Creating more strategic, financially savvy, and confident nonprofit leaders and organizations.
Beyond the mistakes nonprofit leaders often make in staffing their fundraising function, the relationship itself between a nonprofit executive director and the development director (or whatever you call the staff person in charge of bringing money in the door) can often be fraught. In an ideal world, the executive director and development director have a symbiotic […]
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 […]
I was speaking to a group of nonprofit leaders in Pittsburgh last month about how to Move From Fundraising to Financing and there were some parts of the presentation that raised eyebrows and (sometimes) controversy. And it usually happened around the topic of the nonprofit board. I strongly believe that the board of directors is a nonprofit’s most […]
Sometimes I work with nonprofits that are really stuck. They have been spinning their wheels for months (maybe years) and can’t seem to get out of a vicious cycle that might include insufficient funding, a disengaged board of directors, struggling programs, or an inability to articulate their value to outsiders. They continue to have the same conversations […]
One of the things I love about summer – aside from the obvious loves like swimming, family trips and watermelon – is that the slower pace allows time to take a step back and find a better way forward. For nonprofit leaders, summer is a great time to take a hard look at how you bring money […]
I am really in to Slideshare lately. I uploaded my first Slideshare presentation, Calculating the Cost of Fundraising, last month and people seemed to really like it. So I plan to create regular Slideshare presentations and share them on the Social Velocity Slideshare site. Today’s Slideshare is 7 Ways to Kiss Fundraising Goodbye. Traditional nonprofit fundraising […]
I am amazed by the reaction of some nonprofit leaders when faced with a budget shortfall. Some simply shake their head in innocent confusion, some blame an “inexperienced” development director or a “checked-out” board, and others throw together a knee-jerk fundraising event in order to stem the tide. But a much better approach, when you […]
If I had one wish for the nonprofit sector in this new year it would be for nonprofits to get much smarter about money and finally start using it as a robust, strategic tool for creating more social change. But you can’t get smarter about something that you fear, or don’t understand, or avoid, or […]
I am delighted to announce today’s release of the newest volume in the Financing Not Fundraising e-book series, Financing Not Fundraising, vol. 3. The idea behind Financing Not Fundraising is that the traditional way nonprofit leaders, boards and donors have approached funding the work of nonprofits doesn’t work anymore. Traditional nonprofit fundraising forces nonprofits to […]
Note: I wrote the following article for the Summer Issue of Advancing Philanthropy. You can download the Nonprofit Finance section of the magazine, of which this article is part, on the Association of Fundraising Professionals website here. It has been a really difficult few years for nonprofits, particularly their fundraisers. But the bad news is […]
