Clik here to view.
Putting Your Best Foot Forward
Last week I spoke with the Board of Trustees at a really special social service agency. My topic was fundraising and I was brilliant. Not, mind you, quite as brilliant as I had been in the shower...
View ArticleClik here to view.
A Meditation on Rejection
I could lie to you. I could tell you that it’s not personal. You’ll learn to shake it off just like a dog shakes off water. Besides, every door that closes leads to another one to open. Or some...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Boards as Partners in Development
Last time, I wrote in response to a reader’s question about who evaluates the Board. That reader, Hassan, has again raised an important question: “… we say that one of the responsibilities for the...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Get Out of the Office
Jeff Brooks, blogger extraordinaire, writes in his Future Fundraising blog (http://www.futurefundraisingnow.com/future-fundraising/) about the importance of getting out of the office and working in a...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Make Me Care
I can’t quite keep up with Jeff Brooks. I keep reading blogs of his I want to comment on, but then he posts three more. So this is a couple of postings back, but in Crummy Copy Hurts he makes …...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Bad Car-Ma
It was pretty early in the morning. The freeway was moving at a rapid clip, and I was grateful as I had a long drive before I got from the Westside of LA to Victorville where I was teaching a …...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Keeping An Open Mind
I am not an event person. I don’t like gala dinners, carnivals, poker nights. And I especially don’t like them as fundraisers. I think they are ineffective and costly. I believe that there are so...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Building a Culture of Philanthropy
It was mid-summer, so my colleague Chuck Trione and I thought that the crowd would be small. Instead, more than 80 people showed up for our presentation on “How to Create a Culture of Philanthropy.”...
View ArticleClik here to view.
10 Sure Fire Ways to Fire Up Your Donors
I know—it’s the start of a new year, but you’ve got the same old donor pool and they, frankly, are getting fatigued. And you don’t like to think of it as “going back to the well,” or “hitting on the …...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Don’t Decide For Your Donors
That sound—it’s a door slamming shut. And too often, the person doing the shutting is not who you think it might be. It’s not the prospect saying, “No, I don’t want to support your organization.”...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Teaching Board Members to Fundraise
The board member was contrite, but she couldn’t—just could not—ask her friends for a contribution. Across the table, another board member nodded his head. “It’s too embarrassing,” he told me....
View ArticleClik here to view.
Meeting Your Donors Where They Are
When I first started consulting, one of the best consultants I know—Carol Hass—gave me the best advice: Always, she said, meet your clients where they are. Not where you want them to be; not even...
View ArticleClik here to view.
The Cost of A Development Director
She is committed, good at her job, raises a lot of money, and is woefully underpaid. So, so did the reasonable thing—based on her performance, she asked for a raise. Oh no, said the organization...
View ArticleClik here to view.
The Big Fundraising Point
In the past week, Dr. Dre and music producer Jimmy Iovine donated $70 million dollars to USC. The gift, according to USC publicists, is to create the USC Iovine and Young Academy for the Arts,...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Developing a Fundraising Habit
A habit, it is believed, takes about 21 days to develop. Whether you believe those numbers or not, I do know that whenever I have a break in my routine, I find it really hard to get back on track. …...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Doggedly Successful
Barbara Clegg a much wiser coach than I is clear that if the coach is working harder than the client, the coaching isn’t working. In theory I believe that, but in practice, I find that is not always...
View ArticleClik here to view.
No Kvetching
On my bad days, a benign “hi” can get me wondering what the person really means. On good days, even an emphatic rejection can strike me as an opportunity. Unique as I would to believe myself, I know...
View ArticleClik here to view.
About That Fundraising Plan
How many of you would set out on a trip to get to a very important appointment somewhere you’ve never travelled before without first mapping out how you are going to get there? And yet, we do this...
View ArticleClik here to view.
That Insidious Comfort Zone
Many of my individual coaching clients are development types stuck in jobs that no longer interest them. It is time for them to move on, but something is holding them back. That something manifests...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Moving Donors Up
He was jazzed. The hospital he supported with small, annual gifts had invited him to take a private tour, and during that tour, he got to meet and talk with some of the research doctors. The lab...
View Article
