Do the Word

The dust has settled at The Agitator after Roger and Tom’s epic series on The Donor Pyramid Lie. Still, Joanne Fritz hit up with two epic posts of her own (here and here) this past week that have me thinking that one of the most important elements of the donor pyramid epitaph–and one of the key elements of new vision that we all ought to have going forward–still needs to be written.

In the Agitator series, Tom lists a series of seven fundamentals which he contends remain valid with regard to the donor pyramid. Click here to see the whole list; for our purposes the first two items on that list are the most germane, below:

1. Donors who initially make small gifts can indeed be cultivated — dare I say it?! — up the ladder to make bigger gifts … and even bequests. Even HUGE gifts and bequests.

2. Database marketing approaches that utilize personal giving history, donor-expressed preferences, etc. can contribute mightily to moving donors up that ladder.

I do not take issue with the veracity of what Tom notes. But looking toward the future of fundraising, I do want to ask about the desirability and suitability of these fundamentals.

In Joanne’s post, Largest Philanthropists Gave Less, Follow Their Own Drummer in 2009, the title alone astutely underlines two trends that ought to lead us to ask whether a fundraising approach built around migrating donors up a pyramid is either a desirable or suitable master strategy. As Joanne notes, giving from the top philanthropists plummeted 75% from 2008 to 2009. And lest that seems like purely a function of economic distress, Joanne adds:

Rather than write checks to their favorite causes, many large donors are setting up their own foundations dedicated to solving some big global problems. Wealthy donors increasingly want to see concrete, measurable results from their giving. They also want to create large scale change, rather than a piecemeal solutions.

Don’t miss the last sentence: “piecemeal solutions” can easily mean gifts to fund programs operated by your and other nonprofit organizations. After all, if a mega-donor is after large-scale change, this is something altogether different than supporting multiple discrete programs in multiple discrete organizations with multiple generous donations.  Your donor cultivation pyramid may be reduced to a launching ramp as major donors tire of  seeing their resources–financial, intellectual, and relational–trapped in multiple silos (i.e., nonprofits that don’t communicate or work together to effect large-scale change) and decide to design, build, and fund programmatic efforts of their own–even after the economy rebounds.

So is there really any alternative to a pyramid that exhibits the fundamentals Tom notes in his Agitator post?

Joanne’s post, Is Micro-Giving the New Layaway?, offers some tantalizing clues in this regard.

Joanne notes that even in the grip of recession, Americans gave more to Haiti disaster relief than they previously had to tsunami relief in 2004, with one noteworthy difference: the average Haiti gift was $109, as compared to $208 for the Asian tsunamis. Sums Joanne, “We are also giving to charity in more ways”–e.g., online giving, mobile giving–“but in smaller amounts.”

Online giving (with its social network widgets and badges) and mobile giving (powered by the ubiquitous text message) are notoriously social undertakings. That is, I am increasingly likely to hear about a cause (or at least to be motivated to act on what I’ve already heard) through key friends and influencers rather than traditional nonprofit-driven marketing channels.

As such, a “donor pyramid”–in which my growth in the cause is related to “cultivation” by the nonprofit and is measured by increasing gift size–is poorly suited to the reality of a world where my giving is motivated and shaped by friends and influential non-institutional voices not only initially but over time. In other words, it’s not as if I’m recruited to a cause by friends but then the nonprofit through which I gave assumes greater influence over me and my giving decisions than they do.

In a world of micro-giving, a new kind of “pyramidal” measure is needed–one where nonprofits not only recognize but affirm that I am (and always will be) a far greater influencer in my sphere of influence than they are. The job of the nonprofit? To equip me to recruit those I know to participation in the cause, and to assist me in coaching them into engagement and ownership of the cause in their own sphere of influence. (For quick definitions of Participation, Engagement, and Ownership, check out this previous post.)

That recruitment process means that it is I, not the nonprofit, that has the most potent pyramid–a group of my friends and acquaintances who are at various stages of involvement in the cause we and the nonprofit love and share. What role does the wise nonprofit of the future have in that pyramid?

