Wildflowers Institute, headquartered in San Francisco, offers a three-step Approach to discovering the informal ways that things get done in a community and the leaders and activities that quietly make a difference. The Wildflowers Approach is based on over thirty years of grassroots work and research in communities with millions of residents, all over the world.

Hanmin Liu and Jennifer Mei cofounded Wildflowers Institute in 1998 after spending the previous two decades training international leaders from the
fields of philanthropy, education, health care, and government. Through this accumulated experience, they learned that leaders wanted to know not only how to improve themselves, but also how to actually make sustainable social impact.

When they introduced leaders to new cultures, Hanmin and Jennifer recognized an immediate need for guidance on what was going on in these cultures, whom to trust, and how to make a difference in an unfamiliar system. After organizing dozens of cross-cultural exchanges, Hanmin and Jennifer knew that they had developed a unique methodology for helping different cultures understand each other. This methodology became the Wildflowers Approach that gave leaders and philanthropists who were not locals an understanding of how a grassroots community actually works and what the hidden informal strengths are.

Hanmin and Jennifer believe in following a low-overhead model and devoting their resources to the communities they are invited to work in. The work of Wildflowers Institute is made possible by the following foundations and corporations: