Things I wish Boards knew #1

A "prospect" is not "someone we've heard has money."

Here are some things I've been told as a consultant:

• We have a portfolio of prospects, we just need someone to manage the relationships.
• We have more than 100 local prospects who are waiting to be contacted.
• Each of our board members has provided a list of 10 prospects, but our development staff hasn't been able to close a single gift.

I can't tell you how many times I've heard a variation on this theme...and not once has it been what I would call "true."

The board members telling me about their large numbers of prospects aren't (for the most part) trying to confuse or mislead me.  They're misleading themselves with an earnest belief in these "prospects."  But having a list of people (even a well researched list, where you have a specific and accurate estimate of capacity - the reliable measure of wealth) that is essentially plucked out of a phone book is just that - a list of names that no more belongs to you than any other list of names of people in your community.

A prospect is something much much more.

A prospect is someone that you have reason to believe would be interested in supporting your organization if you got the chance to talk to them.  Perhaps they are a friend of someone already connected to your organization, and that person tells you they're interested in some aspect of what you're doing.  (Preferably, that person will also make an introduction!)  Perhaps they have a history of supporting many organizations that share your general mission or vision (e.g., if you do anti-poverty work, they support three organizations that come at it from a different angle or work in a different region).  Perhaps they have a family connection to your mission.  (e.g., if you are a disease research foundation, they have a sibling who has fought the disease you're trying to cure)  Perhaps they have made public statements about supporting social enterprise in their hometown, and you just happen to fit that bill.  There are nearly infinite ways that someone might pop onto your radar - but "having money" isn't enough.

Let me say that again: Being rich does not obligate someone to give you money.  I don't care who you are, or how deserving you feel your organization is.

Here's the hard hard work that has to go into successful fundraising: you have to take people with known capacity and research them to figure out whether your organization has a chance at being a good fit for them.  You have to find a way to reach them so that you can make your pitch.  You have to make a good pitch...and that pitch is rarely "give us money," it's "here's why you should get to know us."  THEN you work your way towards "What would make you want to support us financially" and close with "Can you give us some money?", which will only work some of the time.

If you are a board member, there's no quicker way to convince a great development officer that they're going to be persecuted at your organization than to keep conflating "people who sound rich" with "prospects."  That's so far from the truth that there's no way to succeed if you think everyone with a house in a really nice zip code is just waiting to give you money if you just send a professional to ask them.

I am willing to sympathize though: over 90% of board members (from some study cited at a conference I went to - forgive me, but that's a "truthy" number nonetheless) have never had formal development training as part of their board orientation.   If you are on a board, take the time to learn how development works, and what role you can and should play for your specific organization.  I'll offer some additional tips on fundraising from a board perspective in this column, and please send me questions for the mailbag!

But in the meantime, this is Board Sin #1.  Cut it out.  Not only are you setting your expectations stupidly high on a foundation of sand, but you'll damage the morale of your professional team. And shame your fellow board members who haven't gotten the memo.  (Gently or publicly, whatever gets the message across best.)

Don't forget to laugh

Someone forwarded me an article yesterday on sleep deprivation and mothers of young children.  A sweet and hilarious personal essay recounting great stories like "I walked into a wall and sent my kid to school with an onion instead of an apple" and "that time when I almost fell asleep while walking a couple of blocks with my kid in a baby carrier."  When you truly love the best parts of your job (yes, being a mom is a job - though it won't pay the bills and it's *really* hard to quit), you can laugh at the ridiculous bits.  You know, the ridiculous bits that test your every limit and make you want to cry or hit something; the ridiculous bits that might make someone who's never experienced such a thing smile, but makes instant compatriots out of those who share the experience and gives members of the sister/brotherhood a chance to laugh loudly and deeply, with real guffaws.  I personally laugh in the face of utter exhaustion.

Which is all to say: Fundraisers have a lot to laugh about.  This gig (paid or volunteer) is crazy.  It's hard.  And people are crazy, which makes asking them for money even crazier, and harder.

You need a good laugh.

I can't recommend fundraisergrrl strongly enough for a quick pick-me-up.  I have smiled, I have laughed out loud.  Yes, I say, yes!

Go check her out at fundraisergrrl.tumblr.com

For You: Tricks for improving your creativity

Ever feel burned out at work?  Perhaps it isn't bad enough that you'd call it burn out - you're on autopilot, or just simply uninspired.

Learning ways to hit the "reset" button on your creativity is a phenomenally useful trick.

Here are two exercises you can try immediately.

1. Take a walk.

It's not quite as simple as taking a walk.  You need to take a walk somewhere that isn't thoroughly familiar to you, so turn left where you usually turn right to get your coffee at that cute little shop and keep wandering.

When you're walking in unfamiliar terrain, your brain is forced out of autopilot into a state of higher vigilance.  You'll be less able to focus on doing other tasks while you're walking (I wasn't going to recommend you take work with you, beyond maybe a phone for conversational work calls - nothing that would require you take notes), but when you get back to your desk you will remain more alert for a while.  That means you'll be noticing more, and be primed to react more strongly.  It'll feel like instinct.

Bonus: recent studies suggest that walking 40 minutes, 3 times a week helps you retain connectivity as you age - which means better performance on cognitive tasks.

2. Spend 15 minutes each morning making a list.

Nope.  Not a To Do list.  Those are also great, but a subject for a different day.  You're going to set a timer and write a list that engages your creative self.  The time factor is important - it's really hard to remain at this task for 15 minutes, but the push past difficulty is part of what we're doing.  It's also very hard to make a list for that long without starting to think differently...we get the obvious out of the way, and we start to take joy in what we're noticing next, in our unique perspective and observations, perhaps in our clever vocabulary.

So what kind of lists are we talking about?  There aren't that many wrong answers, we're looking for categories that you can either observe or imagine in detail.  Lists like:

• Things I can see out my window
• Things that are in my refrigerator
• Accessories and what I wear them with
• How I describe my colleagues' haircuts
• What I remember about being 12
• Superpowers that I would give people I know
• What I smelled on my walk to work

It can be straightforward (looking out the window) or whimsical (superpowers) - don't spend too much time thinking about the category, work to make your list.  Make a list every day as part of your daily routine.  15 minutes, no cheating.

The lists will be useless after they're made.  Go ahead and throw them out.  You're not writing poetry.  But you are training yourself to be creative on demand, and like a muscle sculpted by lots of hard work, you'll get to flex and show off the next time you need to brainstorm or otherwise figure your way around an obstacle at work.

Oh, this?  These are my CREATIVITY guns.  I made them with my mind.

Housekeeping and apologies

Fridays for You - this week on Monday.  Alas, I am having trouble with the auto-publish feature on this blog.

It's probably me.  Safe money is that I'm doing something wrong.  But still, for the next week, bear with me as I publish irregularly.  I have a consulting practice that will take most of my time for a few days.

I'll do my best!!!

