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Every Day We Get to Choose

Posted on  June 15, 2020
  · No Comments

Thank you to Penn State’s head football Coach James Franklin for writing a powerful piece about the death of George Floyd. While I cannot claim to ever fully understand what it must have taken to write that statement I deeply appreciate that Coach Franklin found and shared these words. So too I appreciated the clear and direct stand taken by Penn State’s President Eric Barron.

As a white woman who watched a woman from my own sex and race target an African American man in a park, as I watched a police officer kneeling on a man’s neck, as I watched two men hunt down a black man while another filmed the event, as I read about the disproportionate number of people of color dying from COVID-18 I felt horror, grief, anger, despair, and emotions which I cannot even name. And these are just the events that have transpired within a few months, there are thousands more not mentioned here. Sensing what it must feel like to live each day with the crushing weight of hundreds of years of oppression, discrimination, and fear-mongering made the title of Robert M. Sellers piece “I am so tired” far more understandable.

While I recently served on a diversity, equity, and inclusion task group today I have a greater understanding of the magnitude and depth of the challenges faced by not only by people of color but for anyone who can be thought of or who identifies as different from the supposed norm. I realize that the hurdles are higher, the impediments more numerous, and the challenges of having a more diverse, equitable, and inclusive organization and world are bigger than I imagined.

While I do not know the right path forward I say this to my LinkedIn friends and colleagues — please know that I am committed to educate myself further, to be an advocate, and as Seth Godin says in his recent post Applying effort, to choose each day to help change happen.

“Every day, we use our resources to make change happen. Which means that every day we get to choose.”

 
Categories : Blog
Tags : #diversity #equity #inclusion #diversity matters

93 Days of Summer: What’s on Your Reading List?

Posted on  May 28, 2020
  · No Comments

If you are a fundraiser and you have not done so I highly recommend reading Gender Matters: A Guide to Growing Women’s Philanthropy by Kathleen Loehr.

Kathleen was previously with the Women’s Philanthropy Institute at IU and is now with Aspen Leadership Group – she is by far one of the world’s greatest experts on women and giving. Kathleen has written a thought-provoking piece focused on women and philanthropy. Here are a few key takeaways:

  1. Women hold an increasing amount of wealth.
  2. All donors are not the same, what works for men will not necessarily (probably will not) work with women.
  3. Stand-alone programs that focus on women as philanthropists which are not integrated into a larger vision and framework or strategy are likely to fail.

This topic matters because many if not a majority of the donors to your nonprofit are most likely women. (Don’t believe me? Run a list of your top 100 donors or 250 donors). Even if your donor base is equally balanced these questions remain:

  • Are you engaging women in ways that are meaningful to them?
  • Are you involving women in ways that will inspire them to help further your mission?

While the above may focus on women one could ask similar questions about donors from a diverse array of backgrounds. You can learn more about diversity from:

  1. Angelique Grant, Ph.D. (Senior Consultant and Certified Diversity Recruiter at Aspen Leadership Group),
  2. Armando Zumaya who also offers thought-providing perspectives about diversity, and the
  3. Association of Fundraising Professionals (AFP-IDEA — Inclusion, Diversity, Equity & Access).

You are also welcome to contact me about a presentation that I offer about diversity and fundraising.

Are you engaging women in meaningful ways that have increased their philanthropic giving to your educational institution or nonprofit? If so, what has proven successful? I look forward to hearing from you because we can all learn from one another.

Categories : Blog
Tags : #fundraising #diversity #diversityandinclusion #diversitymatters #funrdraisingdiversity #fundraisinginclusion, #womendonors, #womengive, #womenphilanthropy

1 Reason Why a Donor Might Change Her Will

Posted on  May 18, 2020
  · No Comments

What is it advisers know that some fundraisers don’t? The reasons why a donor might change her will. There are several reasons but one of the most salient ones in this time of COVID -19 is that she had or anticipates a change in her life circumstances. 

Serving as the Director of Development for a continuing care retirement community reinforced this important point. I learned that donors and prospective donors changed their wills at much later ages than fundraisers might think, even into their 80s and 90s. While not exclusively, such changes were in a number of cases prompted by a change in the donor’s circumstances such as outliving one or more heirs.

