Common sense fundraising and management for small non-profits.
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There isn’t a nonprofit entrepreneur in America that doesn’t hate the idea of a board of directors, of required board resolutions, of relinquishing some control through the annoyance of having to ask the board. Paperwork seems fussy, and if you wanted to be a paper-pusher you’d work in a bank.
Get over it. First, your board is your best friend, and second, the law requires compliance. I’m not crazy about the model myself, but it’s what we’ve got, and you can make it work. Read the rest of this entry »
For my state reps:
Next time the crazy lady with the pink hair (that would be me) wants to know what you think can be done for small nonprofits, here’s what you can say:
I rendered two politicians speechless today.
I once spent two years cultivating a gift. And the donor I was cultivating actually never did give me a large gift– I got a few nice dinners, some inkind stuff, a couple of auction premiums.
And then one day he called me up and told me he had just spent about 6 months working on one of his clients, and that they were donating all of the building materials and a volunteer corps for our huge project. I had been telling him about the build-out project, but hadn’t asked him to participate in it. Read the rest of this entry »
Correction. You were an artist. Now you’re an artist and a business person, so get over yourself.
Everybody wants an angel.
Along with “why don’t we just get some grants” it’s the top comment from new small nfp clients– “We just need an angel.”
Well that’s great, and if you’ve got one in (with?) the wings with a few extra $zeros lying around to give to you, go for it.
For planning purposes, I give donors a “shelf life” of 5 years. In other words, I assume 100% turnover of my entire donor base every five years .
Especially in small and even mid-sized organizations, there’s a perception that development is a support function–those are the people that set up those annoying auctions, and that know when the proposal is due.
Never doubt it, development is a core activity of your nonprofit endeavor, and there’s a reason we don’t just call it “fundraising” anymore.