And hey - this is a great opportunity to rename my personal development/leadership posts.  Any ideas?

Article Review: For Academics

There is a strange thing that happens in Academia.  Scholars who get promoted into high enough administrative positions suddenly find themselves with fundraising duties.

Here's a great essay from one such gentleman, David D. Perlmutter, who found himself the Director of the School of Journalism at the University of Iowa, and reflects on how he learned to fundraise.

The title says it all: Don't Fear Fundraising.  

First of all, that's good advice.

But second of all, it speaks to how common a problem that is...fear of fundraising.  That's why this whole blog exists, after all.  There's plenty of technique and skill in development work, but psychological blocks are the biggest roadblock to successful fundraising for so many folks.

Check it out.  Some good first-hand advice.

Quick Tips: Shake up your mailing calendar

A lot of folks use the summer to plan their full calendar of mailings.  Are you still sending two big mailings a year, once in December, to capitalize on the tax year ending, and once in the late Spring, before the summer but a reasonable distance from that holiday mailing?

You've got plenty of company, which may offer some comfort...but a lot of folks in nonprofit management positions (including development) tend to be very risk averse, so "best practices" and "wisdom of the masses" tend to get conflated.

You don't NEED to shake things up.  But you do need to think about whether you're sticking to a particular mailing schedule for the right reasons, rather than comfort with routine.

Here are some ideas that are perfect to toss to your development team for a conversation right about now, mailings that separate themselves from the herd and have worked exceptionally well for others.

• Everyone and their mother will make an ask near the end of the calendar year, to capitalize on the end of the tax year, when a lot of folks make all their philanthropic decisions.  It's very hard to stand out, and the likelihood of your bringing in a lot of new donors is low - you're expecting annual gifts from your known supporters (be they consistent or every other year or two donors).  So...if you can find another way to give those folks a reminder that they need to make their regular gift (could be switching to a cheaper mailing, could be switching to email, could be switching to a phone-a-thon by board members...how many folks are we talking about for you?), you can shift those resources elsewhere.
• October 31.  Halloween.  Trick or Treat.  Unless you count UNICEF, no one is known for their Halloween solicitations.  If you've got a constituency that is likely to have fond memories of trick-or-treating, or is currently enjoying this American pastime with their kids...try designing a mailing around this holiday instead!  Bonus points for creatively utilizing a "free-mium" (like the labels so many folks include in their mailings) - they're reported to be annoying, but they do work, particularly if your base is over 50, and the cute aspect of tying this to Halloween may warm the hearts of your youngest donors too.
• February 14.  Valentine's Day.  A genuinely fun and warm valentine arriving as a surprise is going to stand out in most people's mail, in the very best way.  Connect it to your identity and mission and you're golden.
• Are you a religiously affiliated organization?  Use that to your advantage.  Rosh Hashana has long been used by Jewish organizations for their fall appeal; Christian organizations might think about Easter instead of Christmas; etc.  Guru Purnima works well for academic organizations (though you have to have a way to connect with the cultural/religious implications respectfully).
• Summer.  Most folks avoid summer mailings for very good reasons.  People are on vacation.  Productivity (which impacts things like "remembering to put a check in the mail") goes way down.  Peoples' minds tend to be elsewhere.  But those are general assumptions...are they true for you?  If you have a donor base (or a segment you can reach separately) that is aching for a summer distraction because they're not on vacation or working less even though it's light until 8:30pm, summer is a great time to reach out.  
• Maybe even get away from mailings...hopefully you're doing some regular analysis on how effective your direct mail program is.  There are lots of other ways to reach supporters, there are lots of ways to solicit them.  If you're not satisfied that direct mail is getting the financial return you want, if you aren't retaining donors at great rates, if you aren't acquiring enough new donors to sustain your strategies...don't hold anything sacred, including the notion that you need direct mail.  You might.  But if it's worth re-examining your assumption that the summer is a bad time for a mailing, you should be asking if mailings themselves are still working for you.

Article Review: Millenials matter - here's why

Alana Ramo wrote a nice piece over at Policymic about the philanthropic power of today's young adults: Millenials Aren't Millionaires, But We're Great Philanthropists.

She's right.  There's a lot of giving power in today's 20-30 year olds, and they're breaking a lot of "rules" when it comes to supporting causes and missions.  That scares a lot of people, who are uncomfortable having to learn new ways of doing business.  You don't have that luxury.  Not only are you missing out on a huge resource if you decide that you can survive without figuring out how to attract Millenial supporters, you're condemning your future.

It's always been the case that donors (as a demographic) gain capacity as they get older, and the first few organizations who treated today's Big Money Donors as VIPs are statistically likely to remain among their top causes.  There's no reason to think either of those trends will be changing.  Millennials will be richer in 10 years, richer still in 20...and because they're gaining a philanthropic philosophy and practice NOW, getting their attention for significant support years down the road will be even harder.  You'll be competing with institutions who've been working with them for decades by the time they're in their 40s.

Alana's article draws a lot from the Chase Foundation's Millenial Impact Report, which you can check out in full here.

Here are the biggest points in support of my dire warning:

-83% of the Millenials surveyed made a financial gift to at least one cause last year.
-73% volunteer for a cause, and a full 70% have raised money online or offline on behalf of a cause.

If you've ever tried to get your older supporters (or even your Board, who should be your most vocal set of supporters, ambassadors to the community at large) to each ask 5 friends to make a gift to one of your campaigns, you will be blown away at the notion of 70% of ANY demographic group seeking out opportunities to put their own name on the line with their own personal networks to raise money.

But these are also folks who aren't going to respond to direct mail or most email campaigns, they don't go to galas in the same pattern, and they aren't content to simply provide financial support and then be updated with newsletters and annual reports.  These are folks who want to be intimately involved, they want to be active participants in a cause.  You've got to provide that in a way that's authentic, but sustainable for your organization.

What's your strategy for engaging the Millennial generation?

Fridays For You: SMART Goals

One thing that turns into great unhappiness is the sense that you are not achieving your goals, that you are not making headway, that you are not getting things done and you will never be a success.

Note that I said the sense that all this failure is happening...because we humans are very prone to a thing called confirmation bias.  We don't really see things so objectively; we give great weight to evidence that supports our theory and beliefs, and discount anything that might suggest we're wrong.  That means that when we're in a nice deep blue funk (for whatever reason, legitimate or not), we're going to see all the things that support our belief that we're a failure and gloss over our successes.

At the same time, if you're a woman (and actually, plenty of men fall into this category too - it's just statistically more likely to be a gender thing, thanks to a heap of social pressures and reinforcements), you are going to look at your professional accomplishments and misattribute them - to anything other than your work.  You will find reasons to not take credit for things that you have accomplished, even if they are things you actively worked to make happen.  

There's a powerful tool to combat both of these things.  SMART goals.

