The Accidental Fundraiser

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Author: Julie M. Still

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Julie M. Still

Medford, New Jersey

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First printing, 2007 The Accidental Fundraiser Copyright © 2007 by Julie M. Still All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review. Published by Information Today, Inc., 143 Old Marlton Pike, Medford, New Jersey 08055. Publisher’s Note: The author and publisher have taken care in preparation of this book but make no expressed or implied warranty of any kind and assume no responsibility for errors or omissions. No liability is assumed for incidental or consequential damages in connection with or arising out of the use of the information or programs contained herein. Many of the designations used by manufacturers and sellers to distinguish their products are claimed as trademarks. Where those designations appear in this book and Information Today, Inc. was aware of a trademark claim, the designations have been printed with initial capital letters. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Still, Julie. The accidental fundraiser / Julie M. Still. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN-13: 978-1-57387-263-8 1. Fund raising. 2. Volutarism--Finance. 3. Nonprofit organizations-Finance. 4. Charities--Finance. 5. Social action. I. Title. HG177.S755 2007 658.15’224--dc22 2007017090 Printed and bound in the United States of America President and CEO: Thomas H. Hogan, Sr. Editor-in-Chief and Publisher: John B. Bryans Managing Editor: Amy M. Reeve VP Graphics and Production: M. Heide Dengler Book Designer: Kara Mia Jalkowski Cover Designer: Ashlee Caruolo Copy Editor: Suzanne Cloud Tapper Proofreader: Pat Hadley-Miller Indexer: Sharon Hughes

Contents Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ix Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xi Introduction: What Is an Accidental Fundraiser? . . . . . . . . . 1 Chapter 1: Planning Your Role . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17 Your Work Style and Preferences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17 Picking Projects of Interest . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26 Developing New Skills . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27 Legal and Accounting Issues . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29 Working on Many Projects at Once . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30 When Things Go Wrong . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31

Chapter 2: Setting Organizational Goals . . . . 35 Organization Type . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35 Mission Statements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39 Tangible and Intangible, Long-Term and Short-Term Goals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42 Benchmarks to Success . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45 When Things Go Wrong . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46

Chapter 3: Divide and Expand . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49 Breaking Down Your Goals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49 Taking Your Intangible Goals into Account . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54 Costs in Time and Money . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58 Avoiding Obstacles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59 Setting Priorities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61 Special Needs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62 Keeping Inventory of Your Resources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65 When Things Go Wrong . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66

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Chapter 4: Matching Goals with Opportunities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69 Using Your Resources to Achieve Your Goals . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69 Finding the Best Matches . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72 Arranging Backup Plans . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74 Staying Open to Other Possibilities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76 When Things Go Wrong . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79

Chapter 5: Finding the Money . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81 Private Foundations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85 Government Money . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89 Membership . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90 Sponsorship . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93 Donations and Gifts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94 In-Kind Gifts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97 Events . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99 When Things Go Wrong . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100

Chapter 6: Making Friends and Forming Partnerships . . . . . . . . . . . . 103 Partnering with Groups That Need What You Have . . . . . . 103 Partnering with Groups That Have What You Need . . . . . . 106 Making Friends—and Keeping Them . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107 Politicians and Candidates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108 Media Matters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111 Helping Others . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114 When Things Go Wrong . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115

Chapter 7: Passive Fundraising . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117 Communicating with Interested Parties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117 Brochures and Newsletters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118 E-mail and Web Sites . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120 Blogs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123 When Things Go Wrong . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125

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Chapter 8: Tips and Advice for the Accidental Fundraiser . . . . . . . . . . . . 127 Spend Wisely . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127 Guard Your Reputation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129 Keep Up . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 130 When Things Go Wrong . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131 The Benefits of Volunteering . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131

Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135 About the Author . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145 Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 147

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Acknowledgments The Rutgers University Libraries were kind enough to allow me a sabbatical to work on this book and I am very grateful. In addition, the director and my colleagues at the Paul Robeson Library offered encouragement and support while I was writing. My family was patient with me when I was cranky or procrastinating, and allowed me the time to be active in my community even when they would never reap the benefits. My thanks also go to those who take the time to work on community projects, large and small, to improve the lives of the people around them. Working on this book was humbling in more ways than one. I learned about the many things that happen all around me that I had never been aware of before. This was the most difficult writing project I have ever undertaken. As I was working on the book, however, I was inspired to do a number of things I would never have thought of otherwise. It has been quite an experience. Finally, I want to thank John Bryans and Amy Reeve, my editors at Information Today, Inc., for their great input and support throughout the process.

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Preface Last weekend I drove past a park where a trail will be built this fall. I look forward to doing cartwheels along it, especially since I penned a grant for $115,000 that allowed the township to tap into an additional $450,000 of federal funds. My name doesn’t appear anywhere in the paperwork, and I won’t have touched a shovel. But when that trail is built, it will, in part, be because I dotted the “i’s” and crossed the “t’s” correctly. As an “accidental” fundraiser, I have worked with many different people and on a diversity of projects. In two weeks, I will go to a school board meeting to be part of the presentation certifying the beautiful tree in front of my son’s elementary school as a historic tree. I was the driving force behind this project. The award doesn’t bring in any money, but it will be a tool for making sure the upkeep of the tree, for which the school was named, remains a priority and will help with other fundraising ventures. On Monday, I brainstormed with the school librarian on ways to raise the money she needs for the Reading Olympics. We developed a good idea and plotted out an initial strategy. Yesterday, as I volunteered at a food kitchen, my team discussed ways of making it easier for college dorm residents to donate their unused food, old clothes, and belongings to charity instead of throwing them away at the end of the year. We also kicked around the idea of trying, once a year or so, to find enough paperback books to put a book in each bag of groceries we pack. Next week, I will be at the meeting of the county historical society’s library committee. One agenda item is how to find funding to process gift books that currently sit boxed and unusable. Last fall, I worked with a local jeweler to create a pendant and charm based on my children’s school logo; the jeweler agreed to share the profits with the PTA. xi

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There are a lot of people active in their community, either through volunteering or through a job that requires them to spend a little time fundraising. Some people make a career out of this, but many, many more of us dabble here and there, trying to find a little money for this, a lot of money for that, a way to fix a problem, ensure a success, and generally make our corner of the universe a little tidier or sunnier. It is amazing to watch people come alive to the concept that they can influence their neighborhood for the better, or that their elected officials are often as anxious to make improvements as they are (or can be persuaded that it is a good thing). We are not simply cogs in a great machine, but part of a larger community that can plant flowers, encourage new businesses, put on a play, elect an honest man (or woman), and bring a smile to someone’s face. In doing this kind of work, one can easily acquire a reputation. This can be both addictive and dangerous. Once you have a reputation, it can be hard to get rid of. It is easier to lose a good reputation than a bad one, and harder to earn a good one than a bad one. Yet, once established, you have it—at least for a while. Someone at a community meeting once referred to me as “The Money Lady.” This was a gross exaggeration, but I’m as susceptible to flattery as the next person and I liked the way that sounded and felt. I was proposing that a group apply for a grant, and I offered to write it, even though it would go in under someone else’s name. A few months later, a township official approached me about a project he wanted to work on and I outlined some strategies for him that I thought were fundable. A woman called me on Saturday morning and asked me about possible funding sources for a project a friend of hers was doing. She said she called me since I seemed to be able to find money. In that case, I was somewhat stuck for ideas, but I’m working on it. It is very flattering to be thought of in these terms, although people’s expectations often far

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exceed my ability to produce. Nonetheless, I enjoyed being “The Money Lady,” even if it was only for a day. This book spells out some of the strategies that accidental fundraisers like me—and hopefully, you—can use to find the resources we need for the projects we want to see developed. Like one of those big real estate developers we all read about in the paper, we start with something small and make it bigger and better. Along the way, we produce facts that support our intentions and form coalitions of “investors” (although ours are investing time and effort more often than piles of cash), earning the support of community leaders, elected officials, and the general public. If we play our cards right and the deities are smiling on us, one fine day we see something new and shiny grow or be built as a result of our efforts. There are a number of books on setting up nonprofits and on writing grants. I decided to take a different angle and write about what needs to be done before all that happens. While some people do go into fundraising intentionally, for most of us it is a gradual process of falling into it. Some people take a job that has a fundraising component, but for many it starts in other aspects of life. Most accidental fundraisers begin their journey through community activities, unaffiliated with work. In a job setting, when someone is needed to raise money, the boss is more likely to pick someone who has the experience and connections created through volunteer work or professional associations than someone who has never been involved in fundraising before. It is not simply a matter of sitting down and writing a grant. There is a good deal of work that needs to be done before pen hits paper. I’ll be going over some general strategies. While it may seem that a lot of time is spent on advance work, as opposed to actual money or resource gathering, it is the spade work—the research and planning—that makes much of what happens happen. You really do need to have given a lot of thought to what you want to do, and

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checked to make sure there aren’t good reasons why it shouldn’t be done. Planning needs to be done on a personal as well as on an organizational level. You as an individual need to think about what you want to do and then find a cause or organization to work with. Chapter 1 deals with most of the personal issues. Chapter 2 covers organizational structure and general goals. Chapters 3 and 4 concern organizational planning and the specifics of what you want to do and how you can go about accomplishing it. Chapter 5 is the actual money chapter, discussing the various avenues available for finding funds and other resources. Chapter 6 is devoted to the fine art of keeping good company. People are often judged by their friends and associates; the same goes for organizations. Chapter 7 talks about “passive fundraising,” or the importance of keeping yourself in the public eye. Chapter 8 tells you how to husband your resources and keep them safe, and how to keep up with new opportunities, legal changes, and other innovations. At the end of each chapter, you’ll find a “When Things Go Wrong” section (which will address some of the options you have when things don’t happen as planned), a list of recommended readings, and a list of organizational Web sites mentioned in the chapter. A bibliography at the end of the book cumulates and annotates sources referenced throughout the book. Initially, I planned to have a second part of the book outlining a variety of projects and how they had developed and how funding was obtained. Mostly I wanted to interview people to find out how they had accomplished what they did. What I found is that organizations tend to be close-mouthed about things like that, especially if you are an outsider. Some organizations that have money may be worried about someone else cutting into their funding stream. However, in most cases, I think it is more likely due to the fact that in each project, and especially in a series of related projects, there are delicate workarounds and bumps in the road that

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must be cleared with gentle persuasion, compromises, confidential gifts, and behind-the-scenes maneuvering that people are reluctant to discuss. So I looked at published financial reports and newspaper articles, with some interviews thrown in, and interspersed those examples throughout the book as “Notes from the Field.” I hope you enjoy reading this book. It was certainly a lot of fun for me to write, and having to set things down on paper made me focus in a way I had not done previously. As a result of writing this book, I think I will be a much better accidental fundraiser in the future. So I thank you for this opportunity and I hope you will learn some things as well. Please feel free to drop me a line and share your own experiences about accidental fundraising. Julie Still [email protected]

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Introduction What Is an Accidental Fundraiser? When we refer to a fundraiser we naturally tend to think of someone who brings in a lot of money, preferably in large chunks. This, however, is a very limited view. I prefer to think of a fundraiser—especially an accidental fundraiser—as someone who reallocates existing resources or creates the connections needed to get something done. Most large organizations have a professional development officer, a big gun who goes after the big bucks. If you are interested in reading about this process, there is a wonderful chapter in Writing for a Good Cause: The Complete Guide to Crafting Proposals and Other Persuasive Pieces for Nonprofits by Danielle Furlich and Joseph Barbato that provides an enlightening, and no doubt very accurate, picture.

Professional and Accidental Fundraisers This is not to say that larger organizations have no use for accidental fundraisers. A workshop was given by a state department head, who used to work for a nonprofit organization, on writing applications for specific grant programs. He said that when he worked for the nonprofit, it wasn’t worth his time to work on grants of less than $4,000, but he had a volunteer who loved to do it. So the organization had both a professional fundraiser and an accidental one. The volunteer brought in lesser amounts—which were still very needed and appreciated sums—while the professional went after the larger dollars. Both were useful to the organization. 1

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I have heard other directors or development professionals at large institutions say similar things. It just isn’t worth their time or their staff’s time to go after the smaller projects or investigate these smaller opportunities, but they dearly love a volunteer who will do it for them. When you look at what is involved in writing small and large grants, you can understand why. According to a Center for Philanthropy study, “Listening to Grantees,” it takes about seven hours to prepare a grant for $10,000 (or $1,500 per hour), but only 12 hours to prepare a grant for $100,000 (or $8,500 per hour). Since they also found that more time is spent on grant preparation than either grant monitoring or evaluation paperwork, it is clearly more expedient to go for larger grants. However, a volunteer may be able to take the time to get the smaller ones. Given that many granting agencies receive applications amounting to much more than they can afford to fund, having someone in an organization plug away at the smaller grants may, in the long run, bring in as much (or more) money as the larger ones. Not all national, or even international, organizations have paid development staff. Some have an all-volunteer army, while others more focused on local issues have small, paid development staff. So the size of an organization or the breadth of its focus are not necessarily key indicators of whether a professional or accidental fundraiser, or both, are on board. In general, though, it is the smaller groups that use accidental fundraisers the most. Also, keep in mind that very few large organizations were born big; most grew into their current size. Some large organizations even shrink, at least in staff. Thus the structure of any organization is elastic and can become larger or smaller depending on the circumstances. In smaller organizations, the main fundraiser may have four or five other primary job duties as well; fundraising may not be the most pressing or important, especially given the uncertain aspects of it. Submitting a grant or making a call do not guarantee funding. If the organization’s board or director feels that staff should focus

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on something else, volunteers are typically brought in to do the fundraising work. Some organizations are built solely of volunteers that do any and all fundraising. These are the people I call accidental fundraisers. For both the low-paid fundraiser and the volunteers, the work is usually a labor of love, which makes them all the more passionate about what they are doing. In some instances a volunteer fundraiser, especially one who is retired or has a flexible schedule, can devote more time to their efforts than a utility outfielder, who may be juggling two or three jobs to make ends meet.

Notes from the Field: Starting Small The Guillain-Barré Syndrome Foundation (www. gbsfi.com) is a group that started small and grew into an international organization. It began with eight people who had a common interest in the disease sitting down in someone’s home. Today there are 160 chapters worldwide with 23,000 members.

Many organizations use fundraising volunteers to staff the phones during phonathons or annual pledge drives, to stuff envelopes, or to approach specific people—but this is not what I would consider an accidental fundraiser. An accidental fundraiser is more intricately involved in the entire process, often making plans or weighing decisions on how to proceed with specific projects. A volunteer may play a variety of roles, but an accidental fundraiser wears a combination management fedora and workman’s cap. Almost everyone is an accidental fundraiser at one time or another in his or her life. Certainly, anyone involved in the fabric of his or her community will be an accidental fundraiser at some point. Have kids? Attend a church? Belong to the Kiwanis, Friends

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of the Library, or another organization? If you answered yes to any of these questions, you are guaranteed to be an accidental fundraiser on one or more occasions. The Nonprofit Kit for Dummies reported a study by the National Center on Charitable Statistics, which found that, in 1999, two-thirds of the nonprofit organizations in the United States had annual revenues under $25,000. That’s a lot of accidental fundraisers. Most accidental fundraisers are not born to the role. Most of us stumble into it without realizing it. Here are some examples: • St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Camden, NJ, working in conjunction with Grace Episcopal Church in nearby Haddonfield, hands out approximately 132 bags of groceries each week to residents of Camden. Someone suggested that volunteers also try to include one paperback book a week to provide food for the mind as well. They could have looked for a grant to provide the approximately $720 it would take to buy 120 paperback books at about $6 each. But it was decided that a less expensive, more economically friendly way was to ask around and see if anyone had some paperbacks they would be willing to donate. One of the volunteers at this project also volunteered in her church library. A member of her congregation had died recently and the church had received a collection of books as part of her estate. It included a box of paperbacks that were not suitable for the church library, but were fine otherwise. Some were recent bestsellers, some were pulp romances, and all were in good shape. These formed the nucleus of the collection. Other people involved in the program rooted around at home for old paperbacks, while others picked up boxes of books at yard sales for a dollar or two. • To provide better prenatal care for low-income pregnant women, local elementary schools can collect books or magazines on pregnancy that students’ mothers no longer need. Obstetrics clinics can gather similar items from their

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patients, and these can be redistributed to women who cannot afford to buy these books, but could benefit from the information. • A town in Pennsylvania wanted to revitalize its downtown and looked into ways of bringing more people in and enticing them to stop and wander through the stores. A local community group decided that a Starbucks coffee shop might do the trick. Unlike a traditional franchise, someone does not just decide to start up a Starbucks; the corporate office makes the decision on store location. The group researched the area, found a vacant building they thought would be suitable, and took a picture of themselves holding Starbucks signs in front of the storefront. Cheaper than a hiring a consultant, this community spirit showed support for the store and a ready-made customer base. • College students might notice how much stuff is discarded at the end of the year when the dorms empty out for the summer—food, furniture, clothing, and household items all just going to waste. A student group can look around for charitable institutions in the area that would be willing to put out boxes or dumpsters so students can recycle the things they don’t need anymore. The items can then be sorted by condition and given away to those in need. None of these projects required real money, yet all of them would provide a public good. If the guiding lights behind each of these projects had gone out and gotten corporate sponsorship or a grant, there might have been a flash of publicity, but by simply redistributing resources, the job was done easily and inexpensively. One distinction between a professional fundraiser and an accidental one is that a professional fundraiser must sometimes seek out publicity as a public showing that he or she is doing a good job. An accidental fundraiser can afford to skip that and focus on the meat of the problem and find the quickest, and often cheapest, solution. Since an

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accidental fundraiser is often not getting paid and not dependent on fundraising work for an income, a lot of the cobwebs and paperwork can be dispensed with. As it is a volunteer activity, time is of the essence—no one can afford to stand on ceremony or grandstand or spend a lot of time in unnecessary meetings. See a problem. Find a solution. Get it done. One of the lines in the “Desiderata,” a poem very popular in the 1960s, says “Do not compare yourself to others, for there will always be lesser and greater persons.” This should be the motto of community activists and accidental fundraisers everywhere. In the previous examples, the accidental fundraisers could have spent a lot of time feeling inferior and unimportant because they weren’t bringing in the big bucks, but what they did achieve allowed the group to do things they could not otherwise do. In addition, smaller projects often lead to larger projects. Very few things spring forth fully grown like Athena from Zeus’s head. There is often a great deal of prep work done behind the scenes. A neighborhood civic association wanted to see if a trail could be put in their park; at that time, a park trail was already slated to be built in an adjacent area. Working with the civic association, the trails group I work with applied for a grant to do some initial planning. Even with a friend on the board, we had to apply twice and were only granted $5,000—half of what we asked for. Still, it was a start. Rather than feeling depressed over the small amount received, the civic organization jumped in with both feet. They went out and identified a number of connections that the trails group would not have thought of, as we were not that familiar with the area. The planners we hired were charged with drawing up some initial maps of what people wanted. During this process, the township applied for $100,000 of a new state grant for formal construction planning, and to our benefit, the area we were working in was included. Would this area have been included in the plan if we had not gotten our smaller grant? Probably not. At this writing, the

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grant application wasn’t funded, but we hope the township will reapply. So in the end, the $5,000 we thought was so small actually led to the possibility of $100,000, which would go a long way toward actual construction. This is very likely how a great many projects get started. Don’t judge your work by the number of dollars brought in, but by whether your goals are being accomplished. Also, don’t keep score based on the number of grants you receive versus the number you apply for. Make a list of the projects you want to do and how much progress you have made on them. There may be a project on your list for which you sent in three grant proposals and all were declined—not very encouraging. However, another group may take on the project after hearing about your interest in it. While that isn’t something you can necessarily take credit for, the work is still being done. On the other hand, maybe you do get a grant for something, then run into political problems and have to let the project go. That isn’t your fault and you shouldn’t feel responsible. When doing volunteer community work, it is important to maintain an upbeat attitude. It may require you to alter your frame of reference on some things, but is well worth the effort.

Things Every Accidental Fundraiser Should Remember 1.

It isn’t personal. In general, nothing that happens to you in your role as an accidental fundraiser is related to you as a person. Are people cranky when you talk to them on the phone? Chances are they had a fight with their spouse, or maybe their socks are wet from stepping in a puddle. Anyone who blocks your way probably doesn’t even see you, but is reacting to something else entirely. Sometimes, it is hard to understand that neither your failures nor your successes have much to do with you at

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all. But it has also been said that a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. When you donate a few hours to a good cause, then your steps, however few, have been a part of that journey. Sometimes it is difficult to realize that we are insignificant and indispensable at the same time. 2.

It’s incompetence, not hostility. When obstacles are placed in your path, it is natural to assume it is done intentionally. That’s not necessarily true. It’s probably just incompetence or bureaucratic red tape or forgetfulness. Sometimes people will try to make your task more difficult. There is no denying that. However, for the most part, that person was probably distracted by something else. Phone calls not returned are not a slight, just a sign that the person has a stack of messages and yours didn’t make the cut that day. Harboring resentment will get in the way of doing your job effectively.

3.

Three steps (sometimes four) forward, two steps back. Anything worth having is worth waiting for; regardless of the project you take on, and regardless of how easy it may appear, it will take geometrically longer than you think— weeks instead of days, months instead of weeks, and years instead of months. Patience is a virtue and community work is very virtuous. Thus, it takes a lot of patience! It is important to take a long-term approach and keep in mind what you want to accomplish.

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Eyes on the prize. Always stay focused on your goal. Don’t be distracted by petty interpersonal squabbles or partisan politics. If your road is blocked one way, look for another. Just keep at it. Wait, bide your time, and keep working in the background.

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If you get what you want, does it matter how? This can be tricky. Say you get a grant because you know someone on the board. That means some other proposal that’s equally worthy, maybe more worthy, didn’t get funded. Tomorrow

Introduction

your proposal may not get funded because someone else has a friend on the board. Is that fair? No. But, as many people have probably told you by now, life is not fair. Provided there is nothing illegal or unethical involved, take what is offered. Sometimes the sun shines on you, sometimes it does not. Elected or appointed officials may be sympathetic to your cause and arrange for you to receive funds through state, federal, or local programs. Take it, smile, and say “thank you.” Someone you may not like, or who has politics or beliefs of which you don’t approve, gives you money or material. As long as the money or material was legally obtained, take it, smile, and say “thank you.” An official who never returned your calls suddenly does something that furthers your cause, but still never acknowledges your group. The public information on the project assumes you and your group don’t exist. Don’t ask questions. Don’t get mad. (Well, okay, get mad, but grit your teeth and keep it to yourself.) Simply mention the project in your public statements and reports and tell how well it complements and enhances yours. 6.

Make people trip over you. If you want to be in the game, you have to make the players notice you. Be where they are. Be friendly. Be ready to jump in the game at a moment’s notice. While you may think this book is overly focused on planning, it is a truism that those who are prepared when opportunity arises are most likely to succeed. People tend to go with the easiest option so you always want to make sure that if someone has money or resources to hand out, you are standing right in front of them with all the details worked out, so all they have to do is sign the check.

7.

No one will ever tell you anything. You will always have to ask. Be sure to touch base with those in the know every now and then. It gives them the opportunity to tell you something you want to know, but that they never thought

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to call and tell you. Make sure you have talked to everyone involved and make sure they understand what you are doing and when. I had everything set for a church project that was coinciding with another church event. I included it in a written overall project proposal and mentioned it to a number of people who all okayed it. Yet, 10 days in advance, I’d found out an event had been scheduled for that same time in the space I had planned to use. No one had put two and two together. Make sure you touch base with the necessary persons two or three times, restating the same thing. 8.

Even the mighty oak was once an acorn. Your projects may look small, but without you they won’t come into existence. Once you have an idea out there and start even the smallest step you are on your way to achieving it. You may not live to see it, but it is there nonetheless. Others may build upon it, but you helped lay the foundation.

9.

There’s more than one way to build a bridge. My uncle used to tell me he took his daughters to a bridge he helped build with his own hands. He was proud of that bridge. It was in a rural Missouri area and probably did not see much traffic by city standards, but his hands had helped create it out of sweat, iron, and concrete. I’m not an engineer or a stonemason. I cannot build a bridge. Yet, I have helped fix bridges and build trails, and I am just as proud of them as my uncle is of the bridge in Missouri. By helping raise the money to pay for construction, I am just as much a part of the project as if I ran a cement mixer.

10. Don’t nickel and dime people. If you are planning a series of fundraising events, let people know in advance what they are. It is annoying to get a fundraising appeal, send in money, and then get another one shortly thereafter. Let people know what is coming so they can pick and choose what they are most interested in.

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11. Play nice. If you ask the local mom-and-pop shops for prizes and donations, don’t buy your supplies at the big box stores. If you know another group is having a problem and you can help fix it, do so. What goes around does indeed come around, and you want a good reputation so that when your chips are down someone might give you a hand. 12. Prioritize. You cannot do everything at once. Make a list of a few top priorities and put most of your resources into the one likely to get done most quickly. Keep enough resources on your second and third priorities to keep them moving. If you try to do too much at once without sufficient manpower, you may get overwhelmed. 13. Be nimble. Resources may suddenly become available for your second or third priority, or perhaps your first priority stalls. Try to be flexible enough to switch gears if need be. Try not to let yourself or others in your organization become so personally invested in any one aspect of the project that they can’t let that part idle if another, better opportunity comes along first. 14. Be prepared. The Boy Scouts are right. You need to know exactly what you would do with money or resources if some came your way. Have your plans set, with a number of options, far in advance. 15. Everything is a learning experience. If you have just seen years of work blown away in a political or monetary firestorm, take time to grieve and regroup. Maybe this project will rise from the ashes, maybe it won’t, but you will have learned something that will help you next time.

