Yours for the Asking: An Indispensable Guide to Fundraising and Management

by Reynold Levy

Younger professionals tend to be familiar, calling people they hardly know by their first names in writing or in person. For mature adults, the right to call someone by a first name is earned over time.

the letter ought to be well written, shorn of misspellings and typographical errors, and it should come to the point in crisp prose.

Donors expect to be treated not as customers or suppliers handling a commercial transaction, but as citizens engaged in private action for the public good. They are annoyed and offended when a charitable pledge they have advanced to a nonprofit organization is followed up not by a letter of warm appreciation requesting its redemption but by a brusque note enclosing an “invoice.”

It is always the solicitors who need to cross the generational divide to encounter their donors. Always. The donors are right, by definition. They deserve to receive information in a form congenial to them. They should be thanked graciously for their generosity, not billed or dunned for an offered gift. Meeting them halfway is 50 percent less than what is required to be successful. In short, nonprofits must tailor the timing and the form of their conduct to the preferences of donors and prospects. There is simply no room for self-indulgent behavior on the part of the solicitor.

One of a CEO’s recurring challenges is deciding when and how deeply to intervene in a process or an interaction.

very often the prospective donor, the inquisitive reporter, the key government official or politician, the indispensable partner, or the important trustee expects to receive attention not from the development director, public relations director, public affairs manager, or head of business initiatives but from the CEO and only the CEO.

Permitting a campaign director to accompany a trustee on a funding call not to the corporate CEO and not even to a senior officer but to a low-on-the-totem-poll staffer formally in charge of philanthropy. That’s a recipe for entanglement in business bureaucracy and should be avoided, if at all possible. Do everything you can to see the CEO or his or her closest colleagues about your request. Otherwise, the likelihood of success is vastly reduced.

Take a look. As you do, please note that there is virtually no difference between how the proposal would be crafted whether it is destined for the eyes of a foundation official, a corporate executive, or an individual donor. Indeed, the same disciplined explanation of the case for funding would work for requesting smaller gifts as well regardless of the field of endeavor. Solid, engaged, and persuasive writing knows no bounds. It is rarely exhibited. It is welcomed by all recipients.

In my experience, from a donor’s perspective, it is better to be “roughly right,” concise, and early than “perfect,” long, and late. Those you have solicited are very busy people. If there is a significant gap in time between the stimulus of a meeting and the response of a proposal, other matters will fill the vacuum. Regaining a prospect’s attention, once lost, becomes an additional and unnecessary struggle.

Beyond avoiding prolixity and lateness, the proposal’s content needs to be crafted from the donor in, not from the supplicant out. In other words, shaping the content of the case to appeal to what interests the specific donor you are soliciting and incorporating what might have been said at your meeting in the written follow-up are critical to success.

Major donors expect and deserve to be treated as unique and to feel that their views, questions, ...

Are you prepared to offer alternative ways for your prospect to respond favorably in the event he or she is not of a mind to say yes to the first request?

Have you considered asking your prospect to help leverage his or her donation and assume philanthropic leadership by offering a challenge to your fundraising team?

What criteria have you used to select the one or two volunteers who accompany...

You have held your face-to face-solicitation. You have followed up with a warm thank-you letter and a cogent, persu...

How do you accelerate donor progression up the ladder of generosity? What is your plan for dono...

Do you treat your cadre of supporters as allie...

What methods do you employ to engage trustees in the fu...

How do you and your colleagues learn to improve your fundraising skills and your track re...

Are you spending adequate time with existing donors and potential pr...

Institutional donors are generally more complex creatures than individuals. Their interests are multifaceted, their decision-making processes less transparent and slower, their cast of characters frequently changing, and, in the case of corporations, their stakeholders many and varied. Figuring them out takes time and endurance. It is not a challenge for a nonprofit’s staff only. Your homework should include who knows whom best at these places. It should identify the leading mission and objectives of these institutions and how they intersect with the work of your favorite nonprofit organization or cause.

gifts from companies and foundations carry a seal of approval different from individual donations. Everyone assumes that the competition for institutional support is fierce, that careful due diligence was conducted on the successful organization and its proposal, and that both passed muster in an exacting process.

The era of big government is hardly over, but the age of pure corporate philanthropy is drawing to a close. Corporations must justify gifts to charity. Do they enhance the brand, facilitate sound government relations, increase sales, entertain clients, or improve employee morale and loyalty? Find the intersections between nonprofit need and corporate interest and you will unlock the safe not only of what remains as philanthropic funds but of marketing, advertising, sales, sponsorship, and employee relations resources.

Corporations employ hundreds, even thousands of people in your community. The financial support of a business reinforces or stimulates voluntary activity of all kinds that can satisfy nonprofit needs. Employees can serve on nonprofit boards of directors or have their own donations matched by the company. They can provide pro bono financial, legal, advertising, public relations, or general management assistance. They can lead fundraising campaigns, chair gala events, or actually be secunded to work for Third Sector organizations on a sabbatical leave or as a bridge to retirement.