Goal setting is a great way to organize your daily work, manage your professional growth in monthly and quarterly and yearly chunks, and think about the longer horizon in a productive way.  But most people set goals like "get promoted by next year" or "get boss to like me" or "become a successful novelist"...even something as compelling but utterly unmeasurable like "be happy."

If you are setting unmeasurable, unrealistic goals, you will never achieve them (because they're unrealistic) and even if you did, by some miracle, get there, you'd never know (because they're unmeasurable!)

SMART goals are:

Specific

Measurable

Achievable

Relevant

Timely

An example of a specific goal - let's say you're hoping to go to law school - don't say "I want to improve my LSAT scores"...your specific goal will be "I want to increase my logic score to the 97th percentile."

The above is a good example of a measurable goal, too...but much of life doesn't result in concrete test scores.  Let's say that you've read Sheryl Sandberg's Lean In and are convinced that you don't speak up enough in department meetings.  Rather than "speak up more in meetings," your goal will be "speak up at least 2 times in every meeting."  It's more than your base level, and you can keep track in a very concrete way: simply count.

Achievable goals, well, you have to keep yourself honest on this one.  "Get promoted to Vice President" is achievable (even if it's not easy - that's why it's a goal, not a forgone conclusion) for some people, but let's assume you shouldn't put it on your list of goals for next year if this is your first year out of college, working for a Fortune 500 company.  Again - achievable is not meant to keep your goals from being ambitious, just realistic.  

I like checking things off my to-do list as much as the next person.  But "take shower" is not something that's super relevant to my larger goals - specific, achievable, measurable, yes, but completely tangential at best to my three year plan for world domination.

Timely is one of the things that I find oddly hard for my more ambitious clients.  They want to beat the curve, they want to do the superhuman.  I force them to adhere to the achievable guidelines - ambitious is OK; virtually impossible is not productive.  For example, a junior professor I worked with insisted that 3 publications and 2 new grants was a good goal for the fall semester.  Nope.  We sat down and looked at a timeline to tenure and came up with a much more plausible set of goals...timing is often the key on making a goal achievable or not, and don't forget that all your goals add up, so accomplishing one or two may be possible, but not if you have six labor intensive goals that you expect to accomplish all at once.

There are plenty of resources on the web when it comes to SMART goals.  They're used in both teaching and business management a lot.  Give them a whirl.

I want to be explicit about what they'll do for you though:

• If you're prone to confirmation bias, SMART goals, thanks to their measurability and relevance will keep you from giving too much weight to your negative thoughts.  It's hard to wallow in an I'm-Such-A-Failure Funk when you have some very concrete evidence that you're making small gains on a consistent path to a bigger goal.
• If you're prone to impostor syndrome, it's hard to change your perspective, but SMART goals are again, concrete evidence that you are setting goals and realizing them.  Luck and the efforts of other people are part of the mix, but you deserve credit for these specific, measured achievements that you conceived, committed to, and made happen.
• Also, duh - they're a good tool for thinking about where you're going and how you're going to get there.  Goals are also good for keeping you focused and moving forward towards whatever those goals might be.

Want help figuring out how SMART goals apply to your life?  I'm willing to workshop with you in the comments section.  

Back to Basics: How do you Cultivate?

If you read yesterday's post, you know where you're trying to go with all of this cultivation stuff, at least in the abstract.  (For extra credit, check out my Friday For You post this week, where I talk about SMART goals...you should be using them for your own development, but they apply beautifully to this specific work as well.)  So HOW do you do it?

For the life of me, I can't find a set of benchmarks from a reliable source, but you're looking for a number of "touches," over a 6 - 24 month period, to go from "prospect" to "major donor."  (Of course, this is the dream.  The harsh reality is that you should focus your expectations differently...as a fundraiser, you can't eliminate the need for actual dollars to come in as a result of your work, but when it comes to major giving, success is not fully about converting a prospect to a donor - it's about getting to a good solicitation, even if the answer is no.)

Here's an incomplete list of techniques you can use on that journey:

1. Face to Face Meetings

This is the obvious one.  There's nothing quite like being in the same room with someone.  You can connect better, your conversation will flow more naturally, the person on the other side of the table can see your charming, genuine smile.  But you have to be careful not to overuse these...and if your prospect feels like you're a nuisance or wasting his/her time, you've dug yourself a nasty hole.

Have an agenda.  Think about what you want from a meeting.  Granted, this can be two parallel answers: what you really want is to get in front of that prospect so they remember how much they love you...but that's not something that's likely to be valuable to the prospect.  Make sure you have a *real* reason to visit with them.  Getting feedback on something?  Works if you actually want their feedback on your newsletter/program/new strategy/website design/etc.  Will backfire if you don't really care what they have to say.  Update them on something a little too sensitive to put in writing?  Again - this is delicious if it's true (finalist for X grant; about to start a search for a new Executive Director and hoping they might be able to recommend some candidates confidentially, etc.), but likely to annoy if you're overreaching.  How about an introduction to another key player in your organization?  Senior staff, maybe direct program staff or students/clients/participants, if that's a draw, board members, your founder, etc.

Another tip for face-to-face meetings: it's OK to be direct when you're asking for one.  "I want to update you on X" is different than "I'm looking to find enough funding to do X before the end of next month.  Could I sit down with you to talk about that effort?"  One tees up a solicitation in a very different way...but if you're hoping to actually make an ask, it might make the actual meeting much much easier if you are upfront about your agenda.

2. Phone Calls

In between meetings, it's nice to stay in touch.  The phone is one way to do that.  

Be mindful of how your prospect likes to stay in touch, and always be respectful of their time ("It's so nice to hear your voice - is this a good time to talk?")  Same rules about agenda apply, but have a little slack in them.  There's less commitment to a 10 minute phone conversation, and they have a chance to get off the phone much sooner, so your reasons for calling can be less direct.  Wanting to tell them a particular anecdote from the field, wanting to tell them that you read that book/article they recommended, congratulating them on their child's graduation/black belt/recital

3. Email
I'm told that only old people are into email these days.  Luckily, almost everyone you'll be asking for money is "old" - or at least old enough to use email for both business and personal communications...and you're hoping to be at the edge of overlap with yours.  (I fear I'm dipping a toe into the gentle bubbles of the La Brea Tar Pits as I say that - you're not looking to be personal friends with your donors.  This is a professional relationship.  Period.  But you're looking to become the equivalent of a "work friend" - that person that you wouldn't hang out with if you ever left this job, but you're genuinely glad to run into them and chat while making copies, and you grab lunch occasionally.)

Email doesn't catch someone at a bad time, like a phone call, but we do generally feel pressure to respond quickly (24-48 hours), which makes it a fairly conversational medium.  It adapts well to expectations - you can be formal or informal as needed.  You get answers to your questions quickly, you can reference the weather or news without worrying that no one will remember what you're talking about by the time your parchment is delivered by pony express...