The Accidental Fundraiser’s Toolkit There are certain things you must have in order to be a successful accidental fundraiser—no, it’s not a million dollars in the bank,

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although that would certainly make your life easier. Here is a brief list of items and talents you will absolutely need. • Storage space – Set aside an orange crate or file cabinet drawer for your projects. It is imperative to keep good paperwork. Someone in your organization is going to need to put her hands on copies of bylaws, mission statements, old grants, correspondence, your Employer Identification Number (EIN) (if you are an incorporated nonprofit), and other organizational documentation, as well as other items in this list. If it isn’t you, make sure it is someone trustworthy. If you keep documents electronically, be sure to back them up on a regular basis. • Plans – Get a copy of as many masterplans, mission statements, reports, whatever you might need that directly relates to your project(s). Some of these will be available from local government offices or relevant professional organizations or planning agencies. Some you will have to buy. Some are government documents that can be read and/or copied in local libraries or obtained from state and federal governments. You will want to refer to these in your own documents to show how your project fits in with established plans. If your cause is not geographically oriented, you will need relevant research reports and studies. • Demographics – If your cause is local, get access to census data. Most of the current information is available on the Internet, but just in case, find out which area libraries have the information you need. Try to find the data down to the block level if possible. You will need this kind of information for statistical purposes. If you are saying a specific project will take place in a predominantly minority area, you will need to show proof of those demographics. If your cause is related to a hobby, medical or psychological issue, or historical or sociological phenomenon or event, find statistical information on the issue or event (reports listing

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your interest as one of the top 10 hobbies in the country, for example). Update this information from time to time. • Political representatives and governmental officials – Know your state, local, and federal officials, and the people that work for them. I try to have a contact in the office of my congressman, state senator, and state representative, someone I can call or e-mail for a letter of support, information, or recommendation. The more local the level, the more likely you can contact the official personally. For higher level offices, try to find a good staff person. While there is a general tendency to assume all elected officials are crooks, this is often the view of the uninformed. Go out and meet your officials. I have been pleasantly surprised to find people of conscience who generally want to improve the lives of their constituents and the areas they represent. Sure there are some bad guys (and gals) out there. One reason they are there is that the electorate doesn’t pay attention to the people running for office, especially at the local level. When possible, attend debates and open meetings (these usually only happen near election time, unfortunately), and make a point of introducing yourself to the official or candidate and let them know what you are working on. The good ones are always interested in seeing who is out there volunteering and what is going on in the community. They especially want to get to know you if you can make them look good. Also, make sure you understand the structure of local government and what responsibility comes under whose jurisdiction. Calling your congressman when you should be talking to a city commissioner will only irritate everyone and make you look like an amateur. • A library – Use your library. It can be said that I am biased because I am a librarian; however, this also gives me a unique viewpoint. I know what can be found in a library and what you are missing if you don’t use one. Local public

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libraries are likely to have copies of all the plans you need. You can use these or copy the sections you need for any given project, in lieu of always getting a copy yourself. Libraries have access to electronic information that you will need: newspaper and magazine databases, scholarly journal articles, and so on. Not to be overlooked are the services of a good reference librarian. Just tell her what sort of information you are looking for and she will help you find it. One gentleman in my community asked me to help him find information on the impact cell phones had on automobile accidents. This was a bit out of my league, so I asked a colleague in a law library. He told me related information would be in case law, which would be tricky and time consuming to find, especially as law enforcement agencies were not uniformly reporting the presence of cell phone usage in accidents. So, he suggested I look for a good law review article instead. Sure enough, one was found that contained most of the analysis needed. While it wasn’t exactly what the gentleman was looking for, it was more than he would have found on his own. • A smile – Ask for things with a smile. I’m being just a bit facetious, but as the old saying goes, you can catch more flies with honey than with vinegar. For much of your information you will be dependent, like Blanche DuBois in A Streetcar Named Desire, on the kindness of strangers. If you are unpleasant or rude, people won’t tell you anything. Don’t expect anyone else to be as dedicated to your cause as you are. They have their own causes, as near and dear to them as yours are to you. Be nice. Be polite. Say please and thank you. • Press list/kit – Prepare a press list or press kit. More will be said about this in the “Media Matters” section of Chapter 6, “Making Friends and Forming Partnerships,” but it bears mentioning here. Make a list of the media in your area. Don’t forget the local freebie weekly shoppers with small

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articles on community matters. Look in the area papers, small and large, for guidelines on sending in news items. Are there community- or cause-oriented Web sites? Local cable access television stations or shows? Keep a good list of these, as you may want to contact these people. • Good records – Keep well-organized records. Who has donated to your group/cause in the past? Who has the upto-date membership list? What events did or did not work in the past? You need to make sure you have this information so you don’t accidentally approach a previous sponsor’s competitor without having given your past donor first shot to support your group again. Even having them both listed as supporters for the same event could cause hard feelings. You also want to be able to acknowledge those who have consistently supported you. Receipts for donations, grants, in-kind donations, and other resources are as necessary as organizational records. • Patience – Be patient when dealing with people, waiting for results, developing a plan, and waiting years for politics to change or for the right time to present it to the right people. Things will happen in their own season. People sometimes experience a genuine change of heart or find the will to redirect their time and money into your cause; sometimes the change is politically motivated. As mentioned earlier, if you get what you want, it doesn’t matter how. Someone who rolled his eyes at you in March may be your biggest supporter in October. A pretense of friendship isn’t necessary, but civility is. • Integrity – Be trustworthy. If you are asking people to trust you with either their time or money, they are much more likely to do so if you have a reputation for being competent and trustworthy. Work hard at building a good reputation and even harder at maintaining it.

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While most of us will wear the accidental fundraiser’s hat at some point in our lives, few of us will wear it for any length of time. If you discover that you have a talent for resource reallocation, please consider keeping a hand in the community soup. Talented, sensible people are not that easy to come by and the world needs all the help it can get. I’ve had a great time doing this kind of work and can see that I will probably be doing it for many years to come. Won’t you join me?

Recommended Reading Hutton, Stan and Frances Phillips. Nonprofit Kit for Dummies. New York: Wiley, 2001. Listening to Grantees: What Nonprofits Value in their Foundation Funders. The Center for Effective Philanthropy, 2004.

Recommended Web Sites Guillain-Barré Syndrome Foundation, www.gbsfi.com

Chapter 1 Planning Your Role This chapter sets out some options and guidelines for you to consider before you get started in your fundraising endeavors. As with all things, a little planning in advance can save a lot of grief later. While you may think that your role can be defined as “getting money,” that is really only a part of an accidental fundraiser’s job— sometimes not the most important part. As you read through this book, you will see instances where getting money created more problems than it solved. Sometimes your project or cause gets the money—just not directly through you. Defining yourself simply as a money-getter is very limiting, so you need to define yourself by more strategic and concrete goals. You will learn what I mean by this as you read on. As mentioned in the Introduction, many people become involved in fundraising unintentionally, often through community work or volunteering. Even for those whose job entails some aspects of fundraising, the path is usually gradual, and typically due to experience or interest. The points covered in this chapter, while focusing on volunteering, are also applicable to such workrelated fundraising.

Your Work Style and Preferences One common frustration of those involved in civic or volunteer activities is that they become overwhelmed with the work and those around them become overwhelmed. It is guaranteed that, at some point, this work overload will cause a meltdown of one kind or another. Someone suddenly realizes they won’t be able to make

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a deadline, but are too embarrassed to say so. He or she just disappears, leaving the rest of those involved holding the bag. It is seldom intended—it just seems to happen. Actually it is due to poor planning and poor time management. Decide beforehand how much time you are willing to give and stick to it. If you don’t have the time or simply don’t want to take a project on, it is better to say so in advance than to drop the ball in the middle. Also, when joining an existing project, insist in the beginning on an estimate of what your part of the job entails. No one likes to be surprised, but it happens all too often that someone will volunteer for one thing and find out it includes a number of other things. This is a quick way to permanently lose volunteers who will be very wary in the future of agreeing to do anything for this project or any other project. If people are deliberately dishonest about what they expect of you, don’t work with them again, but do look around for other opportunities. Projects so disorganized that no one really knows the baseline of what the “job” will entail should be viewed with some degree of suspicion. While workloads can easily be expanded, it is important to start out with a set list of expectations. If you are asked or volunteer to take on fundraising activities as part of your job, try to sit down with your boss and discuss how much time you should devote to this, and what the expected outcomes are. You absolutely cannot guarantee to come up with so much as a dime, and that should be taken into account when agreeing on what percentage of your work time should be set aside for the task. One mother, whose children were active in an organization, was asked to play a more active role that she was told would only take a little time. However, in weeks prior, she had inadvertently been put on the e-mail list for those holding formal positions in the organization; these e-mails outlined long lists of meetings and events people were expected to attend. So she declined the opportunity to get more involved, fearing if she did, all these other obligations

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would suddenly be sprung on her. If she had asked for a detailed description of what would be expected of her, or inquired specifically about those meetings and events, she might have received some reassurance; it is likely that she would not have been required to attend anything. She did not ask, however, and the organization did not ask what her specific reservations were; thus both sides lost an opportunity. Some volunteers agree to take on fundraising duties with the understanding that they will apply for grants or monies that could be used to pay them a salary. Think long and hard before agreeing to this arrangement. You could be working almost full-time on the project for years before any money comes to you directly, if any ever does. In the meantime, any funds you receive for the actual project itself will need to be managed, with the money spent as specified in the grant and any required report written. If you are developing a fundraising project, write up a proposal, setting out what you intend to do. Inevitably some people will make suggestions or comments about expanding or changing the focus of the project. This is most often an expression of interest and enthusiasm on their part. Many of these ideas may be good ones, but not within the scope of what you, and often they, are willing to do at that point in time. Tell them their ideas are great, but at the moment you can only commit the time to do what you originally planned. Ask if they want to volunteer to do the larger part they suggested, or keep them in mind as a future enhancement, but don’t allow them to force you to do more than you planned. It is very difficult to follow someone else’s vision unless you believe in it too. Input and enthusiasm from others is a vital and valuable part of any project, but it is all too easy to let a more powerful personality derail something by changing the boundaries of the project or shifting the emphasis from one thing to another. Far too many projects fail and far too many civic-minded people become disillusioned because of clashing visions or because a

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manageable project grew larger than the group’s capacity to complete it. The bottom line in volunteer work is, or should be, that the person willing to do the most work gets to set most of the rules. If you plan to spruce up the grounds of a school or park and have inkind donations of plants from a nursery and permission of the landowners (school administration or parks department), do not let someone else, no matter how well intentioned, turn it into a much larger project. If they don’t have the resources to do so, or aren’t willing to put in the time to get those resources, let it go. You have a bird in hand; go ahead with your original idea and then see if it can be grown into a larger project later. This is especially true in fundraising when you are dealing with other people’s money. You absolutely do not want to promise beyond your abilities. Small and appropriately sized funding success can also be overshadowed by more grandiose dreams. If you have received a gift or grant, regardless of its size, celebrate! You may be able to leverage it into something larger, but if not, you have still achieved what you initially set out to achieve. Two of the most common causes of burnout among volunteers, including accidental fundraisers, are the sense that the workload will never stop growing, and that if they don’t do something themselves, it won’t get done. In volunteer work, especially in fundraising, the workload can indeed continue growing forever, as each success begets increased expectations. That is another reason to decide in advance how much time and effort you really want to put into a project. You can always increase your commitment later, but setting realistic guidelines at the start will help you set limits for yourself and keep others aware of what you can and cannot do. Once you get started and fall into a groove, you will see opportunities on a regular basis and continually think to yourself, “We could do that.” Yes, you could—if you were employed to do this full time. There are many opportunities you could explore, but there simply

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isn’t time to investigate every possibility. Many of them will pass by. This is okay; you can’t do everything. As for the sense that if you don’t do something yourself, it won’t get done, admit to yourself that this is, in fact, true—often if you don’t do something, no one else will. Once you understand this, let it go. Will people be disappointed in you? Maybe. Look at your options, though. Accomplishing something, however modest, is better than accomplishing nothing. Do not let yourself be run ragged with an overscheduled life. Find your middle ground, where you are comfortable. Set your limits and stick to them. Few projects, no matter how admirable the goals, are worth making yourself miserable over. Your choices are to feel good about what does get done or bad about what doesn’t. Dwelling on the negative isn’t going to put you in a positive frame of mind for the next project or the next part of this one. As an example, last month I turned in a grant proposal to a funding agency. We could have turned in more than one, as the funding agency allowed multiple submissions, and in fact, my group had prioritized two other projects as good possibilities for this agency. However, we were unable to complete the paperwork in time, for two reasons. First, I had filed our 501c3 letter (proof of our nonprofit status) in the folder with the last proposal I had written, instead of returning it to the “nonprofit status” folder where it belonged. It took me more than an hour of tearing the house apart to find it. Accidental fundraisers often work against deadlines (as do professional ones) and small errors like this can be the difference between getting a proposal postmarked on time or not. Second, based on a suggestion from the funding agency, we decided to include the page numbers of the watershed planning document we were quoting from. (Some funding agencies allow smaller organizations to submit proposals in advance and provide feedback on how to make them stronger. This is a wonderful service and is often available if you ask.) I had gotten our feedback

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about two weeks before the proposal was due, which should have given me plenty of time to add the page numbers. Good news: I had downloaded the plan from the Internet and had it on my computer at home. Bad news: The page numbers weren’t included, nor were we able to track down a printed copy. The revisions to the first proposal took so long there was no time to prepare additional proposals. While this may seem overblown, it is not unusual. One accidental fundraiser told me about someone who routinely drove 700miles round trip to turn in grant proposals because they weren’t completed in time to be mailed. Another accidental fundraiser shared her story of missing an application deadline because she missed a signature page on the application, and the person whose signature was needed had left for the day. A third accidental fundraiser missed a deadline because the copy machine ate his original document and he couldn’t go home to print another copy. It is always easy to kick yourself about things that could have been done, but that is the surest path to burnout. These things happen and they will happen to everyone—including you. It may seem strange to talk about burnout at the beginning of this book but some awareness of what leads to it can help you avoid it from the start. Too often people dive into community work and quickly become disillusioned by the time and effort it takes to get things done, or become overwhelmed by what they have taken on. Understanding the process clearly and setting limits on the amount of time and energy you are willing to contribute right from the start will lead to a longer, more satisfactory experience. There is always the temptation to make things bigger and better when they are fine as they are. In other words, if it isn’t broke, don’t try to fix it. Maybe you could improve it, but maybe that improvement is not worth the time and effort it would take. Consider the following scenario: You are asked to chair or assume a leadership position on an established fundraising event. Try to find out in

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advance exactly what is involved. See if the previous chair has notes or files he or she might be willing to share. Delegate as much as possible by asking people to take on specific duties, but be aware that the more people involved, the more communication and organizational management needed. If your plans become too grand and one of your team has to drop out, you are the most likely person to pick up the slack. Knowing this, you might try to dampen the initial enthusiasm of some of your team members to do a bigger event and raise more money than previous years. Make sure you discuss with them the full implications of a more involved project, and the time and effort needed. Unless everyone is willing to sign on, with complete understanding of what it would entail, stay with the established approach. Sometimes just doing as well as the previous event is good enough. The pressure to do a stellar job will keep many perfectly capable people from agreeing to take on the task. Do what you can. If you cannot shine in one capacity, there will be other opportunities. Too often burnout is caused by people trying to do their best at everything all the time and it just isn’t possible. To be fair—to yourself and others—inventory your time and talent constraints from the beginning. Some projects, no matter how inviting, need to be set aside or declined. For example, I wanted to start a project that would have proved very beneficial in many areas and even nationally. I talked with people who worked in the specific field and received a positive reaction. However, in planning out the initial strategy, it became clear that the project would take more time than I had. With apologies to the people I had already recruited, I backed out of the project before it even began. In the future, it might be possible that I or someone else may have the time to pick it up, but the project just wasn’t something I could commit to at that point in my life. If you realize this before you start a project, you will save yourself and those around you a great deal of anguish and regret later.

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Another thing to consider from the beginning is what level of profile you want within the organization. The organization will likely have a public profile of its own and you may have some influence on that. The more active you are within the organization and the more dependent it is on you, the more it will take on your personality and priorities. Those who have paying jobs with an organization typically have a higher profile, often becoming a public face and doing media interviews. Those who are doing the work solely as a hobby tend to keep a lower profile. These roles shift as people come and go and personal goals change. Deciding where you want to shine and when you want to be in the background allows you to accomplish those things most important to you, and introduces you to people who can help you accomplish other projects. It also allows you to play to your strengths. I prefer to stay in the background and avoid some of the more public social activities that require a greater ability to schmooze than I possess. Other people in the organization handle that angle, which allows me to spend more time researching funding opportunities and writing. When people work together and trust each other, it allows everyone to exercise his or her strengths. For instance, one woman I know who is extremely good with people likes to make fundraising phone calls—and people love to give her money. However, she has never learned to use a computer, can’t hang onto paperwork, and has an almost allergic reaction to advance planning. She depends on other people for those things. Provided there is a good trust level built up between the “front office” and the “back room,” a division of duties works well for many organizations. It also allows everyone involved to use their best talents, without having to do something they are not comfortable with or consider drudgery. For my purposes, I can get a lot more done by keeping a low profile than by being in the spotlight, but everyone has different agendas. If you have any plans to run for office in the future, then you

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need your name to be mentioned repeatedly (and positively) over several years. If you are trying to create public good will for your business, you also need this exposure. Otherwise, consider taking a lower profile. One of my favorite sayings is, “There is no end to what you can accomplish if you don’t care who gets the credit.” Thus, I try to stay focused on getting things done and not on getting recognition. My professional vita is hefty enough that I don’t feel a need to pump it up with a high visibility in community work, yet I can still list my activities on my annual report if I want, no press clippings required. Also, I am willing to increase my public profile if I feel it could have a positive impact on my children or my career. Take into account the personality of the organization and how it meshes (or doesn’t) with yours. My office and my house are messy, but I work in a very organized fashion, planning ahead and always maintaining some level of control. Projects that I work on tend to have similar attributes. The actual work may be done close to a deadline, but a lot of planning and preparation will take place in advance. Some people like to put everything together at the last minute and have a high tolerance for noise and chaos. It’s just a matter of different work styles. While I try to be helpful in such situations, I avoid getting deeply involved. If it turns out that a group you approach operates in a manner you can’t deal with, find another group. There are plenty of them out there; any number will be happy to have you join and contribute. Keeping your personal preferences in mind can help you be more successful as a fundraiser. My favorite scenario is to be given a clearly defined job and a deadline, and then left alone to do the work. Anything that mostly involves going to meetings or working in groups is not my cup of tea, and so I tend to decline taking on those types of projects. Knowing my own preferences allows me to pick and choose projects that are going to give me the greatest satisfaction and cause the least frustration for those around me. For example, I like to be active in my children’s schools. At the spring fair,

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one of our primary fundraisers, I prefer to work the popcorn machine rather than be a barker or work at one of the more popular games. Some parents prefer working the bean bag throw, while others like the goldfish. Some people contribute by bringing baked goods. When it comes to fundraising, I would rather work on a project primarily involving just two people (such as working with the local jeweler to come up with a bracelet based on the school logo) instead of a project involving a large group and a lot of meetings (such as working on the gift wrap sales committee). There are people who would rather come in and set up equipment and leave before an event gets started, while others want to be in the thick of things. Everyone has to find his or her niche. And remember, each task that you volunteer to do is one more thing that doesn’t require money. Of course, many people prefer to work in groups and socialize as they work, and in larger organizations there is room for all preferences and personalities. In smaller groups there may be more individual clashes, but you may also end up playing a more crucial role because you are the only one with your unique skill set.

Picking Projects of Interest Time is the most valuable resource you have—it’s critical to guard and manage it well. There are few things worse than spending a lot of time doing something that you really don’t like or that you know won’t help you meet any personal goals. Where possible, only volunteer for projects you enjoy or groups you connect with. I became involved with a local trails group—not due to any deep abiding passion for trails (although I think they are pretty neat!), but because I wanted to be involved in my community and the group was willing to take me on my terms. Other projects I’ve worked on were also chosen less for personal interests and more for convenience of the moment. Like most people, I have a lot of interests so there are lot of things I could work on. Don’t make

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yourself crazy. Find a project that gives you some enjoyment and allows you to work with nice people. Any project or group that benefits your loved ones is a worthy cause. If you have school-age children, then you absolutely must find a way to be involved in their school. Join the PTA. Paint your daughter’s kindergarten room. Plant flowers in front of the school’s welcome sign. If a loved one is in a nursing home or group shelter, see if there is a friends and families group. If there isn’t or you don’t like the one that exists, find a project you can do on your own. You need to see what is happening and you need to make sure people know you are around. Be helpful, but not problematic, so that if someone wants to tell you something they will feel comfortable approaching you. The benefits to your loved one may not be visible, but believe me, they are there. If a loved one has an illness, see if there is a support group in your area. There is power in numbers, and your voice, added to the chorus, makes the group stronger. I have two children and I try to be active in their schools. Sometimes a parent’s presence and involvement can make all the difference in the world. Most parents I know who are involved in their kids’ schools or other activities are there for similar reasons: We want to make sure that our phone calls get returned, that teachers will contact us if there are problems, that other parents will cut us some slack, and that our little ones won’t fall through a crack somewhere. In a perfect world, all children would get the help and attention they need and a parent’s involvement wouldn’t make any difference, but it doesn’t always happen that way.

Developing New Skills What do you want to get out of your involvement in fundraising? There are often multiple answers to this question. I want to develop fundraising skills because they will enhance my professional toolkit

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Notes from the Field: Finding Your Niche Suppose you don’t like any of the volunteer options mentioned in this chapter, but you want to do something constructive. Think about what you do like to do and find a way to use those talents. For example, Gaudeamus is a group of five musicians who perform 10 concerts a year and donate the proceeds (and sales from their CDs) to charity. (For more information visit the group’s Web site at www.letusrejoice.net.) Some people simply pack an extra sandwich in their lunch and give it to a homeless person they see on their way to work. If you have long hair and are thinking of cutting it, why not donate it to Locks of Love, an organization that uses donated hair to make wigs for children with medically related hair loss. (For more information visit www.locksoflove.org.) Everyone can do something.

if I’m looking for a job. Nothing makes a search committee’s eyes bug out more than seeing “I have personally written grants that brought over $150,000 into my community” on a job application. I’m not likely to get this experience in my current job, but I want to keep my options open for any future career change. If gaining fundraising experience for future jobs is part of your goal as well, be sure to collect documentation of any volunteer fundraising that you do. Keeping a high profile throughout the project helps with this, as does asking officials and others to write letters outlining what your contribution was to a particular project. You can keep these for a professional portfolio. You may want to expand your professional network, so look for organizations that appeal to the

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type of people in your field. Take some time to browse newspapers and Web sites and see where these groups congregate. It never hurts to learn new things, such as the latest software, or to develop new skills, such as grant writing or working with the media. In Sarah Ban Breathnach’s Simple Abundance, the author writes that you need to repot yourself every few years—learn a language or take up ballroom dancing. Otherwise, people find themselves divorcing, moving, or changing jobs just to get a new perspective. Sometimes, nothing so drastic is required—you may just need to learn a new skill or meet some new people. Repotting yourself not only allows you to develop new skills and meet people, but to stretch new muscles. Staying active is a factor in longevity.

Legal and Accounting Issues You’ve probably been told at some point in your life to always read the fine print. This is good advice. Carefully read all grant contracts, sponsorship agreements, and other types of paperwork. Make sure all liability falls on the organization and not you personally, unless you have complete control over what happens in the organization. One young man, full of zeal and good intentions, took out a personal loan to purchase materials an organization needed. It was understood that he would be paid back, but nothing was in writing. The organization was not as well organized as everyone had thought and fell apart shortly afterward. He ended up selling his car to pay back the loan. No one helped him with it. I doubt he ever did anything like that again. Insurance is another issue. Sometimes simply finding meeting space is a problem because some churches and other organizations will want you to have your own liability insurance to use their facility. Any event you are inviting people to will probably require insurance, either by the organization or by someone you are partnering with. Participants in activities may need to sign waivers as

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well. Laws will vary by state, so if at all possible find a local lawyer to help you make sure all your bases are covered. This is especially true if you are an incorporated nonprofit. Be careful of accounting problems. Recently, three established organizations in my area faced bankruptcy because their volunteer treasurers were embezzling. If you are the treasurer as well as the fundraiser, insist that someone else in the group audit the books once a year. If possible, find an accountant or bookkeeper who will look over the books from time to time. While continuity in an office is a good thing, the treasurer’s position is one that may need to turn over every once in a while, just to make sure the books don’t stay in one person’s hand for a number of years with no oversight.

Working on Many Projects at Once Some people want to devote all their available time and energy to one project or group. Others, like me, enjoy dabbling in a lot of different things at once. You might be involved in a religious organization, a parents’ organization, and a group relating to your personal interests all at the same time. You may be more active in one setting than in another. If possible, see if you can overlap your fundraising abilities in the groups in some way. Sometimes working in more than one group allows you to move the same agenda forward. Working toward getting a tree certified historic for a school group goes hand in glove with work in a trails group. Developing a PTA fundraiser that sells jewelry based on the school’s tree logo furthers both aims and makes a good economic tie-in if the jeweler in question is based in the community. While these three projects have distinct aims, they are all connected and can lead to other projects with other aims. If you limit yourself to one area you may be passing up opportunities to expand your horizons a bit. Linda Lysakowski, one of only 78 people worldwide to hold the Advanced Fundraising Certified Executive designation,

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has conducted research that shows that most people who volunteer do so in a number of organizations. Dag Wollebaek and Per Selle, both of the Department of Comparative Politics at the University of Bergen in Norway, suggest that being involved in a number of organizations, even if ties to some of them are by name or donation only, builds more social networks and better social capital than very active participation in only one organization.

When Things Go Wrong Oh, yes—things will go wrong in your fundraising project, and more often than you would like. Accept that this is bound to happen and be prepared to move past a problem once it has been resolved. You’ll find it helps up front not to make promises you aren’t absolutely certain you can keep. When things go wrong, don’t try to assign blame. If someone messed up, it is likely everyone will know it. You can decide whether to continue working with this individual. Sometimes you make a mistake yourself. Assess your errors and try not to make them again. You may need to find another organization to work with. Above all, try to find a balance between having high standards and being gentle with yourself and others. As mentioned earlier, it is easy to get overwhelmed and burned out as a volunteer, which is one reason to pick projects carefully. If you find yourself in over your head, resign. Try to do so at a time that is relatively convenient for the other people involved but don’t hang in there until it is too late. I was once the assistant treasurer on a political campaign. It was clear pretty early that I was in over my head: This was not a position for someone with a full time job, children, and no accounting background. Reports had to be filed at specific times and there was often only two weeks between the end of the reporting period and the filing deadline. So I resigned. I felt like a failure and, in truth, I was not able to keep up with the

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job. However, I gave the candidate two months notice (through the next filing period) and offered to train my replacement. He found the job overwhelming too, but as a retiree with tax experience he had more time to work on it and more experience in the area than I did. Giving appropriate notice and offering to help out if needed allowed me to stay on good terms with the candidate and with my replacement. The person who holds the purse strings has control. If you are the gateway to getting money, people may feel threatened by you. There is bound to be some friction. For example, the percentage of school budgets funded by state and federal money is falling. In a school with a strong alumni or parents’ organization that brings in a lot of money and has a say in how that money is spent, there are likely to be some arguments between school administrators and that group. How those arguments are resolved depends a lot on the personalities involved. Another thing to accept early on is that even if you are a success at fundraising, someone somewhere isn’t going to like you. Your plans will certainly at some point run contrary to someone else’s: One community leader might be at odds with another and their pet projects get pulled into the fray. Warring political factions among elected officials withhold funding from groups associated with the opponent. It isn’t necessarily logical, but then human nature seldom is. A couple who worked on fundraising for historic preservation and coordinated an old house group in their town said they were widely disliked by city officials because they often worked to block unplanned development. It was just part of the territory. Remind yourself it isn’t really personal and that, in time, if the winds of fortune (or the economy or public opinion) change, you may find yourself on the same side.