The strongest factors affecting giving by small companies were the personal values of the owner, the condition of the business, social responsibility, public relations and the quality of the organization making the request.

Such affluence (in 2006, 9 million people in America enjoy net assets of $1 million or more, exclusive of their homes) renders philanthropic generosity more affordable than ever before in American history. That this already large cohort of millionaire professionals, entrepreneurs, and small business owners is likely to expand from five to seven times faster than the general population is a fundraiser’s fantasy come true.

Beyond small businesses as an incubator for philanthropy, you should think about the modern corporation as the gateway through which tens of thousands of Americans have been catapulted to affluence by employment at such firms as Intel, Microsoft, Google, Oracle, Sun Microsystems, Yahoo, Netscape, and Goldman Sachs. The wealth of many others has burgeoned due to employment in private equity firms and hedge funds.

Today there are 463 billionaires in that club and more than 500,000 decamillionaires. Point made.

Corporations are not in business to give money away but to earn it for their shareowners. Therefore, “pure” philanthropy given without an agenda or motives of self-interest is relatively rare and unusual. Ask yourself this question: How will corporate philanthropy, or sponsorship or an in-kind gift (advertising, use of facility space, the provision of pro bono services) help to burnish a company’s brand, improve employee morale, assist in employee recruitment and retention, advance marketing and sales objectives, or contribute to effective government and community relations?

you need to learn all you can about a company’s strategy and its interests. How does each connect to your nonprofit’s mission and objectives? Once you have successfully concluded that homework, you are ready to research who is who inside the firm. Identify the name, rank, and serial number of those responsible for departments that manage assets of potential use to you. Then find out which supporters, friends, and allies of your nonprofit know these folks and can introduce them to your work. Spend time acquainting them with your outfit in person and on-site, in an appealing manner that respects an executive’s time and responds to his or her interests.

When the time is ripe, recite some of the unmet needs of the organization that can be satisfied with corporate help. Ask whether that is possible.

Change does not come simply, particularly to those easily threatened or when an idea is not invented here, but there.

Initiating a new order of things is tough in an established institution. Active resistance is common and easier to overcome. But passive resistance—of the kind Mahatma Gandhi would have admired—is a specialty at complex places like Lincoln Center. If the Lincoln Center Conservancy was to be created, only its president could be the champion of the cause.

I decided to give the whole effort a try and to do so personally. I took advice from a legendary fundraiser, Naomi Levine, who spent her entire professional life helping to move New York University from a fair to middling institution of higher education into one of the most sought after by students and faculty in the world. Remember...

In the bibliography, I outline recommended reading: newspapers, periodicals, and books. Together, they will provide an intellectual map that can give conversations you have at the chamber of commerce or Kiwanis Club meetings greater meaning. Dipping into that literature regularly will win you respect as someone not confined by the payroll you are on or the organization you lead. It will leave the impression that you understand the value of business to society and that you respect the role of the private sector and of government. It will also inform your conversations with prospects and demonstrate that you took the time to learn what they are about.

the business of foundations is giving money away. Is there a stranger manner in which to earn a living than to be employed by one of these institutions for the sole purpose of disseminating gifts? Your attitude should be that you are there to help the weary, wary, and beleaguered foundation staffer. After all, his or her employment depends on supplicants. Foundations need applicants, as stores need customers. They are in business to entertain your proposals, however much in practice it may appear to be otherwise. Be positive. Be persistent. Stay the course.

Here, too, doing your homework matters. Have you conducted enough research to determine that the work of your organization fits the area(s) of interest and the eligibility guidelines of the target foundation? Have you prepared a brief letter of inquiry followed up by a phone call to determine whether the specific idea(s) for funding you would like to proffer are of current foundation interest? If you formally apply and are turned down, did you really endeavor to find out the whys and wherefores, not in order to lodge a protest but to learn how to improve? And if you are fortunate enough to win a gift, do you treat the foundation as a friend and ally and ask how it can help you rally other funding sources to your side?

Woven into the exposition on how best to solicit individual donors, foundations, and corporations have been some key methods and skills: • The essence of excellent oral and written communication. • The routines of constant, attentive, and extensive reading and painstaking research. • The art of writing a first-class funding proposal and a knock-your-socks-off, close-the-deal fundraising letter to major gift prospects.

Few activities in life are more fun than conceiving and executing a superb benefit or gala for your organization. Identify a worthy honoree, someone, it is hoped, who is popular and not averse to asking for support. With his or her help, choose cochairs who will do the heavy lifting on solicitations. After figuring out the table and ticket pricing structure, presolicit, face to face, the highest category of supporters. At this level of asks, the chief executive should be personally involved. At Lincoln Center, I introduced the $100,000 table and the $5 million gala. Underwriters at such an exalted level of giving must be seen face to face. They have a right to expect personal treatment and to be thanked early and often. We also presolicit as many $50,000 and $25,000 tables as possible. Doing so makes having others sign on a lot easier. Gala attendees are as interested in who will be present as they are in the organization they are supporting and what will be performed. The more recognizable names commanding tables at higher prices, the better.

