The Fundraising Talent Podcast

Latest Episodes:

How can fundraisers ensure their organizations more than transactions? Sep 27, 2022

Show notes

Today’s podcast conversation with Ray Gary was fantastic. Why? Because Ray evidently doesn’t relate to the world like a technocrat who is convinced tech will save the planet. Ray certainly understands the role technology can and should play; however, he also understands that technology can’t be expected to do all the heavy lifting. Ray wants to see generosity become a habit and lifestyle rather than a one-off transactional experience that we’re often counting on technology to ensure happens. As the founder and CEO of IDonate, Ray believes that if applied correctly technology can amplify the good that the sector is already doing.

Our conversation today went in all sorts of directions - everywhere from why the nonprofit sector is so CRM centric to what Peloton can teach us about being a part of a dynamic community. Ray describes Peloton as an example of how an organization can transform a product or service into way of life. Ray explains that what makes Peloton such a remarkable concept is much less about the exercise bike and a lot about the community of Peloton users. Our conversation about the popularity of Peloton begs the question of how charitable organizations might create more community-centered experiences that allow their donors to form meaningful relationships with others who share a commitment to the same cause.

As always, we are especially grateful to our friends at CueBack for sponsoring The Fundraising Talent Podcast.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit fundraisingtalent.substack.com

Do our board recruitment strategies align with our DEI aspirations? Sep 12, 2022

Show notes

My guest today on The Fundraising Talent Podcast is Paulina Artieda, executive director for The New Philanthropists, an organization that works to create more racially diverse and inclusive nonprofit boards in Austin. Their mission is to build a pipeline to leadership for people of color; cultivate diversity, equity, and inclusion among mainstream nonprofit boards; and enable nonprofits to be more effective stewards of public trust and to produce better outcomes for the people they serve. My conversation today with Paulina begs the question of whether our board recruitment strategies align with our DEI aspirations.

As Paulina and I got warmed up, we started wrestling with some of the questions boards should be asking themselves. Is it time to abandon any semblance of “give, get or get off,” the privilege of board members “buying” their way into their seats, or the habit of recruiting individuals who sit on boards everywhere else? What Paulina and her team want us to make sense of is that a board member is more than their financial gift, that boards have to ready themselves for cultural shifts, and that it all begins with cultivating genuine relationships. What I most appreciated about this conversation was how often we reminded ourselves that recruitment to any role, be it board members, major donors, or volunteers, needs to begin with our genuine desire to be in relationship those who are different from ourselves.

As always, we are especially grateful to our friends at CueBack for sponsoring The Fundraising Talent Podcast.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit fundraisingtalent.substack.com

What if more nonprofits accurately reflected the communities they serve? Sep 08, 2022

Show notes

Madge challenged us this morning by asking what would it look like if more nonprofits accurately reflected the communities their organizations served. This is one of the conversations I have with my students every spring, and my career has afforded me opportunities to see where we’re getting this right and wrong. How do we ensure that our boards and bosses have a grasp of who they are serving and why? As Madge explained, studies have shown that less than 20% of nonprofits are led by people of color while the vast majority of our nonprofits serve communities of color. Much of our conversation today was about making sense of how to change this reality.

Madge is the CEO at Mission Capital, a capacity building organization in Austin, that has been serving the region’s nonprofits for over 20 years. As Madge shared with me, Mission Capital’s explicit goals are three-fold: to close the racial leadership gap, to increase organizational resilience and sustainability, and to expand collaborative networks. What I most appreciated about our conversation today was how Madge described the organization as a place where the diversity of our sector can show up, where messiness is expected to happen, and where everyone leaves stronger by having participated in the conversation.

The team at Mission Capital are individuals who are passionate about serving their community. They envision a Central Texas where leaders feel empowered to elevate their voices and where organizations are equipped to fulfill their missions. Our team at Responsive is delighted to be partnered with Madge and her team at Mission Capital as they host the first stop on our roadshow next week in Austin. If you’re interested in attending, sign up via our website here.

As always, we are especially grateful to our friends at CueBack for sponsoring The Fundraising Talent Podcast.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit fundraisingtalent.substack.com

Does fundraising have a bad case of shiny new toy syndrome? Aug 30, 2022

Show notes

One of our goals with our roadshow is to shine a spotlight on highly capable individuals who are helping their local nonprofit community to thrive. One such individual is Cat, founder of the Giant Squid Group, who I’m delighted will be a part of the lineup for our upcoming roadshow stop in Austin on September 16th.

