at least 12,000 views. (The project is a personal one, not part of Mr. Rea’s work with Gates).

One of his hopes is to give people a richer understanding of the tsunamis than they can get through The Impossible. The film focuses on a white family of tourists whose visit to Thailand is disrupted by the disaster.

“Every single Thai character is at the service of foreign tourists,” says Mr. Rea. “You have no sense that their own lives have been turned upside down. It’s a missed opportunity.”

Philanthropy Tips

His other goal is to help inform disaster philanthropy. Mr. Rea’s takeaways, in broad strokes, are relatively simple:

* Make gifts not only to the Oxfams of the world but also to community groups. (Or, in the case of New York’s Superstorm Sandy, “Give to Occupy Sandy and community foundations as well as the Red Cross,” he says.)

* Give “when emotions are high,” he suggests, but also later—six months or a year after the disaster, when it becomes clearer which nonprofits are doing an effective job and still need cash.

* Write checks; don’t send used clothes.

Mr. Rea’s trip to Sri Lanka was mostly encouraging. A vocational training center to which Give2Asia sent $500,000 had expanded its programs and served as a “safe haven” during the country’s civil war, says Mr. Rea. A $50,000 grant paid for 100 people to be trained in culinary skills. He learned that many of the program’s graduates were thriving in businesses overseas.

With hindsight, Mr. Rea says he wished he’d done more to help women who participated in the program but chose not to leave their homes and families for work.

Still, he says, the experience taught him that giving to local groups often pays off over the long term. ”It’s a big investment that’s been sustained after the crash of post-tsunami philanthropic aid died,” he said.

Mr. Rea is plotting next steps for “Tsunami Plus 10″—he has two more years, after all, until the storm’s anniversary—and plans additional trips to the region.

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The report says that four banks’ corporate foundations — Bank of America, Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase, and Wells Fargo — give only modest shares of annual corporate revenues to nonprofits. Bank of America gave a median of 0.15 percent over the last five years, while JPMorgan Chase gave 0.08 percent and Goldman Sachs, 0.03 percent, says the left-leaning watchdog group.

The median giving by corporate foundations in the financial industry, as a percentage of annual revenues, is 0.13 percent, according to data from the Committee Encouraging Corporate Philanthropy cited in the report.

The report also faults the banks for lacking transparency by failing to detail which charities receive grants from the companies’ corporate coffers. In addition, it says that too little of the banks’ giving aims to help the poor and that most of their grants are one-year commitments for specific purposes.

Meanwhile, the banks regularly tout their philanthropy in an effort to bolster their public image, says the report. The report notes a 2009 Congressional hearing to account for how the banks were spending money from the Troubled Asset Relief Program, during which the heads of JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America highlighted their banks’ “respective philanthropy as proof of their good corporate citizenship.”

A Different View

Representatives of the banks disputed the report’s claims.

The companies give the bulk of their charity through their foundations, for which they provide grantee information, the banks said. Corporations are not required by law to report on how they spend money through company coffers, and most do not.

The banks’ overall giving also compares favorably with many big companies. Goldman Sachs gave 2.6 percent of its pre-tax profits to charity last year, according to Chronicle data. (Many companies aim to give away at least 2 percent of their pre-tax profit). Wells Fargo gave 1.1 percent. Bank of America has contributed roughly $200-million annually in recent years, even as it has posted overall losses.

The banks also disputed the report’s claims that they fail to adequately support needy people and provide general support to charities. For example, Goldman Sachs Foundation’s biggest philanthropic programs include efforts to help small U.S. businesses and women entrepreneurs overseas.

Bank of America, meanwhile, said that nearly 60 percent of its foundation giving last year was general support.

“It’s always important to assess the role that banks play in creating economically vibrant communities,” said T.J. Crawford, a spokesman for Bank of America, in an e-mail to The Chronicle. “That being said, this report inaccurately portrays our commitment to improving the communities we serve, especially those that face greater challenges than others. One of the hallmarks of our corporate social-responsibility program is giving in a transparent, responsive, and consistent manner.”

“JPMorgan Chase and its foundation donate over $200-million a year to worthy causes in the U.S. and around the world,” said Jennifer H. Kim, a spokeswoman for JPMorgan. “We’re very proud of our innovative approach to charitable giving and the generosity of our company and employees.”

Dig deeper: See The Chronicle’s annual study of corporate giving.

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The higher the concentration of corporate headquarters in a city, the faster the growth of local nonprofits, the study found. But the impact was greater on nonprofits that enrich the culture or higher learning of a community than on groups that aim to alleviate social problems.

The study examined the influence of locally headquartered corporations in 100 U.S. cities from 1987 to 2002.

“Corporations are vessels for aggregating resources,” Gerald Davis, a professor at the University of Michigan’s Ross School of Business and a co-author of the study, said in a written statement announcing the study’s publication. “We find that across every major American city, the resources of the corporate sector are most beneficial for elite-oriented nonprofits.”

Christopher Marquis, a Harvard Business School professor and lead author of the study, said the new research supported other studies suggesting that philanthropy may be a “vehicle to benefit elite interests.”

“Corporate effects on elite-oriented nonprofits are enhanced when there is a community structure in place that organizes and validates the elite,” Mr. Marquis said in a written statement.

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In an interview, Vikki Spruill, who has led the association since July, said the change was driven by a need to work differently, not a decision to cut certain services or programs. The council, she said, would focus on better anticipating the needs of member foundations and would be creating up to a dozen positions next year that fit that new approach.

“It’s a different business model, and we need different skills and competencies to support a new business model,” she said.

The organization, Ms. Spruill said, would also aim to be less “hierarchical.” As an example, she said the council eliminated its chief operating officer position as it moves away from a more-traditional structure.

The council has faced challenges attracting and retaining members, its membership falling to about 1,700 from 2,000 in 2007. Last year, it ran a $3.5-million operating deficit. It now employs 47 people, compared with about 65 a year-and-a-half ago and 105 before the recession.

Ms. Spruill said the changes were not a response to financial problems. The council anticipates a much smaller operating loss, of about $750,000, in 2012, and is budgeting for a loss of roughly $396,000 next year. “We are on very strong financial footing,” she said.

A ‘Fork in the Road’

Ms. Spruill informed council members of the changes in an e-mail that said “several positions” had been eliminated and described a new model that will “operate as the hub of the largest, most connected philanthropic network in the world—one that is designed to foster more meaningful, intentional partnerships between our staff and each of you as we link you to others who share your specific priorities.”

Terry Mazany, president of the Chicago Community Trust and a council board member, said the changes may seem abstract for now, but that they are designed to help the council stay relevant in an era where “more is being asked of philanthropy than ever before.”

He and other board members said they were pleased by the changes; Mr. Mazany called them “overdue.”

He said the council faced a “fork in the road.” Staying on its present course of being a “traditional trade association where the value is coming together to basically celebrate the sector” would have put the organization on a path to obsolescence, he said.

“I wish they had embraced this choice five years ago because I think they would be better positioned,” he said.

Nina Stack, president of the Council of New Jersey Grantmakers and a Council on Foundations trustee, said it would be wrong to suggest that the changes were about getting rid of some staff members and bringing in new people.

“The board was really deliberate in hiring a leader who could re-imagine an organization,” said Ms. Stack. “That is what they wanted and that is what they got with Vikki. She has done the work to understand where the council was, where its strengths were, and where it can be.”

With the new model, Ms. Stack said, the council would strive to work more closely with other grant-making associations like her own. An example of the council’s value came after Hurricane Sandy, she said, when its employees connected Ms. Stack with the appropriate officials at the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

Sherece West, president of the Winthrop Rockefeller Foundation and a former council trustee, said she also supported the direction in which Ms. Spruill seems to be taking the organization. Ms. West said the council president called her this past week to discuss the changes.

“She needs to build her team around that direction,” Ms. West said. Five months, she said, is too soon to expect a detailed strategic plan. “It requires some patience and giving someone an opportunity.”

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Financial woes stemming from declining investment earnings from the group’s donor-advised funds led to the decision, said Casey Cook, executive director of the Bread and Roses Community Fund and chairman of the Funding Exchange’s board.

“Ultimately the board had to make the very difficult decision to cease operations at this time in order to be able to honor our existing commitments,” she said. “The board acted on its fiduciary responsibility not to operate in a deficit.”

In addition to its donor-advised funds, the Funding Exchange held an endowment of roughly $12-million that supported the 16 member foundations that made up the collaborative. The board has yet to decide what exactly will happen to the endowment, but it will continue to benefit member funds, she said.

Some observers said the grant-making network suffered from structural problems as well as financial ones.

Pablo Eisenberg, a senior fellow at Georgetown University’s Public Policy Institute and a Chronicle columnist, said that some members of the collaborative resented the influence of the national organization and the dues they paid. Those dues made up roughly 14 percent of the Funding Exchange’s $1-million operating budget.

“The governance structure didn’t make any sense,” he said. “There was constant tension.”

A Loss for Nonprofits

People at progressive nonprofits said they were sorry to see the organization disappear.

“During the past 30-plus years, the network’s unique activist-advised model to grant making has helped many grass-roots efforts across the country to bring equity and justice to our communities and has served as an inspiration for democratizing philanthropy,” Kristina Moore, communications director at the National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy, wrote in an e-mail to The Chronicle.

The Funding Exchange supported advocacy and organizing efforts that few foundations support, said Josh Spring, executive director of the Greater Cincinnati Homeless Coalition.

“Many funders want to fund something they can physically touch. And organizing and advocacy, people in the street pushing for new legislation, doesn’t always seem touchable,” said Mr. Spring, whose group received $12,000 over three years from the Funding Exchange.

Ms. Cook said all existing grant commitments, like the one to Mr. Spring’s group, will be honored.

Over its 33 years, the Funding Exchange awarded more than $66-million to 10,500 grass-roots organizations, the organization said. Its total budget last year, including grants and operations, was $3.4-million.

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Employees at the nation’s grant makers rated their job satisfaction an average of 5.3 out of 7, according to a study based on a survey of more than 1,000 people conducted by the Center for Effective Philanthropy.