Recommended Reading Ban Breathnach, Sarah. Simple Abundance: A Day Book of Comfort and Joy. New York: Warner Books, 1995.

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Bonnicksen, Bruce C. “New Roles of Volunteers in Development.” New Directions for Philanthropic Fundraising 39 (Spring 2003): 5–21. Lysakowski, Linda. “What’s In It for Me?” New Directions for Philanthropic Fundraising 39 (Spring 2003): 53–64. Wollebaek, Dag and Per Selle. “Does Participation in Voluntary Associations Contribute to Social Capital? The Impact of Intensity, Scope, and Type.” Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly 31 No. 1 (March 2002): 32–61.

Recommended Web Sites Gaudeamus, www.letusrejoice.net Locks of Love, www.locksoflove.org

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Chapter 2 Setting Organizational Goals While Chapter 1 concerned your personal agenda, this chapter concerns the organizational agenda. I will discuss the levels of organization various groups may have and goal setting. The type of organization or group will, in large part, decide what type of fundraising you do, or at least define what you cannot do. If you are joining an existing organization some of these matters will already have been decided, but they should all be revisited from time to time. Missions change, goals are reached and new ones need to be developed, and benchmarks need to be updated. This can be time consuming but it is absolutely essential. Suppose someone gave your organization $500, $2,000, $10,000, $50,000, or even more? What would you do with it? Do you know? Would there be any consensus? If you don’t have a good idea of what you would do with each of these amounts, then you haven’t done your homework. Don’t start seeking funds until you do have a clear idea of what the group or project’s goals are and where any amount of money raised would go. As Elizabeth Wilson says in her book, Building Credibility, “The difference between occasional luck and sustained success is careful planning.”

Organization Type Organizational status can be very important and may change over time. The trails group I work with started out just as a group of people with a similar goal. Later it became an official township organization, but when a rift developed it ended up in a strange inbetween category. Eventually we decided to incorporate and have

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a formal membership. Knowing it would allow us to apply for grants, we incorporated as a federal 501c3 nonprofit corporation, as many funding agencies will only provide grants for organizations with this or similar status. Apparently, we weren’t alone. According to Bruce Bonnicksen, Senior Director of Planned Giving, St. Louis Children’s Hospital Foundation, the number of 501c3 organizations increased almost 48 percent from 1989 to 1998. There are costs involved with incorporating, but in our case, we were able to minimize them when someone talked to their neighbor—a lawyer who shared our interests—and he did the paperwork for us pro bono. The downside of incorporating is that you are a formal body, which makes your corporate assets open to litigation (and yours, too, if you aren’t careful) and legally obligated to follow certain rules. There are reports that need to be filed, which become more complex the more money you bring in. Registrations have to be updated and paperwork filed. Make sure you know what you are getting into. You will also need bylaws. There are books, such as Starting and Running a Nonprofit Organization by Joan M. Hummel, that give examples of bylaws; alternatively you can borrow what a similar organization is using and adapt it as necessary. You may also need or want to register as a charitable organization in your state. In addition, there are state associations for nonprofits. Thirty-nine states have statewide nonprofit groups to which nonprofits of varying sizes belong. To find the association in your state, check out the National Council of Nonprofit Associations (www.ncna.org). At NonProfitExpert.com, you’ll find a list with contact information. The benefits of joining state nonprofit groups are that you may get discounts for lawyers or accountants fees, or be eligible to attend training sessions at reduced costs. It can also enhance the reputation of your organization and sometimes lead to new and useful contacts. These groups often provide training on aspects of nonprofit management and fundraising that you may find useful and affordable. Even if you decide not to incorporate, it

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is helpful to be a little familiar with the process and have a good relationship with one or more formal organizations. In some cases you may want to access grant monies by partnering with one and having the formal organization be the official applicant. One caveat here is to think carefully about what name you use to formally apply. This will be your official name from now on. Make sure the group has thought through all the ramifications of the selected name. Was it used by an earlier incarnation of your group? Are there feelings, good or bad, associated with it? Can it be abbreviated or turned in to an acronym that is either negative or susceptible to ridicule? Does it express your mission or concerns to those seeing it for the first time? These are all things to consider. If you incorporate under one name and end up using another name in everyday business, you will end up spending a lot of time explaining the discrepancy and having to remember to explain it in any formal fundraising efforts you do. A name is important and well worth a lot of thought at the beginning. Some groups are local affiliates of larger organizations. For example, while most of the schools in my township have parent–teacher organizations (PTOs) or home/school organizations (HSOs), my son’s school is an affiliate of the national Parent Teacher Association (PTA). A PTO is solely a local organization, while a chapter of the PTA is tied to a larger national organization. There are also ways of creating ties with a larger group without becoming an affiliate. For example, the American Hiking Society has an Alliance organization that other hiking and related groups can join. These are often small local groups for whom the connection to a larger more established group provides some gravitas. For the larger organization, it is an opportunity to more directly connect with local groups (read more about this in Chapter 6, “Making Friends and Forming Partnerships”). A formal group, especially one with membership or an incorporated status, generates paperwork. Someone has to handle it.

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Whenever the trails group applies for a grant, we have to include proof of our current 501c3 status. I maintain the letters and certificates verifying this status and regularly make copies for inclusion with our grant proposals. If you do incorporate, keep in mind that there will be paperwork of this sort and it must be entrusted to someone who won’t lose it (or, as mentioned in Chapter 1, misfile it). There are also budgetary considerations. In Pennsylvania, a nonprofit group pays an annual registration fee based on annual budget. If you go over $25,000 (this can be averaged over a number of years) there is a big jump in registration fees. The same goes for federal nonprofit status. Check with a lawyer or a statewide nonprofit association for the most current information. Someone has to be aware of these types of issues. If the devil is in the details, these are the details that trip up many small organizations. Paperwork is misplaced or not filed in time and an organization loses its status and can no longer apply for certain grants or fundraise within the state. If the organization has a membership, someone must keep and maintain the membership list; the organization will have to consider issues such as whether to have membership cards. However, sometimes just being a loosely organized group is the best option. This will help you avoid some complications, although it may limit your options. As mentioned earlier, a large percentage of granting agencies will only accept proposals from incorporated nonprofits. Civic associations are often structured along these lines. They don’t intend to apply for grants or accept money other than dues or donations, so they do not need to incorporate. A set of bylaws and some officers can keep things running smoothly. Some groups prefer an even looser status and join together for a specific project without membership or a formal structure; it is simply a loose affiliation for one particular project, sometimes only a day long. You will sometimes see letters to the editor in your local paper from someone claiming to represent a


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group; keep in mind, it may be a group of one. Consider what you want to accomplish and what sort of structure best suits that. You can incorporate or unincorporate later, but you cannot go back and forth too many times without attracting some perhaps unwanted attention. It is important to stop for a moment and talk about money. If you are handling other people’s money, it is imperative to keep good records. The treasurer must be dependable and above reproach. An organized nonprofit group registered with state or federal governments must submit financial statements and sometimes more detailed forms.

Notes from the Field: The Hampshire Family Fund In America, we tend to think bigger is better, but this is not always so. We should, perhaps, instead find our own personal Goldilocks—something that is just right. Take the extended Hampshire family. In lieu of buying each other Christmas presents each year, they pool the money they would have spent and donate it to a charity. One person from the family, including children, chairs the fund for a year. They don’t feel a need to incorporate or expand. This is something they do together. For more information, go to their Web site at www.hampshire familyfund.com.

Mission Statements “Mission statement” is more than a management buzz phrase. It is important to decide what your organization’s primary goal is.

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It doesn’t limit you from doing other things but it does provide a framework for you to build around. The mission statement of Abington Trails is “to foster the development and usage of safe passageways in Abington Township.” Pretty simple. We also apply for grants for amenities and environmental projects in the areas where trails exist or are planned. The Philadelphia Sports Hall of Fame spells out its mission on its Web site (www.philly hof.org) this way: “Dedicated to honoring those athletes, coaches, teams, organizations, supporters, events and venues that have, through athletics, brought pride and glory to the great city of Philadelphia and have enhanced the sporting experience for fans.” This tells you exactly where they stand and what they might want money for. Your mission statement defines where your priorities are and how you might go about achieving them. Think carefully as you develop this statement and revisit it from time to time. For the trails group, once a series of trails has been built (speaking optimistically) our mission would probably change to helping with maintenance and upkeep and encouraging responsible use, or we may choose to expand our geographic boundaries or become an affiliate of a larger group. A parents’ group, whose goal is to find funding to purchase materials and supplies outside the school’s budget, will have a different focus than a group with a broader goal of enhancing students’ educational experiences. The latter group may try to find funding to purchase materials as well, but they might also look for volunteers to come to the school to give a lecture, plant flowers, create mentoring programs with local businesses, or do any number of other projects. It might also try to find ways to provide more teacher training or to persuade the school to allow parent volunteers to come in and help. In general, you want to have a mission statement that is flexible but still focused. If you are unsure how to develop one, look at the end of the chapter for books on the topic; you’ll find similar titles in your local library and


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you can also look at mission statements being used by other local organizations. Remember: Even if everyone agrees on what the mission is, you need to have it in writing. In time it will probably appear in many places in written form—on brochures, in press releases, and on your Web site. If your mission is too narrow you may begin to feel constrained; if it is too broad you may feel rudderless. Mission statements can and should be revisited every few years to make sure they still fit. As an organization grows and develops, its core mission may shift. A good mission statement provides a focus for the group but does not restrict its movement too much.

Notes from the Field: Mission Statements When Blacksburg, Virginia, set up a community network, the developers had to decide on the specific goal for the project. This is what they came up with: “The true measure of success in this project will not be the number of consumers of information services and products, but will be the number of community producers in the proposed environment” (Bowden, 17). This affected how they set up their project and how project managers guided it. Focusing on users instead of producers would have led to a different type of network. This would also affect the type of fundraising they do, encouraging content producers as much or more so than users.

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Tangible and Intangible, Long-Term and Short-Term Goals Rather than starting out and seeing what happens or trying to do a series of unconnected things, have your group set down a list of specific goals. While this sounds simplistic, it is a first step that many organizations and project groups skip—and regret later. What are you trying to do? What do you want to accomplish? Objectives change over time, but it is vitally important to start with an agreed upon organized mission and goals. Some of these will be tangible—for instance, building something or achieving a specific verifiable physical goal, setting up a program, reaching a particular demographic audience, increasing attendance at an existing program, or some other quantifiable goal. Others will be intangible, such as developing relationships with other groups, elected officials, or the press. The intangible goals tend to be ongoing. One group had a goal of developing a better relationship with the press. They called the reporters for the local papers and asked them to please contact the group when writing about the subject. The reporters assured them they would. The group considered the goal met. This was very shortsighted on their part, given the nature of journalism and the rapid turnover among reporters on small suburban papers. A more realistic approach is to send out a press kit about the organization (giving the names and number of officers, brochures, etc.) that can be left in a file cabinet and used by new reporters when they join the staff; also, keep in touch with the reporters on a semi-regular basis. What are your long term and short-term goals? The parent group working to enhance the student experience at school may have had a short-term goal of buying better art supplies and a long-term goal of sponsoring an art contest. The competition would involve students creating ads for local businesses as a way of fostering school/community relations, with an eye to persuading those businesses to hire students or contribute to the schools.


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It is always a good idea to have not just immediate short-term goals but also a wider vision of how those short-term goals fit into an overall strategy. As an example, when I worked toward having the school tree deemed historic, it was not entirely an altruistic measure on my part. Across the street from the school is an undeveloped woods that was the site of a Revolutionary War battle. There are existing informal trails in the woods. The trails group wanted to create a more formalized trail network, but set the project aside when some of the neighbors objected. The tree’s historic status is in part due to its proximity to the battlefield, which will make a few people more aware of the battlefield’s location. In time, there may be more attention and respect given to the battlefield’s status. The tree was a short-term goal in a larger strategy. Goals should be recorded somewhere, even if it is not in an official form. Some years ago, the trails group asked members to go out and scout areas they thought would support the best trails. We asked them to send their recommendations in written form. When we’d meet with other groups to discuss trail possibilities in their areas, one of the first things we’d do is get what they wanted down on paper and, if possible, go out with them and have one of our people draft even the roughest of maps. In looking back over my years of work with the group, the areas where we had the most success have been areas where we had a written proposal or prospectus. There are several reasons why this strategy works. It forces one or more people to focus on the concept enough to make sense of it on paper. It also provides a concrete way of sharing the information with others. Anything on paper or in digital form can be kept and distributed. Ideas and goals stored only in someone’s head can be easily lost or miscommunicated. It is easy to sit and brainstorm pie-in-the-sky projects; yes, everyone leaves the room feeling great, but without a real plan—in writing and distributed within the group—it’s hard to get anything accomplished. Working with printed or digital documents helps to

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ensure that everyone is on the same page: When you are coming up with or updating your list of goals, printed materials can be placed on a table so everyone knows what is actually being discussed. Documents can be changed or adapted as needed, and it is important to stay flexible so projects can be moved up and down on your priority list, but having an annotated list of projects limits the potential for confusion and helps keep people focused. So, write down the basics of each planned project, fleshing them out as necessary. When you assign someone to handle a specific task, provide a written list of his or her responsibilities and deadlines. It is easy to sign up for something and then forget; distributing a printed memo or e-mail message will improve accountability. Brainstorming is great, but it’s the follow-through that counts. Many people just won’t take the time to write things down. The few who do will dictate the course of a project or even the future of an organization. If projects are proposed verbally during a meeting, with just one person taking notes, try to be that person or to encourage someone you trust to accept the role. A project missed in the initial minutes is seldom picked up again. The person who can control or influence which projects are formally presented or included in official documents has a great deal of power indeed. One example I can cite pertains to mission statements. A library was reworking its mission statement around the time a librarian was coming up for a five-year post-tenure review. She offered to draft a revision of the mission statement for everyone to review. It was accepted with few changes. She wrote it so that it presented the library in a positive way and the mission statement was wellworded and consistent with the university’s mission and with resources and services the library offered. It was also written in such a way that her accomplishments mirrored it almost exactly. She did the library a service and supported her own agenda at the same time. That’s a smart thing to do, and I admire her ingenuity and cleverness. Of course, this can conceivably backfire, if a small


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number of people with contrasting views gain control of “your” organization, change its goals, and steer it in a direction you don’t like. This might be a short-term thing and if you bide your time the pendulum may swing back again; but on the other hand, you may soon find yourself looking for another group to join. Having a list of goals will give you more latitude in picking projects. Opportunities arise unexpectedly, but if your goal list is too short and too narrow you will miss them. Prioritize definitely, but keep your entire list on the table so you can shift strategies nimbly when one project is stymied and a possibility arises for another. Having various levels of projects also lets you decide how to use various types and levels of support as they become available. For example, if the PTA at my children’s school was given $100 it would probably use the money to buy playground balls, hopefully enough that each grade could have some of its own, sized appropriately. If given $500, it might buy a gift card at a teacher supply store for each teacher in the school. (We know how often teachers spend their own money for classroom supplies and this would be one way of helping them out.) If given $1,000, the PTA might buy a nice jazzy new camera or other equipment for the school’s television station. Knowing the group’s priorities and goals makes it easier to proceed when the money comes in. Of course, it is possible that these priorities can change as new problems emerge or unexpected donations are received.

Benchmarks to Success How do you know if you’re making progress? First, have your mission statement, short-term goals, and long-term goals written down so you can review them from time to time. Don’t measure success by how many grants you’ve gotten or by how much money you have raised—for most of us this may only lead to depression and a sense of failure. Instead, keep track of the progress being

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made toward achieving your goals. Other organizations or groups may be working toward the same end, or an official may have taken one of your goals up as a pet cause. Even when you aren’t doing the work personally, if your goals are being met, that’s the true mark of success. It will be said many times in this book that meeting goals is what matters, regardless of who brings in the money or gets the credit. It is hard sometimes to keep egos out of the way, but if you are truly committed to what you are doing, than being an accidental fundraiser (as opposed to a professional one) should help you to focus on the project at hand because you won’t be worrying about keeping your job.

When Things Go Wrong One of my organizational responsibilities is keeping the membership list for Abington Trails. The list is in an Excel file on my home computer. A backup copy, made before I went on vacation this summer, is encased in plastic and kept in my refrigerator, to protect it in case the house burns down. (This is a tactic several doctoral students have described for keeping a copy of their dissertation safe in case of emergency.) I also keep a paper printout of it handy for referral to phone numbers and addresses. Any changes I make (updating addresses, deleting anyone who has moved, adding new members) are usually first marked on the printout and then transferred to the digital copy. Recently, I lost the printout after having made quite a number of corrections. The time spent making corrections was wasted, as was that of group members who had scouted new contacts. I printed out another copy and attempted to remember all the updates, but surely some of the changes will be forgotten. Sound familiar? Losing paperwork happens to even the most organized people sometimes. Did you lose your state or federal paperwork? Call around and see who you need to contact to get a


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replacement copy. Other setbacks will also surely arise. Is your mission statement poorly worded? Rewrite it. Conflict in the group over what the mission should be? See if it can be worded broadly enough to encompass all factions. If it gets too divisive, find another group. Many mistakes can be rectified with a few phone calls. You might have to grovel, but that’s life. Sometimes your mistake can’t be fixed and you have to start over. Fairly often, these things happen because too much responsibility is given to one person. Sometimes, usually over time, the personality of an organization changes and you are no longer as comfortable with it as you once were. Perhaps you’ll opt to find another outlet for your energies. This isn’t a failure on your part, and it isn’t necessarily a permanent move: You may find that the situation has changed again in a few years and wish to come back. Leave as gracefully as you can to avoid burning any bridges.

Recommended Reading Barbato, Joseph, and Danielle S. Furlich. Writing for a Good Cause: The Complete Guide to Crafting Proposals and Other Persuasive Pieces for Nonprofits. New York: Fireside, 2000. Bonnicksen, Bruce C. “New Roles of Volunteers in Development.” New Directions in Philanthropic Fundraising 39 (Spring 2003): 5–21. Bowden, Philip (Theta), Earning Blythe, and Andrew Cohill. “A Brief History of the Blacksburg Electronic Village.” In Andrew Michael Cohill and Andrea L. Kavanaugh (Eds.). Community Networks: Lessons from Blacksburg, Virginia (2nd ed.). Boston: Artech House, 1999. Graham, John W. and Wendy C. Havlick. Mission Statements: A Guide to the Corporate and Nonprofit Sectors. New York: Garland, 1994. Hummel, Joan M. Starting and Running a Nonprofit Organization (2nd ed.). Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2002. Hutton, Stan, and Frances Phillips. Nonprofit Kit for Dummies. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley, 2001. Wallace, Linda K. Libraries, Mission and Marketing: Writing Mission

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Statements That Work. Chicago: American Library Association, 2004. Wilson, Elizabeth Westman. Building Credibility: The Foundation for Fundraising. KIT Publishers, 2001.

Recommended Web Sites Abington Trails, www.abingtontrails.org Hampshire Family Fund, www.hampshirefamilyfund.com National Council of Nonprofit Associations, www.ncna.org NonProfitExpert.com (Minges & Associates, LLC), nonprofitexpert.com Philadelphia Sports Hall of Fame, phillyhof.org

Chapter 3 Divide and Expand Now it’s time to come up with workable pieces of your larger goals. Some readers may be familiar with the old saying about taking bites of the elephant—that is, divide a project up and start with a small piece. The whole thing may be intimidating, but if you break it down it becomes much more doable.

Breaking Down Your Goals Take out your list of written goals and look at each goal separately. What are the steps or possibilities involved in each goal? You may have an intangible long-term goal to bring more people into the local library, as a way of either increasing Friends of the Library memberships or usage statistics or as a way of improving the chance of receiving grant funding, or both. Within that, you will need to find tangible, probably individual, smaller goals. What audiences will you want to attract? How can you bring them in? You may decide to start with a few small discrete projects. Let’s say you want to bring in people who currently don’t use the library often; target community leaders or people active in the local community. Talk to some people in your target groups and see what they might need that the library can supply. Community groups often need meeting space. If the library does not currently offer this service, there may be a storage room or some other underutilized area that could be cleaned up to use for this purpose. To accomplish this task you can either have a “clean-up day” and invite in the Friends of the Library or see if a youth group would want to take it on as a service project. The costs here would be minimal, primarily supplies.

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One of the short-term tangible aspects of this goal may be to purchase display cases to enhance or enlarge your ability to display art, historic or cultural collections, or other materials generated by the community as a way of bringing people in. This dovetails nicely with your intangible goals of attracting community leaders and populations who don’t currently use the library. Community leaders are always interested in having a place to display their successes and to allow the public to look at project plans. This might provide you with enough groundswell to write a good grant application to purchase better cases, demonstrating community interest in public display areas. Be sure to get letters of support from other groups stating the lack of similar facilities elsewhere. You may want to host community events, such as a chili or grill cook-off, in part of the parking lot near the start of football season, with tastings and prizes for the winners, tying it into the library’s sports and cookbook collections. If your clientele is more urbane you may want to cultivate local wine, film, or computer clubs. If admission or entrance fees are charged, these events easily double as fundraisers. All of these activities, while seeming small, would be a sound start toward your goal. Each would take time, effort, and money, but once started could become annual events. They would also provide excellent examples to potential sponsors and funding agencies of what you are able to accomplish with community support and a little money. Other projects may require even more ingenuity and may not always appear, on the surface, to be fundraising activities while in fact they are. You may be part of a group concerned about the declining economic vitality of your business district. It is starting to look unkempt and seedy, depressing your already teetering economy. Shoppers seldom come to the area and when they do, they go to one place and leave. How can you lure new industry and

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more retail dollars to your area? Your first thought might be to try to bring in a developer—an expensive proposition. A short-term solution might be to plant trees and flowers in an empty lot, which will not necessarily help with the rest of the area. You have approached elected officials about revitalization funds, but there are a number of other geographical areas applying for the same funds that have a better economic outlook and are therefore more likely to get the money. How can you tackle a project like this? Your overall goal is to revitalize a downtown area. As a more general goal, you want more revenue flowing through existing businesses to bring in more tax dollars as well as more public support. One short-term goal then may be to find a way of getting people to linger in the retail areas. Do some research by visiting your local library to look for articles and reports on what makes people frequent a business area. You can consult with chambers of commerce in more developed areas to learn what has worked for them—though you should keep in mind that they may view you as potential competition. Visit other areas to see where people tend to gather socially and note what places you felt drawn to. Research the demographics of your area and find out what types of hobbies and activities people in those demographics like to do. If after doing all this you decide that a coffee shop is what you need, then think about what you need to do to get a coffee shop to open. This becomes another step in your larger goal. Next, break this down, considering whether you want a chain or a locally owned shop. Examine the pros and cons of each option and then ask yourself, with an eye to expansions in the future: What is more practical at this point in time? You need to interest entrepreneurs or franchises that might come into the area, or maybe local businesses might add a coffee shop to an existing facility. There are almost always a number of options and each of them needs to be explored. Write down your options and ideas, and the pros and

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cons of each. This will function as a guiding document even if no one sees it but you. Now you are ready to go out and look for financial and other incentives to bring a business into your town. While at first blush you may not see the connection to fundraising, this kind of background work is imperative to any successful project. Is the owner of a building with an empty storefront willing to offer reduced rent for a period of months while the coffee shop builds a clientele? Is there a business that will let the coffee shop use part of their space rent free in return for maintenance costs? Can you find a group that will paint and do renovation work for free or a reduced cost? Can you guarantee business by having local groups meet at the shop during non-peak hours to start word-of-mouth praise and demonstrate community acceptance? If you can make some of these things happen, you will have engaged in fundraising even if you aren’t handing the prospective new business a cent. Deciding what you need to do to accomplish your goals is a part of every successful project—a process that gets little attention but is absolutely essential. Even the smallest activity requires advance planning. Consider what it takes to run a 15-minute errand. For instance, if I need to send out a mailing, I need four things: envelopes, stamps, mailing labels, and the document that needs to be mailed. Sometimes putting all this together can seem like a monumental task, especially on days when my free time comes in small snippets. First, I have to find the mailing list, update it, and then print out labels. Next, I find the information that needs to be mailed and copy it. Then, I put the labels and stamps on the envelopes, put the copies in the envelopes, and get the whole thing in the mail. It only takes about 15 minutes to get the mailing out once I’m out the door, but it took me considerably more time to get it all organized. While it is easy to dismiss this kind of planning as unnecessary and trivial, it is in exactly these areas that small organizations and volunteer efforts run aground. If a simple mailing can

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be this complex, imagine completing a full-blown fundraising project! The reality is that planning ahead can eliminate a lot of unproductive wheel spinning. Before you begin any project, sit down, consider your goal, and break things down into steps. Consider what information you need to begin. In raising funds for community revitalization, you’ll need neighborhood demographic information. This can probably be found in census documents at your local library or in a local government office, but someone has to find it. You need to know what businesses exist and who owns unused land. For a project to buy new playground equipment, you will need similar data on the ages of children who live in the area, what other facilities are nearby, safety regulations, and projects already in the works. In raising funds for someone’s medical expenses, you will need to know something about the disease or medical problem the person has and how much treatment costs, where treatment is available, and so on. In raising funds to attract a developer, you need to decide what sort of businesses you would ideally want and what qualities, both tangible and intangible, they will bring to the community. You need to decide how best to find these types of businesses and attract them to your community, or how to encourage someone in the community to open that sort of business. What economic incentive packages are available? Assign these tasks to individuals or do them yourself one at a time. It will take time, but with effort you can get all the information you need. If you have lots of money, you can hire these tasks out to a planner or developer of some kind. If you can get a large enough grant, you can hire a “main street manager” (at least for a short time) to take care of these details. However, if you don’t have these resources you will have to do the work yourself. That’s how it works for most accidental fundraisers, most of the time. Say you are on the library’s board of trustees and the library director says she would like to improve the look of the reading

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room—it is starting to have a shabby feel to it and the faded 1970s carpet has got to go. What would this entail? New carpet, certainly, but does the furniture need to be replaced or just rearranged? Are the tables still in good repair? Is the upholstery on the chairs starting to fray? You need to prioritize, deciding what must be done vs. what should be done vs. what you would like to have done. Once you’ve broken your goals down in this manner, you can study the options for getting each of them accomplished. In many areas of community building, planning is not just something to be done before beginning to work on a project, it is a formal process that must be tackled before anything else can be done. Anything that entails the actual construction or remodeling of something, whether inside or out, must start with an actual paper and pencil plan. One of the ways that accidental fundraisers can be invaluable is in finding the funds to have a formal plan developed. Hiring a consultant or planner for a small, specific project can often be done for $5,000 to $20,000. If you can find someone who wants to get his or her foot in the door for further work within the area, you may be able to get the work done for less. As we will see in later chapters, once a plan is developed, it can be broken down into sections and worked on piecemeal. However, no one in a city or town hall will really pay a lot of attention to a project until there is a formal plan, developed by someone with credentials and experience.

