
Executive Issues

Be ready to weather the storms of fundraising by enhancing your decision-making skills. So get moving — take action!
Here are eight ways small nonprofits can cultivate donors and sponsors: 1. Get clarity on your goals. 2. The different between success and failure is structures and systems. 3. Know the difference between sponsorship and corporate donations. 4. Start with who you know. 5. Automation is a great way to use limited resources well. 6. Get a database! 7. Fundraising is not the job of one person. 8. Fundraising is not just about money.
In 2010, CASA of the Tennessee Heartland was facing some very serious issues. There was significant debt, the board and staff were unengaged, and things were looking bleak. Fundraising was going backward instead of forward, and while everyone knew something needed to change, no one knew exactly how to break the status quo.
Naomi Asher, who was promoted to executive director of the organization, helped turn her organization around 180 degrees and went from disaster to dynamo.
It is imperative that you understand board chair dynamics. Never take this responsibility for granted. Your organizational success as an executive depends in part on the progress of the volunteer board you help guide. Enjoy the experience, and embrace the ever-changing challenge.
Nonprofits often use one of two strategies when planning fundraising approaches for the upcoming year: determine how much they want to spend and how much they need to raise to achieve that figure, or examine what they raised in the year just past and use that as a basis for determining next year's figure. Organizations would be wise instead to take stock of their current resources and the universe of possible givers and donors, and develop a strategy aimed at building capacity to reach its highest possible level of giving.
For the nonprofit sector to start to demand a seat at the big-money table, nonprofits must stop apologizing for needing money. To truly begin to use money as a tool, nonprofit leaders have to stop regretting their need of it and start demanding that they receive enough and the right kinds of money to successfully accomplish their work. You can't simply decide to stop feeling bad about asking for money. Instead you have to find the confidence to identify and secure the right financing for your work.
In the nonprofit world, success is tied to relationships and trust. Both take a hit when the leader leaves and there's no clear successor or plan for succession. On the other hand, if there's a plan in place and someone is ready to step in, or there's a defined path to finding the next leader, you've answered many of the questions that supporters, partners, the board and even staff may have about the changes.
Do your workers just do their job, or do they understand their real job is to be part of your greater vision-focused undertaking? Unless you’ve created a culture of philanthropy in your organization — one where everyone who works there is fully informed and passionate about your work and the values you enact in the community — then you’re inevitably going to blow opportunities to garner vital support. Under-informed workers lead to disengaged workers. Disengaged workers lead to disengaged constituents. And here’s how it happens.
Like most small businesses, nonprofits are born out of passion and the desire to make a difference. While the financial goals of nonprofits and for-profits seem different on the surface, they’re actually both striving for the same thing: to generate revenue and then distribute it.
That’s why leaders of nonprofits might want to take a closer look at the for-profit world of business: There’s much to learn about running their organizations like a small business. Here are four key lessons …
Put yourself in the other person's shoes, and you may enhance your perception and improve your skills as a manager!