It serves as the base. The convening mechanism. The platform. The stage on which the action–performed by the champions, equipped by the nonprofit–plays out.

Interestingly, put Joanne’s two posts together and you come to an interesting conclusion: It’s not only the rich who are wanting to break out of non-profit pyramid silos erected by organizations. It’s the micro-givers, too. So not only does our understanding of the giving pyramid need to change; our understanding of our own organization needs to change as well, from fund-seeking doer to funding-platform equipper.

Last word to Joanne, who says it better than I have here:

I like the idea of framing micro-giving within the context of broad social change. We’ve already talked a great deal about micro-giving as the democratization of philanthropy where anyone can participate, no matter what their means. Now the picture widens and we can see that micro-giving may be intertwined with new economic realities and cultural shifts.

In one of my series of posts on how nonprofits and donors responded to the Haiti earthquake, I noted that the conversation between nonprofit disaster relief agencies and donors typically unfolds like so in situations like this:

Donor: How can I help?

Nonprofit disaster relief agency: Send us money. After all, we are highly rated!

Donor: What if I want to get involved more deeply? You know, lend a hand?

Nonprofit disaster relief agency: Then you are behaving irresponsibly, for you, unlike us, are not highly rated in disaster relief. So just send us the money, OK?

Donor: Does it have to be an either/or? I mean, can’t I send money and get personally involved?

Nonprofit disaster relief agency: You’re just not getting this, are you?

So I was delighted this week when Generous Mind Jon Hirst  generously called my attention to David Livermore’s post, 5 strategies to avoid being arrested when you volunteer internationally.

The very existence of such an article implies that going beyond sending money to getting personally involved is not ipso facto an irresponsible, foolish act.

Livermore readily admits that irresponsible, foolish acts do happen, but given that 4.5 million US Christians travel internationally on short-term mission trips each year (and no small percentage of these are trips to global trouble spots; after all, the nature of mission work is that it not infrequently occurs where there’s, you know, trouble), it’s surprising that more irresponsible, foolish acts don’t upset the global apple cart.

The key to equipping ordinary people to be effective in global disasters is, of course, equipping ordinary people to be effective in global disasters. In other words, without training, ordinary people do indeed run a fairly significant risk of doing irresponsible and foolish things in challenging situations. But with training–legitimate, serious, goal-oriented equipping by highly-rated folks like you–not only can they do things previously thought to be the province of only the disaster relief pros. And they can do so at a much lower cost (do you know what a highly-rated disaster relief pro costs these days?), typically raising their own support themselves–and being drawn to a deeper level of commitment and participation in the cause, which benefits your organization in the long run.

Legitimate training for donors in how to personally increase the impact they can have on the cause is, in other words, your alternative to flashy brochures, fundraising banquets, and those pitiful pouty-faced urgent fundraising letters that you and 1.6 million other US nonprofits are regularly mailing with ever-declining results.

So I love the fact that Livermore wrote this article that takes as its premise the idea that donors can and should be involved hands-on, and that such hands-on involvement must be preceded by legitimate training.

Of his 5 strategies to avoid being arrested when you volunteer internationally, I would particularly commend two and amend one:

The commendations:

4. If you haven’t done it here, don’t do it there. In other words, when the disaster hits, don’t show up at the disaster site and ask, “How can I help?” If you have to ask, that means you didn’t pass Training 101. Training 101 happens here, not there.

5. Partner with the Haitians. As you can tell by reading my post on how I am giving to the Haiti relief efforts and why, I couldn’t be more emphatic in my agreement with Livermore on this point. Look–who do you think really stands a better chance of knowing how to navigate the mine field that is Haiti: “highly-rated” disaster relief charities or Haitians? Lest we fret too much about corruption, let us ask: With whom are highly-rated disaster relief charities interfacing in order to deliver their aid? And how would they know who is reputable and who is not? “Because they’re working with the authorities”, you say? Ah, I see. I am completely reassured.