Taking Your Intangible Goals into Account In the earlier example of bringing a coffee shop into a deteriorating business district, the intangible goal is to create an atmosphere capable of coaxing people out of their homes into town, keeping them there, and providing them with a pleasant place to relax for a moment while shopping. You want them to feel comfortable, refreshed, and at ease. While these are things that can’t

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really be codified or measured, they are just as important as any tangible goals. In many cases, intangible goals will represent your greatest challenge. Money won’t help you buy the intangibles, but any good fundraiser knows that ignoring them is the quickest way to defeat. Consider this situation in which an important intangible goal was not addressed early on: A neighborhood group in Mt. Airy, Pennsylvania, wanted to raise money to build a playground at the local elementary school (the tangible goal), so that area children could use it when school was not in session (the intangible goal). While the money was raised and the playground was built, the group did not have the same success in actually getting the children to use it. As it turns out, there was never full support by the people living near the school, who were concerned about older kids congregating at night and the potential for injury in the case of unsupervised children. Once the playground was built, a fence and lock were purchased and some agreement was reached on the hours when the playground would be available. Unfortunately, the rules were not clearly spelled out and there was still a disagreement on the necessity of having a parent volunteer present at all times when the playground was in use. Therefore, while this playground still stands today, it is seldom used as envisioned by those who raised the money to build it. Intangible goals can often be the most difficult to reach. In the aforementioned case, communicating with and getting neighborhood residents involved might have slowed things down in the short term, but would have helped the planners avoid major disappointment later. A list of rules for a playground might seem like an odd prerequisite for building one to some people, but not to those whose backyards abut it—then it’s serious business. Such details can derail a project before it gets started or make it less functional or efficient once it is completed.

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Think very carefully about your intangible goals and set them down on paper as if they were just as important as your tangible goals. They are. In fact, they can be more important when you look at the long term. You may have the political clout to push a project through, but if you want it to be used and valued you will have to find a way of incorporating that goal into your strategy as well. Everyone’s personal agenda may differ, but the group goals of the organization or project need to be paramount, and that means everyone has to understand what they are. If one of your intangible goals is to build a groundswell of public support, then you must have ways of communicating to the public. A membership organization must have ways of communicating with members. One of my great frustrations with a local group I belong to is that I have no way of knowing what they have done with the money I give them every year. A short letter goes out with the annual appeal, but otherwise there is no communication. The umbrella parent organization has a Web site, but there isn’t any current information on this subgroup. Minutes aren’t posted anywhere either physically or virtually, even though the group has a dedicated physical bulletin board in a public spot, as well as space on a Web site. One is left with the observation that only lip service is paid to the call for public support. Either the group doesn’t know how to communicate with the larger membership that doesn’t attend meetings, or it has no interest in doing so. Non-membership groups or organizations must also find ways to communicate their goals and the progress toward them. The Internet has allowed many such organizations to make that information available through Web sites. The section in Chapter 6 on media matters will go into some other options more fully. You will have to find out what aspects of your project the public may object to. “Opposition research” is usually taken into account in business and politics, but it is also applicable in community activity. Sometimes the objections are to matters beyond

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your control. You may get caught in a feud between two powerbrokers, or gain the support of someone who later falls from grace. Without some idea of the level and kind of resistance you might face in such situations, you will be ill-prepared to deal with them. Sometimes you cannot overcome opposition, but being forewarned allows you to be forearmed. It may be possible to dissolve opposition by changing wording or shifting the more troublesome aspect to a lower priority (this is a delaying tactic, not a solution, but it buys you time). Whenever possible, talk to your opposition or invite an opposition member to be a part of your organization. This may seem contrary to common sense, but tackling problems early on (and within the group) and getting all concerned to buy in can make your more public encounters less combative. Perhaps your opposition supports one aspect of your project but not another. Working with them on the former might lead to a change of heart in regards to the latter.

Notes from the Field: Friends of the Library A February 2003 article in Computers in Libraries by library fundraiser Janet Balas contended that the raising of money is almost secondary in library fundraising. Balas wrote that the most important part of library friends groups is the creation of connections between the library and the community. Her article contains a list of Web sites that can be useful in developing fundraising plans and selecting fundraising venues.

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Costs in Time and Money As an accidental fundraiser you will always need to keep expenses down. This is one area where advance planning and the creation of partnerships can really help. When the elementary school children at my church wanted to do service projects, we decided to pack Christmas boxes for Operation Christmas Child (www.samaritanspurse.com). Most of the items we packed were inexpensive, but we found that costs could be cut even further by doing more advance planning. For example, whenever I take my children through the fast-food drive-thru and get kids’ meals, a little toy is included. The kids play with them for two minutes while eating; then it is put in a drawer and forgotten or thrown away. A few of these would be suitable for the boxes. Household items, such as soap, washcloths, toothbrushes, and toothpaste, were suggested for the boxes, too. Keeping a box or bag in the bottom of a closet, someone could collect things throughout the year. When items were on sale or came my way through gifts or chance, I’d bring them in the following year for the Samaritan’s Purse project. Saving money this way would allow the scarce resources available for purchasing new items to go toward nicer things. However, we also needed to remember the $5 cost associated with processing and mailing each box. The more boxes we packed, the higher that cost would be. In addition to money, there are time and energy costs. Finding a time for this group to meet and do the service projects was another challenge. Older teenagers can drive themselves or find their own way to the church on a weeknight; they often want to do things independently of their parents. However, younger kids can’t and the parents would be understandably weary of chauffeuring them around to yet another activity. The church sponsored a communal lunch one Sunday a month after the service. After an informal survey of the elementary school parents, it was decided that this would be a great time to have the kids do their projects. Many parents had

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been wary of staying for the lunches as there were no planned activities for the kids. The parents were left with the choice of monitoring the kids and not having a chance to talk with other adults or letting the kids chase each other around the tables. They welcomed the opportunity for the kids to be involved in a supervised community service project so they could relax and visit with other church members. With each project or part of the project, you need to assess how much time you can devote to it. If you agreed to do something time consuming that was supposed to happen in October, but it has been pushed back to December, you may need to see if it can wait until after the start of the new year. With the Samaritan’s Purse project, in addition to collecting the items and arranging time and space for them to be packed, there was the matter of getting them to a collection point. The boxes had to be sent to a central location and postage for that would be outside the allowed project budget. However, a little research showed that a collection point had been set up in a town about a 40-minute drive away. It took half a vacation day, but the only cost was time and gas. It is important to keep temporal and financial costs in mind when planning and to have a realistic idea of what a project will need. You will also want to make things as easy on people as possible. More people will participate if it requires less on their part. Plan ahead and absorb as much of the impact as you can yourself, or spread it over as many people as possible to lessen the impact. If you plan on doing a project on your own, it means the money will come out of your pocket. When working on someone else’s project, tell them what your strengths are and ask what you can do to help.

Avoiding Obstacles Look at the steps toward your goals, but also make note of the obstacles. Opposition research was mentioned earlier, but

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sometimes the barriers are not opposition per se. What is preventing you from getting from where you are to where you want to be? Saying “we don’t have the money” is the usual response, but it is often only part of the problem. Is everyone who needs to be on board for the project actually on board? What resistance are you likely to encounter and where is it likely to come from? One library had red carpet in the main reading room. The room itself was dark due to bad lighting, but the carpet made it worse. However, the red carpet was chosen by the woman who was the largest individual donor toward the construction of the library— the building was even named after her son. However, the library was told that it was named in her will, so regardless of how anyone else felt about the carpet, there was no movement to replace it until after the donor had died. The reading room looks much more inviting now with a lighter carpet, but this step could not be taken while the donor was alive in a sincere effort to respect her wishes. There may be other matters to consider. One local trails group was interested in seeing a trail or path constructed along the grounds of an elementary/middle/high school complex, connecting to a park along the boundary of the schools. However, the school district was in litigation with a civic association over the location of a new stadium in the area. This standoff lasted for years. While the school was not averse to seeing a pathway in the area, they were not interested in discussing it until the legal proceedings were over. As it turns out, one of the compromises hammered out in court was that the school would construct a walkway from the elementary school (and the parking lots) over to the stadium, right across from the park, to allow for more parking in hopes that those attending events would not park on side streets. In this case, the trails group will eventually get what they originally wanted, but the process was stalled for about five years while everything went through the legal system. Had they had the money necessary at the beginning, they still could not have

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brought the project to fruition until the political problems were resolved. Sometimes you get the money first and then find the obstacles later. One township had been awarded $450,000 in federal monies to build a trail. The money sat unused for several years. The problem? The politician who had worked to get the money fell from favor in the local party and interparty fighting led to this money being used as a hostage to political intrigue. Or at least that is how it appeared. This is another case where the full story is never likely to be known. Obstacles like these hamper or lengthen project time for many accidental fundraisers. It is easy to dismiss these examples as kowtowing or childish bickering. However, all human interactions involve making compromises or accommodating the wishes of other people. If the previously mentioned library had replaced the red carpet, they would have been flouting the best wishes of someone who had clearly and dearly cared for the library. Was red carpet too high a price to pay for her goodwill? This is life, in all its messy glory. Victoria Steele and Stephen Elder have an excellent section in their book Becoming a Fundraiser on dealing with the wishes (or demands) of donors. Their bottom line is “Draw your lines where they really matter.” As you build your project “wish list” and divide it into doable steps, keep in mind the unrelated factors that will help or hinder each project. Include them in your project descriptions to make sure everyone understands the situation. Sometimes you can find partners or “work arounds” to your obstacles, but only if you know what the obstacles are and have given considerable thought to overcoming them.

Setting Priorities Your priorities will sometimes be from the heart and sometimes from expediency. Your number one priority may shift to second or

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third place if money from the second priority comes in first, or if obstacles appear or are cleared unexpectedly. If you have an overall goal and then break it down into specifics, tangible and intangible, you can be nimble and shift priorities as opportunities arise. If you have a big unorganized jumble, this will be more difficult to do. As I said in Chapter 2, a rigid mission statement may prevent you from taking advantage of related opportunities. Once you have made a priority list, you may need to go back and reorder some of your previous work. You may have thought your mission was to create a new reading room for the library, but after making a list of goals and prioritizing them you may decide that what you really want to do is make the library more welcoming to the growing ethnic groups that have been moving into the community. Your priorities now shift to increasing the collection of fiction written by authors from that group, and providing smaller, more private spaces in the library for English language tutoring and small study rooms for book clubs and social organizations. If your mission is indeed to update the reading room, it is important to decide on the primary mission in order to successfully prioritize. Do the director and board want a sweeping new vista? A completely redecorated room? Or do they just want new chairs to replace the old ones? If the latter, it might be helpful to put this information out into the community so that if, for instance, a local bank remodels its consultation area, consideration can be given to donating the old chairs to the library. This might serve as an acceptable short-term solution until a capital campaign can be accomplished on behalf of the library.

Special Needs While the goals of fundraising can be very similar across the board, the places people find money can differ. According to the Nonprofit Kit for Dummies, organizations across the board are

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funded by dues, fees and charges (39 percent), government sources (31 percent), private sources (foundations and corporations) or individuals (18 percent), other sources (7 percent), and endowments (5 percent). However, the percentages are different for arts or cultural organizations: They receive about 40 percent of their income from private contributions and 24 percent from dues, fees, and charges, with government sources and other revenue streams playing a much smaller role (p. 197). In part, this is because they have unique talents to offer, but it does lead to unique problems too. One problem faced by such groups is the need for physical space. Symphonies, orchestras, and drama groups that can use existing stage space or perform outdoors can avoid these costs, unless they are required to pay rent. Housing can be a big headache, so avoiding ownership as long as possible is usually a good idea. Larger theater groups will eventually need to have regular access to space over long periods of time, but groups that have short performing seasons or sporadic performances may be able to use space in churches, performing arts centers, and schools. They often already have an area suitable for performing and may be willing to donate the space or rent it for a small fee. Even areas with large municipal arts groups are home to smaller organizations. While Philadelphia has a superb orchestra, there are about 30 suburban equivalents on a much more limited scale. Those who enjoy playing music but have never made it a career can participate and enrich not only their own lives but those who come to listen. These performances bring together people who may not otherwise meet one another. A small neighborhood orchestra can host a cello-playing doctor and a plumber flautist. Most of those who participate do so out of love for the music. Audiences are drawn from those who cannot afford tickets to see the more well-known orchestras, who don’t have the transportation to get to the bigger venues, and who simply enjoy the intimacy

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of smaller or less formal groups. Parents also find it a wonderful way to expose their children to music. These groups, with volunteer musicians and conductors, may have no staff costs but they still have to print tickets and programs, pay rent, and advertise their events. Ticket sales and memberships will cover many of these costs, and additional donations fill in the gaps. Many of the completely volunteer orchestral groups operate on budgets of around $10,000.

Notes from the Field: Historic Theaters The Hiway Theatre in Jenkintown, Pennsylvania, was built in 1913 and retains much of its original architecture and charm. A nonprofit formed in 2003 and purchased the building; the group currently operates the theatre, showing a mix of first run, independent, and foreign films, with special showings for kids timed to coincide with local school closings and holidays. Ticket sales cover some of the costs and graduated membership levels are available for people wishing to support the effort. Recently, the theatre began hosting discussion groups and lectures based on

some films to

enhance the theatre experience. The group would like to renovate the building, but at present the funding has not been found to do so. (For more information, see www.hiwaytheatre.org.) Another historic theater in Pennsylvania, the Ambler Theater (www.amblertheater.org), was able to renovate after receiving $90,000 in foundation grants. This theater also is run by a nonprofit that plans to show a mix of first-run and independent films.

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Some organizations, such as those devoted to saving or restoring existing buildings or groups large enough to need their own performing space, will have to learn the ins and outs of real estate management and, in some cases, historic preservation laws in their area. This will require a more organized management team than a group that works out of someone’s basement and has one or two people running the show.

Keeping Inventory of Your Resources Along with your mission and goals, you should continually inventory your resources. Who is in your group and what strengths and interests do they have? What connections do you collectively have now and which ones are you likely to develop in the future? What schools do your kids go to? Where does everyone work? What churches do they go to? What other groups are they active in? You don’t want to barrage people with questions when they first show up, but as people become more involved make note of what they say and start making gentle inquiries. This can be very important later. Most groups appreciate free meeting space. Someone with ties to a church, firehall, community room, etc., can be a big help. Some spaces let you bring in food, while others don’t. If you are currently paying for meeting space and find someone in your group whose connections can provide free meeting space, they have, in effect, increased your project budget. Finding someone who can provide free Web hosting means you don’t have to pay an Internet service provider for your Web site. Someone whose kids go to a particular school can provide an entrée to the local PTA. Keeping at least a mental tally of your resources lets you tap into them (or at least try to) as new needs arise, but at some point—and the sooner, the better—the inventory should be written down or put into a database program.

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With the trails group, we often work within township wards. When I was asked to keep the mailing list, it came to me in an Excel spreadsheet with columns for township ward numbers and the commissioner’s name, but the information was sketchy and only about half of the people on the list had the information. One afternoon I sat down with the township map and the mailing list and made a good guess at what ward everyone was in. This information became extremely useful when we were reviewing our priority list or when we were asked to suggest people for planning boards. Do we have anyone in ward X who lives near park Y? A quick glance told us. Without this information, we would have been making a lot of guesses and cold calls. Now we can zero in on the people who might be willing to serve, and pinpoint people to contact specific commissioners. Every group will need to have at least a loose idea of who has what political connections—certainly if you have any interest in getting local, state, or federal monies. Who volunteered on whose campaign? Whose spouse did? Who donated? Who knows elected officials through the local Chamber of Commerce? It never hurts to have a mix of political affiliations represented, as it can help you connect with a broader range of officials. Each group or cause will have different needs in this respect. Discuss within your group the types of contacts that would be most useful, and then brainstorm on how to make them.

When Things Go Wrong If your goals and priorities list don’t match, something needs to be changed. If your goals and priorities don’t match your mission statement, something needs to be changed. The planning process is very important, but invariably once you get into the nitty gritty

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Notes from the Field: Scripter Award The Friends of the University of Southern California Libraries inventoried its resources and came up with a novel fundraising idea. In 1988, it established the Scripter Award, which recognizes the best film adaptation of a book or novella. The reputation of USC’s film school put the group on solid ground in sponsoring such an award. Today, it is given annually with proceeds benefiting the Doheny Library Preservation Fund. (For more information, see www.usc.edu/libraries/scripter/ about.)

of any project, you will realize that at least one important component has been overlooked. In one town, planned bike lanes were delayed a year because the planning process neglected to take into account that new traffic lights would be needed and had not been budgeted for. You often won’t know what obstacles you will face until you get started. My trails group is uncertain how people in a particular area will react to its proposals until some of the local residents start testing the waters. Even if you have political support, a small group of vocal residents (i.e., voters) can shoot your project down. Even getting the money or resources you need is no guarantee that you will actually be able to use them for what you intended. Having a list of projects to work on means that when one of them has to be shifted to the back burner, you can turn your attention to another, or (in some cases) that money originally slated for one project can be shifted to another. Patience is a crucial item in the accidental fundraiser’s toolkit. Sometimes, but not very often, a project gets planned and executed in a short period of time. A more common scenario is that it

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can take years to get everything ready and then the actual work is done in a few months. The preparation time and getting all the necessary people on board and involved is the part that takes the longest.

Recommended Reading Bagwell, Ryan. “Hiway’s Financial Future the Topic of Special Meeting.” Times Chronicle July 28, 2004: 2. Balas, Janet L. “Fundraising: It’s Not Just About the Money.” Computers in Libraries 23 No. 2 (February 2003): 32–4. Hutton, Stan and Phillips, Frances. Nonprofit Kit for Dummies. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley, 2001. McGroaty, Cynthia J. “Show Goes on at Theater.” Philadelphia Inquirer January 2, 2005: L3. Slobodzian, Joseph A. “The Local Orchestras: Gotta Play.” Philadelphia Inquirer October 28, 1982: F2. Stearns, David Patrick. “The Joys of Second Fiddle. Special Report.” Philadelphia Inquirer December 14, 2003: H1. Steele, Victoria and Stephen D. Elder. Becoming a Fundraiser: The Principles and Practice of Library Development. Chicago: American Library Association, 2000.

Recommended Web Sites Ambler Theater, www.amblertheater.org Hiway Theater, www.hiwaytheatre.org Samaritans Purse, www.samaritanspurse.org USC Scripter Award, www.usc.edu/libraries/scripter/about

Chapter 4 Matching Goals with Opportunities Now, here is where we can begin to get creative. This chapter deals primarily with tangible objectives—that is, the quest for real money and resources—but intangible goals will also be discussed. In Chapter 3, we developed goals and then broke down the steps necessary to accomplish them. In this chapter, we learn to look at these goals and steps through Alice’s looking glass—or a kaleidoscope, if you prefer. Remember, fundraising can be as simple as “reallocating resources.” The key to being a successful accidental fundraiser is to keep your eyes open. Opportunities lurk everywhere—all that’s missing is the time, talent, and energy to exploit them.

Using Your Resources to Achieve Your Goals Dig out that goals list you (hopefully) developed after reading Chapter 3. Look at it divided into steps and priorities. What do you actually need to complete each step for a given project? Assign a dollar amount or range to each. Even if you do not have to actually spend money for each step, it’s helpful to have for reporting inkind donations or other purposes. Next, decide how to best accomplish each step. Sometimes it is merely a matter of getting the word out. Do you need a lawyer to help you obtain formal government nonprofit status? Check your inventory list; see if anyone is a lawyer (or is married or related to one) or runs a business that has lawyers on staff. Let each of these people know what you are

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looking for. Someone might know someone somewhere who would be willing to do your paperwork in exchange for membership or as a pro bono project. Or they might know someone who would do the work for a minimal cost. Also check with any law schools in the area to see if they offer assistance to nonprofit groups or those that would like to incorporate. If you run across a grant that would allow you to hire someone, that’s good, too. Do you need new carpet? Find out if anyone in your circle works in the industry and could get it for cost. Are you doing a landscaping project? Many township environmental advisory committees love to have members with ties to the nursery business or to have friends who are landscapers because they can often get trees wholesale or provide leads on unwanted plantings. Does a school or scout troop need a citizenship project, and would they agree to water the newly planted trees for you all summer? If you are trying to put on an inexpensive but popular event, see if someone has a friend or relative who does appraisals and hold an “Antiques Roadshow” type of fundraiser where an entrance fee is charged. Maybe someone is or knows an auctioneer who would be the master of ceremonies at a charity auction of donated items. Even less expensive are silent auctions, where people pay an entrance fee to attend a reception and place written bids on donated items. For such events, getting desirable items to auction is the hard part. Something that may seem insurmountable to you may be solved with a single phone call by someone else. In The Tipping Point, Malcolm Gladwell talks about “connectors”—people who know lots of people. Any group that has a few connectors is ahead of the game. Making connections is one area where accidental fundraisers have an edge over professional ones. A group of parents sat down to discuss a fundraiser that would go toward buying the school a color printer. The fundraiser had been planned and the group was chatting. One woman mentioned that her employer was getting a

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Notes from the Field: Women for the Water Works When Ernesta Ballard, a long-time Philadelphia activist and fundraiser, died in 2005, one of her pet projects—the restoration of the Fairmount Water Works— was unfinished. In her memory, 40 civic-minded women calling themselves “Women for the Water Works” decided to finish the project. Instead of setting up a Web site and sending out brochures, they made phone calls, wrote letters, gave tours of the building and the grounds, and made many personal connections. Within eight months, they had raised around 2 million dollars (Dribben).

new computer system. Someone asked if they were getting a new printer, too. They were. Was the old one a color printer? It was. Could she ask her employer if the school could have the old one? She did, and the printer was donated. The fundraiser now only had to bring in enough money to buy inkjets for the year. Sometimes you need grants, sometimes you need monetary donations, sometimes you need barter or in-kind gifts, and sometimes you need to have a big fundraising party. Sometimes someone drops a big old pot of money in your lap and you need to find a good way to spend it pronto. As you go through the process a few times, you will learn a pattern to follow in laying out your plans, looking at funding sources, and going back and forth. You may need to adjust some of the steps in your plan to match one source or another. It’s a dance: Look at your plan. Look at funding possibilities. Look at your plan. Look at funding possibilities. Apply for a grant. You don’t get it. Apply for a grant. You do get it. Shift priorities accordingly. Look at your plan. Look at funding possibilities. Someone

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gives you $1,000. Look at your plan. And on into the evening until the clock strikes midnight and the rest of your life beckons.

Notes from the Field: Water for Waslala Water for Waslala is an organization devoted to bringing fresh water to a region of Nicaragua. Originally, the project’s mission was to set up a water system for one area, el Guabo. A visiting group of students from Villanova University, near Philadelphia, learned of the problem and raised the money for el Guabo’s water system. However, the group decided to expand the project to the entire region; now, they’re raising funds to provide clean water to the larger area and formally train at least one local resident to manage and maintain the system. The group has broken its goal into components, with three primary ones: presentations to schools and parishes, applications for grants, and a letter-writing campaign. Since Villanova is a Catholic university, it is partnering with the Augustinian Volunteers as an umbrella organization that already has nonprofit status. The university’s engineering department helps plan the water systems and a Nicaraguan organization, Agua Para la Vida, helps train water system technical engineers. (For more information see www.waterforwaslala.org.)

Finding the Best Matches Let’s say one of your intangible goals is to introduce yourself, or actually your project, to the community in a variety of ways. Certainly you want to watch for community fairs and other places where you can have an information booth, but don’t limit yourself


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to only that. Check your inventory list: Is someone in the Kiwanis or other community organization looking for speakers? Does your local bookstore invite authors and others to come in and give book talks? Can someone in your group do that? Once you have given a few talks, you will be in a good position to seek funding or resources to get better display materials, and that will allow you to do better presentations and be invited to more events. You will also make connections as people approach you after each talk to ask more questions or express interest. Be prepared for some people to tell you they don’t approve of what you are doing or don’t like your cause. Thank them kindly for their comments and that you hope you will be able to work together on another project in the future. The person may eventually change their mind or, indeed, you may find yourself working with them on something else in the future. In Chapter 5, “Finding the Money,” we will discuss keeping a “possibilities folder.” In preparation for that, as you talk with funding agencies, take careful notes on general requirements and keep those with the agency or grant descriptions. This will allow you to compare those requirements and previous funding history with your current projects. What doesn’t pan out for one project may work well for another. From time to time, if it seems appropriate, touch base with funders. One watershed grant program focused on particular watersheds, none of which were in my area. I called the agency and asked if, at some point in the future, they might be looking for applications regarding the creeks near me. The woman on the phone said it was possible and, sure enough, two years later a brochure showed up in my mailbox telling me the agency was focusing on a different set of watersheds, some of which were close by. The agency had either made a note of my call or checked a list of environmental groups in the area. We applied and received a grant from them.

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Review what you want, what you have, and what is available. Try to connect the dots. It can take a nimble mind, or a group of minds, to see how things might fit together. Many of the more successful meetings I have attended are based around trying to collectively develop a strategy for finding resources to do a particular project. We review grant guidelines and talk about businesses we know that might be willing to donate one thing or another, who knows whom in a given field or neighborhood, and what problems might come up. In business terms, this might be known as a SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats) analysis. We look at what we want to do, broken down into steps, and see what resources we have or think we can get. We also consider where there might be problems, what we can do to resolve them, and how to take advantage of unexpected opportunities. This sort of brainstorming is especially useful when working with grants that require a match. See if the match can include the value of in-kind donations or volunteer work. If so, then everyone you can find who donates professional expertise or sweat equity increases the dollar amount of the grant you can get. A scout troop’s afternoon of free labor can add up if you are allowed to use minimum wage to quantify the value of their time.