"Just thinking of you" emails are great.  Low investment, no need for the other person to respond, but decent impact, if you do it well.  Send links to articles, send videos, recommend a podcast that touches on something you talked about at your last meeting.  Make it personal - it needs to be clear that you wrote this email exclusively to the donor, and didn't cut and paste an email with a link to the society pages featuring your gala to all 15,000 donors in your database.   Want a response?  Ask an interesting question - one that begs an answer (nothing rhetorical or too open ended..."check this out; any thoughts?" isn't getting any replies.)

4. Handwritten notes and other postal mail
I get ~200 emails a day, all told.  More when things are busy.  But I can tell you exactly who sent me the last handwritten note I got in the mail.  It was a job applicant, thanking me for my time interviewing her (on behalf of a client.)  She went from being one of three equal candidates in my mind to being someone I felt very warmly about, all things considered - though it can't be overstated, *what* she wrote certainly helped, by proving she had actively listened to some of my questions and comments during our meeting.  Content counts, obviously.  But a beautiful card and a few short handwritten sentences stand out, inherently.

And think creatively - try to remember the joy of getting unexpected notions in the mail.  One of my early fundraising mentors, a 25 year volunteer solicitor, sent Halloween sized candies, randomly, to his annual list of prospects.  Things I learned by experience so you don't have to: M&Ms don't make it to Texas in the summer.  The candy gets shattered and the chocolate forms one big lump with colorful shards.  Also, don't send Smarties when the post office is on high alert for anthrax.  But in general, this works *very* well to make people think of you fondly...and you can be creative with the principle - any small, delightful little gift.  Nothing expensive, but something charmingly valued as a surprise in the mail.

Check out some of the research done on gifts sent with solicitation...people feel obligated when you send gifts.  Even those stupid labels from the ASPCA and March of Dimes.  There's a reason direct mail packages are designed like that - the response is worth the extra expense.  The difference here is that you're not pairing your gift with a solicitation on the spot - you're simply building good will, towards a future very large ask. 

5. Invitations to events
It's like a face to face meeting, but better.  Invite your donors to non-solicitation events.  Asking for scholarships for tuba players?  How about a seat at your next orchestra or brass band concert?  Looking for capital gifts?  How about a ground-breaking ceremony, or a tour of the construction site?  Be creative - you might even consider events that have nothing to do with you.  Is your prospect a huge baseball fan?  How about an afternoon game with the local farm team?  Great place to talk.

6. Whatever materials small donors are getting, personalized
Don't take your donors out of the pool for all the direct mail/email/whatever you're sending to your full base of supporters.  First of all, if you're trying to make people feel like part of an inner circle at your organization, having them out of the loop on any piece of mail is a great way to kill that.  I remember one case where the development team held back on sending a (pretty cute, musical) video to their major donor prospects because it contained an ask for $45 at the end.  Except it went viral (ish...a bunch of the older donors who were targeted sent it around to each other), and there wound up being a handful of major donors who were seriously hurt and annoyed that they were left out.  Secondly, if you're cultivating a savvy philanthropist, they want to get a very good sense of your organization and its operations.  They want to know what you're doing to raise money other than ask them to hand over some serious cash.  Seeing your newsletters and general solicitations adds a lot to their understanding of how you work.  (If you're afraid of that, the answer is in figuring out why - are you presenting yourself in conflicting ways to different audiences? Are you frustrated by the quality of your communications?  Fix the problem instead of trying to hide it!)

BUT...please don't just send generic solicitations or any communications without comment.  A note on the year-end mailing saying "I wanted you to see what we sent our whole list of supporters; don't you love the picture on page two?  You were at that event, weren't you?"  Or simply "You're obviously not the target demographic for this solicitation, but I wanted you to know what we sent to last year's donors, asking them to renew their support."

Personalizing mailings with post-scripts can get tricky, of course, and there's no good way to handwrite an extra couple of lines on an email or self-mailer...that doesn't let you off the hook though.  Send a note in advance of the form letter/email they're about to get, handwritten or via email.  It goes a very long way towards making people feel like you're paying close attention to them as individuals...because you ARE.

7. Introductions
I bet you have some folks among your supporters - maybe big donors, maybe passionate small donors or volunteers - who are great ambassadors for your organization AND a joy to know.  Maybe you have some supporters who have specific skills or interests that might be unique and very valuable to your prospect.  As you get to know your prospects, think about connecting them to others within your organizational sphere.  Perhaps the college counselor on your board would be a great connection for the woman whose granddaughter has her heart set on college in California.  Perhaps you know a great bridge partner for the gentleman whose usual partner is in Florida for the winter.  Perhaps you just think donor X would have a blast chatting with prospect Y.  When it's right (this isn't a technique you can force, only one you can keep on your radar so you see the opportunities), it's a great way to increase the human connections surrounding your organization.

8. Social Media!
The goal of using mail and email (and phone) in your cultivation strategy is simple: increase the points of contact between you and your prospect so that you strengthen the lines of communication between you.  Social media - everything that exists now, everything that will exist in the future - provides new tools for doing the same thing.  Start a back and forth on twitter with a prospect who loves tweeting.  Make sure your Pinterest or instagram fan sees your latest photos.  Like and comment on some of your Facebook fanatic's daily status updates.

One caution here, though...your institution shouldn't leap into all of these new channels without understanding how to authentically AND SUSTAINABLY transfer your brand to this new communication tool.  It always makes me tremendously sad when I see organizations who have a Facebook account that last summer's intern started for them that has been thoroughly dormant since they left.  If you don't have the manpower (paid or volunteer) to *really* use, say, Twitter in a meaningful way, in a way that shows you "get" the medium...don't do it poorly.

What are your favorite tips and tricks for connecting with people and strengthening their relationship to your mission and organization?

Back to Basics: What is Cultivation?

What IS cultivation?

When I was thinking of starting this blog, I asked friends and clients for questions that they'd like me to answer - anonymously (for them) so no one would think they were stupid.  This is the second most frequent question I got.  And since I put up some posts describing the very basics of major gift fundraising, I've been getting variations on this theme - now that I've met with a prospective donor, I know that I'm supposed to "cultivate" them and then "solicit" them...but what does cultivation really mean?  What am I supposed to be doing???  How will I know when I'm done cultivating and it's time to solicit?

So let's pick up where we left off: You get a meeting, you psych yourself up, you go, and you rock it out with confidence and good listening skills.  Congrats!  You are now in the cultivation phase.

Before I give tips from my experience on techniques you can try to cultivate folks, let's think about what cultivation needs to do for you.  There are people who don't know your organization, and there are people who give meaningful gifts to your organization.  What lies between those two points is cultivation.

Cultivation is HARD work, and you've got to plant many seeds
if you want to gather enough fruit to feed your family.

Cultivation does the following:

• Turns your prospect into someone who knows enough about your organization.
• Turns your prospect into someone who cares enough about your organization.
• Connects your prospect to your mission and its larger context in new ways.
• Teaches you enough about your prospect.