In our conversation today, Cat and I connected the dots between fundraising’s bad case of shiny new toy syndrome and the realization that a lot of these new toys aren’t actually delivering on their promises. What concerns Cat is the effect that these shiny new toys have on the professional development of young fundraisers and whether these new toys get in the way of learning how fundraising really works. Cat’s critique is similar to that of Lucy Bernholz who describes the effect of the “givingscape” as commodifying giving rather than democratizing it.

Today’s conversation has us asking whether making charitable giving fast, easy, and painless is really what we’re after or whether removing all the friction has the unintended consequence of making renewing donor’s support more challenging. As I often say, how we go about soliciting the initial gift will have a bearing on whether we can successfully secure the subsequent gift.

If you would like to join Cat, Michelle, and myself in Austin for the first stop on the Resonsive Fudnraisinb Roadshow, we would be delighted to have you join us. To register, visit our website here.

As always, we are especially grateful to our friends at CueBack for sponsoring The Fundraising Talent Podcast.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit fundraisingtalent.substack.com

Has the window of opportunity for greater fundraising self-care begun to close? Aug 23, 2022

Show notes

Earlier this year, Evan wrote an article for Candid’s Philanthropy News Digest entitled “We need a ‘Nonprofit Development Bill of Rights’” wherein he insisted that the time for “us” has arrived. If the past two years have taught us anything, it’s that self-care and psychological safety have moved front and center; and we owe it to ourselves — and our donors — to make sure we take care of ourselves. Evan’s proposed “bill of rights” is not anything most of us would expect for our ourselves and our employers no matter the role in which we happen to be.

Since this publication, Evan has had many opportunities to discuss and explore his ideas with friends an colleagues. Unfortunately, what concerns Evan today, less than six months since his article’s publication, is that the window of opportunity for getting some of these things right for our professional community seems to be closing too quickly. While Evan is positive about the progress we have made, he’s concerned that perhaps we’re already evolving back to our pre-2020 organizational behavior. Evan is asking whether we have made as much progress as we think we have.

As always, we are especially grateful to our friends at CueBack for sponsoring The Fundraising Talent Podcast.

To read Evan’s article, “We need a ‘Nonprofit Development Bill of Rights”, visit this website here.

If you’d like to register for one of Responsive Fundraising’s upcoming roadshows, visit their website here.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit fundraisingtalent.substack.com

How do we make professional development more accessible? Aug 16, 2022

Show notes

If there is anything that my twenty-plus years in this space has revealed, it’s that professional associations have a way of getting themselves into a mess of trouble. While I’m sure the reasons for this can simmer up from just about anywhere, I suspect most of the trouble is emerges in between the inclination to create rulebooks for how to most ethically get the job done and the need to ensure that their sponsors are happy enough to underwrite next year’s conference. Recently, after watching yet another group of members unravel their disappointments with conference organizers in the Twitterverse, I began to wonder how long these associations will be able to maintain their role as fundraising’s gate-keepers to professional development and networking.

I had a hunch that our friends at FundraisingEverywhere might have some ideas about how traditional associations might keep themselves out of trouble. In 2019, Nikki and Simon founded FundraisingEverywhere in order to answer a similar question; how do we make professional development and networking opportunities more accessible to more fundraisers? Their timing couldn’t have been better; with prohibitive fees increasingly scaring fundraisers away from association membership and insiders increasingly dominating the conversation, Nikki and Simon launched a platform that is now hosting some of fundraising’s most important conversations.

As always, we are especially grateful to our friends at CueBack for sponsoring The Fundraising Talent Podcast.

To learn more about upcoming events at FundraisingEverywhere, visit their website here.

If you’d like to register for one of Responsive Fundraising’s upcoming roadshows, visit their website here.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit fundraisingtalent.substack.com

324 | What if we incentivize sticking around rather than raising lots of money? Aug 12, 2022

Show notes

I have often advised employers to bet on time rather than money. More often than not, the opportunities for fundraisers to raise serious money are there; the question is whether we can keep our fundraisers around long enough to prove it. My conversation today with Stephanie echoes this point; in order to get this right we have to think more holistically about the jobs we are creating for fundraisers to fill. As Stephanie explained, it’s going to come down to meaningful work and competitive compensation. In my mind, meaningful work is largely a matter of how long they stay in the role rather than how much money they raise. We have to create environments where fundraisers can thrive.

I would insist that too much of the conversation about professional turnover has always been about addressing one side of the time/pay equation while ignoring the other; we’ll pay fundraisers well, but who gives a damn whether they want to stick around. Stephanie and I wrapped up today where I hoped we would, asking whether we can persuade employers to incentivize sticking around rather than raising a lots of cash. The more we make sense of how fundraising really works, the more we discover that money raised is an outcome of longevity in the position. If organizations are stuck in lane one, they’re not experiencing fundraising as meaningful work and there isn’t enough margin for meeting everyone’s expectations.