Why does this matter to you as a fundraiser? As Dr. Russell James said one of his webinars,

“Every time a donor changes her or his will it provides an opportunity to exclude, or include, a nonprofit.”

What’s a fundraiser to do? To the degree possible, keep in touch with the donors who have already told that they have included you in their estate plans. Unless the person asked to be removed from your mailing list or you know that the individual is no longer cognizant send the newsletter, make a call to see how they are doing, or even consider sending a care package (see my latest newsletter article for more on that topic, you can sign up here to receive a copy). 

Do you have a board member who thinks that a donor would never remove your nonprofit from their will? Feel free to share this story. Some years back and I a nonprofit executive visited with a donor to discuss a campaign for which we could accept estate commitments. After we talked about the campaign the donor told us that he had recently removed a nonprofit from his will and would redirect the gift to our organization. Why? Because he had informed the other organization that they were included in his will. However, even after telling the nonprofit about the estate gift he never heard a word from them, no thank you note, no welcome to our legacy society, nothing.

Feeling uncomfortable about mentioning planned giving in these times? Remember your messaging can be subtle. For example, you could simply include two lines on your BRE or on your giving reply card:

___ I have included Your Nonprofit in my will.

___ Please send me information about how to include Your Nonprofit in my will.

Need convincing that just two lines can have an impact? I volunteered with a nonprofit that included these lines on their giving card for years. They nearly removed these lines from their annual gift pledge card because a volunteer said: “Only one person has ever checked the box, this is a waste of time.” After some impact storytelling took place over the next year seven couples/individuals checked one of these boxes. Would you be thrilled if seven new donors told you that they had included you in their estate plans? 

Want to know more about planned giving? Feel free to give me a shout out at i5fundraising.com. 

Categories : Blog
Tags : #plannedgiving #legacygiving #estategifts

Flipping the Focus: Fundraising Impacts Donors

Posted on  April 26, 2020
  · No Comments

Little did I know when I first wrote the article below in mid-2019 that we would be in the midst of a pandemic less than a year later. I’m resharing this piece because while your nonprofit undoubtedly needs money now, maybe to survive, donors also have needs.

Now more than ever donors have the need to know that their lives, which have the potential to be cut short, matter. I share this as a reminder to keep in mind the positive impact that we can have on donors. The reality is that whether or not we are living in challenging times when we consider how our actions impact donors it can lead to longer-term loyalty on their part and to lager gifts and joy for all.

Here’s the article with a few edits made in light of the times in which we live:

Five I’s – Identify, Inform, Involve, Invest, and Impact. These five simple words guide my work with nonprofits. This is true whether we are engaged in a development audit, a capital campaign, or planning board training.

When talking about impact the focus is on telling stories about the ways in which gifts can change or save the lives of those who benefit. Three things prompted me to flip the focus to the impact of our work on donors:

1. Reading Ron Schiller’s book Belief and Confidence (Ron is with Aspen Leadership Group).

2. Jeff Brooks’ (Future Fundraising Now) post How you are improving donors’ lives.

3. Jennifer Harris’ article about her first authentic ask (Giving Tomorrow, Issue 9, plannedgiving.com).

What do these seemingly disparate items have in common? They speak to a reality:

Fundraisers impact the lives of donors.

If you have seen Rent or heard the finale Seasons of Love you know that we all have the same number of minutes in a year 525,600.

Many of those minutes are taken up by the day-to-day –working, sleeping, and eating. Others are taking care of an elderly parent, are getting divorced, or planning a memorial service for a family member (and more sadly so during this pandemic because the service may not occur for months). 

In these cases, minutes suddenly seem more precious than ever and fly by at a very fast clip! When you connect with a donor, whether by mail, phone, or Zoom you are using up their minutes! This time is precious because it can’t be reclaimed – that time is a gift!! 

1. As you prepare to connect with donors do you consider the sort of impact that the donor hopes to have?

2. Have you ever asked a donor, as Ron suggests in his book, what THEY hope to see transpire as a result of making a gift?

3. When you write an appeal or annual report is the focus all about your organization or on donors? For more on this visit, Tom Ahern’s site or read #9 Love Your Donors from Pamela Grow.

Today I invite you to flip the focus. If you can’t answer the above questions schedule some phone calls or Zoom meetings with donors.

1. Let the donor know that you are not asking for a gift but want to check in and learn what is motivating them and helping them to keep going.