Employees are far more likely to express satisfaction with their jobs if they feel they are respected, their ideas are valued, and they can use their skills and creativity to make a positive difference, according to the study. Those factors were more important than pay or workload, the study says.

To encourage a feeling of “empowerment” among employees, the study recommends, foundation leaders should clearly communicate goals, conduct employee reviews that are fair and helpful, and give workers the sense that they are valued.

While that advice may sound obvious, says Ellie Buteau, vice president for research at the Center for Effective Philanthropy, “our data supports that it’s not easy for staff to feel empowered. It happens through concerted effort on the part of leadership.”

Foundation leaders would be wise to make that effort, she says, in part because of the link between employee happiness and job performance.

“It’s of interest to everyone that foundation staff are doing the best they can do,” she says. “Given that foundation staff are working on such important issues, foundation job satisfaction, I think, should matter greatly.”

In addition to an analysis of the survey, the study, “Employee Empowerment: The Key to Foundation Staff Satisfaction,” profiles two organizations—the Commonwealth Fund and the Skillman Foundation—that have achieved high levels of employee satisfaction.

Mr. McDonnell is a business leader who is retiring this year after nearly 40 years as chief executive of DST Systems, a technology company in Kansas City. He has served on the Kauffman foundation board since 2003 and as its chairman since 2006.

Mr. McDonnell succeeds Carl Schramm, who led Kauffman from 2002 until last year.

Mr. McDonnell said in a statement that he was “honored” to serve as the foundation’s leader. “Our important work in education and entrepreneurship has made an impact both around the globe and in our hometown of Kansas City,” he said.

His nonprofit affiliations include serving as chairman of the Greater Kansas City Community Foundation and the Kansas City United Way Campaign.

Janice Kreamer, former chief executive of the Greater Kansas City Community Foundation, was selected to replace Mr. McDonnell as Kauffman’s board chair.

The interviews were conducted by the Bridgespan Group to help donors learn from one another. But the videos are also helpful for fundraising and charity executives who want to figure out what makes wealthy people give big.

For example, Eli Broad applies three key questions to the “philanthropic investments” he makes: “Would it happen anyway? If it’s going to happen anyway, we don’t make the investment,” he says in a video clip. “Two, will it make a difference 20 or 30 years from now? And lastly, is talent leadership there that can really make it happen? … If the answer to any one of those is no, we don’t do it.”

The videos are part of Bridgepan’s Give Smart resources for donors.

The video collection debuts today with nearly 400 clips, but it will eventually offer 1,200 and is searchable so viewers can look at all the conversations about, say, education or the arts or giving strategies.

The New Americans Campaign will aim to use $20-million donated by multiple foundations to make it easier for people to become full-fledged Americans. Currently, barriers prevent the vast majority of the nation’s 8 million legal immigrants from becoming naturalized. Only 8 percent of those eligible each year do so, the campaign reports.

Applying for citizenship costs $680—too much for many immigrants. The lengthy, labyrinthine path to citizenship can take two years to complete, dissuading many from trying. Many who do fall prey to fraudulent operators who take their money but offer little in legal services in return.

“The goal of the campaign is to allow those who want to take that last step toward citizenship navigate the system,” says Geraldine Mannion, director of the U.S. Democracy and Special Opportunities Fund at the Carnegie Corporation of New York, one of six grant makers involved in the campaign. Carnegie has made $7-million in grants to the effort. “We want to help people who contribute to our country economically and socially integrate fully into it.”

A Pilot Program

Since July 2011, the campaign has run a pilot program that has helped 30,000 legal permanent residents by linking them with new online technology that streamlines the citizenship application process, saving them $20-million in fees and legal costs.

The effort also uses new approaches to reaching immigrants in eight cities where a total of 3.3 million legal residents live, tapping dozens of immigrants-rights and faith-based groups.

Finding institutions that will lend money to people who couldn’t otherwise afford to pay for citizenship will also be part of the campaign’s work, Ms. Mannion says.

“We see people who would like to become citizens along with their family members,” she says. “When you have a family of five, that’s a lot of money to come up with. It’s important for us to look for new ways to help them find it.”

In addition to Carnegie, founding supporters include the JPB Foundation and Open Society Foundations, both in New York, the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, in Miami, the Evelyn and Walter Haas Jr. Fund, in San Francisco, and the Grove Foundation, in Los Altos, Calif.

The 20 finalists—including High Point, N.C., for a plan to adapt a nonprofit gang-violence program to reduce domestic abuse; Philadelphia’s proposal to “re-imagine” the government grant-making process; and Milwaukee’s ideas for using foreclosed property—will attend an “ideas camp” in New York later this month to share their ideas and help them take shape.

“We want to identify the best thinking and most creative solutions percolating up from across the country, elevate the solutions, and ultimately help them spread,” said Jim Anderson, who leads the foundation’s government-innovation work.

The cities are competing for a $5-million top prize and four runner-up awards of $1-million each. Winners will be announced this spring.

Mr. Anderson said 305 cities of all sizes, from 45 states, applied for the awards.