Arranging Backup Plans The other day I was rushing out the door to take the kids to school and then go to an important meeting, for which I could not be late. It was, of course, the day I couldn’t find my keys. After several minutes of frantic rushing around, I just went to the coat closet, found the hooks holding labeled duplicate keys and took out the extra house keys that my very efficient husband had put there. Not all problems can be so easily solved, but it never hurts to have a backup plan. If you can’t get the money or resources for something from X, can you get them from Y? When the trails group


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looks at grants, often months before proposal deadlines, we try to come up with two or three projects that might fit and, as the deadline draws nearer, determine which one would benefit most from the money. It takes more planning on our part to do this, but in the long run it provides us with a greater number of options. This approach is also useful in negotiations. If you can tell people that doing a project one way will provide a better, longer-lasting product, but that if all else fails you can seek funding through another avenue, you are in a better bargaining position. There may be times when you run into a roadblock and can’t proceed with that project until the roadblock is removed. In that case, move on to the next item on your priority list. If at all possible come up with two or three scenarios for how to fund a project. This is a lot of work on your part, but it gives you a much better idea of how things might be accomplished and lets you switch from one plan to another if one doesn’t look feasible at any given time. Having done a lot of homework in advance, even if much of it is never used, gives you a much stronger edge toward accomplishing your goals. Keep in mind that regardless of what promise someone has made you, you cannot count on the money until the check has cleared. Businesses have downturns. Funding agencies have shortfalls. People change their minds. Be ready to roll with the punches. A woman who volunteers at a doll museum in the Midwest told me this story. For years, a group of doll collectors had wanted to open a small museum. Someone gave them a house for this purpose. They were ecstatic. But after they fixed it up, the house burned down. On top of this, while their materials were in storage, a relative of one of the group’s members stole some of the dolls and sold them. But in another twist, a group member died and left them $10,000. The group bought a small house and, with volunteer labor, gutted it, redecorated it, and finally opened the museum. It

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has been thriving for a number of years, with volunteer docents, gifts, and contributions. This sort of adaptability and don’t-give-up attitude can be very important. Recently, I spoke to someone who asked for my advice on a particular project. She asked what I could tell her about funding possibilities. I outlined three potential strategies—a “quick and dirty,” a “tried and true,” and an “edgy and iffy”—so she would know what is out there, and then explained the pros and cons of each and how one did not necessarily exclude the others. The “quick and dirty” might work in the short term (she had a very short period of time to complete the project), and then she could look at the other options as a way of revamping the project in the long run. Handing someone a list of funding sources you have spent hours compiling is a bit nerve-wracking. You never know if they are going to take your research and use it for projects other than the one you intended. It is generally wise to keep some of the specifics to yourself and speak only in generalities, until you are relatively certain the other group is serious about working on your joint project. However, if they take your list and use it to complete the project and never acknowledge your work, keep in mind that the job has still been done, regardless of who got the credit for it. In the trails group, I have sometimes prepared lists of funding agencies, complete with their requirements and guidelines, to distribute for people to review and think about, in terms of what projects could be applied. I do ask people not to distribute those lists outside the group, because it represents a significant amount of my time.

Staying Open to Other Possibilities As mentioned in Chapter 3, it is important to know what obstacles lay in your way. Knowing your potential problems ahead of time may allow you to skirt around them when they arise. By


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breaking your goals into steps, you can focus on one item at a time or have a two- or three-pronged agenda. In my experience with Abington Trails, the group’s intangible goal is to get people outside to use the trails, so we always take that into account in planning and implementation. We are sure to involve neighborhood residents in the process; ideally, they will help to lead the charge. If we run into opposition, we retreat and regroup. There is an old saying that when a door closes, a window opens. In accidental fundraising, that means when one avenue toward a goal closes, look for other opportunities. In Chapter 2, I talked about the trail group’s attempt to put a trail in woods that were the site of a Revolutionary War battle. The project was shelved due to the objections of those living in the area. In time, there may be commemorations of the battle or a resurgence of interest in it. Any attempts at increasing public knowledge of the historic significance of the area, in addition to perhaps increasing property values, might lead to renewed interest in access to the area. Perhaps a group would want to put up a historic marker or a monument of some kind to the soldiers who were killed in the battle. Any of these events would provide an opening for a discussion on trails. Sometimes finding alternate opportunities is a matter of patience and flexibility. By chipping away at the goal and looking for alternative opportunities, the likelihood of the trails being formalized might increase. We will see what the future holds. There are always several ways to accomplish a goal. When a group in another area called my trails group for advice on completing a funding project, we provided more than one scenario. The first didn’t involve them actually spending any money, but reusing resources that are currently available. Another scenario entailed partnering with the township to complete the project. The third suggested incorporating the project into an even larger project. Strange as it may seem, it is sometimes easier to fund a larger project than a small one.

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Sometimes taking on a seemingly unrelated project will lead you to alternate routes for obtaining necessary funds. In one part of my town, a series of retention basins is being put in. The trails group has been asked to investigate ways of paying to have the construction area reforested once the basins are completed. We agreed to look into funding, provided the access road—necessary for maintenance trucks but not open to private vehicles—could also function as a walking path. The area to be reforested is across the street from a park. The commissioner for that part of town, which is one of the lower income areas in the township, asked us about the possibility of finding funding for some toddler equipment for the park. There is a grant available for lower income areas with specific guidelines, but none deal with trails. One guideline, though, relates to projects that support fathers’ involvement in children’s lives and other fatherhood initiatives. So we have come up with the idea of applying for a grant for “Dad’s Park.” If we partnered with a parenting group that has special fathers groups or programs and activities in the park specifically for toddlers, then we could justify buying the playground equipment. Reforesting the retention basin area could be a community-wide father/child activity—“Dad’s Forest,” if you will. If the strategy works, we will end up with a new trail, a new playground, and a way to fund the reforesting of the construction area. In the process of developing a backup plan, I read through the Boy Scouts manual and discovered that scouts can receive credit toward a badge by planting 20 saplings. If I can find a den of 15 boys willing to plant 20 saplings, 300 saplings would be planted. That might be a good first step in the reforestation project. Of course, finding two or three dens would mean between 600 and 900 trees could be planted. Didn’t I hear just recently that the township’s environmental advisory committee was given about $8,000 for plantings and they hadn’t decided where to spend it yet?


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Suddenly, I have even more options for funding the reforestation project. One option does not necessarily preclude the other. It might be possible to find a small grant to pay an official reforestation expert to advise on what to plant and where to plant it, and how it might be done in stages over a number of years. It never hurts to have an official plan; in fact, those plans can make it easier to find additional funding. Providing information in our proposal about the potential labor (free) and plantings money (sitting in the bank) could help secure the small grant for the forester. That information might also provide the show of support necessary to find even more funding to also plant some native groundcover or shrubs or wildflowers to fill out the forest understory. So now we have an initial plan, a backup plan, some potential partners, and a much better chance of bringing in the money and other resources needed to start the project. Once it is in motion, other resources may become available.

When Things Go Wrong As I’ve said many times already, things will go wrong and projects will blow up in your face. Officials will mock you publicly. The future will appear bleak. Retreat, retrench, and try again. The first time I saw a project go terribly, horribly wrong, I was in a funk for weeks. Something I had spent so much time on was never going to happen; I believed I had, in effect, been squashed in public and would never have a positive impact on my community. I vented my frustration to the group I was working with in harsher terms than I would use now, as a more seasoned fundraiser. Yet, the group hunkered down and went to the next item on the priority list. Four years later, the project that had seemed like a complete failure is progressing in a slightly different format under the aegis of another organization, which we have assisted when asked.

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It is gut wrenching when things don’t work out, but in time most worthy projects will be resurrected and the work will carry on— somehow, somewhere, by someone.

Recommended Reading Dribben, Melissa. “Let the Funding Flow.” Philadelphia Inquirer May 7, 2006: M1+. Gladwell, Malcolm. The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Different. Boston: Little, Brown, 2000. Hummel, Joan M. Starting and Running a Nonprofit Organization (2nd ed.). Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1996.

Recommended Web Sites Water for Waslala, waterforwaslala.org

Chapter 5 Finding the Money We all read interesting items in the media, hear something from a friend, or get something through e-mail that could be useful from a fundraising standpoint. Use these leads to start a “possibilities folder.” In this folder, you will keep descriptions of grants, articles on successful projects and how those people found their funding, articles on local movers and shakers, and other interesting items you run across. Read all local newspapers, including the free circulars that come in the mail. As I stated in the Introduction, an accessible library is a key item in the accidental fundraiser’s toolkit. If you don’t subscribe to a number of local papers and journals, you will absolutely need to visit your local library frequently. Many smaller papers are not online, so you will need the printed versions, and unless you want to subscribe to them all, that means visiting the library. A small library may not carry all the professional and technical journals you may need, but it will probably have an index to them (or have online access) and will be able to get the articles you need. Watch carefully for any item or article describing where and how a group found funding, available grants, donations made by local businesses (or funding received from professional associations through the efforts of local businesses), school groups that have been involved in community service, active and energetic local groups that you may want to partner with, and so on. A possibilities folder can be tremendously useful, especially over time. I keep one for work and one for projects at home. I check periodically for items that might be applicable to a current project. Often, something important will turn up.

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For example, one local free circular published a photo of a student version of the Kiwanis organization. I discovered when looking at the photo that one of my son’s teachers was an advisor. The caption noted that the group would be doing an Earth Day project, so I sent the teacher a note with a list of some suggested activities. If the odds of my son’s teacher being the group’s advisor seem slim, keep in mind that out of about 50 times that I have clipped a similar picture or article, this is the first time I have recognized a name or face. If you are diligent enough over a period of years, eventually you will see someone you know. (It is sort of like that old saying that if you sit at a Paris café long enough, everyone you have known will pass by. Sitting at a Cheerios-encrusted table clipping articles isn’t quite as sophisticated, but the idea is the same.) One of the ideas I gave the teacher was adopted and perhaps others will be in the future. Be sure to watch for and take note of reporters who cover topic areas related to your cause or project. At some point, you may want to contact or send a press kit to these journalists. There will be more on press kits in Chapter 6, “Making Friends and Forming Partnerships.” Keep an eye out for groups that might be interested in working on projects your group wants to undertake. For example, many schools are now offering extra credit for or requiring service-learning hours—time spent volunteering on projects in the school or community. A school group that works on public- or civic- or schoolrelated projects might appreciate a ready-made project. Are there scouting organizations in your area? Do you have a project that would make a good Eagle Scout project? Take note of who works with what. Volunteers and teachers who work with groups like this are usually busy people and may very well appreciate your providing them with a written project proposal, with the procedure spelled out, all the advance work done, and money available to

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support it. They may not take your project on, but nothing ventured, nothing gained. Don’t limit your attention to local publications: Take note of everything you read. I have found relevant notes on grants and funding possibilities in daily national newspapers, and I clip those as well. Even though it may seem unlikely you will receive funding from a source out in Osh Kosh, it is very useful to present this sort of information to decision makers or potential partners; it shows an interest in similar projects on a national level. You can list them as “possible funding sources” on grants or on general project descriptions that you circulate. There is information everywhere, so keep your eyes open. Don’t neglect relevant e-mail lists or Web sites either. I receive a lot of good grant information from e-mail newsletters that are freely available to anyone who wants to subscribe. State and federal agencies, national organizations, and other groups will sometimes send out newsletters that include grant proposal deadlines or details of potential funding sources. Granted, there is typically significant competition for these monies, but if you don’t know what is out there, you can’t get in the game. This is also where your collection of master plans and demographic data comes in very handy. The more you can show how your project fits in with larger plans and that you have the statistical support, the better. You don’t want to overwhelm people, but you want to show that you haven’t just pulled your idea out of thin air—your proposal relates to other things going on and is a good fit for your location or group. Your reputation can come into play here, as it does in many other areas. Assume that funding agencies, both governmental and private, especially in a specific geographic area, talk with each other. Behave badly or turn in a poorly prepared application to one, and you are less likely to be taken seriously by the others. Keep good manners in place when talking with all potential funding sources. If

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the people on the other end of the phone or the other side of the table get a good impression, they may refer you to other possibilities. Alienate them and you have lost those potential contacts. In addition to going out in search of money, you want to make sure you are in the right places, so people looking to give can find you. Put yourself out there. Register with Guidestar (www.guide star.org) and with state and local nonprofit associations or registries. Join national organizations that allow for local partners. One state government grant we applied for was not funded, but the funding agency put the group on the list of “green projects” going on in the state, which will make us more visible to parties looking to fund such projects. An increasing number of funding agencies, especially private funding agencies, will state that they don’t accept unsolicited proposals. Respect this. However, you do want to make sure these agencies can find you and find out about you. Make sure you have a good general brochure and that you are listed in places where other respected organizations are listed. When people are looking for projects to fund, you don’t want to be overlooked. The type of organization you are will affect the general breakdown of where you get your money. According to the Nonprofit Kit for Dummies (p. 197), there is a basic pattern: Surveys indicate that nonprofits’ money comes from the following sources and in the following percentages: 39 percent from dues, fees, and charges (money that you earn), 31 percent from government sources, 18 percent from private sources (foundations, corporations, and individuals), 7 percent from other sources, 5 percent from endowments (income from money you have invested). The authors go on to spell out how these percentages vary depending on the type of organization. It isn’t broken down by size

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of organization, but this will no doubt be a factor as well. As these figures suggest, you are likely to receive funding from a variety of sources. It is dangerous to depend too much on one particular funding source, as a variety of factors can come into play and dry that stream up. Even larger organizations try to diversify their revenue sources.

Notes from the Field: Fox Chase Cancer Center Fox Chase Cancer Center in Philadelphia is one of the country’s largest hospitals devoted to cancer care. (On a personal note, two people I care about were treated there and they felt the level of service and medical attention was excellent.) The hospital raises money through traditional means, such as research grants and large donations, but it also reaches out to those with smaller budgets. It sponsors “Pedal for Prevention,” an annual bike ride and walk. Supporters also host “Paws for the Cause,” a look-alike contest for pets and their people. The hospital’s donations Web site lists a number of ways to contribute, from planned giving to hosting a garden party or craft bazaar (www.foxchasegiving.org).

Private Foundations Smaller projects might be funded by private grants, memberships, and other funding sources. One example of funding by a private foundation is the partnership between American Forests and the Dale Earnhardt Foundation in a project to reforest selected areas in states that host the Winston Cup. Read more about this project in Chapter 6.

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Many private granting agencies will only deal with organized, registered nonprofits. In these cases, if you aren’t such an organization, you will have to find one to partner with. Some agencies will also accept applications from municipalities or school districts. Most of these agencies will want a formal proposal, which is much easier to prepare if you have done your homework and have written project descriptions. Most agencies will also want a report at the end of the project. Some will want copies of receipts for any expenses incurred and records of how the money was spent. Find out if the money comes to you in one lump sum or is distributed over a number of years or is paid out on a reimbursement basis. These are important things to consider. One of the easiest means of getting a grant is to know someone on the foundation board. This is a good time to check your inventory list to see if anyone is on the board or works with a funding agency in some capacity. The hardest grant to get is the first grant. Once you have a track record that you can refer to in future proposals, it gets a little easier. Competition for grant monies is fierce and an agency often receives proposals for more than 10 times the amount of money it has to disburse. Having a good reputation or someone who can speak for you is extremely valuable. See if larger agencies have “minigrants” for a few thousand dollars or less. These are often good places to start and may provide the seed money you need to interest private donors or other foundations, or to provide the match needed for state or federal grants. Sometimes money falls into your lap. One grant my trails group received happened because a friend of someone in the group worked for a funding agency and offered to support a proposal. We were virtually guaranteed the money. It was for a small grant, but it allowed us to say that we had gotten a grant, and that helped us get future grants. Of course, no one can tell you in advance that the money is a sure thing. Even with friends on the board sometimes things fall through. You should never assure people you can get

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funding until the check actually arrives. Sometimes the funding agency does not get monies it was expecting and then all bets are off, even if you were a so-called shoe-in. Private funding agencies publish or make available their guidelines and requirements. They will tell you what format the grant should be in and how to prepare and submit it. Follow these rules to the letter. This is not a time for creativity. Match your proposal to their requirements point by point, but be brief. No one wants to wade through pages and pages of justification. Make your case effectively but succinctly. There are a number of places to look for grants. As mentioned earlier, watch the papers for announcements. Join larger organizations that provide information on upcoming grant deadlines. Check your local library for grant directories such as the Annual Register of Grant Support, Corporate Giving Directory, and Foundation Reporter (see www.infotoday.com). Some of these resources are online but, as with the Foundation Center (www.fdncenter.org), may carry a cost. Don’t focus entirely on national agencies: Also investigate state and local funding sources. These often provide smaller grants but are focused on specific geographic areas. Ask to be added to online newsletters or regular news bulletins from relevant government agencies or groups. I receive three free, weekly online newsletters that often mention grants and funding deadlines. The competition for these is understandably tough, but it helps to know what’s out there and who is getting it. You may be able to find a book listing grants for your state. I use the Pennsylvania Directory of Foundations and also check the Delaware Valley Grantmakers Web site for updated information. Check out the National Council of Nonprofit Associations (www.ncna.org) to find your state’s nonprofit association; it can lead you to relevant resources for your state. You will find many other useful books, directories, and online resources at your library.

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Make sure you understand what is required. One granting agency had an intangible goal to create a network of people trained in watershed management. In order to achieve this, the agency required that any group it provided funds to had to send a person from its organization to a two-day planning session in another part of the state. My trail group had applied for but been denied that grant, which came as a relief as no one wanted to attend the mandatory training session. We decided not to reapply in later years as the amounts offered (a few thousand), while good money for a small group, were not sufficient to tempt anyone to potentially make the very long trip and be away from home for two days. When preparing a grant proposal, look for any previously written project proposals that may already have the background information and the wording you need, rather than starting from scratch. Grantwriting can be a frustrating process because the number of grants you write will be exponentially larger than the number of grants you receive. While the temptation to throw away unsuccessful proposals—perhaps to stomp on them or set them on fire—will be great, resist it. Chances are there will be other opportunities to submit the same project, and it will save you a lot of trouble if you can borrow from previous applications. Federal monies almost always involve putting projects out to bid, while funding from private foundations may not. However, there are a growing number of private foundations that prefer to pick the projects they support. When I browse the Directory of Pennsylvania Foundations, I often see “does not accept unsolicited proposals.” That means the foundation has to know about you to invite you to ask them for money. It may seem an odd process; however, it is another reason why you must keep some kind of public profile. As mentioned previously, register your group with larger organizations and charitable lists like Guidestar. Make it easy for people to find you.

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Government Money Large projects on public land, such as library renovation, trail construction, and wetland preservation, will almost always require government funding. To access federal, state, and local government monies, you often have to work through your elected officials. Even if that isn’t spelled out, it is a good idea to let them know you are applying as they may be able to influence the process. Of course, they may ask you to wait a while as they are championing another local project in this funding round. Only if you consider them an outright enemy of your cause should they be completely left out of the loop. Make sure you talk with the right official. For state monies, talk with your state representative or state senator. For federal monies, talk with your U.S. representative or senator. As we will discuss in Chapter 6, it is a good idea to have a working relationship with at least one person in each representative’s office. Touch base with this individual from time to time and be sure to acknowledge his or her help. Whenever I meet with elected officials, I let them know that so-and-so in their office was very helpful; I write thank you letters mentioning these people by name. Be sure to include a public expression of thanks for any assistance in your newsletters and minutes. Get photos of elected officials at your events and post them on your Web site. Politicians love good publicity, and if your organization is doing public good, they will want to be your friend, especially around election time. People involved in community affairs tend to vote more often than those who are disinterested; after all, going out to the polls is just one more community activity. Thus, the supporters of your organization are people elected officials want to get to know. Of course, it’s likely they will start inviting you to fundraisers and the like, but that’s not such a bad thing, either. Learn how the funding system for your type of organization or project works. For trails, the state grants we are most likely to get are funded by the Department of Conservation and Natural

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Resources. Community and Economic Development grants have a broader focus and can be used for a number of types of projects. There are literacy grants and historical grants, arts grants and energy efficiency programs, watershed grants, and so on. Get to know the system in your state. If you live or operate in a city, see what programs might be available there as well. Most government organizations that provide funding on a regular basis offer workshops on how to write effective grant applications as well. If at all possible, you or someone from your group should attend such workshops: In addition to the value of the information you’ll pick up, you may get some face time with the people who will be involved in the decision making. If this happens, use the opportunity to introduce yourself, mention your organization, and ask a good question.

Membership Most formally organized groups will have a membership, with dues, however nominal. Some organizations operate solely on monies from dues, although this can severely limit what they do. A membership does imply a certain level of community or public support. Even if you don’t have a set membership, keep track of how many people donate. Two donations of $10,000 can keep you in business, but 1,000 donations of $20, while requiring a greater bookkeeping effort, give you a much greater support base. The best of all possible worlds might be one donation of $10,000 and 500 donations of $20. A membership base also gives you a mailing list to use for approaching potential volunteers. Most organizations offer some form of graduated membership, a basic membership for a small amount (to allow students and senior citizens to join), a family membership, a sponsoring membership, and other types of memberships, all for different amounts. The levels are typically given creative names that relate

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to the organization. An Audubon Society group might have a basic membership of around $25 with options to become “swallows” (at $50), “cardinals” (at $75), “peregrines” (at $100), and “eagles” (at $500). A Friends of the Library group might call its members “page turners,” “bookworms,” and “bibliophiles.” Be sure to allow people to contribute above and beyond the cost of membership, although these amounts may need to be reported differently on your annual reports or tax forms. Membership brings up one area that requires due diligence: Someone has to keep the membership lists, making sure they are up-to-date and that people are credited for the amounts they have paid. Nothing is going to rile people faster than paying dues and then being told they haven’t. Since membership mailings usually only go out once a year, the list needs to be in the hands of someone with an organized filing system who makes backups so that the list isn’t lost from one year to the next. Try to have memberships annualized, so that everyone renews at the same time, instead of at different times of the year. It saves time and paperwork. Your member database is your greatest treasure and will demand a high standard of maintenance. Check it continually for duplicates, errors, and missing information. Watch returned envelopes for changes of addresses. I used to do volunteer work for a politician, and one of my jobs was keeping the donor list. The first task at hand was a database cleanup. Drawing on my librarian’s skills and mindset, I went through and removed multiple listings for the same person. Since the list sorted alphabetically by last name, I made up a list of people who shared a residence but had different last names—parents and step-children, adult siblings, or married couples with two surnames. I also checked the donor list against obituaries in the local papers. No one wants to call a grieving woman, newly widowed, and ask if she and her husband would like to make a political contribution. This level of detail is not necessary for smaller

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organizations, but when asking for large sums of money someone will need to keep track of information like this. You will also need to create a privacy policy that states under what, if any, conditions the mailing list could be shared or sold. You may need to demonstrate that your project is powered by the people concerned or affected. Not having a local investment leaves you open to criticism that you are an “outsider” trying to impose an idea or concept on a population that may not support it. Be prepared to show that you have solid grassroots support with a broad base. Diversity within your membership will help demonstrate that you have support from all areas concerned, whether geographic, socioeconomic, racial, or across a different spectrum entirely. Give your donors something to show for their money—a membership card, at least. If you have fundraising drives consider some kind of freebie to send to contributors. If people are giving you money, they will expect something in return and it is imperative that you keep them informed. Send updates or newsletters and an annual report at the end of each year—people want to see how their money is being spent. Or post information on a Web site or in a prominent place in the library. One organization I used to belong to does not distribute or post minutes or send out anything other than an annual donation request. Nothing is posted on the parent organization’s Web site other than pleas for money and items for sale. Its membership has decreased consistently over the last several years. There may or may not be a correlation, but surely it stands to reason that if you are asking people for money, you should let them know what you do with it. Friends groups—Friends of the Library groups, for example— are a popular type of membership organization. These are groups of loosely affiliated people who may have little else in common other than a mutual interest in a library or other entity. Most

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friends groups operate with a small budget, based on membership, book sales, and special events (antique appraisals, picnics, bookbag sales). Some are eligible for grants and pursue them, as well as individual donations. Some make a point of watching real estate transfers and sending literature to new residents inviting them to join. In Becoming a Fundraiser, Victoria Steele and Stephen Elder argue for a more development-oriented friends group, while other experts—including James Swan, author of Fundraising for Libraries—recommend a more inclusive approach.

Sponsorship One of the key concepts in sponsorship is not to tie the cost to the actual cost of the item or event, but to its value to the potential sponsor. Before approaching a company about a sponsorship, carefully do some research and assess what the company would want to get out of the relationship. What can you give the company in return for its money? Will the company logo be present at the event or on the equipment being sponsored? Team sponsors often provide t-shirts or warm-up bags with the corporate logo or name. Other types of merchandise (bookmarks, bookcovers, bags, waterbottles) marked with the corporate name can also be distributed. Another sponsor expectation is the opportunity for public displays in the form of banners, information tables, or literature distribution. Promoting an event as “Event X brought to you by Company Y” is a common approach. If these types of approaches make you uncomfortable, rethink sponsorship. Be careful not to antagonize potential sponsors, especially when approaching competing businesses. If you have a strong sponsor in one industry, it may be prudent not to approach other companies in the same industry for that particular event. Also, be careful when tinkering with institutions that people feel a real tie to. In Philadelphia, a children’s museum considered a long-term

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relationship with a fast food chain, but a public outcry made both parties reconsider. Some complained about the nutritional value of the food sold by the proposed sponsor, while others were against any alliance between this important local institution and a blatantly commercial entity. You will want to review the businesses in your area carefully; approach the ones most likely to sponsor you and those with whom a sponsorship will be mutually beneficial.

