Phil Buchanan

Phil Buchanan is a passionate advocate for the importance of philanthropy and the nonprofit sector and deeply committed to the cause of helping foundations and individual donors to maximize their impact. Hired in 2001 as the organization’s first chief executive, Phil has led the growth of The Center for Effective Philanthropy (CEP) into the leading provider of data and insight on philanthropic effectiveness. CEP has been widely credited with bringing the voices of stakeholders to funders and with contributing to an increased emphasis on key elements of effectiveness.

Buchanan is author of Giving Done Right: Effective Philanthropy and Making Every Dollar Count, published in the spring of 2019 by PublicAffairs. He is co-author of many CEP research reports, a frequent contributor to The Chronicle of Philanthropy (after serving as a columnist there from 2013 to 2019), a frequent blogger for the CEP blog, author of op eds that have appeared in publications such as The Financial Times and The Boston Globe, and a frequent commentator on philanthropy in the media.

Buchanan is also co-founder of YouthTruth, an initiative of CEP’s designed to harness student perceptions to help educators and funders accelerate improvements in K–12 schools and classrooms. In 2016, he was named the Nonprofit Times “influencer of the year.” Phil serves on the boards of directors of Philanthropy Massachusetts and NCOA.

Phil lives in Concord, Massachusetts with his wife and their two daughters.