Report on Grantmaking Shows Gains in Diversity, Narrowing Pay Gap for Female CEOs

The Council on Foundations released the 2025 Grantmaker Salary and Benefits Report (GSB), an annual analysis of key human resources trends that includes the most comprehensive data on the composition and compensation of U.S. foundations.

The report shows a charitable sector focused on continuing to diversify its ranks. Diversity continued to rise across the sector with people of color now accounting for 34.7 percent of full-time grantmaking staff and 18.6 percent of CEOs—both increases from 2024. Women continue to represent the majority of full-time staff (about 76 percent), a figure that has held steady in recent years. The number of women serving as CEOs, however, grew again in 2025, reflecting measurable progress in leadership representation.

Other key findings include:

• The gender pay gap narrows: Women CEOs now earn 88.1 percent of the median salary reported for male CEOs, up from 83.5 percent in 2024. This marks the most substantial year-over-year improvement in more than a decade.
• Salary increases are up, but don’t fully keep pace with inflation: Median salary increase rates were up slightly compared to 2024, at 4.6 percent, but in “real dollars,” many staff—particularly those at community foundations—remain behind. Salaries for non-CEO staff at community foundations are lower than they were in 2021, despite several years of raises. For private foundations, the opposite is true: Median salaries are higher than in 2021 for most roles, with the exception of CEOs and program officers, whose wages have not kept pace with inflation.
• Turnover rates creep up: After easing in 2024 following the sharp increases of the so-called “Great Resignation” in 2023, the average turnover rate for all staff rose from 10.8 percent in 2024 to 12.3 percent in 2025, with 57 percent of surveyed grantmakers reporting staff departures.

“Once again, the GSB data highlights the progress philanthropy is making in building a fairer, more inclusive workforce,” said Kathleen Enright, president and CEO of the Council on Foundations. “The data shows the gender pay gap narrowing and increasing diversity in the philanthropic workforce. These are encouraging signs that, even in the face of economic and social pressures, philanthropy isn’t just keeping pace but is leading the way in creating workplaces that work for everyone.”

Free for Council members and available for nonmembers to purchase on the Council’s website, the GSB Report has been an essential resource informing grantmaker decision-making on budgets, salaries, and benchmarking personnel policies and practices since 1980.

Organized by grantmaker type, foundation type, asset size, and geographic location, available GSB data includes:

• Salary information on 11,366 full-time staff from 985 grantmaking organizations;
• Benchmarking data for 38 distinct positions;
• Administrative and Program Expense Tables;
• Increase, bonus, and severance eligibility and activity figures;
• Staff counts for full- and part-time staff by grantmaker type and asset size;
• Gender, race/ethnicity, age, and disability data;
• Staff tenure, departure, and turnover rates;
• CEO-specific compensation, benefits, and discretionary grantmaking practices; and
• Benefits practices and employer costs.

Respondents included community, corporate, operating, public, and private foundations (including family foundations).

Access the "2025 Grantmaker Salary and Benefits Report" here.

Source: Council on Foundations

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