Donations and Gifts Donations and gifts refer to contributions above and beyond membership dues, but not monies from charitable foundations or government agencies. Gifts can be monetary or in-kind. For instance, a nursery might donate some trees—probably not their best trees, but fairly healthy ones that didn’t cost you a cent (see the next section for more on in-kind gifts). How do you find and encourage donations and gifts? While grantmakers can be found in books and online, individuals or businesses that might donate are not as easily found. Here is where patience, tact, and careful research can really pay off. I mentioned earlier that reading local papers is a must. Don’t just read the stories related to you and your cause—look further. Watch for articles on individuals, feature stories, biographical pieces, and announcements. For example, I might pay close attention to a story on a local banker who likes to bicycle. He or she would be a likely prospect for a suburban trail group. A parenting organization might clip an article about a local professor who studies childrearing methods or a civic leader who has been quoted on the balance between work and family. Library groups will watch for articles that mention someone’s love of reading, fond memories of a school librarian, or strong views on the importance of knowledge, research, or civil liberties. These people may not wish to attend meetings, but might want to know about your organization. Consider sending them a brief note saying that

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you saw the article about them. Include a brochure (not solely a membership form) and contact information, so they can keep up with your activities. If you have access to a database of business journals (chances are your library has access to one), you can search for businesses in your geographic area and see if any of the names associated with them are known to you. Any business in an industry related to your interests may be a good source of in-kind donations. Watch the business signs as you drive down the road. Watch especially for businesses that are locally owned or based in your town. The local PTA found a jeweler who was willing to make charm bracelets with the school logo on it and split the profits with the school. He had a built-in audience, and the PTA had an ongoing fundraiser that required little effort on their part. Search newspaper databases and the Internet for people who grew up in your area but moved away or are affiliated with your cause in some fashion. One common error in searching for donations or gifts is that groups sometimes hold out for a “white knight”—a wealthy individual who will donate most or the entire amount needed. This is tantamount to little girls humming “some day my prince will come.” You may be able to find such an individual, but he or she is far more likely to contribute if you have clear evidence of community support or preexisting fundraising success—even if you have only raised a portion of what you need. Another common mistake is to limit your search to people already active in the community. These people are probably already overextended. They may indeed be good prospects, but yours is not the only organization likely to be after them. Expand your horizons a bit. While many fundraisers limit their outreach to people who are known philanthropists, there are many generous individuals out there who have simply never been asked. An example of how this can work successfully is given by Thomas J. Stanley in The Millionaire Woman Next Door (p. 231): A fundraiser for a Girl Scout troop in an area known for its

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apple farms researched apple farming, read farming magazines, and approached award-winning farmers—a previously untapped market—rather than drawing on the local society lists. Many of the wealthy people in our country live frugal lifestyles. Give these people an opportunity to do something good. If you make it easy for them, they might. There are ethical considerations that come into play when researching potential donors or when keeping donor lists. If, like many people, you are active in more than one organization, you may have more than one list of donors. I have three different mailing lists on my home computer for three different organizations or groups. Two have monetary contribution amounts for the people on the list. It would be unethical to share with one group the monetary contributions of another. In researching potential donors, you may sometimes come across sketchy personal information or unconfirmed rumors about the donor. If it is anything that could reflect poorly on the organization, before you take any donations, you might make a few discrete inquiries or ask the person directly about the information. Base rumor should not be considered. At all times remember that it is within your power to easily damage someone’s reputation by repeating things you have heard or discovered. You will, however, be damaging the reputation of your own organization at the same time. A few years ago a relatively unknown candidate was running for office against a better-known candidate. Using my information seeking and retrieval skills, I always make it a habit to look into candidates’ backgrounds; in this case, I turned up a few things about the lesser-known candidate that I thought could be damaging. I sent the information to his campaign manager, with whom I was acquainted, noting that it might be used negatively if discovered by the opposition. He asked where I found it and I told him. The information never came up in the campaign, and the relative

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unknown went on to win the election. This is a man who knows me to be resourceful but discrete, someone who will bring questions directly to the source instead of spreading gossip. This reputation will no doubt be useful to me at some point. It is tempting to be viewed as someone “in the know,” and one way of doing that is to pass around information that is not widely known. However, one sure way of losing support is to get a reputation as someone who deals in gossip or abuses a position of trust.

In-Kind Gifts If people, or especially businesses, are not willing to give you a cash donation, they may be willing to give you an in-kind donation (merchandise or services). For example, many organizations will ask merchants to donate food or goods that can be sold or used as prizes in drawings. It is a way for the organization to raise money and for businesses to dispose of merchandise that is not selling well. Participating merchants should be acknowledged in print and in online public relations promotions, and mentioned at the event. Don’t assume that a tax write-off will be sufficient thanks. It is unfortunate but true that the same merchants are approached over and over again. Once they have a reputation for giving, they show up at the top of everyone’s list. It is absolutely essential that you ask those in your organization to patronize these establishments. Hitting up the local grocery store for donations and then buying everything else you need for the event at a big box warehouse store is biting the hand that feeds you. You may have a hard time getting the local store to donate again. It is better to ask for donations from businesses that you patronize regularly. You can earn points by complimenting merchants who support the community before asking them for donations. In my town, there is a mom-and-pop grocery store that donates a lot of food to many events. On several occasions, after an event that they have donated

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Notes from the Field: The Lance Armstrong Foundation and Alex’s Lemonade Stand Another avenue to getting donations is selling something. A loved one’s illness, or one’s own, can be an impetus toward public service. It is not uncommon for national organizations devoted to fundraising for one particular medical cause to find a celebrity spokesperson who has some connection with the illness or disease. Some come forward on their own to set up foundations. One example is champion cyclist Lance Armstrong,

who

started

the

Lance

Armstrong

Foundation in 1997, a year after he was diagnosed with cancer. He began selling “Wear Yellow: Live Strong” plastic bracelets for $1 each and the profit went to support cancer patients. As of February 2005, he had sold 20 million bracelets, many through the www.laf.org Web site. A number of other organizations and causes have adopted color-coded wristbands or bracelets. Another example is Alex’s Lemonade Stand. At age four, young Alexandra Scott, who had neuroblastoma, a rare childhood cancer, decided to help support cancer research by selling lemonade. Her idea spread and others joined in. By the time she died in August of 2004 at age 8, there were lemonade stand fundraisers in all 50 states and two other countries. In the intervening years, the campaign raised more than 1 million dollars. (For more information see www.alexslemonadestand.com.)

to, I have made a point of thanking the owner when I saw him in the store. When some food kitchen volunteers near where I work

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wanted give out bags of Valentine’s Day candy or cakes, I bought them at full cost at the local grocery and made a point of telling the owner. We did that again this year as well. So not only is he aware that I am grateful for his community support, he sees me in his store frequently and knows that I pay full price for merchandise that is later donated to a charitable cause. At some point in the future, I may ask him for a donation. If and when I do, I’m confident he will give it serious consideration.

Events Events are a great way to raise funds—but try to avoid overdone cocktail receptions or banquets or balls. There are enough of these to go around. Look for unique or alternate ways of attracting people and overlooked audiences. One candidate for public office had a fundraising picnic on his birthday at a local park. The picnic area was right next to a playground and the cost was equal to a trip for a family of four to the movies. Many established groups are trying to attract younger donors as a way of getting a new generation of supporters in the pipeline. These organizations have events, often with special pricing, designed to appeal to the under-40 crowd. Think of things people might want or need and see how you can provide them. Parents’ organizations will often host events. The traditional bake sale and school fair still bring in a lot of money, but when many households have only one parent or two parents that work outside the home, it can be difficult to find volunteers to plan and run these events. Other avenues of participation will allow more people to be involved. For instance, when a particular art project is finished, offer parents the option of having their children’s masterpiece framed, charging $5 for a $3 frame. There are a number of good books on developing unique events. Some examples are listed at the end of this chapter.

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When Things Go Wrong It is a sad truth that most of the time when you seek money for something you won’t get it. If you have a 40 percent success rate, you are doing extremely well. I don’t want to think about the number of times I have submitted a grant proposal that was not ultimately funded. I wish I could tell you things will be different for you, but unfortunately, they won’t. This is no reflection on you. It is just the way things are. Remember what you have accomplished, even if someone else got the money and the credit—if you started the ball in motion, it is still one of your accomplishments. Be kind and gentle with yourself. An accidental fundraiser’s job is a tough one. Everyone looks to you for the money and sometimes you just can’t get it. Keep your chin up and keep trying.

Recommended Reading Annual Register of Grant Support: A Directory of Funding Sources (annual). Medford, NJ: Information Today. Bogaert, Pauline Pinard. “Wanted: Young Blood, Need Not be Blue.” Philadelphia Inquirer October 17, 2004, p. M1+. Corporate Giving Directory: Comprehensive Profiles of America’s Major Corporate Foundations & Corporate Giving Programs (annual). Medford, NJ: Information Today. Foundation Reporter: Comprehensive Profiles & Giving Analysis of America’s Major Private Foundations (annual). Medford, NJ: Information Today. Hogan, Cecilia. Prospects Research: A Primer for Growing Nonprofits. Sudbury, MA: Jones and Bartlett Publishers, 2004. Hutton, Stan and Phillips, Frances. Nonprofit Kit for Dummies. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley, 2001. Joachim, Jean. Beyond the Bake Sale: The Ultimate School Fund-Raising Book. New York: St. Martins, 2003. Martin, Patricia. Made Possible By: Succeeding with Sponsorship. San Francisco: Jossey Bass, 2004.

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Nichols, Judith E. Transforming Fundraising: A Practical Guide to Evaluating and Strengthening Fundraising to Grow with Change. San Francisco: Jossey Bass, 1999. Robinson, Andy. Grassroots Grants: An Activist’s Guide to Grantseeking (2nd ed.). San Francisco: Jossey Bass, 2004. Stanley, Thomas J. Millionaire Women Next Door: The Many Journeys of Successful American Businesswomen. Kansas City: Andrews McNeel Publishing, 2004. Steele, Victoria and Stephen D. Elder. Becoming a Fundraiser: The Principles and Practice of Library Development (2nd ed.). Chicago: American Library Association, 2000. Swan, James. Fundraising for Libraries: 25 Proven Ways to Get More Money for Your Library. New York: Neal-Schuman Publishers, 2002. Wendroff, Alan L. Special Events: Proven Strategies for Nonprofit Fundraising (2nd ed.). Hoboken, NJ: Wiley, 2004.

Recommended Web Sites Alex’s Lemonade Stand, www.alexslemonadestand.com The Foundation Center, www.fdncenter.org Fox Chase Cancer Hospital, www.foxchasegiving.org Guidestar, www.guidestar.org Lance Armstrong Foundation, www.laf.org National Council for Nonprofit Associations, www.ncna.org

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Chapter 6 Making Friends and Forming Partnerships You can handle many small fundraising projects on your own or within a small group, but you’ll need to partner with others to tackle the larger ones. Even in cases where you can personally complete a grant application, you may require letters of support from other organizations or elected officials. There will be some funds you won’t have access to but someone else will. When these situations arise (and they will), you’ll appreciate the value of good working relationships with organizations and individuals who can help.

Partnering with Groups That Need What You Have You have assets. These assets may be in the form of cash, equipment, space, talent, goodwill, or something else entirely. Once you know what you have (the inventory list we discussed in Chapter 3 will help), you can look for individuals or groups that might benefit from your skills, talents, or other resources, and that might be willing to reciprocate in their own way. For instance, if a group with related interests is having an event and you attend and support it, its members may respond in kind. You may have someone with grant writing experience who can help them draft a grant narrative, or you can share copies of grants you have written. This may seem contrary to your group’s best interests, but, in reality, it isn’t. For example, a particular agency does not offer you funding, but

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you know another organization that has a mission more in line with the funder. This other group may be larger and have a more stable income stream that makes them more appealing to the funder. If you give this group a tip or a copy of your fund request, it may give them an edge. Or see if you can contribute a letter of support that will tie the two groups together. If nothing else, you will have made a friend, but if the group receives the grant, then your group’s cause has also been forwarded. Recently I helped an organization that sought funding for the creation of walking paths on its headquarters’ grounds. Its members were not aware of the trail possibilities that would connect the headquarters and local open spaces and points of interest—information that is critical to get funding. This information was available in grants I had been working on for a similar project; given our compatible goals, I offered to share it with them and provide a letter of support. Ultimately, my grant application was not funded but theirs was, and while their project was not exactly what I had set out to accomplish, it was a step in the right direction. I was happy to have supported someone else’s good effort, and the resulting relationship is certain to pay off over time. In another case, I did the paperwork for a group that wanted to take advantage of a state program that was involved in putting up signs to alert people to sensitive watershed areas. This was not a trails-related project, but it earned us goodwill with a group that had a strong relationship with some key officials. The group has since written letters of support for some of our grant proposals and allowed us to list them as supporters of several proposed projects. These kinds of partnerships can be formed for a variety of efforts. Every year public libraries around the country have summer reading programs. Many of these libraries have a prepackaged theme. This is a perfect opportunity for libraries to form partnerships with local organizations relating to that year’s theme. One theme involved a trail, which was a perfect tie-in for

Making Friends and Forming Partnerships

Notes from the Field: National and Local Partnerships Many national organizations look for local groups to publicize designated days or weeks to highlight their causes. For example, the American Hiking Society (www.americanhiking.org) has a National Trails Day. There are groups sponsoring Walk Your Child to School Day (www.walktoschool-usa.org) and Bike to Work Day (www.bike-to-work.com). The American Forests organization has a “historic tree” program to highlight trees that reflect the history or culture of local areas. All of these organizations are dependent on local groups to help carry out their missions, and often provide press kits, statistics, graphics, posters, and a variety of other materials for use at registered local events. By combining forces, you can add to the national effort and earn some national goodwill as well. Such national connections go both ways. When local organizations are looking for publicity, resources, and information, the national groups can be very helpful. The Dale Earnhardt Foundation and American Forests (www.americanforests.org) announced a partnership to fund reforesting efforts. The first project is in North Carolina and future projects will be in other states where Winston Cup races are held. The national partnership will be looking for local groups to do the groundwork and help pinpoint appropriate projects. For more information on this project, check out www.daleearnhardtinc.com/content/legacy/foun dation.aspx.

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trail and outdoor recreation groups. Another year it was dragons— a great partnership for children’s theater groups and possibly some zoos (those with komodo dragons, for instance) or local colleges with dragon mascots.

Partnering with Groups That Have What You Need Think about what you need. Money and resources may top the list, but there will be other needs as well. Look around to see who has them and make friends with those people. Are there elected officials that have never warmed up to you, regardless of how friendly you have been toward them? Do you need their support for something? Look around and see if there is a group that does have a good working relationship with these officials that you can partner with, or seek out an individual who might act as a gobetween. The group that used the trail group’s grant narratives, for instance, had a longer history, a bigger donor list, a paid staff, more public support and respect, and a larger membership than ours. They will have a better chance of getting the money. Remember, as long as you get what you want it doesn’t matter how it gets done. Creating a formal attachment to a larger or more established organization can provide you with access to new and better funding sources. For example, the American Hiking Society has an affiliate program that allows local hiking, trails, or recreation groups to join as organizational, or affiliate, members. Individuals are always welcome to join, but an affiliate membership provides recognition to the local organization as a group. The American Hiking Society also has a small grant program. Local affiliates get extra points in the grant evaluation process. Organizations that have hosted National Trail Day events might also get points. Associating with a larger organization also shows signs of stability and continuity.


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Look for national or regional associations that might have affiliate programs. It is well worth the small membership fees to belong. There are other, more silent ways to partner. Are there large annual public events in your area? Can you sponsor a table or a team? Can you donate an item to a silent auction? These are good ways of letting the public at large know that you exist and are a reputable group. Being seen with other more accepted organizations is one way to build your own reputation, and if you are willing to pitch in and do some of the work for the larger event, it will make it easier for you to contact the sponsoring organization later.

Making Friends—and Keeping Them Don’t be so blinded by your own passions that you exclude others or make them feel small for not being as passionate as you are. Accept graciously what others offer. A fervent belief is a powerful force, but a zealot can do as much harm as good. How many of us have quickly crossed the street or lied to get off the phone in order to avoid a conversation with someone who is deeply concerned with one topic and one topic only? It doesn’t matter how wonderful the cause is if the delivery drives people away. Well-intentioned but overly idealistic animal shelter volunteers who alienate potential adoptive families are doing the animals no favors. An organization that demands immediate and total loyalty is unlikely to recruit a great number of new members. Most people need to observe first before they will feel comfortable spending their time and money with you. Encourage an organization they are involved with to partner with yours. It is important to be fervent, yet welcoming. Make it as easy as possible for people to contribute, and thank them quickly and politely. Single-mindedness is a wonderful attribute, but if you are trying to persuade people, you will need to allow them to be half-hearted and even somewhat skeptical about your activities. If they choose, let them wander in and out over

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time. They have friends, their friends have friends, and you want all these people to eventually find their way to your doorstep.

Politicians and Candidates Among the groups you need to cultivate are your elected officials. While most people are aware of their federal (U.S.) senators and congresspersons, they may not be aware of their state counterparts. Every state but Nebraska has a state senate and state house (Nebraska has one legislative body), but the members may be called by different titles. For example, in New Jersey, state representatives are known as assemblymen and assemblywomen. While federal officials can get large sums of money for big projects, state officials are more likely to get you money for local projects. If you aren’t familiar with your state officials check out your state government’s Web site. (To find your home state’s site, insert your state abbreviation into the following URL: www.state.XX.us. For example, Missouri is www.state.mo.us, Arizona is www.state.az.us, and so on.) Below the state level you will have county, township, and city or municipal officials. They can help you with local regulations and give official support to projects. While we often view our elected officials with skepticism, I have found that most of my representatives are good people who sincerely want to make the community a better place. Like most of us, they want to see worthwhile projects succeed. If your group has established itself as one that can get things done, it will be more likely to get money and support from government sources. Elected officials are also interested in publicity, especially around election time. What is the best way to get to know your elected officials? Find out where they are and go there. Most elected officials make appearances at large public events. During election years, they at least give a pretense of having town meetings, and the local League


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of Women Voters will probably sponsor at least one debate or forum. Such events offer excellent opportunities to meet your officials without spending a dime. Check their Web sites for lists of events or any office open houses they are hosting. If they, or their staff, are good at what they do, you will only need to show up once or twice for them to remember you. You may also request an appointment with someone on the staff if your organization is getting ready to announce a big project or has several upcoming events, or if you just want to update the staff on what the organization is doing. Keep such meetings brief and present your information as concisely as possible; time is in short supply for officials and their staffs. While federal-level officials are less open to meetings due to time constraints, state-level officials may welcome an opportunity to find out what is going on in their communities—especially when they are being provided with information rather than being asked for money. This is also true for officials below the state level. Larger cities may have a full-time city council, but in smaller areas, city, township, or even county officials are likely to have full- or part-time jobs elsewhere. If you can find ways of keeping them informed of your group’s activities without taking up too much of their time, they will appreciate it. Elected officials never want to be caught unaware of what is going on in their communities. If you want to be popular with your elected officials find ways to get them good publicity. Invite them to your events, especially when you are expecting a good turnout. If they are present, try to include them in photos you send to local press. Be sure to give credit where credit is due. If they help you get money, mention this as prominently as possible. A good track record in this regard is an excellent credential to have when seeking official assistance. By all means, take any help they offer, even if you disagree with their politics. Acceptance does not imply endorsement, though it could be awkward if anyone from your group connected with the

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immediate project actively campaigned against this official. Some thought may need to be given to this aspect when deciding who does what or who is photographed with the official. Look for other possible ways to help your elected officials. If an official is hosting a public event, try to have one or two people from your group attend. Donating money and attending fundraisers are also good ways to curry favor. As mentioned earlier in the book, it is advisable to make friends with the staffs of political appointees. These are the people I call or e-mail directly if I need a letter of support for a grant application or to handle something locally. Often the staff is able to take care of things for me. In return, I always make it a point to write the elected official a letter thanking them for their assistance and mentioning how helpful their staff members were.

Notes from the Field: Perkiomen Trail Coalition In 1999, the Perkiomen Trail Coalition, a citizen group that had been working for over 10 years to advocate for the construction of the Perkiomen Trail in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, disbanded when it looked like land for the rails to trails project would revert to the original landowners. It was not until Michael Marino was elected county commissioner and made the project his intended legacy that significant progress was made. The Coalition reconstituted itself and now, in addition to advocating for trail expansion, it acts as liaison between the government and the general populace in trail matters and works on trail maintenance. In November of 2003, 22 miles of trail were dedicated. (Source: Stanley, Lea Sitton. “Trail Blazing Along Perkiomen.” Philadelphia Inquirer March 19, 2002: A1.)


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State and local employees are useful contacts. If you work on environmental projects, you might want to get to know the head of your parks and recreation department. If you plan on applying for state grants, you will come into contact with the people in various state departments as well. Try to find at least one person in these areas you can work with, who can answer questions, and who can get you the “straight skinny” on what is going on. Try to assure them that your projects won’t conflict with or interfere with their work.

Media Matters Most people involved in fundraising know they will need to have press coverage—after all, people aren’t likely to give you money if they don’t know you exist—but many groups may not know how to go about getting it. The first thing you need to do is a media inventory. Make a list of newspapers, free circulars, local cable stations, local affiliate stations, local interest TV shows, radio spots—any place that covers your local area or that might be interested in information on your cause. If you are in the arts, look specifically at arts publications or papers that list community events. By calling the publication or browsing its Web site, you can find out if any one reporter is assigned to your topic or area. Next, send reporters a press kit that includes information about your group’s goals and accomplishments, copies of brochures, contact information, and a few positive published stories or mentions, if you have them. Even with a turnover in reporters, this type of information is likely to stay in the files. The reporter assigned to your geographic or subject area need not be your only contact. Watch the papers for well-written articles sympathetic to your cause, even if not directly related to it. Send these writers a press kit as well. Reporters at smaller papers

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in particular may welcome an opportunity to meet with you briefly to talk about your organization. You can’t expect journalists to seek your organization out or to report things just the way you’d like them to. You can’t expect them to remember to call you when something relates to your cause or organization. Stay on their radar screens by contacting them to present your side of any relevant story. Reporters and other journalists covering your topic area will be interested in knowing about your events, successes, and accomplishments; communicating with them on a regular basis is one of the best ways to ensure you get press. Put yourself in the reporter’s shoes: You are working on multiple stories, coming up on deadline, and you need something to fill a spot in the next edition. One person calls to tell you about an event, another faxes a press release about a different event, and a third sends an e-mail that includes information about still another event. Assuming all three events are of equal interest and importance, which one are you most likely to write about? The first person is expecting you to write down all the details correctly and the second is giving you information you will have to retype, but the third is sending background and contact information in a format that allows for cutting and pasting. All other things being equal, it’s pretty much a slam-dunk which of these events is going to be covered. If you have a photo to send, inquire as to the format and delivery method a given publication prefers: Do they want a print, a slide, or a digital file? Is there a preferred size or resolution? Is e-mail acceptable or should the material be sent by mail? The easier you make it for the media, the more often you will get press. Write press releases in the accepted format, giving who, what, when, where, and why. Read a book or two about how to generate publicity (I have included some suggestions under “Recommended Reading” at the end of the chapter).


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Think of unique and timely angles on your story and work them into your media communications. For example, every year there is a designated “Walk Your Child to School Day.” The local papers are probably not going to report on it the same way every year. However, one year they might report which schools have sidewalks around them and which don’t. Another year they might write about groups of parents that take turns walking all of their children to and from school. There are a number of angles you can suggest, and if you provide contact information on examples for each, it improves your chance of getting covered. Reporters don’t like to think they are in anyone’s pocket and won’t take all your suggestions, but you might be surprised how open some of them are. Local free papers and circulars are often worth submitting information to. Send them short articles from time to time. There is a general view that everyone likes to see his or her name and picture in the paper. This isn’t true for everyone, but it is for many people. Take photos at events, meetings, and award ceremonies and send them, with captions, to the local paper. If they have the space available, they may run something. As a courtesy, I always ask an individual for permission to make public a photo he or she appears in—not only in respect to newspaper publication, but for images your organization wants to post on the Web. It is very important to do so, especially when children are involved. Some parents (myself included) prefer not to have their children’s images published and identified. Local TV and radio shows are always on the lookout for interesting stories. Send a brief summary of your group and what you would like to discuss to the host or producer. Pick one of your more photogenic, interesting, and articulate members to be a representative. Provide the host with a list of “talking points”—it will supply food for thought and might make the difference in getting your story on the air.

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Having an updated Web site is also a good idea, as will be discussed in greater detail in Chapter 7, “Passive Fundraising.” Include your Web address in all your publications and press releases in order to give people a way to keep up with your activities. An outdated or abandoned Web site will project an image of neglect. If you can’t make the commitment to keep a site updated, either don’t have one at all or adopt a static approach where you offer basic information that can stand the test of time.

Helping Others In your work with accidental fundraising, and overall in your daily life, remember that the people you encounter may very well be able to help you out at some point in the future. In other words, treat others as you would like to be treated. Public figures know this all too well, but it is relevant even to those of us who toil at the lower levels of community organizations. As soon as you are publicly associated with a group or organization, you become its public face, and your actions can impact the group positively or negatively. Personally I have stayed active in the community in a variety of ways, as opposed to being associated with just one organization. Those who are opposed to one organization I’m involved with are less likely to dismiss me if they know I am also active in the local PTA or a regular participant in other community events. Keeping a behind-the-scenes role in most groups also helps: The more public your role in an organization, the more you need to be aware on a daily basis that your actions and words reflect on the group. If you learn that a group or someone working on a good cause is floundering, see what you can do to help. Tomorrow or the next day it might be your group that is floundering and wishing for someone to help. Helping out can be as simple as sharing your makeshift rock paperweights at an outdoor information table on a


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windy day. If you have three rocks and only two stacks of paper, and the table next to you has two rocks and three stacks of paper, well, the solution seems obvious: Give them your extra rock. This is a simplistic example, though if you have ever staffed an information table on a windy day, you will understand its importance! Most situations are more complex, but the concept remains the same. If you have found a great funding source, but your group doesn’t fit the requirements and your projects will probably never be relevant enough to apply, send the information to a group that fits the bill perfectly. Single-minded glory hounds may win the battle, but the war is another matter. A case in point is the charter school that, because of its founder’s reputation for ruthlessness, was unable to muster the public support it needed to succeed. A more gracious attitude at the top might have engendered access to a greater variety and number of helpful resources.

When Things Go Wrong Maybe a major contributor is opposed to what you are doing. Sometimes an official just won’t like you. Maybe several people in your organization worked for her political opponent in the previous election. These things happen. If the official is at the start of a 20-year run in office, you may be in trouble. But if public support is clearly behind your cause, he may change his public stance even if privately he remains opposed. Stay the course and wait things out. You may run afoul of another organization or inadvertently offend someone in a way that can come back to haunt you. Try to make amends where you can. As with elected officials, sometimes you just have to ride out the storm. Sometimes people take your information and ideas and never give you credit. Remember, if your goals are being accomplished, that’s all that counts.

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Sometimes people don’t want to be your friend in the first place. Sometimes the big city paper isn’t interested in small organizations like yours. The local papers may not find you newsworthy or the local reporters may have a negative view of you for one reason or another. Send items to the free circulars and bide your time. Reporters move on. The next one may be friendlier. Sometimes you can mend fences; sometimes you can’t. Sometimes projects will lie fallow for a few years until the political and social climate is better. Keep a stiff upper lip and, when the tide is against you, wait. It will change. This may not seem very comforting when you are going through a stormy time, but sometimes life is like that. If you are looking at long-term goals and not focusing on the short term, or if there is another project you can pick up in the interim, it will make things easier. Some days are bad, but remember that these too shall pass.