That word "enough" is a killer though, right?  I'm so sorry - I can give you a framework for thinking about these things, but there's still an element of art to fundraising, a gut sense that you have to develop for yourself.  

Every prospective donor has their own set of criteria for making a donation to an organization.  This is true from your $20 donors on up to your $20 million donors...and it often varies by the size of the gift they're contemplating, and how emotional their tie is to your mission/cause.  Your job is to figure out what they need to know before they're comfortable donating to your organization.  Might be financial assurances, might be strategic planning, might be proof that your programs are having impact...might just be an understanding of what you do and why.  The important thing to remember is that your job is NOT to get them to some basic level of knowledge about your organization.  You don't get points for their being able to pass a pop quiz if you've failed to pay attention to what's relevant to them - and then get them that information, without overkill.

When it comes to what you do and why, that's the key to "caring enough."  When your prospective donor sees beyond the technicalities of your needs (you need money to do X) and starts being truly interested in WHY your organization has made its choices, you're on your way.  Most donors will need to get to the point where they feel that you stand out from the crowd, that your programs are different, in a good way, from what other organizations are doing with similar missions.  You're looking to take up residence in your donors' brains, so that they forward you newspaper articles and funny tweets related to your mission, and so that they talk about you when they're out with friends.

Which brings us to connecting these folks in new ways.  It's not just that they appreciate your programs in a sea of like-minded institutions, it's that they become more connected to the larger mission.  For instance - if you are an organization that provides mentoring for young girls, you want these donors to think of you when related topics come up over drinks with friends - bullying and what to do about it; feminism and equality; lack of women in politics; the impact of intergenerational relationships in society...cultivation is bringing that potential donor to the point where they think of themselves as being involved in good works, being part of the solution to society's Big Problems (even if you're only tackling a small piece of things) because they're connected to you.

And last but not least, cultivation is not purely a process that your donor goes through.  You are cultivating a relationship, and that takes two people.  When you can answer confidently "yes, this person is ready for a solicitation" - which, by the way, also requires you to know what the right solicitation might be - then you know your donor well enough to move to the next level.

Tomorrow: practical tips for doing this kind of work

Accounting vs. Plain English - the problem with "unearned" revenue

I went to business school.  I learned a lot of very useful things there, but when I give people the 30 second version of why it was so important to me and my career, it all boils down to this: college taught me how to speak French and Latin and a little Old English...but in business school, I learned how to speak Accountant and Consultant and a little Finance.  And a good part of what I do professionally is translating from one of these business languages into plain english.

Many folks get frustrated that such translation is necessary.  Can't we all just use a common language for all this?  But that's like getting frustrated that they speak French in France.  And French has some beautiful words and phrases that you just can't say perfectly in any other language.  Same thing with the business languages.  If you're reading this blog, the odds are that you're not one of the folks who grump around with tea-bags stapled to nasty placards, complaining that everyone should have to speak English here in 'murica.  (If you are, you may continue to complain about not feeling you should have to learn how to speak accounting...you're still utterly WRONG, but you're internally consistent, so go ahead with your wrongheaded old self.  I can't help you in a single blog post.)

So what brings all this up?  I was just doing a tutorial with a client on her balance sheet.  We got into a very emotional discussion when it came to one particular line: unearned income.

Unearned income.  That's accounting speak for "contributions."  In fact, many folks have decided to go with new terminology - they call it "contributed income," which lets you bypass this whole conflict, but that's not nearly as educational...so indulge me for a moment.

When you work yourself to the point of exhaustion trying to bring in enough contributions to support your organization, it might seem like a very low blow to call all of that "unearned" income.

From an accounting perspective, of course, it's pretty cut and dried, without any moral implication of "earned" vs. "unearned."  Earned revenue is anything you sell - from services to tuition to theater tickets to goods created by women working to feed their families in a developing nation.  Unearned revenue is just given to you.  People get tax credits.  It's not about how much work you have to do to get that gift.

But I get why it seems like a brutal designation.  Unearned has so many negative connotations - that we are unworthy of these dollars, that we have not worked hard to get them, that we have perhaps swindled and bamboozled our way into them through overly trusting patrons.  I can tell you - most donors who bother to look at financial statements for your organization won't bat an eye if you name that category of income as "unearned."  If they care to examine them, these donors speak business well enough that it won't occur to them that "unearned" is not such a nice thing to say in plain english.  Corporations have unearned income, people have unearned income...things like investment income, annuities, various benefits...prepayments for goods/services yet to be delivered...

It's that last category that makes me think that instead of playing linguistic games and just renaming the category "contributed income," truly embracing an understanding of unearned income might be a great idea for an organization and its leaders.

When a company receives money for goods or services that have yet to be delivered, that gets put on their books as unearned income.  That's a great way to see the donations that people make to your organization.  They're willing to support you, to pay you in advance for all the things you will do to meet your mission...but it's a prepayment.  They expect something in return.

When we think about "gifts," we think about something that is freely given.  The transaction here is that you make a solicitation, and if that person says yes, you get a gift.  That's it.

With an advance payment, the transaction shifts: I make a solicitation, my donor agrees and gives me money, and I now own an obligation to deliver what I've promised, whether that's specific programming or the continued existence of my organization to press on towards my mission.

That's a much better way of understanding your donations.  A healthier understanding, a more elegant understanding, a more robust understanding.  When you internalize that understanding so that it permeates all of your communications with donors, it will make you more attractive to donors.   And when your board appreciates this new understanding, they'll understand development that much better (stewardship isn't optional; development and good governance are locked together; etc.).

Just another lesson in cross-cultural linguistics.  More or less, with tongue in cheek.  This has been a friendly reminder from your development shrink that anything that causes an emotional knee-jerk reaction is worth examining closely.

Mailbag: Forget the Overhead Myth

Q: I know that donors are looking at my administrative costs, and that I'm supposed to keep my overhead low if I want to get good evaluations from watchdog groups...but what does that actually mean?  I can't cut anything else without cutting staff, so...are other people just way better at creative accounting?

A: Yes, there are some donors who are looking at your administrative expenses, popping it over your whole budget and rejecting folks whose ratio doesn't match their ideals.  YOU DON'T NEED THEM. Also, they're really really few and far between.  Asking you about your overhead is a good thing - it keeps us honest, it keeps us mindful of a need to answer to our supporters, to be efficient.  But that's the start of a conversation for most donors, as it should be.  That's not a bad thing at all.

There is, certainly, a big drive in the sector, for accountability and efficiency.  And overhead seems like a good way to measure that.  So let's be kind and say that this is a case of a little knowledge being a dangerous thing - there are donors who've read this far in their official donor orientation handbook and ran out of time, and are now just winging it.  You run into them in the field, and you hear about them in the nonprofit press...and they make a good scary story to tell around the nonprofit campfire, because like all good scary stories, there's enough truth there to make the story seem very very real.

First, head here, to one of my favorite web comics, Savage Chicken.  Have a chuckle, then come right back.

Now, let's talk.