As always, we are especially grateful to our friends at CueBack for sponsoring The Fundraising Talent Podcast.

If you’d like to register for one of Responsive Fundraising’s upcoming roadshows, visit their website here.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit fundraisingtalent.substack.com

Can fundraising embrace the science of muddling through? Jul 30, 2022

Show notes

As I shared with Andy today, I recall one of his books being among the first that I read early in my career. Now, more than two decades later, it was a pleasure to find so much common ground in how we think about fundraising. Perhaps what I most appreciated about our conversation was that Andy wants fundraisers to enjoy space where the metrics aren’t the focus and where collecting a check isn’t the only goal. As I have said many times myself, we have to afford the relationship the opportunity to do at least some of the job for us.

Andy wants fundraisers and their employers to be more comfortable with ambiguity because our world seems to get more complex and unpredictable by the day; Andy insists that developing a tolerance for ambiguity is a good trait to have. As studies demonstrated decades ago, Andy wants boards and nonprofit leaders to appreciate the fact that muddling through can sometimes be as good an approach as a well-structured and highly detailed strategy.

As always, we are especially grateful to our friends at CueBack for sponsoring The Fundraising Talent.

If you’d like to learn more about Responsive Fundraising’s sense-making retreats, email me for more information.

If you’d like to learn more about the messy middle, download our free white paper entitled, Making sense of the messy middle.

For more information about the upcoming Nonprofit Consulting Conference, visit their website here.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit fundraisingtalent.substack.com

Why don’t fundraising wizards talk about the messy middle? Jul 23, 2022

Show notes

Early in my career, I figured out pretty quickly that the fundraising wizards want nothing to do with the messy middle. Instead, half of them decide to become overly-invested in new donor acquisition while the other half try to one-up each other in the billionaire campaign club. In this kind of environment, it’s no wonder everything feels so transactional, donor attrition is what it is, and our fundraisers are fed up. Blame the wizards.

Today, I sat down with Laurel and Noah, two members of Responsive’s team who, like myself, have made a lot of sense of why the fundraising community, consultancies in particular, won’t talk about the messy middle. What Laurel and Noah have discovered is that the messy middle is where fundraisers have the opportunity to shine, where their employers make sense of how it all actually works, and where the wizards start to feel like they’re getting in the way.

As Laurel and Noah discuss in todays podcast conversation, the messy middle isn’t about the timing of, size of, or who gets credit for a donor’s contribution. The messy middle is where the organization makes an intentional decision to prioritize their relationships ahead of the gift - where the donor becomes a citizen rather than a mere consumer. The messy middle is where, as Laurel describes, the job becomes more than that of being a master technician who runs a “fundraising machine.” As Noah describes it, the messy middle is where those on both sides of the exchange can be known, understood, and listened to as human beings.

As always, we are especially grateful to our friends at CueBack for sponsoring The Fundraising Talent Podcast. If you’d like to learn more about Responsive Fundraising’s sense-making retreats, email me for more information. If you’d like to learn more about the messy middle, reach out to either Laurel or Noah for a conversation, and/or download our free white paper entitled, Making sense of the messy middle.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit fundraisingtalent.substack.com

Are fundraisers being more selective about whom they work for? Jul 15, 2022

Show notes

What I have found enlightening about my conversations with Michelle is her studies in anthropology and her active involvement in several well-organized discussions aimed at addressing some of our sector’s enduring challenges. What I also find noteworthy is that, while some might like to accuse such discussion groups of over-thinking, the colleagues who are seated at the table with Michelle certainly don’t see it this way. Today’s conversations with Michelle confirms that our sector will never reach higher aspirations without asking some tough questions.

When I asked what Michelle believed was the common thread among the conversations she is a part of, she described a heightened awareness that what got us here isn’t going to be adaquate for the road ahead. While fundraisers may have tolerated being part of an intervening subculture in the past, they are now insisting on more active and influential roles. Michelle explains that her peers are well aware of the fact that the status quo is flawed and that the boards and bosses who want to hire them are highly resistant to change. All this means that fundraisers need to be savvier about their job descriptions and a bit more selective about whom they sign on with.

As always, we are especially grateful to our friends at CueBack for sponsoring The Fundraising Talent Podcast. If you’d like to learn more about Responsive Fundraising’s sense-making retreats, email me for more information. If you’d like to learn more about the conversations that Michelle and her colleagues are a part of, visit these websites for more information.

Community-Centric Fundraising

The Donor Participation Project

Association of Fundraising Professionals - Austin Chapter

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit fundraisingtalent.substack.com

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