Are you successful? How can you tell? Isn’t it great, to look back on a recently completed fiscal year, and say, “yes, we did it! We were successful!” But many fundraisers can’t ever experience that little bit of euphoria. Nor can their chief executives or their governing boards. It’s not [...]
Randy Hawthorne and I have a lot in common. We both run a blog, a conference and a webinar series for fundraisers, and we both opened up co-working spaces for nonprofits. What I lack is his fashion sense, a print magazine, and a podcast - like his excellent Hubcast from [...]
Ever since my very first Professional Fundraising Conference in 1983, where I met Jerry Panas for the first time, until just last year, Jerry was a fixture at nearly every single one! It was so easy to spot him. Why? He was always the person nearly everyone else went to [...]
Mission. Values. Vision. Organized, they become your brand, and your singular and compelling case for support. Together they drive everything your nonprofit does today. And everything you will do tomorrow. They are your body, heart and soul. Combined, they define your essence. They are how you are known in the [...]
"Fundraising is the only profession you can join without knowing a thing." So observes Professor Adrian Sargeant, founder of the Philanthropy Centre. And it's not the new fundraiser's fault, either. Charities that hire untrained fundraisers and then expect great results are to blame. Dr. Sargeant has been passionate for 25 [...]
I have been proud to be a part of the Fundraising Effectiveness Project every since its inception more than a decade ago. In case you are not familiar with FEP, a little background might be in order to help you realize just how important the four comparison metrics noted below [...]
The recently released and breakthrough research report entitled The Wake Up Call – A Study of Nonprofit Leadership in the U.S. and its Impending Crisis can be found in its entirety here. Nearly 1,200 nonprofit leaders participated in this research project that should sound a warning cry for nonprofit sector. [...]
Understanding what a budget is and its importance is crucial for every organization because it can be a way to achieve financial sustainability. But what is a budget exactly? Some people see it as a forecast, meaning a prediction in the future. Others see it as a target or even [...]
Finding a way to break out from our daily routines can be nearly impossible. A routine, your “normal way of doing things,” provides stability, comfort, efficiency, and even, success. But what about those areas where your routine is failing you and is causing you to be mediocre, or even to [...]
At least part of the focus of nearly every philanthropy study ranging from the Fundraising Effectiveness Project to the Giving USA Report to many others, is how flat-lined overall giving is in the United States as a percentage of GDP. This has historically hovered around 2% with very little variance over the [...]
“Nothing comes from nothing.” – King Lear speaking to his daughter Cordelia. You really, truly must spend money to raise money. If you think otherwise, you’re naïve or foolish. And you have to spend enough money. How much? Enough to get the job done without leaving money on the table. [...]
Deep down every single board member knows they need to be a financial supporter of the charity whose board they sit on. This becomes more apparent every year because of the increasing need to fund the mission of the charity through fundraising dollars. In fact, it's now virtually common [...]