A piece of direct mail should be a call to action. Stimulating positive behavior is what a successful campaign is all about. At the IRC, we enjoyed considerable success by associating well-known, credible, reliable personalities with our ask. One example is Andy Grove, the former CEO and cofounder of Intel, a refugee who escaped from Budapest to freedom in Vienna during the Hungarian Revolution of 1956. Because Andy is so widely admired in business circles and because he had just been named the Time Magazine Person of the Year for 1998, we decided to ask him to sign an appeal letter. It began in this arresting way. Dear Friend: My name is Andy Grove. I am a refugee. By telling succinctly and powerfully how the IRC came to his rescue and about how many hundreds of thousands of others it could assist with the reader’s help, Andy’s letter broke all records in terms of favorable replies. The IRC was fortunate as well to win Paul Newman’s approval to have mailings go out over his signature. Here the personal connection with the organization was less direct and compelling. But Newman’s high name recognition and his attractiveness as a generous donor to many causes, including the IRC, proved to be very successful.

Judging where to put your scarce fundraising resources is a major strategic question. Are opportunities more attractive in pursuing government sources of funding, or foundation, corporation, and major individual gifts? Are benefits and special events likely to yield a more robust return than direct mail solicitations? Whether and how much to invest in which forms of fundraising requires sober financial analysis. Grappling with finite resources, nonprofit institutions are constantly confronted with the necessity for choice. It is the task of leadership to choose wisely and well.

In Yours for the Asking, learning is all about gain, not pain. Painless learning should permeate all workplaces, where those who strive to improve are encouraged, not derided, and where everyone acknowledges that excellent performance is the product of a process of continuous improvement.

What is different are the assets each nonprofit brings to a fundraising appeal. How extensive is your impact in terms of population served, directly or indirectly? How does your nonprofit’s distinctive approach to providing services compensate for the modest numbers of favorably affected clients, students, patients or audience members?

Rome was not built in a single day. Fundraising is a marathon, not a sprint.

2. Was our fundraising in the last fiscal year a measurable improvement over the prior year’s results? 3. How does our fundraising track record compare with other admired institutions, overall, by market segment and by method? 4. Are we successfully bridging the gap between our fundraising promise and performance, year over year?

The second question allows one to appraise progress in an evolutionary way. Were our efforts to improve performance by segment and method from one fiscal year to the next successful? If so, how so? If not, why? The third question compels us to look outside the confines of our own shop and inquire after how our colleagues tackle similar challenges, overall, by segment and by method. What can we learn from them that is adaptable to our own environment? How, precisely, did they achieve superior performance, and what will it take for us to meet or exceed their results? At Lincoln Center, we frequently check out how Columbia and New York universities, the Brooklyn Academy of Music, the New York Public Library, the Museum of Natural History, the Museum of Modern Art, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, among others, conceive and conduct their programs. To be sure, our institution is different in mission, history, and culture. Few initiatives or practices are easily transferable in their current form from one organization to another. Nonetheless, how others fare and why are lessons that can help improve the means and the ends of Lincoln Center’s development efforts. The fourth question is the most challenging and tantalizing. It asks us to compare ourselves not to our budget, nor to prior-year performance, nor even to the conduct of others. Rather, it beseeches us to strive for an ideal, to dream grandly of how well we would perform if we broke the existing mold, engaged in disruptiv...

Fundraisers who worry aloud excessively should be aware of the impact of the self-fulfilling prophesy. Nothing in the economy, even short term, cannot be rectified by more energetic, intelligent, and resourceful asking.

I would posit that the larger the nonprofit organization, the less a CEO can measurably and substantially improve fundraising performance.

Weighed against these major embedded advantages, can a CEO really matter? Arguably not. Unless . . . Unless he or she sets forth an animating vision rendering the whole institution far more than the sum of its parts. Unless he or she recruits an extraordinary cadre of professional managers and complements these gifted fundraising professionals with generous, talented, galvanized volunteers. Unless he or she devotes extraordinary energy to having a felt presence all around the university or hospital and wherever graduates or former patients and their families reside. Unless he or she sets goals that raise an institution’s sights and stretch its capabilities. Under such circumstances, a president truly can be said to add value.

The opposite is true at a smaller or newer nonprofit, or as in the case of Lincoln Center, where the goals set for fundraising are so large as to be unprecedented. In these cases, the president’s fundraising role is simply indispensable. In these cases, the president is doing more than meeting a fundraising target, he or she is establishing a culture of asking and building a foundation on which future campaigns can rest.