1) How's your overhead?  Are you doing things that make sense?  When you spend money, do you do so intentionally, with reasons you can articulate and stand behind?  How does your board feel about your expenses (overhead and beyond)?

That's right - I'm not asking you about your overhead in comparison to anything - not in ratio with your overall budget, not in comparison to an average for your type of organization, and certainly not by asking how close you can get to zero.  I'm asking why you spend what you do, and why you think that's the right move for your organization and the people you serve.

If you can tell that story, most donors will listen.  ASKING QUESTIONS IS NOT A BAD THING.  Donors should be asking questions, and this is a question that you can expect, so swing for the fences.  You're going to be asked to talk about why you need money, and how much you can do with it!  That's a great place to go in a conversation, and these questions means that the donor is driving you there.  Again - this is fantastic.  A gift, really.

2) Now that I've asked you to tell me a story about what you spend and why, without feeling persecuted by expectations of your overhead, please remember to tell that story to anyone who will listen.  But, of course, it would be stupid not to be prepared to discuss how that number, whatever it is, compares to other numbers in the mind of your prospective donor.

• What's typical overhead for an organization in your field?  How do you compare?  Explain any big differences...could be that you're operating in Nebraska and most are in New York City.  Could be that you're running these two pilot programs that require extra oversight and evaluation.  Could be that you have a commitment to covering full health benefits for all your employees.  
• What's your overhead to program ratio? The question at hand, however you want to break it down: what's the "running the organization" vs. "performing our mission" set of numbers?  And when you think of it like that, you may start to see that a simple ratio from your budget or balance sheet doesn't really describe that accurately.  Say, for example, that you put all your staff in the administrative line...but there are only two of you, and in addition to running the organization, you and your second in command also provide direct services to clients.  So...are you "overhead" or are you "program?"  You don't even need to decide how to categorize yourself - you just need to be able to explain why the numbers themselves need context.
• What other numbers (straight from your financial statements or in comparison to any benchmarks) will draw questions?  Be prepared for questions you can reasonably expect.
• There's no end to the list - but the same rules apply: As long as you can explain your reasons for the way you stack up in various comparisons, being clear and open about your institutional choices is GREAT.  It may help you and some donors see, early on, that you're just not a good fit for each other.  You want - NEED - to let them go.  They'll be dissatisfied with their donations, and you'll drive yourself crazy trying to please them.  

3) Your comment about creative accounting scares the bejesus out of me.  Creative accounting shouldn't be a euphemism, it should be a term of praise for the folks who have figured out how to use the very clear and straightforward rules of GAAP (Generally Accepted Accounting Practice) to sing nuanced and complex melodies.  Don't ever attempt any kind of deception through your financial statements!  (First of all, it's one of the stupidest things you can do; it's bad form and bad faith, and you can't make up for that by pretending it's justified to help you achieve your mission.  You have to live with your realities, and they are reflected in your numbers.  Second, you'll get caught.  You will.  And that could, perhaps should, destroy your organization, in a shuttering/closing to business/not-existing-anymore sort of way. Don't do it.)

• You should be discussing options with your accountant so that your numbers are "singing" your song.  
• You should be running your basic financial statements by trusted business savvy advisors, for the express purpose of having them tell you what they see in them, what questions they have after reviewing them, etc. (Then you prepare to answer those questions straightforward and with confidence; see above.)
• You should prepare development versions of all your financial statements that attractively lay out all the context and assumptions that folks should find relevant in looking over those numbers.
• IF YOU ARE HOPING TO HIDE anything that you find embarrassing in those numbers, the problem isn't the numbers.  The problem is the embarrassing reality.  So you either need to find a way to confess a one time lapse (you screwed up cash flow your first year on the job and needed to make a withdrawal from savings to make payroll for a couple of months) or change the way you do business so that your practices reflect what you want to tell people you do.  See how that works?

Announcing a New Feature: Fridays For You!

I thought about calling this Fundraising Free Fridays, because that's what this is...but one of the things I'm always saying is that everything relates to fundraising, one way or another...so, dear reader, I didn't want you to think you were completely off the hook.

But here's the thing - The Development Shrink as a blog is becoming my professional soapbox, and it needs to expand, since I have not one but two areas of passion in my coaching practice.  The first, which you've clearly seen in this blog thus far, is development as a synonym (euphemism?) for the full work of fundraising.  But the other is for personal development, helping individuals advance their own leadership skills - something that runs the gamut from working with college students and millennials just starting to manage their own careers to working with senior executives on refining management techniques and working around/through their weaknesses in the workplace.  I particularly love working with women and minorities, since I have found that many of the most popular trade books on leadership do not address the particular challenges and penalties faced by everyone who is not an older white man, and I most often work with folks who are working somewhere in the nonprofit sector (including folks in higher education - that counts as mission-driven!).  

So...

Starting today, I'm going to start injecting a little personal development into this development blog.  Fridays from now on will feature a leadership tip or exercise.  I hope you like it - and please, please, share with your friends and colleagues.

Fridays For You: a trick for stressful situations

About to go into a stressful or high pressure situation?  (A negotiation, a public speaking engagement, a job interview?)

Squeeze your LEFT fist as hard as you can for 30 seconds, then let go.  (Make sure you're getting to a full 30 seconds - that's a longer time than you think it is, when you're focused on something like this.  If you can't see a clock with a second hand from wherever you are, count Mississippi.  Remember to breathe.)

Unlikely though it may be, this trick dramatically improves the performance of athletes performing tasks for which they have trained...and you've trained for your job, too!  Published in the Journal of Experimental Psychology as a study on preventing people from "choking under pressure," this technique is called "hemisphere-specific priming," and there's a growing body of research that shows that enhanced right-hemisphere activity (what you're forcing when you squeeze your left fist) facilitates skilled performance.

This is no substitute for preparing properly for one of those high stress situations...do your due diligence!  But this tiny trick won't hurt, and could give you that slight edge that you need in a high stress situation.

Try it - let me know if it works for you!

Social Entrepreneurship: Why you can't ignore this buzzword

Echoing Green, along with the Columbia School of International and Public Affairs, put out an interesting report (preliminary, they note) in June of this year titled Early Stage Impact Investing: A Blueprint for Screening Social Impact Potential.

Why you should care:

1. Maybe some of you consider yourselves social entrepreneurs.  You're seeking funding, but whether or not you're building up a tax-exempt nonprofit organization, you identify primarily as an entrepreneur and you're thinking in terms of investors instead of donors.
2. If you don't identify that way, you still don't have the luxury of ignoring that perspective.  Venture Philanthropy as a concept is not going anywhere in the near future, and in my experience it's not only growing as a philanthropist mindset, it's a good thing for the sector as a whole.  You need to be able to make a case for your organization and projects in terms of social investment, with calculable returns and impact.

