The rambunctious Wounded Warrior Project embraces multichannel strategies to fund its mission to transition America’s youngest disabled vets back into civilian life.

By Margaret Battistelli Gardner

Fresh face of fundraising
Having a constituency base of people in their 20s and 30s allows — actually requires — WWP to do things a little differently all around.

Training and ongoing education, for example, are imperative parts of Melia’s grand plan. He and his staff constantly educate themselves, reading books — like “Good to Great and the Social Sectors” (by Jim Collins) and “Forces for Good” (by Leslie Crutchfield and Heather McLeod Grant) — that keep them on the cutting edge of fundraising know-how, general management principles and nonprofit efficiency. He has attended the Executive Education Program for Nonprofit Leaders at Stanford University and regularly sends fundraising staffers to The Fund Raising School at The Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University. The “professionalization” of fundraising is a topic being debated throughout the sector, with some practitioners voicing concern that too much formal training could suck the very heart out of it.