Ford is one of the largest foundations in the world. Like most funders, it paid mostly for projects, plus a small cut for overhead. Walker thought that cut was a polite fiction. Nonprofits could deliver impressive programs while running on thin reserves, old systems and overstretched leaders, because nobody was paying for the organization underneath the work.
He said so publicly. Metrics built by nonprofit watchdog groups, he wrote, had "equated lower overhead with organizational effectiveness," and funders had followed.
Ford's case was built on cost logic and Walker's experience, not on a study of harm to its own grantees. The foundation was candid about that later: it described BUILD as a test of a hypothesis, that nonprofits would thrive with longer, larger and more flexible grants.
Ford's budget was large but fixed. Giving fewer organizations bigger, longer, more flexible grants meant giving nothing to others. Going deep meant going narrow.
It also meant giving up control. Project grants let a funder see exactly what its money bought. Flexible operating money asked Ford to trust its grantees to spend well on things that are hard to photograph: finance teams, technology, leadership, reserves.
"Our policy of 10 percent overhead on project grants in no way allows for covering the actual costs to administer a project."Darren Walker, November 2015
Walker announced the restructuring. Ford would dedicate $1 billion over five years to BUILD, double its overhead rate on project grants from 10% to 20% starting January 1, and likely cut its number of grants by up to 20% over two years.
The first BUILD grants went out: five-year general operating support, plus dedicated money and help for institutional strengthening. Grants ranged from about $2 million to more than $10 million.
Ford committed a second $1 billion. BUILD 2.0 went to a subset of the original grantees, chosen case by case, with funding starting in 2022.
The cost landed first on the organizations Ford stopped funding. Ford narrowed its focus areas and expected to make hundreds fewer grants. Walker was direct about it: "some outstanding organizations and fields will be receiving final grants." Whole program lines closed. Those grantees paid for the depth others received.
At launch, critics questioned whether a big organizing principle would tell program officers where the money should actually go.
The second cost came at the end. Five-year grants still end. In the 2024 survey, about a quarter of grantees had not been told whether more funding was coming, and the share saying funding uncertainty disrupted their planning rose from 25% to 38%. Grantees without a second grant said they would have to reduce scope, downsize or lay off staff.
Ford's 2022 evaluation reported that 83% of surveyed grantees said they were more financially resilient in 2021 than when their BUILD grant began. An independent study published in 2025 put the 2021 figure at 76% and found 85% reporting greater resilience in 2024. Among 22 grantees with financial data, the median gain was 3.7 months of operating reserves. It also found that 30% of grantees said the growth BUILD paid for wasn't sustainable once the grant ended, up from 16%.
The survey results are grantees reporting to their funder. Only 38% responded, and grantees for whom BUILD was more than 30% of their budget reported the biggest effects.
In July 2024 Walker announced he would step down. In November 2025, as Heather Gerken took over, Ford closed BUILD as a standalone program after about $1.9 billion, routing remaining grantees to a possible grant from another Ford program or a tie-off grant. Walker said BUILD's principles now run across Ford's grantmaking, pointing to general operating support rising from about 20% to about 80% of grants. Some in the field said the closure left a gap. Gerken's new strategy is due to take effect in 2028.
Depth has a price, and someone else pays it.
Bigger, longer grants for some meant final grants for others. Ford named that out loud, which is rarer than it should be.
A billion dollars can ride on a hypothesis.
Ford didn't wait for proof that restricted funding was hurting its grantees. It acted on logic and experience, then measured.
Flexible money builds strength, and dependence.
The grantees who leaned on BUILD most reported the biggest gains, and nearly a third said the growth wouldn't last without the grant.
How support ends matters as much as how it starts.
Grantees said the uncertainty at the end disrupted their planning. A program can work and still be hard to leave.
Which of your funding rules exist because they make your job easier, rather than because they help the people you support succeed?
If you gave fewer people more, who would you stop supporting, and how would you tell them?
What happens to the people you support on the day your support ends?
- Darren Walker, "Moving the Ford Foundation Forward", Ford Foundation, November 8, 2015. $1B for BUILD, overhead 10% to 20%, up to 20% fewer grants, "final grants," both Walker quotes.
- Chronicle of Philanthropy, "Ford Foundation Spells Out Cuts to Make Way for Its Shift in Focus to Inequality", November 9, 2015. Narrowed focus, fewer grants, ended program lines, early critics.
- Ford Foundation, "What is the BUILD initiative?" FAQ, April 8, 2021. BUILD as a hypothesis; second $1B; BUILD 2.0 for a subset.
- Ford Foundation, BUILD Evaluation Final Report, May 16, 2022. 83% more financially resilient (self-reported).
- NIRAS, Longitudinal Evaluation of BUILD, Final Report, Ford Foundation, 2025. 85% resilience, 3.7 months of cash, 30% unsustainable growth, end-of-grant uncertainty, 38% response rate, no control group.
- Chronicle of Philanthropy, "$2 Billion Later, Ford Scraps Its Institution-Building Program", November 17, 2025. Closure, about $1.9B spent, grant sizes, tie-off grants, critics.
- Inside Philanthropy, "An Early Postmortem of Ford's BUILD Program", December 4, 2025.
- Associated Press via News4Jax, "Darren Walker, president of Ford Foundation, will step down by the end of 2025", July 22, 2024.
- Ford Foundation, "Ford Foundation Announces Heather Gerken as New President", July 1, 2025.
- Chronicle of Philanthropy, "Ford's Early Steps Toward a Strategy Overhaul", September 10, 2026. New strategy timeline.
An independent analysis of a publicly documented decision, written for leaders facing similar choices in their own work. For informational purposes only. No coaching relationship with the featured leaders, and no endorsement by them, is implied.