This report, among other things, does an excellent job of highlighting seven elements that "investors should probe in order to mitigate impact risk and increase the potential for an investment to achieve its social targets."  When you cut through the jargon, you've got yourself a nice list of seven items you want to address (or be able to address in further conversation) any time you are putting together a grant or proposal for someone who identifies as a venture philanthropist or has been indoctrinated into the sector fad of "accountability."

• Social mission: how do you demonstrate your commitment to your mission? This all boils down to that thing your grade school (high school?) writing teachers kept telling you: show, don't tell.  "We're committed to fighting illiteracy" is not as expressive as "we have tutored 10,000 students this year, and all of them now test at grade level in reading comprehension."  (Wouldn't that be amazing?)
• Evidence: Can you prove causality?  How does a donor know that your program directly caused the changes (outcomes) and that those changes have an impact for society?  (Maybe all those thousands of kids were going to test at grade level, or their teachers are really good and it's not the tutoring that helped them.)
• Social entrepreneur: Just like investing in businesses, the leadership matters.  A great idea won't make it if the organization's director is bad at their job...so inspiring confidence in the leadership team is essential.
• Impact measurement: How are you evaluating your work? (There's no one right answer, as long as you're doing it in a sustainable and sensible way, and can communicate to the donor what kind of reports and measurements they should expect to see in the future.)
• Potential for disruptive innovation: What makes you unique?  Why should a donor give to you, instead of one of the gazillion other organizations trying to solve the same problem/provide the same services?  
• Potential for scale: This is mostly applicable to smaller organizations, but the general question is "if you succeed, can you change the world?"  When you're looking at investments, you want to know if you're investing in a very nice little coffee shop that will serve its neighborhood well, or if you're investing in Starbucks.  Most investors salivate over the latter more than the former, but you have to be honest about what you are and hope to be.
• Governance: This is a different aspect of leadership, and importantly distinct.  But making it clear that this yours is a well governed (and not just well helmed) organization is good for addressing everything from paranoia (how do I know you won't misuse my funds) to agility (if "market conditions" change dramatically tomorrow, will you have the adaptability to change with them?  Think about March of Dimes, which started to combat polio in children...but still exists, despite the near eradication of that disease, thanks to good governance.)

Mailbag: Recipe for Alienating Your Donors

Q: I just got a "thank you" note from my kid's school that is such a ridiculous form letter that I don't think I'll ever donate to them again.

Dear <Mr. and Mrs. Names Redacted to protect the annoyed>: Thank you so much for supporting <Could be any school, really> with your generous gift to the Annual Giving Campaign. Your tax-deductible gift of $20 will have a tremendous impact on <let's call her Jane> and her classmates.

In fact, when my 10 year old saw it, she asked "Is that sarcastic?  It's kind of mean."

I get that there's an absurdity to fundraising etiquette, but...are they being sarcastic?  It's a school of less than 100 families.  I know I can't give anything close to what some families give, but it would be really nice to feel like someone actually cared that I gave what I could.  How do I get over this and not let it affect my relationship with the staff at the school and the fellow parent who solicited me?

A: When I taught SAT Prep, one of my favorite little reminders to my students was to remember that writing SAT questions is someone's job.  They're not brilliant, they're not out to get you - on the other end of that test question is a pencil pusher who's an average Joe, clocking in and out and just looking to pay the bills.  The lesson there was to demystify that which held emotional power over you.

Same thing applies here.  They really didn't mean anything by it.  It's a form letter, and a fairly benign one at that, truth be told.  They're not out to get you, and I'm pretty sure that even the petty folks (and there are some) who might be tempted to shame or embarrass folks who didn't meet their standards for How Much To Give would be more flamboyant about their attempt to make you feel bad.  On the other end of that letter is someone who is just doing their job, probably underpaid and overworked and just trying to get out a few hundred thank you notes at once.

On the other hand - this is a great lesson for those of you WRITING form letter thank you notes.   Take note of these tips, and don't put yourself in this situation:

1. Segment your list.  You should really be sending different language to donors of small gifts (whatever that is for you) and donors of large gifts.  You might also segment by lifetime giving history, so that someone who's given millions gets a letter than acknowledges how much they've done for the organization over time, even if this gift is just $50.  This story shows how much it can matter.  
2. Don't be afraid of telling it like it is in your thank you notes - sincerity goes a long way.  Once you've segmented, for your small donors, try something like "...it may not seem like much, but your gift of $x will be put to good use, and knowing that 90% of our parents give what they can is extremely gratifying for our entire community." If you think anyone would describe your purple and flowery prose as "absurdist fundraising etiquette,"try simplifying - using plain language to say that you're grateful, and what you're grateful for is the best way to communicate authentic gratitude.  Use hyperbole, and your sincerity may get lost (to the point of suspected sarcasm, in really bad cases).
3. Personalize the note, when you can...and in a school setting, you really should be able to.  A handwritten postscript would have made all the difference here.  It would have instantly made the recipient feel like part of a community again instead of a faceless stranger being pumped for money by people who see her every day.

note: I cheated a lot in putting together this post - the real story (and of course there is one) happened on facebook.  It wasn't so much a question, sent to my email mailbag - a friend posted her complaint to everyone on her friend list (and she's charming and amazing, so there are a lot of us)...the second lesson, as important as the one above, is that it only takes one person to have a terrible experience to tarnish your reputation with a thousand people immediately. EVERY donor should be treated with grace and sincere gratitude.  This is one anecdote, but I have several others...how you treat your $25 donors reflects on your organization as much as how you treat your (may you have some) $25,000 donors.

Article Review: Guidestar's Interview with Jerold Panas

Last month, Guidestar published a nice, short and sweet interview with Jerold Panas.  I haven't read his book, but I agreed with much of what he said in this interview.  I'm recommending it (the one page article - make your own choice about the book!) as good advice for new fundraisers and good reminders for those who've been in the trenches a while.

Things I want to highlight and restate:

1. He's got a great formulation for three factors that need to be present for a successful ask: relevancy (the mission, organization and/or project needs to be important to the donor), emotional appeal, and urgency (why give NOW?).  One of the questions I get asked a lot is how you know when to make a solicitation instead of continuing to cultivate...so here's one answer: when you know you can make a relevant, emotional, urgent ask, you're there!  
2. He doesn't use the word explicitly, but much of his advice boils down to empathy.  Can you put yourself in your donors shoes?  This is not a generalized phenomenon - we're not talking about you being able to think of several perspectives that groups of potential supporters might have...that's good too, and an extension of honing your empathic skills, but in this case we're talking about specific people.  Do you know your donor well enough to structure a great solicitation - who should make the ask, what questions will the donor ask (or not ask), how should you actually phrase "will you give me money?" Can you project yourself into this person's mind?  (Check back for future posts on building up your empathy levels - it's an incredibly useful tool, for every aspect of your life!)
3. Again, this is my word, not his, but authenticity is an incredibly important part of successful fundraising.  Jerold talks about making sure to "sing your own song."  It's true.  You need to figure out your own, authentic style - for making solicitations, but also for stewardship, cultivation, communications...and it has to be real, passionate, full of integrity and enthusiasm - authentically you.  That's not easy - for many of us, we're trying hard to be "us" in general, to find ourselves, to find balance, etc.  Adding in a quest to then translate that moving target into a professional version of ourselves is a challenge, to say the least - but it's part of life, and it's part of fundraising.

