Executive Issues
October 26, 2015 at 10:26 am
A few weeks ago, I was asked to speak to the Big Bend Association of Fundraising Professionals about anything I wanted to talk about. So I chose to talk about what I’ve learned working and volunteering in the nonprofit sector for the past 30 years. I titled my speech “The Lessons I’ve Learned, Sometimes the…
October 26, 2015 at 10:13 am
A group that has been advertising car donations that support local charities, such as Make-A-Wish, was actually giving most of its donations to two private for-profit corporations, according to Minnesota Attorney General Lori Swanson. Swanson held a press conference Wednesday morning to announce a compliance report that's been issued, questioning the payments of one of…
October 26, 2015 at 9:53 am
Edith Cruise called to tell me someone named Dan Savage had mailed her a pornographic letter. “Do you know who he is?” Cruise asked me. Uh, yeah, I do. Savage is a journalist who writes a sex and relationship column called "Savage Love." People write to him for advice, but Dear Abby he is not. I…
October 26, 2015 at 9:39 am
Over the years, Richard and I have evaluated dozens of major gift programs from a wide array of organizations. When we look at these files, we often see a ton of donors who give the same amount every year. But we see very few gifts in the high five, six or seven figures. Why? The problem is that over time, development directors and their major gift officers seem to come to the conclusion that this is how their donors always behave...
October 23, 2015 at 9:24 am
Forty years ago, she was a struggling computer programmer for AT&T in Philadelphia. Today, she is the only woman on the President's Management Advisory Board. How did Gail McGovern, CEO of American Red Cross, manage to get there? And what can we learn from her? Here are five of the watershed moments that helped her…
October 22, 2015 at 10:24 am
Ben Carson said, “nine out of 10 nonprofits fail.” Yet data on nonprofits show that half of the organizations that received their tax-exempt status 20 years ago were still considered active by the IRS in 2015. Carson, who currently ranks second in an average of national polls for the GOP presidential nomination, made the claim…
October 21, 2015 at 6:00 am
We’ve all been there. Feeling unappreciated. Working for organizations where you’re the fifth development director in three years. Mired in dysfunction. It can all get a bit discouraging sometimes. But remember, your leadership is a process, and it’s not going to happen overnight. This will take commitment, dedication and persistence...
October 20, 2015 at 10:09 am
The chairman of a nonprofit mentoring program for at-risk boys, which has had contracts with two area school districts, has been accused of asking a teenage boy to send him an explicit photo. Paul Dean Jamison Jr., who founded Developing Boys To Men (DBTM) in 2009, was arrested Friday morning. Bail was set at $10,000.…
October 19, 2015 at 10:10 am
One of the things donors often wonder is whether the “ask” they just heard or received from the major gift officer (MGO) is really true. They’re just not sure that the promise of what will be done with the money is totally factual. When you include the organization's leaders in your process with the donor, the donor feels included in the inner circle of decision-making...
October 16, 2015 at 10:07 am
A North Carolina woman and her mother have been indicted on federal charges that they defrauded more than $574,000 from a program designed to feed low-income children. Cindy Hall and her mother, Stephanie Almond, falsified documents and exaggerated the number of children being fed through their Suffolk nonprofit in order to get more federal funds,…