2. If you are considering sending out an appeal you could ask your loyal donors what they hope might transpire as a result of making a current or a future gift. Be clear that you are not asking for a gift, rather that you are being sensitive to the times in which we live and seeking their advice and counsel about how to word a request for funding.

3. Finally, thank the donor for giving of her time because it is one of the most precious gifts of all.

Sophie is the founder of i5 Fundraising, her mission is to help nonprofits raise more money to change and save more lives.

Categories : Blog
Tags : #fundraising #donors #giving #charitablegiving #donorfocus #donorlove

Be a breath of fresh air for donors

Posted on  March 29, 2020
  · No Comments

My last post was titled Time to Put on Your Oxygen Mask. While you may be able to assist others for a short time, if you don’t take care of yourself first it’s impossible to provide support to others over the long term.

This may seem raw to some but I believe it’s time to fundraisers to stop and think about our donors on a deeper level than you may have ever before. Those at the greatest risk from Covid 19 are elders, people who are 80+. The next most at risk are people in their 70’s, 60s, and people with chronic conditions. 

1. Which of the donors that support your nonprofit are in their 60s, 70s, or 80s?

2. Who has a chronic condition of which you are aware?

I have little doubt that many of the most loyal and generous donors who choose to include your organization among the group which they support fall into one or even both of these categories. 

I was reminded of how an older person might feel at this time by a fellow campaign committee member. This a man in his 80s who is a highly respected and valued member of the organization for which the funds are being raised. Couched in an email chain was a line that read something such as

“While I hope to see this project come to fruition I don’t know how much time I have left given the spread of this virus.”

This note was gut-wrenching. My eyes teared up when the reality behind his statement hit me. This person whom we have loved and respected — who has given his time, talent, and treasure — feels he might be measuring his life by a much shorter time frame.

If you have ever read “How to Say it to Seniors” (David Solie) you know that those who believe that they are reaching the end of life

want to know that their lives mattered.

You can provide a breath of fresh air to a donor by letting them know that they have made a difference, that their life has mattered. 

As you move through this crisis things will hopefully settle for you. Now that you’ve mastered, or at least aren’t making a fool of yourself on Zoom and have figured out other word-at-home tricks you may find that you have more time than expected because your commute is now from the kitchen to your home office.

What could you do with this time? You can be in touch with the donors who have made a conscious choice to support the nonprofit which you serve. (FYI see why I use this terminology in She is not YOUR Donor!) Consider this:

Call two or write to two donors today, two tomorrow, and two the next day.

  • Identify those most in need of a note of thanks and support based on age, health, not having family, etc.
  • Inform them that they have made a difference.
  • It might sound a bit challenging to do but involve them by saying something such as “if only you could see staff pitching in and clients being served despite this crisis” then tell a story.
  • Invest your time, not by asking for a gift but by giving back to those who gave.
  • Impact — Share a short story about how one of your clients or staff is making it through this time thanks to donor support.

And leave it at that, just say thanks maybe share an inspiring story. Most of all, if you make a call be prepared to listen — if ever there were a time to build a deeper bond with a donor it is now.

If you are looking for more on this topic you might want to read

  • Fundraisers Harbingers of Hope
  • Flip the Focus: Fundraising’s Impact on Donors

Are you keeping in touch with donors? What are you hearing from them? I hope that you will share because we can all learn from one another.

Categories : Blog
Tags : #donors #donorlove #donorloyalty #loyalgiving #stewardship #fundraising, #fundraising #charities #charitablegiving #5i'sfundraising #giving
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Recent Posts

  • Every Day We Get to Choose
  • 93 Days of Summer: What’s on Your Reading List?
  • 1 Reason Why a Donor Might Change Her Will
  • Flipping the Focus: Fundraising Impacts Donors
  • Be a breath of fresh air for donors
"I have often spoken about the importance of intentionality in philanthropy: that it has to stir the soul. This is true whether you are feeding the homeless, mentoring a child or working on climate change."

Charles Bronfman
"The results of philanthropy are always beyond calculation."

Mary Ritter Beard
"There is no passion to be found playing small - in settling for a life that is less than the one you are capable of living."

Nelson Mandela
“I don’t wish to be successful but I definitely wish to be successful in helping someone, sometime for something good.”

Manasa Rao Saarloos
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