Ramadan Kareem!

One of the things that fascinates me, in general, is looking at traditions and practices of charity through different cultural lenses.  Tonight, Ramadan starts for millions of Muslims, a holiday where an attempt is made to cut through the trappings of the world that interfere with Islamic thought and deed.  To do that, those observing Ramadan will fast from sunrise to sunset, study the Quran, and perform acts of charity.

To honor the fast of my observant Muslim friends, I am presenting a few thoughts on the Islamic conception of charity, and its meaning as part of Ramadan.  (But this is a practical blog!  What's with the history lessons?  Well...if you're dealing with a Muslim donor, and many of us will at some point, this is incredibly useful information to know.  And, while I'll expand on this some day in the future again and again, if you want to be a great fundraiser, take a little pride in the craft!  It makes you a more interesting person, and donors wanting to spend time with interesting people is a very good thing for your bottom line.)

I should also say: I am not a scholar, I am an amateur.  Please comment below if you feel I'm missing nuances or contextual information!

Let's start with the deep connection of Ramadan to charity.  One of the traditional greetings you give to someone during Ramadan, is "Ramadan Kareem" - where you are wishing someone a "Generous Ramadan."  To me, that says a great deal about the way generosity and charity are woven into the culture.  (For contrast- have you ever been wished "Generous Christmas?" And charity IS central to a great many Christian practices...)

When I've asked friends about the meaning and function of the Ramadan fast, the most common answer is that putting aside worldly concerns, bodily concerns frees you to focus on God.  But the second answer I get, sometimes in the same breath, is that fasting helps you empathize, to truly understand what it is to be hungry, which makes your charity more urgent and meaningful.  Collecting money for charitable causes and making sure that everyone has a plentiful iftar dinner is a significant part of Ramadan practices.

That said, let's move on to one of the things I find deeply interesting about Islamic conceptions of charity.  There are TWO distinct and equally important types of charity in Islam: Zakat and Sadaqa.  Zakat is an obligatory donation of a fixed percentage of your wealth to those less fortunate, something akin to "tithing" in other religions (although a tithe goes to the church or institution, with the understanding that they are responsible, in general, for helping the poor).  Sadaqa is a voluntary gift, whatever is given above and beyond one's Zakat requirements, and extends in practice to less basic needs (community niceties rather than human essentials for individuals).

So, I don't fully understand the complexities of Zakat...but there are pretty intense and explicit calculations involved (2.5 % of capital assets held for an entire lunar year; fixed percentage on agricultural crops and livestock, etc. - non-cash assets - in excess of a minimum deemed necessary for meeting your own basic needs).  This is a serious obligation - one of Islam's five pillars - that we non-Muslims would identify as "charity" but transcends even the noblest intentions of voluntary philanthropy.  Zakat is spiritually cleansing.  Essentially, you go to hell if you don't give zakat...which I say both lightly and accurately.

And the underlying reasons for this are kind of amazing - we're talking about a religion that culturally enforces a personal responsibility for its members to ease economic hardship for others, and to work to eliminate inequalities.  Looking around the world at places with large Muslim communities, it's easy to see why inequality becomes so critical - the poor dip below subsistence levels.  The gap between standards of living are functionally enormous (technically, we're not talking about the world's worst inequality - for an analysis of the 10 countries with greatest gap between rich and poor, go here - but that's small comfort to the people living under the poverty level in places like Pakistan or Bangladesh, both countries where the state is involved in the collection and distribution of zakat).  The political impact of inequality is perceptible in the US, but it's actively dangerous in much of the middle east, for example.   Socialism aside (and zakat is not socialism), this is as strong a religious argument as you can make for sharing your good fortune with your less fortunate neighbors.  Being brought up in such a culture has got to affect the way you view charity that goes to meet the basic human needs of a community - food, shelter, etc.

(Note - I'm not going to touch the question of whether zakat can be given to/used by non-Muslims...that's complicated enough for its own post, and something I want to address alongside other in-group-only giving.)

And then we can move to Sadaqa.  Sadaqa is any charitable giving that comes from the heart - from compassion, from a sense of appreciation, from desire...self motivated, is the idea.  You want to give this support, instead of feeling obligated to do so or else disappoint/defy God.  Of course, it's sort of a religious notion that you're really supposed to feel a desire to give out of self-motivated desire, but as long as you don't think too hard about that, you're OK.

I warm quickly to this concept of charity.  Essentially, if you are lucky enough to live comfortably (and we're going with a real definition of comfort - you have food and shelter and clothing for your family), you must give a portion of that good fortune to the poor so that they can survive.  Period.  AND you should want to give more than that, you should train your children to be generous beyond that minimum level of charity.

I think that's a wonderful way to prioritize giving as a cultural mandate.

For those of you who work in the Muslim community, or with Muslim donors - how does this play out in your direct experience?

In the spirit of cross-cultural good will, this is not a traditional Muslim greeting, it's something Jews will often wish each other on Yom Kippur - but I think it applies well here: may you have a meaningful fast!

Followup: Giving like the Buffetts

I posted about this a couple of weeks ago: an online philanthropy class designed by Doris Buffett and her grandson.

Registration for the Learning by Giving MOOC is open.  Class starts Monday, July 15.

Sign up...and get your supporters to sign up.

You'll all get a chance to nominate a nonprofit to be eligible for grant funding, which is not just a chance for some fiscal support, it's a chance to expose your organization to all the people who are taking this course!  How many is that?  Let's assume that it's lots. And people who wouldn't otherwise find you, which is a bonus.

http://www.learningbygivingfoundation.org/mooc/

Shameless self-promotion: Policy Mic interview

Anyone out there read Policy Mic?  It's a pretty great website that describes itself as "the first online news platform to engage millennials in debates about real issues."  It's journalism meets social media, targeted at the Millennial Generation.

Well, they were looking to profile a few folks who could offer some experienced wisdom for the just-out-of-college set, and they picked me.

Because I'm an unstoppable female entrepreneur.  (Ha!  Flattery will get you everywhere.  But do check it out, and check them out.  Policy Mic is a great place to have non-talking-points debates on current topics with folks you don't yet know.  Very satisfying and through-provoking, as I poked through the site.)

Check out the interview with me here.

The only thing I wish the author had included was the REASON that I think everyone should take acting classes (because that's true): a good acting class is a lesson in applied emotional intelligence.  It will improve your awareness of the messages you are sending to the world, it will improve your ability to adapt and negotiate interpersonal conflicts, it will make you better at "reading" other people, it will deepen your empathy.  All those things are amazingly useful for anyone, in any job.