Trust and Steering Committee

The Women in Philanthropy (South Africa) Trust (IT002203/2007(C)) is a charitable, non-profit trust through which the network is managed. The events are run by a Steering Committee and both the trustees and the Steering Committee act on a voluntary basis.

Moya Wolff

Steering Committee
Co-Founder

After a varied teaching and business career in SA, UK and Japan, Moya discovered her real passion in 2007 when she stumbled across the Social Sector. The realisation that her contribution at work could be so much more meaningful spurred her on to use her skills to assist non-profit organisations to thrive. When Kate Clayton asked her to assist in starting Women in Philanthropy SA, she was delighted to collaborate with so many like-minded, passionate women. As a qualified professional fundraiser/marketer she has had the privilege of working with many varied organisations on their long-term financial sustainability in order to further their social impact – most recently, The Clothing Bank and Habitat for Humanity SA in the capacity as Head of Resource Development and Communications.

Kate Clayton

Co-Founder

Kate is an Integral coach and strategist working with leaders and their teams bringing a more integrated perspective to any challenge. She does this through truth hunting and speaking, and solving at source, with curiosity and adventure. Ultimately to help leaders and their organisations find purpose and grow – their joy, impact and profitability. Currently clients range from AIG South Africa to Yoco and Jack Hammer Executive Headhunters.

Previously, she worked as a strategist and facilitator with a range of organisations including social enterprises like Open Africa, Activate! and Fetola, helping them deepen impact through more strategic marketing and fundraising.

Kate’s reason for starting Women in Philanthropy was to connect more women working in the philanthropic space to share their ideas and resources as a way to create more impact in the sector.

Anna Vayanos

Steering Committee Member and Trustee

Anna Vayanos is an admitted attorney of the High Court of South Africa as well as a solicitor for England and Wales. Anna practised trust, tax and charity law both in Cape Town and London for a period of ten years. Passionate about making a difference in South Africa, she left legal practice in 2005 to pursue a role that would enable her to work further with donors and the non-profit sector and re-conceptualised and soon headed up the Philanthropy Office at Nedbank Private Wealth (previously BoE Private Clients). The business was recognised as the industry leader in South Africa in the provision of philanthropy services (Business Day, Top Private Banking Survey August 2012) and remains the largest and most established philanthropy offering with repeated international recognition.

Since 2013, Anna has been consulting independently through her own business, Anna Vayanos Philanthropy Consulting. She remains very active within the donor and NPO sector and her current board positions include being Chairperson of Home from Home as well as Women in Philanthropy (South Africa). She has spoken at many conferences, is a regular contributor of articles and viewpoints on industry-related topics and co-wrote Advancing Philanthropy in South Africa with Shelagh Gastrow. Anna acts a professional trustee and advises donors and NPOs on tax exemption and structuring, financial sustainability, good governance and responsible and effective giving.

Louise Driver

Steering Committee Chairperson

Louise is a fundraising and social investment strategy specialist with 25 years of development and corporate experience. She held the position of CEO of the Children’s Hospital Trust, fundraiser for the Red Cross War Memorial Children’s Hospital and Paediatric Healthcare in the Western Cape, for the past 9 years. She recently took on a new role as Executive Co-ordinator of the Independent Philanthropy Association of South Africa.

Louise has a Business Science Honours degree in Social Marketing from the University of Cape Town. She has worked in the corporate sector for Old Mutual and MTN’s Corporate Social Investment projects, and has worked in the development field for the Catholic Welfare and Development, fundraising and marketing for the 22 development projects under their umbrella. She was MD of GreaterCapital, a Corporate Social Investment consultancy, part of the GreaterGood SA group, where she worked with over 60 corporate clients assisting them in developing and implementing effective corporate social investment strategies.  Louise has initiated and run various community welfare and development initiatives in Cape Town and Durban. She is also the researcher and author of the book: How to Help: A Guide to Worthy Causes in Durban, which provides a beneficiary resource for private and corporate funders.

Sarah Scarth

Steering Committee Member

With over 25 years’ experience in the non-profit sector, working locally and internationally, Sarah is an experienced fundraising and communications practitioner, who is passionate about helping non-profit organisations create diversified and integrated fundraising and communications programmes.  After completing her studies in communications, Sarah entered the commercial PR world until finding her true passion for the social impact sector through the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW), where she spent 12 years first as a campaigner and then in senior management positions. In 2008 she joined the Cape of Good Hope SPCA, where as head of Fundraising and Communication she helped the organisation significantly increase funding and diversify their revenue streams.  Today Sarah serves as the Internationals Programmes Director for The Resource Alliance.

Nyasha Njela

Steering Committee Member

After spending 6 years working in retail banking in her native country Zimbabwe, Nyasha moved to South Africa with her family. Having worked as a personal banker to priority clients during her time in retail banking, customer relations has been at the core of her work life, which transitioned to non-profit humanitarian work when she started working for Doctors Without Borders (MSF) South Africa in the fundraising department. Nyasha strongly believes in the power of individual fundraising. With almost a decade experience in fundraising, Nyasha is now the Resource Mobilisation Manager at Feenix.

Pippa Shaper

Steering Committee Member

Pippa’s career started in retail in the United Kingdom before she settled in South Africa in 1992. In 1995, during the HIV/AIDS crisis, Pippa offered her services to Nazareth House in Cape Town, as a fundraiser. During her ten years there, she was extensively involved in the setting up of community based foster homes and seeing the tremendous benefits of this type of care was called to co-found Home from Home with Jane Payne in 2005. After 14 years, she stepped back from her position as Director of Home from Home in 2019 and now consults to them.

Pippa is also a trustee of several International foundations – The Elton John AIDS Foundation South Africa, Get On Skills Development Centre and Friends in Ireland Trust. In 2015 Pippa started her studies with the Centre for Coaching at UCT’s Graduate School of Business. She coaches individuals and groups, with a focus on non-profits, small businesses and people in transition. She has also co-authored The Ten R’s on Authentic Resilience with Gabi Lowe, and runs resilience workshops both in South Africa and the UK.