Founders of a foundation focusing on impact investing and people working with helping socially marginalised groups were honoured at an awards ceremony this week in Paris by BNP Paribas Wealth Management.

Founders of a foundation focusing on impact investing and people working with helping socially marginalised groups were honoured at an awards ceremony this week in Paris by BNP Paribas Wealth Management, part of BNP Paribas.

The bank’s 2014 Grand Prix awards went to Charly and Lisa Kleissner, founders of the KL Felicitas Foundation. They undertake global work in impact investing. The 2014 Jury’s Special Prize, meanwhile, was awarded to Tomasz and Barbara Sadowski what is called “social integration work and promotion of their social franchise model in Poland and abroad”. In the latter case, the Barka Foundation for Mutual Help “empowers and reintegrates socially marginalised groups through education, training, entrepreneurship and housing programmes”.

Along with a number of other private banking groups, BNP Paribas Wealth Management has sought to make philanthropy advice and service more than just a “nice-to-have” client offering or marketing ploy, arguing that it often enables a bank to work more closely with clients, understand them better, and do so over the long term.

The winners, BNP Paribas said in a statement, were chosen by jury made up of figures from business and charitable organisations, along with experts from civil society. The jury is chaired by Suzanne Berger, Professor of Political Science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Boston.

The bank said it was the first private banking institution to provide its clients with a comprehensive philanthropy advisory offering through the Fondation de l’Orangerie and bespoke advice. In 2008, BNP Paribas Wealth Management set up an advisory service to assist clients in their philanthropic endeavours. The bank launched that same year the BNP Paribas Wealth Management Prize for Individual Philanthropy.  .

The jury members:

Yann Arthus-Bertrand, photographer and Chairman of the Good Planet Foundation;       Bernard Faivre d’Arcier, President of the Lyon Biennial Contemporary Arts festival and of the Metz en scène concert organisation; Michael Golden, Vice Chairman of the New York Times Company; Lorenz von Habsburg, banker and board director of several listed companies; Leena Labroo, entrepreneur and director of the Mahindra & Mahindra Educational Trust. Mahindra & Mahindra is one of the top ten industrial corporations in India; Maria Nowak, Founder and President of the Association pour le droit à l'initiative économique (ADIE), which helps the unemployed set up their own business; Louis Schweitzer, former Chairman and CEO of Renault Automobile Group, former Chair of the Haute Autorité de Lutte contre les Discriminations et pour l'Égalité (HALDE), which helps to combat unfair discrimination and fights for social and economic equality; Michael de Giorgio, Founder of the Greenhouse Charity (Jury’s Special Prize winner 2012) delivers sports programmes in London's disadvantaged areas.

In addition, the 2013 winners of the BNP Paribas Awards for Individual Philanthropy were invited to sit on the jury for the 2014 Awards:

Shiv Nadar, co-founder and President of HCL and founder of the Shiv Nadar Foundation in India, and Chuck Slaughter – founder of Living Goods.