It might seem like everyone’s getting in the game, but if your brought together every wealth manager in the country who was actually advising on philanthropy (and not just on how to reduce taxes via charitable giving), you’d still need a handful of your seasoned peers to field a baseball team.

For most wealth managers, philanthropy is just a pretty sounding hook to get in front of a client.

Everyone is getting in on it.

Last week my bait shop offered discounts on its strategic philanthropy consulting with each purchase of a tub of red wigglers.

I am sure that the field will dabble with ethics, conflicts of interest, and standards of practices about as well as the mainstream foundations do.

What concerns me is that the full service wealthateria or wealth-o-rama shop may perpetuate the lack of accountability, isolation, lack of transparency, and lack of diversity that befuddles its seasoned peers.

Despite the complaints of one of my colleagues who think most wealth manager philanthro-newbies are “greedy suits that are dumber than a box of hair”, I think the new voices in the conversation is a good thing.