The amendation:

2. Partner with the experts. I would recommend Livermore’s sentence be amended to say, “Partner with the experts at training and utilizing volunteers”. Highly-rated disaster relief charities have a tendency to be wallet-centric when it comes to their vision of how donors factor into the highly-rated disaster relief world. Look for organizations that understand that you are at your best when your hand, head, and heart come attached to your check. I mentioned UMCOR in my Haiti-related post on this subject, but there are certainly other experts in this regard (though they are fewer in number and harder to find than ought to be the case).

Sum it up and say: If we believe that old chestnut, “Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime,” when it comes to our field operations and programs, why wouldn’t we apply it to our development operations and programs as well?

A fun New York Times piece by Susan Dominus on The Secret Society for Creative Philanthropy raises a killer question that virtually never gets talk about in our line of work, namely:

Who holds donors accountable for their giving?

The article itself makes no pretense toward profundity as it recounts the tale of New York author Courtney Martin, who, finding herself in possession of a six-figure book advance, purposed to give some of it away through nine friends. She gave each one $100 to use in whatever charitable manner each saw fit, with but one fascinating caveat:

In a month she would hold a party at which each individual would be required to share what they did with the money.

And with that, the Secret Society for Creative Philanthropy was born.

The philanthropic impact of the Society may not exceed its novelty–the article to detail how ten of this year’s Society members spent the $100 they each received, and the Gates Foundation this is not–but Susan Dominus’ article exceeds the philanthropic impact of the Society. Ask Dominus:

What if every philanthropist had to get up in front of some party of their peers and riff about how they had spent their money? All kudos to Bill Gates, but how might he surprise the world with an infinitesimal portion of his foundation dollars if he had his monologue at a Secret Society gala in mind?

Or what if every average Joe just made a pact with his five best friends that they would get together once a year and share how they donated their money? To start, they’d surely get around to actually donating that money: and yes, accountability is as much the point for Ms. Martin as celebration.

What if instead of donor appreciation events we held donor accountability events where our donors had to share with the other donors at their table how over the past year they spent their money and their time and their passion on the shared cause that captivates you all, and what they purpose to do in the year to come, and how much more they might be able to do if they worked more closely together and drew others into the circle?

“No one would come to such an event” might be our offhand response. But what does that say about us and our organizations and how we relate to those who share our passion and calling to the cause that captivates us?

And if not in our nonprofits, where are donors held to account for how–and how much–they gave?

For the most part it does not happen in churches, who tend to think about congregational giving as a whole (and its relation to the church’s budget need) rather than by individuals (and the relationship of their giving to any kind of standard other than what is construed as an absolute and inviolable right to privacy).

“But my donors (or congregation members) would kill me if I held them accountable for their giving!” we might protest. “I mean, who am I to hold them accountable?”

Yes–who are we indeed? And as coaches and advocates for crucial causes, do we have a responsibility or an aspiration to be anything more than the world’s most skillful asking and appreciating machines? And if we don’t, does anybody?

So what is the easiest way to begin the accountability process?

Sit with willing donors (or congregation members) at the start of the year and talk about their giving goals. Ask them questions about how they decide how much to give, and to what, and when. Ask them how they would rate the effectiveness of their giving from the previous year and what they would like to see become more effective in their giving for the coming year. Ask them if they feel there are causes that are overrepresented or underrepresented in their giving and how they come to that conclusion. Ask them what one single change they could make in their giving this coming year in order to have the largest possible increase in effectiveness over last year.

And so on.

Most of these questions will initially draw shoulder shrugs and sheepish smiles. They will readily confess that they haven’t thought of these questions–which gives you the ideal opportunity to enter into a mutual accountability relationship where you share your own answers to these questions and help them develop their own.

All of which puts you in a different relationship to your donors/congregation members than unconditional admirer. This then makes it not only possible but necessary for you to hold that donor accountability gathering at the end of the year so that those you have coached can gather together to share their struggles and successes, personal transformations and goals, with each other.

Accountability, they call it. And if it happens with starving artists and struggling writers in New York City, why not with those donors and congregation members within your sphere of influence?