About us: Who we are, what we do

  1. Vision & Mission
  2. Com­mit­tees
  3. Friends of PHINEO

Vision & mission

Our vision for a strong civ­il society

Our vision is one of a vibrant, strong civ­il soci­ety in which doing good and achiev­ing social impact belong firm­ly togeth­er. After all, it is only by work­ing togeth­er that the poten­tial for soci­ety and for each indi­vid­ual will ful­ly unfold.
Com­pre­hen­sive infor­ma­tion and resources should be made avail­able to all those who wish to con­tribute to this social development.

Our mis­sion: Empow­er­ing non­prof­its for max­i­mum impact

We help non­prof­it organ­i­sa­tions bet­ter achieve their goals. As a think tank, con­sul­tan­cy and social organ­i­sa­tion, we work to ensure that com­mu­ni­ty engage­ment has a real impact.
We are com­mit­ted to ensur­ing that every hour of work and every euro is spent for the best pos­si­ble outcome.

Four ways to reach our goals:

1. We think ahead

Inno­va­tion is the cur­ren­cy of the knowl­edge-based soci­ety. There­fore we explore new ideas of phil­an­thropy and impact invest­ing. We link proven and inno­v­a­tive meth­ods and ensure that new approach­es can be suc­cess­ful­ly implemented.

2. We analyze

Fight­ing pover­ty, help­ing chil­dren, sav­ing the envi­ron­ment – every day thou­sands of peo­ple work to make the world a bet­ter place. But what do they need to achieve an even greater social impact? By explor­ing this mat­ter, we track down big ideas and iden­ti­fy mech­a­nisms behind them.

3. We advise

We sup­port every­one who wants to make a dif­fer­ence – non­prof­it orga­ni­za­tions, foun­da­tions, com­pa­nies, min­istries, indi­vid­u­als. We also cre­ate net­works among these play­ers. By work­ing togeth­er, projects can be tak­en on that indi­vid­u­als would not be able to do on their own.

4. We act

Imple­ment­ing our own ideas is anoth­er com­pe­tence that our own projects teach us. Espe­cial­ly through them, we learn both faster and more effec­tive­ly. And when things are going well, we turn a loose idea into a ground­break­ing innovation.

Our com­mit­tees

Exec­u­tive Board, Super­vi­so­ry Board, Advi­so­ry Board – who does what?

As a non-prof­it stock cor­po­ra­tion, PHI­NEO is sub­ject to the reg­u­la­tions of the Ger­man stock cor­po­ra­tion law. The non-prof­it stock cor­po­ra­tion has three exec­u­tive bod­ies: The Exec­u­tive Board, the Super­vi­so­ry Board and the Annu­al Gen­er­al Meet­ing. In addi­tion, an Advi­so­ry Board is in place.

The Exec­u­tive Board

The full-time Exec­u­tive Board con­sists of Dr. Andreas M. Rick­ert and Dr. Anna K. Her­rhausen. The exec­u­tive board man­ages the busi­ness activ­i­ties, rep­re­sents PHI­NEO exter­nal­ly and is pri­mar­i­ly respon­si­ble for the estab­lish­ment of part­ner­ships, the fur­ther devel­op­ment of con­tacts as well as the over­all strat­e­gy. The board informs the com­mit­tees on a reg­u­lar basis, approves the annu­al accounts and accepts the auditor’s report.

Chris­t­ian Berg­er and Juliane Hage­dorn sup­port the Exec­u­tive Board in the man­age­ment of the organization.

The Super­vi­so­ry Board

The hon­orary Super­vi­so­ry Board con­sists of six com­mit­ted mem­bers. It is in its respon­si­bil­i­ty to con­trol the Exec­u­tive Board of PHI­NEO, in par­tic­u­lar the audit­ing of the annu­al report. 

In addi­tion, the Super­vi­so­ry Board must approve the trans­ac­tions set out in the Arti­cles of Cor­po­ra­tion, such as the devel­op­ment of new busi­ness segments.