Recommended Reading Salzman, Jason. Making the News: A Guide for Activists and Nonprofits (Revised & Updated). Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 2003. Stanley, Lea Sitton. “Trail Blazing Along Perkiomen.” Philadelphia Inquirer March 19, 2002: A1.

Recommended Web Sites American Forests, www.americanforests.org American Hiking Organization, www.americanhiking.org Bike to Work, www.bike-to-work.com Dale Earnhardt Foundation, www.daleearnhardtinc.com/content/legacy/ foundation.aspx Walk Your Child to School Day, www.walktoschool-usa.org

Chapter 7 Passive Fundraising Passive fundraising is making sure that if people want to help you out, they can. In other words, you need to let people know what you have done, what you are doing, and what you want to do. As discussed previously, there are many foundations that will not accept unsolicited funding applications; they invite applications from organizations they find worthy. Who do they invite to apply? The organizations they have had prior experience with or have heard good things about. What have they heard about you? It is very difficult to raise any money without having some form of printed or online materials to provide your organization or cause with legitimacy. The mission statement and goals list that you prepared in Chapter 2 can be copied into any printed or digital promotional materials that you have. You need to clearly state upfront who you are and what you want to accomplish, and you must have something to give to potential donors that spells out what you are doing, even if it is no more than your project goals printed out on plain white paper. When you are asking people for money or resources, you don’t want to hide your light under a bushel. Here are some tips on how to make sure you are letting your light shine.

Communicating with Interested Parties We touched on communications issues in Chapter 5, in the section on membership, and again in Chapter 6. However, there are some other basics you should know. First, if you have a membership group, you need to keep in touch with the members. There are

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a number of ways of letting members know what the organization is doing. You can’t expect every member to attend every meeting, and important issues develop between meetings. Talk with your core group of active members (sometimes this is you, the mirror, and your cat!) in order to identify the people and organizations that must be kept up-to-date on your activities. If you have a membership list, keep these vital contacts near the top of it. One somewhat controversial issue is whether to regularly mail information to people who have indicated an interest in the organization, but have not specifically asked to be on the mailing list. On the one hand, adding someone to your mailing list is an excellent way to recruit new members. On the other hand, what is the point of joining if you can get the news updates for free? It is a conundrum. One organization decided that official members should receive a monthly mailing, and that interested nonmembers should receive a quarterly update. It opted to make e-mail and Web updates available to all. This solved the problem of members feeling they were not being given preferential treatment. However, it does not answer the question of whether to continue sending information to non-members. One way to avoid continually annoying those who would rather not receive your information is to include information on how to be taken off the mailing list or to include a self-addressed envelope with a membership form and a box indicating a desire to no longer receive mail. Relevant elected and appointed officials should also be included in your list, as should people working on related projects, so you won’t be at cross purposes or trying to do the same thing at the same time. Now think about how often and through what medium you should keep in touch.

Brochures and Newsletters All formal organizations should have a brochure to distribute at public events and to send to people interested in joining. This will

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just need the basics: your mission statement, a list of some previous accomplishments, some general goals, and contact information. This last part, contact information, can be a sticking point. Bigger organizations with staff will have an office with a phone number, while many smaller organizations won’t. Someone who owns a small business or home-based business with a separate line may be willing to use that line as the organization’s phone, or to let the organization use his or her business address as the mailing address. Otherwise, individuals may be wary of having their personal phone number on something that will be widely distributed, especially if what you are working on is controversial. It may be better to just have a mailing address and an e-mail address. I have avoided having my home phone number put on materials that are distributed publicly. I’m not ashamed of what I am doing, but my home phone number is one digit off that of a cab company’s and I get enough wacky phone calls as it is. Plus, as my children become old enough to answer the phone, I don’t want any irate citizens to take out their anger on any small person who picks up the receiver (people are not always careful to make sure they are talking to the person responsible for whatever it is that has upset them). Calls made in the middle of the night are likewise unappreciated. If this is your situation and no one else in the organization wants to release their personal phone number, restrict your public contact information to e-mail and a mailing address. A brochure is a wonderful way to introduce your organization to people. You can mail it out to private foundations, just to let them know you exist, and offer ways of keeping up-to-date on your activities (your Web site for example). Brochures can be left in places that have information racks: libraries, train stations, bookstores, church foyers, and many other locations. Be sure to see what permissions are required and follow the rules as closely as possible. Take copies of your brochure to public events where people interested in your cause may be gathering. One woman in a

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trails organization takes brochures with her when she goes out to walk the dog; when she runs into other dog walkers who complain about the scarcity of open places where Spot can stretch his legs, she pulls out a brochure and introduces the organization. Friends of the Library or similar groups may want to have a few brochures handy when they go to book readings and book binding classes. Update your brochure annually or as necessary. Newsletters, even of the “down and dirty” variety, can be very useful. (For a membership organization, meeting minutes can form the basis of a newsletter.) Organizations that can’t afford color printing can still prepare a visually pleasing black-and-white publication that can be copied onto colored paper or forms that have been preprinted with colored fields and flourishes. The key thing to remember about newsletters is that regardless of how attractive they are, you must still must have something to say. Cheery notes from the board president or long statistics-laden articles won’t captivate your audience. Remember to try to emotionally connect with your readers, provide reasons why they should give to your cause, and list ways previous donors or donations have made a positive impact. Of course, keep in mind, for print mailings you also have to come up with the money for photocopying, paper, and postage.

E-mail and Web Sites E-mail is a wonderful outlet for small organizations, provided your constituency will use it. You can send out meeting reminders, meeting minutes, and links to relevant online articles, as well as request input on decision making. Regular e-mails provide a sense of vibrancy to an organization. As with newsletters, you want to make sure you are making good use of people’s time by having something to say when you e-mail. A series of “rah rah” or “preaching to the choir” e-mails will not endear you to your constituents.

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A reader of my book The Accidental Webmaster e-mailed me to say he had considered becoming active in a discussion group on a free e-mail server. However, he found that the communications tended to be partisan in nature as opposed to informative. None of the individuals who attended the group’s meetings or events ever posted a summary of what happened or descriptions or other relevant items; rather, they spewed “aren’t we neat?” fluff with no real content. He opted to join another organization. Although I am a firm believer in democracy, it is this type of experience that has made me a proponent of moderated discussion groups. Someone needs to make sure that messages going out represent the group and are relevant to the matters at hand. You can set up an e-mail account through Yahoo! or Hotmail or a number of other free services and ask people to sign up for e-mail updates. Some of the e-mail services have limits on how many e-mails you can send out in a set time period or to how many people; sometimes this is dependent on how active the account has been recently. I have run into trouble when I haven’t sent out an e-mail to a large group in awhile. An e-mail account that hasn’t been active and then tries to send out a large number of e-mails is suspect of sending spam. When I’ve used the account regularly there hasn’t been a problem. At times, I’ve had to send an e-mail to half of the group, and then send it to the other half later. Also keep in mind that while it might be convenient to send e-mails through your personal account, you will be better served by setting up a specific account for the organization. This allows you to distinguish personal communications from those related to the organization. It can come in handy to have both options: Your personal e-mail can function as a more private communication system, while the group’s e-mail is used for public announcements. I have used this approach when communicating with elected officials. Information sent to a group’s e-mail account is fair game for public dissemination, while anything sent to my personal account

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is considered confidential. This distinction can be crucial in fundraising. A Web site is a virtual necessity these days for nonprofits, even small ones. A simple Web site can be built fairly easily. You may be able to find a local Internet provider who will provide you space for a reduced fee or for free. If you have a little money you can set up a site through a national or local Internet service provider. At the very least have a “brochureware” Web site—one that presents the information you would likely find in a printed brochure. This would not need to be updated often. A more dynamic Web site will involve posting meeting dates and minutes, updating your activities, adding new photos from time to time, and keeping your visitors informed of events, legislation, and activities they may wish to participate in or share with others. Be sure to provide contact information for the benefit of anyone who may want to get in touch with the organization. A good Web site does not need to be glitzy. In fact, if you want to attract a regular following, keep the site, especially the home page, simple enough to load quickly, with updated information easily identifiable. For example, the Web site for Harry Potter author J. K. Rowling (www.jkrowling.com) is beautiful, easily the best graphics based site I have ever seen—but it takes a long time to load. If I want the latest Harry Potter news or to know if Rowling’s site has been updated recently, I visit www.mugglenet.com. Mugglenet is text-based, which means it loads faster and can be updated more frequently. For more detailed information on setting up a good Web site, be sure to read The Accidental Webmaster. It is designed for those who are running a Web site on a part-time or volunteer basis for nonprofits or for their own company. Another must-have for any fundraising organization’s Web site is an easy-to-use feature or instructions that allow people to contribute. The simplest solution is to provide a printable form and a mailing address—this type of thing make it possible for individuals

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to send checks without requiring complex Web programming on your end. Another option is to allow payments to be made through an online service such as PayPal (www.paypal.com) or Amazon (www.amazon.com). Credit card payments on the Web can be a little trickier than using PayPal as they require you to have some kind of online banking capability and a small percentage of the donation is deducted as a fee.

Notes from the Field: Online Personal Fundraising TechSoup (the technology place for nonprofits; www.techsoup.org) recently posted an article on online personal fundraising. It references Justgiving (www.just giving.com), “a web-based service that allows individuals to set up personal web pages to help raise funds for the nonprofit of their choice.” Suppose you plan to run in a marathon or lose some weight, or even grow a bumper crop of tomatoes. Justgiving will let you set up a Web page to announce your intent and take donations or pledges, with the money going to your chosen charity.

Blogs Weblogs, or “blogs” as they are more commonly known, are the newest way to keep in touch with a group of people. One or more people set up a blog and then post messages to it daily, weekly, or as often as they like. Depending on the system, bloggers can allow everyone or just the internal group to view the postings. Like Web sites, blogs that are not kept current will quickly lose their audience.

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However, blogs can be very effective, especially when a group of bloggers work in concert toward a common goal. If you are planning a community event in a geographic area that has a number of bloggers writing on local issues, ask if they will mention your event if you will return the favor for their events. Photos and other illustrations will often be included in blogs. If you are interested in blogging, watch a few blogs and see how they work before you try your own. If you aren’t up to speed on blogs yet, go to www.blogger.com, click on their in-house blog and then on the

Notes from the Field: Cooperative Campaign Blogs In the spring of 2005, a number of Philadelphia-area bloggers banded together to promote the primary election campaign of Seth Williams for city district attorney. He was running against an incumbent, always a difficult task, and did not win. However, his campaign had an online campaign director who worked to make connections with area bloggers (this was not the person’s only campaign task). They had three “days of action.” The first day was to just spread the word, with each blogger taking a different tack on the race or the candidate. The second day called for people to contribute; $3,000 came in that day through the candidate’s Web site. On the third day bloggers asked their readers to volunteer. Seventy people did. The bloggers also advertised a lastminute fundraiser, which brought in additional money and volunteers. While the amounts may not seem large, they cost the campaign very little to bring in. It also proved that bloggers can make a difference.

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“next blog” button at the top of the screen. You can randomly review a number of blogs. This same Web site will allow you to set up your own blog. Keep in mind that a blog is even more relentless than a Web site. You will absolutely need to keep it current. Tracking software, on either a Web site or a blog, will allow you to see who and how often people are visiting your site. Sitemeter (www.sitemeter.com) has a free version that will take care of most of the needs of a smaller blog or site. Unless visitors are using an anonymizer (which blocks their information), it will tell you the IP address of the visitor, their geographic area, what page they went to, what page they left from, and how long they were at the site.

When Things Go Wrong In The Accidental Webmaster, I discuss some of the problems volunteer Webmasters run into and how to avoid them. Keeping a Web site current is a primary item, but even the best volunteers will have down days, weeks, or months. Dust yourself off and get back in the saddle as soon as possible. Blogging is a relatively new phenomenon and people are still getting used to it. While blogs have become accepted as information outlets and public relations tools in areas like politics and product placement, there is still a large segment of the population that does not read or make use of them. However, what is true for e-mails and Web sites is also true for blogging; the basic guidelines—such as don’t denigrate people, don’t broadcast confidences, and don’t post anything you wouldn’t send to the newspaper—apply here as well. You can remove something from your blog, but it still exists out there in the blogosphere somewhere and crafty people will find it, retrieve it, and print it out. Keep your online and printed materials tidy, updated, and maximize their potential by presenting your organization, its mission, goals, and successes in the best possible light.

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Recommended Reading Ahern, Tom. Raising More Money with Newsletters Than You Ever Thought Possible. Medfield, Emerson & Church, 2005. Still, Julie. The Accidental Webmaster. Medford, NJ: Information Today, Inc. 2003.

Recommended Web Sites Blogger, www.blogger.com Hotmail, www.hotmail.com J. K. Rowling, www.jkrowling.com Justgiving, www.justgiving.com Mugglenet, www.mugglenet.com PayPal, www.paypal.com Sitemeter, www.sitemeter.com TechSoup (the technology place for nonprofits), www.techsoup.org Yahoo!, www.yahoo.com

Chapter 8 Tips and Advice for the Accidental Fundraiser In Chapter 3, you made an inventory of your resources, both the tangible (money and equipment) and intangible (expertise and goodwill). These are your primary assets and should be carefully guarded. They can be critical to helping you succeed as an accidental fundraiser and you will want to use them wisely. This chapter reiterates some key points we’ve already covered about leveraging and conserving them that bear repeating.

Spend Wisely If you are reading this book, you may be dealing with modest as opposed to huge sums of money at the moment, but aiming higher in the long run. In a million dollar project, mismanaging a few thousand is probably no big deal. In a $2,000 project, mismanaging even a little is bad. In a $500 project, there is no margin for error. Yet, people are often more careless with these smaller projects. For several reasons, it is important to have more than one person involved in planning and implementing any fundraising project, even if only peripherally. Accidental fundraisers will often do the lion’s share of the work, but others need to be at least aware of what is going on so you don’t find yourself at cross purposes. It is all too easy for an organization to let one person handle all the work, but what happens is you end up mishandling something. Personally, I am not good with math. I have many talents, but addition (let alone higher math skills) is not one of them. People in the

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trails group I work with have learned through experience that I should not do grant budgets on my own. Either someone else does them, or they give me the numbers and I plug them into the right places on the necessary forms. A handful of people are needed to assure any project is done correctly. This isn’t to say that one person can’t do it all, but there should be some way that one person can get a second opinion or talk things over with someone familiar with the project. We discuss as a group how money should be spent and how we might do something similar for less money. There are a variety of experiences that come into play. One board member is a retired policeman who tells us what neighborhood areas we might want to avoid and knows a lot of local history. One member is a retired management consultant who can often suggest ways to cut corners and streamline projects. We have a former urban planner, an architect (more on this later), a long-time real estate agent, and a number of others with differing backgrounds. With all of us working together, we can often find creative ways to get the job done. As mentioned more than once in this book so far, if you have a geographic focus it is an excellent idea to work with local merchants and consultants, even if it costs you a little extra. The goodwill you will earn is worth it. This tactic will also allow you to say on your brochures that you have brought X amount of dollars into the community. Most organizations go to local businesses for donations, but all too often buy their supplies at big box stores and chains that are usually not as generous. The other end of the spectrum is collusion between a business and a nonprofit that allows the business to overcharge in exchange for a kickback or some other favor. This is unethical. It may be a hard line to balance on, but I maintain that supporting community businesses strengthens the local economy and that is definitely good for you. Your bylaws should spell out ethical expectations. Some grant forms will ask for biographies of board members and specifically

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ask if any board members will financially benefit from any funds allotted. As just mentioned, my trails group has an architect on the board, but his specialty is indoor architecture, not landscape architecture. His expertise comes in handy when reviewing plans, but he is not someone we would hire for any planning that we do. This allows us to make use of his particular skills and not cross any ethical boundaries. Smaller nonprofits often do not have offices and therefore are not tempted to use “overhead” money to buy pricey chairs or laptops for staff to take home and use. This also can be unethical. If the organization is purchasing equipment that will be kept in a private residence, there should be a written agreement on who actually owns it, who is responsible for maintenance, and if it needs to be returned to the organization if the person leaves. You should watch spending and the appearance of conflict of interest carefully.

Guard Your Reputation In Born to Raise, J. Panas lists the top five qualities to look for in a professional fundraiser. The first is impeccable integrity. Linda Lysakowski, writing in New Directions for Philanthropic Fundraising, says the same is true for volunteers. Elizabeth Wilson states, “Without credibility, fundraising is next to impossible. People and organizations don’t want to give money to groups they don’t know or are not sure they can trust” (p. 9). It is a mantra you will hear over and over. If you want people to give you their money, they have to trust you. It is true of banks. It is true of businesses. It is not always true of politicians and that has led to some trouble. What is it that people most often grumble about paying? Taxes may be the number one item on the list. Do people trust that their taxes are well spent? Not always. Cable companies and healthcare providers may also show up in the top 10. Charities that depend on public donations cannot afford to be

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careless with their reputation. Harbor one bad apple or get one stain on a good record and donations will likely drop. There have been some unfortunate examples of this in the wake of Hurricane Katrina and other disasters. Integrity, integrity, integrity, and credibility, credibility, credibility. It cannot be said enough.

Keep Up A word here about professional development is important because even accidental fundraisers can benefit from continuing education. Earlier in the book, we discussed statewide associations for nonprofit organizations. These associations will often provide training seminars in nonprofit management, grantwriting, and fundraising at an affordable cost. Community colleges will sometimes offer classes on accounting for nonprofits. Colleges and universities, such as the University of Pennsylvania, often offer programs or classes in fundraising. Quite frequently, funding agencies will provide free workshops on writing and submitting grants. If you or someone from your organization can attend, it is an excellent way to get to know those who are handing out the money. There are a number of other, often free, training programs available that people in your group may attend. I also find it useful to be on relevant e-mail distribution lists. The Pennsylvania Association of Nonprofit Organizations and TechSoup are two groups that send out relevant fundraising materials. For trail matters, I receive e-mail updates from Watershed Weekly and the American Hiking Society, as well as from the state’s Department of Conservation and Natural Resources. A few others come in sporadically. These e-mails will often mention fundraising opportunities. To locate relevant lists for your group, check with your state nonprofit association as well as with national, state, and local associations related to your project’s topic of interest


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(libraries, trails, literacy, and so on.). Believe me, once you get on a few of these lists, others will find you.

When Things Go Wrong Life sometimes seems very ironic. A group had received a small grant to plant native wildflowers in parks. They picked three places to plant. At one of them, several children helped to scatter the seeds and cover them. It was a heart-warming scene. Someone volunteered to make a sign to commemorate the planting and to let people know what would be growing. It took longer than she expected. The plants had started to sprout so she hurried to finish it. By the time she completed the sign and took it to the park, the groundskeepers had mistaken the sprouts for weeds and mowed. The group had neglected to notify local government about what was happening. One person had been told, but the information had not filtered through, nor could it be expected to. The sign should have been up the day of the planting, with the planting area roped off. It is these little things, more often than outright purposeful waste, that often trip us up. Most groups have at least one similar story. Look at them as learning experiences, but keep them to a minimum.

The Benefits of Volunteering One of the benefits of doing something as a volunteer or as a labor of love that you don’t depend on for your livelihood is that it can be picked up and put down as the ebb and flow of your changing circumstances allow. Learning fundraising skills will make you an asset to any project or organization and you may move through several over a period of years. One thing ends and another begins; your interests change or you need to turn an enjoyable hobby into

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an income-generating job—all of these junctures will cause you to shift gears. If the project you were working on gets stuck in a political or social quagmire and you have to let it go, take some time to rest and then look for another opportunity to contribute. Maybe the group you were working with shifts priorities and you are no longer comfortable with what they are doing. There are other groups out there. Or you might want to take a few years off from fundraising to go windsurfing. When you get back, there will be other things to work on. I can tell you that the sense of accomplishment that comes from seeing something come to life because of your efforts is one that will keep you coming back, in one form or another. One evening earlier this year, I sat in a room with two other people planning a community event and talking about what it would cost and how it could be developed. Someone used the word “cognizant.” It occurred to me that one thing I wanted as a little girl, but would never have been able to articulate, was to one day be sitting in a room with other people, planning something that hundreds of people would be involved in, knowing that we were capable of doing the job, and using words like “cognizant.” In a world that often seems to value only high salaries and celebrity, it may seem a small dream, but it was mine, and it has come true. These are the things I think about when I walk along trails I helped raise the money to build, or past things that would not be there if I had not put pen to paper to write a grant or picked up the phone to suggest a partnership. There are things that you, too, can create and build, and bring into being that others around you can enjoy. I encourage you to give it a try.


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Recommended Reading Lysakowski, Linda, “What’s In It for Me?” New Directions for Philanthropic Fundraising #39 (Spring 2004): 53–64. Panas, J. Born to Raise. Chicago: Pluribus, 1988. Wilson, Elizabeth Westman. Building Credibility: The Foundation for Fundraising. KIT Publishers, 2001.

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Bibliography This list cumulates sources used throughout the book, and provides an annotation for many of them.

Recommended Reading Ahern, Tom. Raising More Money with Newsletters Than You Ever Thought Possible. Medfield: Emerson & Church, 2005. Ahern specializes in capital campaign materials and other nonprofit communications. His book gives excellent advice on designing effective newsletters. Balas, Janet L. “Fundraising:

It’s Not Just About the Money.”

Computers in Libraries 23 #2 (February 2003): 32–4. An excellent source of information for “friends” groups, especially library friends groups, with a list of related Web sites and other resources, as well as general information on library friends. Ban Breathnach, Sarah. Simple Abundance: A Day Book of Comfort and Joy. New York: Warner Books, 1995. Accidental fundraisers need to look out for themselves as well as work on their projects; I have found this book to be a good resource for setting personal priorities and making peace with oneself. Barbato, Joseph, and Danielle S. Furlich. Writing for a Good Cause: The Complete Guide to Crafting Proposals and Other Persuasive Pieces for Nonprofits. New York: Fireside, 2000.

135

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Anyone interested in how fundraising works at larger organizations should read this book, but much of the information presented here will be relevant for smaller groups. It presents detailed descriptions of the types of writing needed in the fundraising process and concludes with the “Down and Dirty Proposal Kit.” Those interested in reading about the preparation of project descriptions, case statements, proposals, thank you letters, reports, and so on, will love this book. It is written in a very warm and conversational style that will instantly put the reader at ease. Bogaert, Pauline Pinard. “Wanted: Young Blood, Need Not be Blue.” Philadelphia Inquirer October 17, 2004, p. M1+. This article will be of particular interest to those wishing to set up “young friends” groups or to broaden their approach to younger donors. It is one of the few resources on the topic. Bonnicksen, Bruce C. “New Roles of Volunteers in Development.” New Directions for Philanthropic Fundraising 39 (Spring 2003): 5–21. If you are looking for background on the motivation of volunteers or statistics about them, this article will provide a good overview. Bowden, Philip (Theta), Earning Blythe, and Andrew Cohill. “A Brief History of the Blacksburg Electronic Village.” In Andrew Michael Cohill and Andrea L. Kavanaugh (Eds.). Community Networks: Lessons from Blacksburg, Virginia (2nd ed.). Boston: Artech House, 1999. Here is an excellent case study on setting up a project from concept to finished item. Although it is thus limited in scope, it provides a very thorough description of the process, especially as it relates to dealing with people.

Bibliography

137

Gladwell, Malcolm. The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference. Boston: Little, Brown, 2000. This is an excellent read for those who think you must have an army of supporters or a large bank account to get things done. While it does not deal with fundraising per se, it does show how the balance can easily shift. Graham, John W., and Wendy C. Havlick. Mission Statements: A Guide to the Corporate and Nonprofit Sectors. New York: Garland, 1994. The authors provide a great deal of background and some excellent examples of mission statements. Hogan, Cecilia. Prospects Research: A Primer for Growing Nonprofits. Sudbury, MA: Jones and Bartlett Publishers, 2004. This book provides some excellent examples of research forms. It also provides information on research-gathering methods, ethical guidelines, and confidentiality. Those interested in learning how the big foundations raise money will find this especially interesting, but the advice presented can be adapted to smaller organizations as well. Hummel, Joan M. Starting and Running a Nonprofit Organization. (2nd ed.). Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2002. In this very succinct but well-structured guide, you’ll find information on bylaws, budget forms, legal and accounting issues, and some fundraising basics. This is an excellent source for beginners. Hutton, Stan, and Frances Phillips. Nonprofit Kit for Dummies. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley, 2001. A CD-ROM with sample legal and financial forms is included with the book, which provides basic information on setting up a nonprofit, as well as sections on management and fundraising. It

138


is geared more toward larger groups, but the information can easily be applied to smaller ones as well. Joachim, Jean. Beyond the Bake Sale: The Ultimate School FundRaising Book. New York: St. Martins, 2003. Aimed at schools and libraries, this book is applicable to many different types of nonprofit organizations. Listening to Grantees: What Nonprofits Value in their Foundation Funders. The Center for Effective Philanthropy, 2004. Here is an interesting study of nonprofits as clients of larger foundations, and what the nonprofits want and expect. Accidental fundraisers will find some excellent tips on dealing with funding agencies and some of the problems that may occur when dealing with them. Lysakowski, Linda. “What’s In It For Me?” New Directions for Philanthropic Fundraising 39 (Spring 2003): 53–64. Those interested in the motivation of volunteers will find answers to many of their questions here. Martin, Patricia. Made Possible By: Succeeding with Sponsorship. San Francisco: Jossey Bass, 2004. This may be the only guide to sponsorship you will ever need. Written by a former vice president for development and marketing at the American Library Association, the book includes forms, sample letters, examples, and a wealth of information in a relatively short book. Nichols, Judith E. Transforming Fundraising: A Practical Guide to Evaluating and Strengthening Fundraising to Grow with Change. San Francisco: Jossey Bass, 1999.

Bibliography

139

This book provides some excellent forms for surveying, data collection, and information recording, with an emphasis on development assessment. Panas, J. Born to Raise. Chicago: Pluribus, 1988. This author believes that fundraisers have a distinct personality. He interviews 50 of the best fundraisers and surveys 3,000 for a comprehensive study of what makes a good fundraiser. Accidental fundraisers may not wish to adopt the entire persona, but it is interesting to read what the big guns think. Robinson, Andy. Grassroots Grants: An Activist’s Guide to Grantseeking. (2nd ed.). San Francisco: Jossey Bass, 2004. In addition to providing great advice to grantwriters, the author and publisher have made the worksheets in the book available online (see www.josseybass.com/go/grassrootsgrants). Salzman, Jason. Making the News: A Guide for Activists and Nonprofits (revised and updated). Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press, 2003. For the public relations novice, this book will provide some good advice on contacting the media and getting good press. Stanley, Thomas J. Millionaire Women Next Door: The Many Journeys of Successful American Businesswomen. Kansas City: Andrews McNeel Publishing, 2004. This author points out that millionaire men (discussed in his earlier work, The Millionaire Next Door) are not as philanthropically inclined as millionaire women. He discusses several theories on why this might be so and discusses the general profile of wealthy women.

