Giving back

Judith Fiander cares deeply about philanthropy, so being the chief executive of Australian Philanthropic Services comes as little surprise. How she ended up in that position, however, is not as straightforward as one might think.

Having graduated from Macquarie University with a double major in English and education, and a minor in history, Fiander wasn't quite sure where she wanted to focus her career.

After a short stint in academic publishing she returned to university, this time at Sydney University, to complete a law degree as well.

While studying Fiander worked as a dog transporter for a grooming salon, an experience she says she wouldn't change.

"[That job] came with some great stories. I got to meet all sorts of people; rich, poor, good, bad, polite, impolite, law abiding and some I suspect not. It was a lot of fun, and I certainly got some good exposure to life doing that," she muses.

After graduating with her law degree, and stepping away from dog grooming, Fiander took up a job in a small law firm in the city, mostly doing work for government statutory authorities of various sorts.

While there Fiander and few others established a mortgage broking business.

"This was around the turn of the century, that's how long ago it was, in the early days of mortgage broking," Fiander says.

"We built a reasonable sized business and sold out of that. At that point I went to work for one of our competitors, but one that we were very friendly with, and they got absorbed by a financial services organisation.

"That's really where the shift started to happen."

Around this time is when Fiander met Chris Cuffe, someone she says has been a huge inspiration and influencer to her.

Cuffe would go on to establish Australian Philanthropic Services just over 25 years ago.

"I was asked to come and volunteer at this new thing Chris was putting together that had something to do with philanthropy, and I thought that sounded interesting," Fiander says.

"So, I went to volunteer there for a few months, and I'm still here 14 years later. I'm not a volunteer anymore, of course, that grew into a job of various roles, and so on.

"It's not accidental, but perhaps serendipitous in a way. I think on reflection, my experiences leading up to that point within education and law had been very useful."

Fiander says one of the things she is most proud of is the induction and education courses they have established for those who work in the structured giving space.

"There isn't a course for such a thing, so we do it in house," she explains.

"We've had feedback about how good the induction is and how good the learning is here, and I like to think I have something to do with that, at least in the early years."

Fiander says there are many elements of her job that bring her immense satisfaction, or as she puts it "bucket loads of joy".

"I absolutely love it, which is why I've been here for so long. I love what we do, I love the people here. There isn't really anyone else who does what we do, and so that rigour and expertise and professionalism is something we are known for, which is a very satisfying thing," she says.

"But working with our clients is the spark of joy, if I can put it that way, because our clients are the people making donations to charities, they are the givers, and helping them, supporting them, and travelling alongside them is a joyful experience in itself."

Fiander says she is continuously touched by how many clients express their satisfaction once they begin their journey of structured giving, something she says never gets old.

And the number of clients has been growing exponentially, especially as more advisers realise the benefits structured giving could provide their clients beyond the feel-good element of donation.

"You can establish your own private ancillary fund, a family foundation, if you like, and you can make donations into that. They're 100% tax deductible, just like donating to any other charity in the country," Fiander explains.

She says often people look to establish a family foundation when they have some form of trigger event.

"Trigger events don't make people philanthropic, but it is the opportunity for them. So, if they've sold a business, inherited some money or sold an investment property, or whatever it might be, and they have a capital gains tax event of some sort," she says.

"They are able to use that tax deduction in the year that it is derived, or they can use it up to five years, and they can spread that over the five years in whatever way, shape or form assists them. So, if they have lumpy income, it can be quite useful."

The other option is the public ancillary fund - which has around 750 clients - and the same rules apply. A giving fund can be established within that and tax deductable donations can be made.

When Fiander joined Australian Philanthropic Services, they had around 20 clients, now they're nudging up towards 1200 across both the private ancillary funds and the public ancillary fund.

"All of those clients together gave away $242 million in FY25 and we're just about to end FY26 and we'll get a different set of numbers, but it just grows every year, which is fantastic, but there should be more of it," she says.

Looking forward, Fiander is as driven as ever to educate more advisers and their clients about structured giving.

"If I had one wish for the future, it would be that every financial adviser and accountant in the country spoke to their clients about giving. At the moment there's a relatively modest slice of advisers and accountants who do that, and they do it wonderfully well, and working terrifically in this space, but it should be part of the education," she says.

Fiander says it couldn't be a better time for advisers to start engaging with their clients about structured giving as the largest generational transfer of wealth gets underway.

"There's all those numbers and surveys showing that the next generation may, in fact, change advisers if they don't feel sufficiently engaged, and philanthropy is a wonderful way to engage the next generation right now, before they even inherit the wealth," she says.

Fiander has also been working closely with Treasury to ensure new policy settings don't unintentionally get in the way of those with means being able to make charitable donations.

"We make submissions to Treasury whenever there is a piece of legislation, like the new community foundations that have been launched relatively recently," she says.

"I find that quite enjoyable. It's a very satisfying thing, and I think we need to do more of it. Frankly, I'd like to see the organisation do more of that and be closer to government and other parties as well, in order to make sure that we better represent structured giving and better represent philanthropy generally." fs