Hi Bloomerang readers! Guest blogger Mazarine Treyz of Wild Woman Fundraising here. I’m a nonprofit consultant in leadership and fundraising. For the last four years I’ve run two online conferences that Bloomerang has sponsored, The Fundraising Career Conference and the Nonprofit Leadership Summit. This means I’m a nonprofit worker advocate [...]
Are you tired of nothing getting done the way you want in your office? Are you managing a bunch of people but feeling like they don’t have enough motivation? Do you feel like it’s hard to motivate people in nonprofits? What if there were a better way to motivate people, [...]
Every so often, a scandal puts a nonprofit all over social media, newspaper headlines, and the evening news. For those of us working within those organizations, it can be a heart-wrenching time. Whether you are actively involved in communications, development, or administrative roles, a scandal can make the core foundation [...]
For many nonprofit organizations, it can be difficult to measure fundraising effectiveness when it comes to strategy. Especially since there is an old-school and misguided belief by many people that fundraising expenses are bad. On the surface, this belief sounds good. Shouldn’t all money in an organization go towards program [...]
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 [...]
Every nonprofit should be consistently asking its board members for gifts. 100% of your Board giving is a critical number for long-term sustainability. Your board should be your most rabid supporters -- they need to put their money up as well. Assuming you're getting 100% giving from your Board, are [...]
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 [...]
Why sustainability? The modern consumer is savvy and shrewd, and today’s donor is no different. Whether they’re an individual, a foundation or a corporation, donors never have been more judicious about who they give their hard-earned dollars to. Unfortunately, many nonprofits lack similar information demanded of those who might consider [...]
I've helped to manage my fair share of events: from small intimate dinner parties to galas that raise $200K. For the effort that goes into planning and executing any event, a nonprofit needs to be very pointed about what they are looking to achieve. My favorite ones are those that [...]
As much as I harp on the need for nonprofits to have their boards engage with elements of the strategic plan, it should be no surprise that many fundraisers ask me what they should do if no strategic plan is in place. Obviously, my first answer is always to implore [...]
After attending nonprofit board meetings for the last 30 years with organizations ranging from brand new 501c3’s to larger established ones, it surprises me to say that the best board meeting I ever attended was my first board meeting ever. It was a cold Saturday in January. The organization was [...]
Once any person associated with the nonprofit world reads the extremely revealing and recently released Oliver Wyman report entitled: “The Financial Health of the United Stated Nonprofit Sector,” they will be seeking actions to alleviate most, if not all of the key findings outlined below if any of them apply. [...]