140


Steele, Victoria, and Stephen D. Elder. Becoming a Fundraiser: The Principles and Practice of Library Development. Chicago: American Library Association, 2000. While the emphasis is on libraries and full-time fundraising, many of the points made in this book are applicable to accidental fundraisers as well. Steele and Elder take a hard-nosed approach, but their advice shows a great deal of common sense. Still, Julie. The Accidental Webmaster. Medford, NJ: Information Today, 2003. For the novice Webmaster, this title will set out what needs to be done before code hits screen and how to set up an effective Web site. A chapter on fundraising is included. Swan, James. Fundraising for Libraries: 25 Proven Ways to Get More Money for Your Library. New York: Neal-Schuman, 2002. While aimed at libraries, the suggestions provided in this book are applicable to other organizations as well. Wallace, Linda K. Libraries, Mission and Marketing: Writing Mission Statements That Work. Chicago: American Library Association, 2004. While the title is geared toward libraries, much of the information is applicable to all nonprofit organizations. Wendroff, Alan L. Special Events: Proven Strategies for Nonprofit Fundraising (2nd ed.). Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, 2004. Here is everything you ever wanted to know about throwing a party (or something else), but were afraid to ask. Wilson, Elizabeth Westman. Building Credibility: The Foundation for Fundraising. KIT Publishers, 2001.

Bibliography

141

This book focuses on international organizations, but some of the advice is very adaptable to accidental fundraisers. The author often discusses the importance of local support and of maintaining a good reputation. Wollebaek, Dag, and Per Selle. “Does Participation in Voluntary Associations Contribute to Social Capital? The Impact of Intensity, Scope, and Type.” Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly 31 #1 (March 2002): 32–61. Read this interesting analysis of the social impact of volunteering and what factors can affect its social importance. Those who enjoyed the book Bowling Alone, a look at declining social capital in America, will find this interesting.

Other Sources Bagwell, Ryan. “Hiway’s Financial Future the Topic of Special Meeting.” Times Chronicle July 28, 2004: 2. Bogaert, Pauline Pinard. “Wanted: Young Blood, Need Not be Blue.” Philadelphia Inquirer October 17, 2004, p. M1+. Dribben, Melissa. “Let the Funding Flow.” Philadelphia Inquirer May 7, 2006: M1+. Golden, Daniel. “In Religion Studies, Universities Bend to Views of Faithful.” Wall Street Journal April 6, 2006: A1+. McGroaty, Cynthia J. “Show Goes on at Theater.” Philadelphia Inquirer January 2, 2005: L3. Slobodzian, Joseph A. “The Local Orchestras: Gotta Play.” Philadelphia Inquirer October 28, 1982: F2. Stanley, Lea Sitton. “Trail Blazing Along the Perkiomen.” Philadelphia Inquirer March 19, 2002: A1. Stearns, David Patrick. “The Joys of Second Fiddle. Special Report.” Philadelphia Inquirer December 14, 2003: H1.

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Recommended Web Sites Blogger, www.blogger.com An excellent starting point for the beginning blogger, this free service provides a variety of templates to choose from and simple instructions for getting started. The Foundation Center, www.fdncenter.org This truly is an online library for those seeking funding. Many resources require a fee, but others are available for free. Guidestar, www.guidestar.org Make sure your organization is registered here and sign up for their online newsletter. This Web site contains information on a large number of nonprofits, big and small, along with their financial data. Hotmail, www.hotmail.com Like Yahoo! and a number of other services, Hotmail provides free e-mail accounts. Internet Nonprofit Center, www.nonprofits.org This Web site provides a number of resources, including a detailed FAQ file that will answer most beginners’ questions. Justgiving, www.justgiving.com This is an excellent service for people who wish to set up individual fundraising Web sites that are linked to larger causes. Minges & Associates, LLC, NonProfitExpert.com, www.nonprofit expert.com

Bibliography

143

This site provides answers to many questions and has some free articles and suggestions, as well as links to relevant resources that fundraisers might find useful. National Council of Nonprofit Associations, www.ncna.org This is the best place to find out if your state has a statewide nonprofit association, which can in turn lead to resources applicable for your state and provide continuing education and other useful items. PayPal, www.paypal.com This is currently one of the easiest ways to allow donations via the Internet. Sitemeter, www.sitemer.com This site offers a free statistical tracking system for smaller Web sites and blogs. It allows you to see how many people are visiting your site, where they are coming from, where they enter and exit the site, and how long they stay there. This is invaluable information when evaluating the effectiveness of your online resources. TechSoup (the technology place for nonprofits), www.tech soup.org This Web site and its freely available newsletter are excellent resources for staying informed on new technologies and new ways of using existing technologies for nonprofits. Yahoo! www.yahoo.com Like Hotmail, Yahoo! provides a free e-mail service.

Organization Web Sites Abington Trails, www.abingtontrails.org

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Alex’s Lemonade Stand, www.alexslemonadestand.com Ambler Theater, www.amblertheater.org American Forests, www.americanforests.org American Hiking Society, americanhiking.org Bike to Work, www.bike-to-work.com Dale Earnhardt Foundation, www.daleearnhardtinc.com/ content/legacy/foundation.aspx Fox Chase Cancer Center—Opportunities for Giving, www.foxchasegiving.org Gaudeamus, www.letusrejoice.net Guillain-Barre Syndrome Foundation, www.gbsfi.com Hampshire Family Fund, www.hampshirefamilyfund.com Hiway Theatre, www.hiwaytheatre.org Information Today, Inc., www.infotoday.com J. K. Rowling, www.jkrowling.com Lance Armstrong Foundation, www.laf.org Locks of Love, www.locksoflove.org Mugglenet, www.mugglenet.com Philadelphia Sports Hall of Fame, phillyhof.org Samaritans Purse, www.samaritanspurse.org USC Scripter Award, www.usc.edu/isd/partners/scripter/about/ Walk Your Child to School Day, www.walktoschool-usa.org Water for Waslala, www.waterforwaslala.org

About the Author Julie M. Still is a librarian and community activist. She has been active in fundraising for a number of organizations, including school, community, and environmental groups. Her published works (as author or editor) include The Internet Library (Meckler, 1994), The Library Web (Information Today, 1997), Creating Web Accessible Databases (Information Today, 2000), and The Accidental Webmaster (Information Today, 2003). She has written or co-authored more than 25 articles on various aspects of library issues, including the ethical issues of college libraries allowing full Internet access to the general public and resources in researching the history of children and childhood studies, as well as more traditional aspects of library work, such as the humanities and electronic resources. She has spoken on similar topics in the U.S. and abroad. She has degrees from the University of Missouri (BA in History, MA in Library Science) and the University of Richmond (MA in History). At present, Julie is a reference librarian at Paul Robeson Library, Rutgers University, Camden Campus. She designed the library’s first virtual tour and works with a variety of Web-based instructional tools. After work, she serves on the board of Abington Trails, a nonprofit group. She also serves as a church trustee, PTA secretary, and assistant brownie troop leader. In addition, she has consulted on a variety of Web sites relating to state and local politics, libraries and online databases, community groups, and small businesses. Participation in an investment club led to an invitation from the White House to participate in the President’s Economic Forum in 2002. Julie and her family reside in Abington, Pennsylvania.

145

146

Index A Abington Trails, 46. see also trails project accidental fundraisers. see fundraisers, accidental The Accidental Webmaster (Hill), 121, 122, 125 accountability, goals and, 44 accounting issues, 29–30 adaptability, 76. see also flexibility addresses, 46 Advanced Fundraising Certified Executives, 30 affiliate programs, 37–38, 106–107 Agua Para la Vida, 72 Alex’s Lemonade Stand, 98 Amazon.com, 123 Ambler Theater, 64 American Forests, 85, 104 American Hiking Society, 37, 104, 106, 130 Annual Register of Grant Support, 87 anonymizers, 125 articles, archives of, 81–83 assets, 36, 74–76, 103–106. see also resources Audubon Society members, 91 Augustinian Volunteers, 72 award ceremonies, 113

Barbato, Joseph, 1 Becoming a Fundraiser (Steele and Elder), 61, 93 benchmarks, 45–46 bike lanes, 67 Blacksburg, Virginia, 41 blogger.com, 124 blogs, use of, 123–125 board members, 128–129 Bonnicksen, Bruce, 36 Born to Raise (Panas), 129 brainstorming, pitfalls of, 43–44 Breathnach, Sarah Ban, 29 bridge building, 10 brochures distribution of, 119–120 mission statements on, 41 in press kits, 111 use of, 84, 95, 118–120 budgets control of, 32 incorporation and, 38 management of, 127–129 meeting spaces and, 65 overheads, 129 Building Credibility (Wilson), 35 bulletin boards, 56 burnout among volunteers, 20–21, 31–32 delegation skills and, 23 work style and, 17–18 business journals, 95 bylaws, 12, 36, 38, 128–129

B backup plans, 74–76 Balas, Janet, 57 Ballard, Ernesta, 71

C cable stations, 15, 111

147

148


candidates, political, 13, 96–97, 108–111 census data. see demographics Center for Philanthropy, 2 chambers of commerce, 51, 66 charges, funding through, 63 civic associations, 38 college student donations, 5 communication blogs and, 123–125 contact management and, 9–10 delegation and, 23 e-mail use, 120–123 of goals, 44 of intangible goals, 55–57 with journalists, 112–113 with members, 117–118 opposition research and, 58–61 Web sites and, 120–123 Community and Economic Development grants, 90 company logos, sponsorships and, 93–94 competition, perceptions of, 51 Computers in Libraries (Balas), 57 consultants, use of, 54 contact information, 119 contact management information gathering and, 9–10 local media outlets, 15 resource inventory and, 66 sponsor lists, 15 continuing education, 130–131 contributions, funding through, 63 cooperation. see also partnerships affiliated organizations, 37–38, 106–107 formal attachments and, 106 helping others, 114–115 with other organizations, 82–83 Corporate Giving Directory, 87

corporations funding through, 63 as sponsors, 93–94 correspondence, archives of, 12 cost-benefits analyses, 2 costs, management of, 58–59 credibility with elected officials, 109–110 fundraising and, 129 incorporation and, 36 credit for efforts, 5, 25, 76, 97–98 cultural organizations, 63–64

D “Dad’s Park” project, 78 Dale Earnhardt Foundation, 85, 104 databases. see documentation; inventories; recordkeeping deadlines documentation of, 44 funding agencies and, 21–22, 87 incorporation documents, 37–38 pressure of, 31–32 responsibility for, 44 work styles and, 17–18 debates, political, 13 decision makers, 83 delegation, need for, 23 demographics census data, 12–13, 53 collections of, 83 importance of, 12–13 project planning and, 53 researching, 51 Departments of Conservation and Natural Resources, 89–90, 130 “Desiderata” (poem), 6

Index

development professionals, 2 discussion groups, 121 district revitalization projects, 5, 50–55, 67 documentation bookkeeping, 30 of fundraising activities, 28 of goals, 43–44 of in-kind donations, 69–70 incorporation and, 37–38 lists of local media, 14–15 loss of, 46–47 of meetings, 44 membership lists, 46 mission statements, 39–41 possibilities folders, 73, 81–82 of resources, 14–15, 46, 65–66 documents, storage of, 12 Doheny Library Preservation Fund, 67 donations funding through, 94–97 in-kind, 69–70, 95, 97–99 from members, 90–93 to political candidates, 110 in possibilities folders, 81–83 receipts for, 15 requests for, 93 trust and, 129 donors consideration for, 60 lists of, 91 locating, 94–96 recognition of, 93, 97–98 researching, 96 due diligence, 91 dues, funding through, 63, 90–93

149

distribution lists, 130 information gathered from, 83 notes to journalists, 112 public announcements, 121 use of, 120–123 Elder, Stephen, 61, 93 elected representatives e-mail to, 121 government money and, 89–90 impact of political factions, 32 information on, 13 publicity for, 89 relationships with, 108–111 election time candidates at, 13, 96–97 debates, 13 fundraising events, 99 use of blogs, 124 Employer Identification Numbers (EINs), 12 endowments, funding through, 63 errors, recovery from, 46–47 ethics, 8–9, 96, 128–129 events fundraising through, 99 hosting of, 50 photos of, 113 planning for, 10 politicians and, 108 Excel files, 46, 66 expectations, burnout and, 20–21

F E e-mail addresses, 119

facilities. see also storage space insurance for, 29–30 meeting spaces, 65 for organizations, 63

150


failures burnout and, 21–22 finding balance after, 31–32 learning from, 11 fairness issues, 8–9, 23–24 federal officials, information on, 13 fees, funding through, 63 flexibility backup plans and, 74–76 of goals, 44 importance of, 11 mission statements and, 40 openness and, 76–79 food distribution projects, 4, 98–99 Foundation Center, 87 Foundation Reporter, 87 foundations, private, 85–88 Fox Chase Cancer Center, 85 Friends of the Library groups, 92–93 Friends of the University of Southern California, 67 funding agencies deadlines of, 21–22 private, 87 proposals to, 84 requirements, 73, 87 funding histories, 73 fundraisers, accidental description, 1–7 making connections, 70–71 planning your role, 17–33 toolkit for, 11–16 fundraisers, professional publicity and, 5 use of volunteers, 1–2 fundraising, passive, 117–126 Fundraising for Libraries (Swan), 93 Furlich, Danielle, 1

G Gaudeamus, 28 gifts. see also donations funding through, 94–97 in-kind, 97–99 Gladwell, Malcom, 70 goals backup plans and, 74–79 focus on, 8 intangible, 49, 50, 55–57, 72–73 measuring accomplishments, 7 of organizations, 35–48 personal, 24, 26–27 priority mismatch, 66–67 in promotional materials, 117 recording of, 43 resource utilization, 69–72 selection of, 42–45 steps toward, 49–54, 51 time management and, 21 wish lists, 61 goodwill creation of, 25 value of, 104 government agencies documents from, 12 funding through, 63, 88, 89–90 government officials information on, 13 relationships with, 109 Grace Episcopal Church, Haddonfield, NJ, 4 grants archives of, 12 backup plans, 74–76, 84 competition for, 86 cost-benefits analysis, 2 declined, 7 descriptions of, 81, 83 incorporated nonprofits and, 36

Index

liability issues, 29 matching-type, 74 minigrants, 86 receipts for, 15 requirements, 73–74 resume building and, 28 support for applications, 110 time spent in preparation, 2 time spent monitoring, 2 grassroots support, 93 Guidestar, 84, 88 Guillain-Barré Syndrome Foundation, 3

151

as distraction, 8 importance of manners, 14 zealots and, 107–108 inventories of resources, 65–66 of time available, 23–24 use of, 73

J journalists, 111–112. see also media Justgiving, 123

H Hampshire Family Fund, 39 historic preservation laws, 65 historic tree program, 104 Hiway Theatre, 64 Hotmail e-mail, 121 Hummel, Joan M., 36

I in-kind donations, 15, 69–70, 74, 97–99 incompetence, dealing with, 8 incorporation, 36 information, networking and, 9–10 insurance, 29–30 intangible goals, 49, 50, 54–57, 72–73 integrity, importance of, 15 Internet, use of, 56. see also email; Web hosting; Web sites Internet providers, 122 interpersonal relationships avoidance of problems, 61

K kickbacks, 128

L Lance Armstrong Foundation, 98 lawyers, 69 League of Women Voters, 108–109 learning opportunities. see continuing education; stumbling blocks legal issues, 29–30 letusrejoice.net, 28 liability issues, 29 libraries Friends groups, 92–93 importance of, 13–14 projects, 49–50, 53–54 research using, 81 “Listening to Grantees” study, 2 litigation, liability and, 36 local government, structure of, 13 local officials, information on, 13

152


Locks of Love, 28 Lysakowski, Linda, 30, 129

M mailings, 52, 58, 118, 119 manners, 14, 15, 83–84. see also reputations Marino, Michael, 110 masterplan collections, 12, 83 media. see also journalists coverage by, 111–114 finding donors, 94 guidelines, 15 networking and, 89 politicians and, 108 possibilities folders and, 81–83 press lists/kits, 14–15 professional fundraisers and, 5 meetings minutes of, 56 note taking at, 44 open, 13 photos of, 113 space for, 29–30, 65 membership annualized, 91 communication with, 117–118 diversity of, 93 levels of, 91 of organizations, 90–93 membership lists, 15, 46, 91 The Millionaire Woman Next Door (Stanley), 95 minigrants, 86 mission statements on brochures, 119 collection of, 12 goals and, 44 improvements in, 47

prioritization and, 40–41 in promotional materials, 117 rigid, 62 storage of, 12 use of, 39–41 mom-and-pop stores, 11, 97–98 Mugglenet, 122

N National Center on Charitable Statistics, 4 National Council of Nonprofit Associations, 36, 87 National Trails Day, 104, 106 negotiations, backup plans, 75 networking bridge building and, 10 importance of manners, 14 information gathering and, 9–10 with journalists, 112–113 making connections, 70–71 manners during, 83–84 opposition research and, 58–61 resource inventories, 69–71 social, 31 New Directions for Philanthropic Fundraising (Lysakowski), 129 newsletters, 120 newspapers, 81–83, 111. see also media niches, finding, 26, 28 Nonprofit Kit for Dummies, 4, 62, 84 nonprofit organizations annual revenue amounts, 4 budgets and, 38 incorporated, 30 private foundations and, 86

Index

professional development and, 130 status of, 69 NonProfitExpert.com, 36

O objections, responses to, 73, 107. see also opposition open meetings, 13 Operation Christmas Child, 58 opposition. see also objections, responses to dealing with, 79–80 opposition research, 56–57, 58–61 orchestras, 63–64 organizations affiliates of, 37–38, 106–107 cultural, 63 funding of, 62–63 on funding patterns, 84 goals of, 35–48 membership, 90–93 mission statements, 39–41 name selection, 37 personality of, 25 physical space for, 63 professional, 12 project selection, 45 size of, 1, 2 types of, 35–39 overheads, 129

P Panas, J., 129 paperback book projects, 4–5 paperwork, storage space for, 12 Parent Teacher Associations (PTAs), 37

153

parent—teacher organizations (PTOs), 37 partisan politics, as distraction, 8 partnerships. see also cooperation benefits of, 106–107 formation of, 103–116 research into, 82–83 passive fundraising, 117–126 patience priorities and, 67–68 progress and, 8 project growth and, 10 waiting and, 15 patient education projects, 4–5 PayPal, 123 Pennsylvania Association of Nonprofit Organizations, 130 Pennsylvania Directory of Foundations, 87, 88 people, possibilities folders and, 81–83 Perkiomen Trail Coalition, 110 personal goals, consideration of, 26–27 Philadelphia Sports Hall of Fame, 40 phone numbers, 46 photos on blogs, 124 of events, 113 to journalists, 112 planning backup plans, 74–76 breakdown into steps, 53 collection of plans, 12 communications and, 10 of events, 99 patience and, 15 visibility and, 9 for your role, 17–33

154


planning agencies, documents, 12 plans, collection of, 12 playground projects, 55, 78 political appointees, 110 political candidates, 13, 96–97, 108–111 politicians elected representatives, 13 government officials, 13 partisan, 8 publicity for, 89 relationships with, 108–111 politics inventory of connections, 66 patience and, 15 project completion and, 56 portfolios, of fundraising activities, 28 possibilities folders, 73, 81–82 prenatal care projects, 4–5 preparedness, alternative options and, 11 press lists/kits, 14–15, 42, 111–112 press releases, 41, 112 prioritization goals and, 61–62 goals mismatch, 66–67 importance of, 11 mission statements and, 40–41 organizational goals and, 45 privacy policies, 92, 113 private foundations brochures to, 119 funding from, 85–88 professional development, 130–131 professional organizations, 12 progress reports, 7, 8 project management avoiding obstacles, 59–61 benchmarks, 45–46

cost management, 58–59 downsizing projects, 20 expectations and, 18 finding balance, 31 job definitions and, 25 multitasking, 30–31 prioritization within, 61–62 setting limits, 21 skill set diversity and, 24 steps in, 51–52 time management, 58–59 volunteers and, 19–20 wish lists, 61 proposals background information, 88 deadlines for, 21–22 drafting of, 19 sharing ideas, 82–83, 104 public announcements, 121 public speaking, 73 publicity, politicians and, 108

R radio spots, 111, 113 receipts, recordkeeping, 15 recordkeeping, importance of, 15 reference librarians, 14 reforestation project, 78–79 reporters, press kits to, 111–112 reports collection of, 12 at end of projects, 86 in-kind donations, 69 of progress, 7, 8 reputations grants and, 86 incorporation and, 36 integrity and, 15 networking and, 83–84

Index

protection of, 129–130 relationships and, 11 useful, 96–97 resources. see also assets backup plans and, 74–79 goals and, 69–72 inventories of, 65–66, 69–71, 73, 103 lists of media outlets, 111 management of, 127–129 partnerships and, 103–106 prioritization and, 11

155

Starting and Running a Nonprofit Organization (Hummel), 36 state officials information on, 13 relationships with, 111 statistics, 12–13. see also demographics Steele, Victoria, 61, 93 storage space, need for, 12. see also facilities Swan, James, 93 SWOT analyses, 74

S St. Louis Children’s Hospital Foundation, 36 St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Camden, NJ, 4 salaries, fundraising and, 19 Samaritan’s Purse project, 58–59 “schmoozing” skills, 24 school projects, 45, 70–71 Scripter Award, 67 Selle, Per, 31 serendipity, fairness and, 8–9 silent auctions, 70 Simple Abundance (Breathnach), 29 Sitemeter, 125 skill sets development of, 27–29 diversity in, 24 job definitions and, 25 smiles, 14 social capital, 31 software skills, 29 sponsors, lists of, 15 sponsorships, 93–94 Stanley, Thomas J., 95

T TechSoup, 123, 130 telephone numbers, 119 television, 15, 111, 113 time management budgets and, 58–59 project selection and, 26–27 setting limits, 21 work styles and, 18 The Tipping Point (Gladwell), 70 toolkit, for fundraisers, 11–16 trails project backup plans and, 77–79 incorporation status, 38 partnerships, 104–106 preparation work, 6 resource inventory, 66 support for grants, 86 trust division of duties and, 24 donations and, 129 integrity and, 15

156


V Villanova University, Pennsylvania, 72 visibility, planning and, 9 visions, clashes of, 19–20 volunteers benefits for, 131–132 burnout among, 20–21, 31–32 embezzling by, 30 expectations of, 19 fundraising by, 2–7 members as, 90–93 work styles and, 18

W waivers, liability, 29–30 Water for Waslala, 72 watershed projects, 73, 88, 104–106 Watershed Weekly, 130 “Wear Yellow: Live Strong” campaign, 98 Web hosting costs, 65 Web sites communication using, 56 importance of, 122 information gathered from, 83 maintenance of, 114

for media outlets, 111 mission statements on, 41 notices of events, 109 use of, 120–123 Weblogs, use of, 123–125 Williams, Seth, 124 Wilson, Elizabeth, 35, 129 Winston Cup, 85, 104 Wolleback, Dag, 31 Women for the Water Works, 71 work styles organizational “personality” and, 25 preferences and, 17–26 setting limits, 21 workloads delegation and, 23 expectations and, 18 growth of, 20–21 Writing for a Good Cause (Furlich and Barbato), 1

Y Yahoo! e-mail, 121

Z zealots, 107–108

157

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Corporate Giving Directory Comprehensive Profiles of America’s Major Corporate Foundations & Corporate Giving Programs Now you can identify valuable links and contacts between your organization’s leaders and the trustees, donors, officers, and directors of corporate foundations. This handy reference book provides complete profiles of the 1,000 largest corporate foundations and corporate direct-giving programs in the U.S.—the funding sources that represent nearly $5.6 billion in support annually. Corporate Giving Directory delivers the latest information on program priorities, giving preferences, evaluation criteria, corporate and foundation officers and directors, and all other data you need to help your nonprofit organization gain a crucial edge as corporate philanthropy budgets tighten. 1,500 pp/hardbound/ISBN 978-1-57387-273-7 $625.00

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Annual Register of Grant Support 2008 A Directory of Funding Sources, 41st Edition Literally millions of dollars in grant awards are waiting to be claimed … if you and your patrons know where, how, and when to apply for them. This exhaustive guide to more than 3,500 grant-giving organizations offering nonrepayable support shows you how to tap the immense funding potential of these sources. Organized by 11 major subject areas— with 61 specific subcategories—Grant Support 2008 is the definitive resource for researching and uncovering a full range of available grant sources. Not only does it direct you to tradtional corporate, private, and public funding programs, it also shows you the way to little-known, nontraditional grant sources such as educational associations and unions. 1,500 pp/hardbound/ISBN 978-1-57387-292-8 $249.00

Fulltext Sources Online Edited by Mary B. Glose, Tina D. Currado, and Christen Orbanus Fulltext Sources Online (FSO) is a directory of periodicals accessible online in full text through 29 aggregator products. Published biannually in January and July, FSO lists more than 33,600 newspapers, journals, magazines, newsletters, newswires, and transcripts. Each title entry comprises the aggregators and databases that provide the publication online in full text. Coverage dates, frequencies, and lag times of titles appearing online, as well as ISSNs, are included. Also provided are more than 26,000 publisher’s URLs indicating free archives, selected coverage, and open access journals. Two volumes/softbound/ISBN 978-1-57387-280-5 $159.00 Two-issue annual subscription/ISSN 1040-8258 $259.00

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The Thriving Library Successful Strategies for Challenging Times By Marylaine Block Here is a highly readable guide to strategies and projects that have helped more than 100 public libraries gain community support and funding during challenging times. The strategies explored include youth services, the library as place, partnerships, marketing, stressing the economic value, Library 2.0, outreach, and helping the community achieve its aspirations. 352 pp/softbound/ISBN 978-1-57387-277-5 $39.50

Social Software in Libraries Building Collaboration, Communication, and Community Online By Meredith G. Farkas Social software lets libraries show a human face online, helping them communicate, educate, and interact with their communities. This guide provides librarians with the information and skills necessary to implement the most popular and effective social software technologies: blogs, RSS, wikis, social networking software, screencasting, photo-sharing, podcasting, instant messaging, gaming, and more. 344 pp/softbound/ISBN 978-1-57387-275-1 $39.50 Ask for these books at your local bookstore or order online at www.infotoday.com

For a complete catalog, contact:

Information Today, Inc. 143 Old Marlton Pike Medford, NJ 08055 609/654-6266 • e-mail: [email protected]

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