Before a nonprofit can achieve financial sustainability, the nonprofit leader has to figure out how to staff their money raising function effectively. When I conduct a Financial Model Assessment for a client, one of the sections of my final report is always focused on the nonprofit’s staffing structure and how that contributes to or detracts from the nonprofit’s ability to attract money. More often than not, a nonprofit that is struggling to bring enough money in the door is not thinking effectively about how they staff the money function.
And it typically boils down to three particular mistakes that a nonprofit’s leadership is making. These are:
1. There Is No Financing Strategy
You can’t expect to effectively staff your money raising function if you are not thinking about money in a strategic and holistic way. The very first step in structuring an effective money-raising staff is for a nonprofit’s leadership to figure out their organization’s financial model — how money should flow into and out of the organization. First you must assess what money-raising strategies fit best with your mission and core competencies. And then you need to develop a long-term financing strategy that is directly tied to the goals of your strategic plan. You can’t expect to hire people who will magically make money appear. Effective fundraisers must be driven by a smart money plan.
2. No Single Person Is In Charge of Money
Once you figure out your long-term financing strategy, you need to find (or promote from within) a person to oversee the entire money function of the organization. To truly use money as a tool, you can’t hire someone who can just write foundation grants, or someone who can just work with individual donors, or someone who can just secure government contracts. You need a single person who is thinking 100% of the time about all the ways money flows to your nonprofit. And make sure you offer enough salary to attract and retain a rockstar. It amazes me how many nonprofits expect to entice a great fundraiser by offering a salary that is comparable to someone with only a few years of experience. If you don’t have the current budget to pay a market rate, raise capacity capital to fund the first 1-2 years of the position. Once you have a great money raiser up and running, he will not only raise his own salary, but also grow your nonprofit’s overall financial engine.
3. Money Doesn’t Pervade Everyone and Everything
Finally, once you have a financing strategy and the right person to lead that strategy, then you need get everyone in the organization bought into and contributing (even in a small way) to its success — this is sometimes called creating a “culture of philanthropy.” But I would instead call it creating a “culture of mission financing,” which means every single person in the organization embraces the fact that in order to succeed in your mission, you must effectively finance that mission. Money troubles often happen when nonprofit leadership offloads all money-raising responsibility to the Development Director. You must make sure that everyone in the organization (board and staff) understand their role in bringing money in the door. Create a culture where a staff member who doesn’t have dollar goals in her job description understands that giving donor tours, providing program outcome data, or writing thank you notes are critical to keeping the organization going. And make sure your board is trained in fundraising, has countless ideas for how each of them can contribute to the financial engine, meets a give/get requirement, and achieves specific individual and full board money goals.
How you staff your nonprofit’s money-raising function is directly tied to how much money you will bring in the door. Therefore you must create a smart financing strategy, hire a staff leader to execute on that strategy, and create a culture of mission financing that ensures everyone plays a role in the financial engine.
If you need help figuring out what’s holding your nonprofit back from financial sustainability, check out the Financial Model Assessment I provide my clients.
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