Elisa Cicinelli Photography
BIOGRAPHY
Dimple Abichandani is a philanthropic advisor, author and social justice lawyer whose work is reshaping how foundations and donors understand their role in this moment of democratic crisis and accelerating inequality.
Her book, A New Era of Philanthropy: Ten Practices to Transform Wealth Into a More Just and Sustainable Future offers a reimagined framework for how philanthropy can move from mitigating the harms of unjust systems to transforming these systems. Published in 2025, the book has sparked conversation across the field and in of democratic crisis and accelerating inequality.
Dimple works with foundations, individual donors and boards to navigate the challenges and opportunities defining philanthropy today. She helps institutions move from outdated practices towards more responsive, proximate and impactful approaches. Her consulting spans governance, strategy, learning, coaching and organizational development.
For two decades, Dimple has brought innovation and new purpose to funding institutions. She currently works with foundations, individual donors, and boards to navigate the challenges and opportunities defining philanthropy today, helping institutions evolve from outdated practices toward more responsive, proximate, and impactful approaches to resourcing change. As Executive Director of the General Service Foundation (2015–2022), she aligned the foundation's grantmaking, investments, and governance with justice values. Previously, she was the founding director of the Rise Together Fund, a donor collaborative at the Proteus Fund that advances multiracial democracy by investing in communities targeted by Islamophobia. She also led the Center for Social Justice at UC Berkeley School of Law, where she founded a Social Justice Innovation Lab to bring multidisciplinary approaches to solving systemic challenges.
Dimple's leadership has been recognized with a Scrivener Award for Creative Grantmaking and a National Center for Family Philanthropy Fellowship. She serves on the Board of Directors of Solidaire Network and has served on the boards and steering committees of the Trust-Based Philanthropy Project, Northern California Grantmakers, and Grantmakers Concerned with Immigrants and Refugees. Dimple is based in the San Francisco Bay Area.
CURRENT WORK
Dimple works with foundations, individual donors, and boards to navigate the challenges and opportunities defining philanthropy today, helping institutions evolve from outdated practices toward more responsive, proximate, and impactful approaches to resourcing change.
Over the past year, she has been deeply engaged with funders through her widely praised book, A New Era of Philanthropy: Ten Practices to Transform Wealth Into a More Just and Sustainable Future (North Atlantic Books, April 2025), bringing its framework to life through keynotes, speaking engagements, podcasts, and confidential advising relationships.
Building on that momentum, Dimple is leading several active projects to bring philanthropy into the new era. She is working with foundation boards on governance, one of the sector's most persistent obstacles, helping them align values with practice and build approaches that are more accountable and proximate to the communities they serve. She is also addressing the sector's slow pace of change and lack of cross-organizational collaboration by supporting funder change agents through communities of practice in the US South and internationally. Across all of this work, Dimple brings her skills as a strategist, sensemaker, and storyteller, building the sector's capacity to move from charitable giving to transformational change.