Out of the estimated $84 trillion flowing to the younger generations in the ongoing “great wealth transfer”, some $12 trillion will likely be earmarked for charity, as baby boomers and millennial generations alike look to align their values and beliefs with their assets, as well as take advantage of favorable tax strategies.
Additionally, many of the younger beneficiaries won’t invest (or give) the way their parents and grandparents did, creating an even more significant knowledge gap. Dien Yuen is looking to bridge that divide and ease intergenerational wealth transfer in her role as founder and CEO of the Bay Area-based Daylight Advisors, an education and professional certification organization for advisors focused on philanthropy.
“The generation that’s inheriting is much more global-focused and social impact-focused. They lived through COVID, right?” Yuen said. “They lived through a lot of these issues, through climate change and racial reckoning. So they want to be involved in making decisions on how to do better.”
Yuen’s passion for philanthropy began in her childhood in the 1970s. One night, her family left Vietnam by boat and briefly lived in a refugee camp before they made it to Michigan. Yuen remembered the comforting presence of the Red Cross during her time in the camp and recalled the Salvation Army, Goodwill and other community organizations helping her family when she first came stateside.
“It was those types of organizations that put my family all together, and got us housing and food and everything,” she said. “That’s why I love doing this work.”
Yuen founded Daylight Advisors in 2023, after stints at Evercore Wealth Management and founding the Center for Philanthropy and Social Impact at the American College for Financial Sciences (she also taught advisors and has a Chartered Advisor in Philanthropy designation).
In the next several years, Yuen hopes to train about 10,000 advisors in philanthropic planning through Daylight’s certification programs, including the recently launched Impact Philanthropy Advisor certification.
In 2025, Daylight will launch several new certificates, including segment-specific programs focusing on working with women, LGBTQ clients and small business owners, and ones focusing on impact investing, collaborative giving and behavioral philanthropy.
The latter uses behavioral finance lessons to understand how to work with clients engaged in sometimes-fraught family dynamics and discussions (which have likely only increased with the ongoing tension on the world stage and the recent U.S. presidential election).
“What wrong do they want to make right in the world? These are not financial planning questions,” she said. “These are questions about how we can help our clients flourish.”
Yuen’s primary goal for Daylight Advisors is to help advisors gain confidence in their ability to converse with clients about philanthropic planning and develop the cultural dexterity to do so fluidly among families that may look very different (and have different priorities) than families did in decades past.
“That is our ultimate goal, if we can help advisors feel comfortable talking about, have the resources to do it, but also to be able to work with all different types of clients,” she said.
