Never Forgetting Where We Came From

Can you remember the first time you stuffed an envelope with an appeal? Or wrote all 40 pages of your organization’s annual impact report? Maybe you can recall the first gift you ever asked a donor to make, face-to-face, over a grilled cheese at a diner? Or perhaps, you think back to the first time your Executive Director applauded your work as you closed the books on June 30th. 

I became a professional fundraiser when I was 23 years old, but I learned about fundraising by sitting at the kitchen table with my parents, writing volunteer names on “Hello my name is” stickers for a basketball marathon. I learned early on how to bring people together in a living room to talk about a most urgent cause and invite them to help. I also learned that if you served cake, more people would come.

Several years ago, I received a call from a client asking if I would provide comprehensive planning and implementation of their fundraising program. Although I was immersed in the work of our consulting firm and typically do not take on this type of engagement, I immediately said yes. 

I was grateful for this opportunity. It enabled me to be in the front row, watching the remarkable program directors encourage their teams. I sat in Executive leadership meetings and heard directly from the CEO about his vision and how he believed we would realize it. I was fortunate to capture stories of those impacted directly by the organization’s work.

When immersed in the work for this organization, I consistently reflected on it, asking myself, “What more do we need to do to ensure impactful fundraising? Do we have a solid base of individual donors and prospects? Is the grants portfolio manageable? What messages are resonating with clients and donors? What type of recurring gift program should we develop? How effective will the planned giving campaign be?” These questions – and many, many more – reminded me that it is essential to stay green in this work.

How can I and our firm offer advice and counsel to those on the ground if we are removed from that space? How do we speak on the trends and what works and what may not when we’re not experiencing it, hearing it, and seeing it ourselves?

Hands-on fundraising is tough. Yes, you’re soliciting contributions to support a mission that you believe in. But you’re also asking people in the hopes they will say yes. Sometimes, they don’t. And you’ll have to keep asking even though your heart may have sunk a bit when you received the rejection.

Hands-on fundraising is also essential to making an organization tick. Sure, the Board expects to raise money quickly. An Executive Director may pressure the team to move from identification to solicitation, without cultivation in between. But each step of the development process leads the organization, the Board, and the ED so much closer to ensuring that neighbors are housed, are fed, receive medical care, and are treated with compassion, dignity, and equity. 

When directing a capital campaign, while we are not immersed in the everyday operations, our responsibility as consultants is also to stand with the team – not above. When creating a new strategic plan that will hopefully guide the organization towards ongoing success, we’re responsible for making recommendations while gathering internal ideas. And when working directly with a Board as they strengthen their governance, it is up to us to ensure they all feel a shared ownership and belief in the organization they are stewarding. We can’t do this if we’re on the sidelines looking in and using the same playbook over and over.

Yes, the fundamentals of fundraising are the same as they were when the first clergymen came to the U.S. to fundraise for Harvard. But what happens in an organization has evolved – personalities, culture, and organizational character change over time. Of course, so does technology and donor attention spans. 

That one request I received years ago has reminded me what Development Directors and their teams do, and how they shift their plans, and why they communicate differently to different audiences, and how they insist cultivation must take place before asking for a gift, and what they show for it. That is the work to indeed make an organization tick. As a long-time consultant, I’m fortunate to stay green, perhaps stuff a few envelopes here and there, support a special event, strategically position leadership for the “ask”, and learn, learn, learn while watching and participating in the challenges and the victories of those organizations that do the work. With some cake in between.