The mem­bers of Super­vi­so­ry Board are:

  • Michael Peters, for­mer mem­ber of the Eurex Frank­furt AG Exec­u­tive Board at Deutsche Boerse AG, until 30.09.2024 (Chair­man)
  • Dr. Brigitte Mohn, mem­ber of the Ber­tels­mann Stiftung Exec­u­tive Board (Deputy Chairwoman)
  • Benedikt Assies, Busi­ness Devel­op­ment at Limes Ver­trieb­s­ge­sellschaft mbH
  • Mat­tias Schmelz­er, CEO and spokesman of the board KPMG AG Wirtschaftsprüfungsgesellschaft
  • Mat­thi­as Schmolz, CEO and Com­mer­cial Direc­tor by Stif­ter­ver­band für die Deut­sche Wis­sen­schaft e.V.
  • Dr. Ais­cha Astou Saw, Man­ag­ing direc­tor SAW Consulting

The Annu­al Gen­er­al Meeting

The Gen­er­al Meet­ing of the non-prof­it cor­po­ra­tion is a decid­ing body. It is com­posed of all share­hold­ers and meets once a year.

Top­ics include:

  • the pre­sen­ta­tion of the approved annu­al accounts of PHI­NEO and the report of the Super­vi­so­ry Board,
  • the report of the Exec­u­tive Board, the appro­pri­a­tion of retained earn­ings, the dis­charge of the Exec­u­tive Board and the Super­vi­so­ry Board,
  • the appoint­ment of the auditor

The Advi­so­ry Board

PHI­NEO is sup­port­ed by renowned experts and promi­nent per­son­al­i­ties on a vol­un­tary basis. In the Advi­so­ry Board they pro­mote the con­cept of an impact-ori­en­t­ed civ­il society.

The Advi­so­ry Board pro­vides PHI­NEO with con­­tent-relat­ed exper­tise as well as the inde­pen­dent view from the outside.

  • Frie­de­ri­ke Beh­rens, Man­ag­ing direc­tor, Post­code Lot­te­rie DT gGmbH
  • Armin v. But­t­lar, Exec­u­tive Board at Aktion Men­sch association
  • Prof. Dr. Thomas Druyen, Exec­u­tive Board at Sig­mund Freud Uni­ver­si­ty Vien­na, Insti­tute for Wealth­i­bil­i­ty and Wealth Psychology
  • Kim­ber­ly Mar­teau Emer­son, Board of Direc­tors, Human Rights Watch
  • Stef­fen Feld­mann, Chief Oper­at­ing Offi­cer, Car­i­tas Internationalis
  • Thiemo Fojkar, CEO of Inter­na­tionaler Bund (IB)
  • Daniela Geue, Lawyer
  • Dr. Anna Katha­ri­na Gol­lan, Part­ner at P+P Pöl­lath and Partners
  • Dr. Eckart von Hirschhausen, Pre­sen­ter, Author, Founder
  • Anne Jeglinksi, Head of Dis­trict Office / Inno­va­tion and Impact Par­itätis­ch­er Wohlfahrtsver­band Berlin e.V.
  • Prof. Dr. Nadi­ne Kam­mer­lan­der, Chair of the Insti­tute for Fam­i­ly Busi­ness­es and SMEs (ifbm@WHU) and Chair of Fam­i­ly Busi­ness­es, WHU – Otto Beis­heim School of Management
  • Nor­bert Kunz, CEO Social Impact gGmbH
  • Dr. Flo­ri­an Lan­gen­schei­dt, Entre­pre­neur, Founder
  • Michael Löher, Man­ag­ing Direc­tor at Ger­man Asso­ci­a­tion for Pub­lic and Pri­vate Welfare
  • Torsten Müller, Founder
  • Oliv­er Oehri, Found­ing Part­ner at sil­ver­FOX 77
  • Alexan­dra von Rehlin­gen, Man­ag­ing Direc­tor at Schoeller & von Rehlingen
  • Hajo Riesen­beck, Man­ag­ing Direc­tor at Riesen­beck-IC GmbH
  • Stef­fen Schulze-Ketel­hut, PRIO Hold­ing GmbH
  • Regine Sixt, CEO of Regine Sixt Chil­dren’s Aid Foundation
  • Prof. Dr. Rita Süss­muth, for­mer Pres­i­dent of the Bundestag
  • San­dra Thi­er, Pre­sen­ter
  • Melin­da Weber, Man­ag­ing Direc­tor at Wohn­RaumGe­sellschaft mbH

Friends of PHINEO

Who are the Friends of PHINEO?

The Friends of PHI­NEO are a group of spon­sors who sup­port the analy­sis and the award­ing of the Seal of Impact to par­tic­u­lar­ly effec­tive non-prof­it organizations.

What is the Seal of Impact? 

PHINEO’s Seal of Impact is a seal of approval for par­tic­u­lar­ly effec­tive non-prof­it projects. In Ger­many there are two char­i­ty seals, one of them is the Seal of Impact (“Wirkt-Siegel”). It is avail­able free of charge.

The Seal of Impact is the result of a sci­en­tif­ic method devel­oped by PHI­NEO, in which we thor­ough­ly ana­lyze orga­ni­za­tions for their qual­i­ty. Only when all aspects of the project, its fund­ing and the peo­ple involved have been ful­ly explored, an inde­pen­dent pan­el of experts will decide togeth­er with PHI­NEO whether the orga­ni­za­tion will receive the Seal of Impact.

How can I become a member?

With a dona­tion of 10.000 Euro per year you can join the Friends of PHI­NEO. With this fund­ing you enable us to ana­lyze and pro­vide pro­fes­sion­al sup­port to two non-prof­it organizations.

Who is Friends of PHI­NEO for?

Entre­pre­neurs, lawyers, sci­en­tists, celebri­ties – Friends of PHI­NEO brings togeth­er com­mit­ted peo­ple from all sec­tors to joint­ly real­ize the vision of a strong civ­il society.

What’s in it for me?

With your fund­ing, you make a deci­sive con­tri­bu­tion to ensur­ing that out­stand­ing orga­ni­za­tions achieve ade­quate pub­lic vis­i­bil­i­ty — and receive more finan­cial sup­port. You will also help us to estab­lish the con­cept of impact ori­en­ta­tion in the pub­lic per­cep­tion of society.

  • You expand your net­work: Once a year all Friends of PHI­NEO mem­bers meet up. Take this oppor­tu­ni­ty for an infor­mal exchange with like-mind­ed people!
  • You ensure greater trans­paren­cy in the sec­tor: The Seal of Impact serves as a guide­line for spon­sors. By expand­ing the pool of rec­om­mend­ed orga­ni­za­tions with your fund­ing, you make a sig­nif­i­cant con­tri­bu­tion to ensur­ing that spon­sors learn more about pio­neer­ing fund­ing approach­es. And, impact-ori­en­t­ed orga­ni­za­tions will gain faster the vis­i­bil­i­ty that they need.
  • You can get into close con­tact with orga­ni­za­tions: We reg­u­lar­ly award the Seal of Impact to orga­ni­za­tions. As a spon­sor you are cor­dial­ly invit­ed to get to know your orga­ni­za­tion and to con­grat­u­late it per­son­al­ly. We would be hap­py to ini­ti­ate a per­son­al con­tact with an orga­ni­za­tion and sup­port you if you are plan­ning a more exten­sive commitment.
  • You enable two non-prof­it orga­ni­za­tions to receive free orga­ni­za­tion­al con­sult­ing: By pro­vid­ing fund­ing, you ensure that we can sup­port orga­ni­za­tions with­out them hav­ing to pay for it. The costs for the analy­sis are borne sole­ly by the sponsors.
  • You can deduct the dona­tion from your taxes.

What is the pur­pose of the seal?

The Seal of Impact con­tributes to the efforts of non-prof­it orga­ni­za­tions to invest more than before in the qual­i­ty of their work, which demon­stra­bly leads to a sig­nif­i­cant com­pet­i­tive advan­tage. In addi­tion, by pay­ing more atten­tion to the actu­al impact of projects, it moti­vates orga­ni­za­tions to take a clos­er look at their own effectiveness and report with more trans­paren­cy on their work.

And that works?

Absolute­ly! A sur­vey, in which 114 of our award­ed orga­ni­za­tions took part, revealed the fol­low­ing picture:

  • 94% would rec­om­mend the PHI­NEO analy­sis pro­ce­dure to oth­er organizations.
  • 78% con­firm high­er fundrais­ing income due to the award.
  • 58% entered into new coop­er­a­tions as a result of the award. The seal also acts as a door opener for foundations.
  • 79% stat­ed that they had ben­e­fit­ed from an image improve­ment as a result of the award.
  • 83% used the analy­sis process for inter­nal learn­ing & qual­i­ty devel­op­ment and ini­ti­at­ed changes in the organizations.

We are committed

How can I help you?

Thalissa-Jennifer Klaps

Press spokeswoman
+49 30 520 065 206
thalissa.klaps@phineo.org

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