Do the Word

That’s the compelling conclusion of  University of Oregon psychologist Paul Slovic, as reported in Nicholas Kristof’s recent New York Times Op-Ed column, Would You Let This Girl Drown? (Thanks to Generous Mind Jon Hirst for the tip.)

Kristof favorably reviews Peter Singer’s The Life You Can Save, a book I panned in a previous post and with which I still disagree. Nevertheless, Kristoff serves up a point with which I agree emphatically: When nonprofits seek to overwhelm people with shocking statistics related to their cause, the only result is that people become overwhelmed.

There’s growing evidence that jumping up and down about millions of lives at stake can even be counterproductive. A number of studies have found that we are much more willing to donate to one needy person than to several. In one experiment, researchers solicited donations for a $300,000 fund that in one version would save the life of one child, and in another the lives of eight children. People contributed more when the fund would save only one life.

Kristof notes rather resignedly that this is largely a function of our rationality impeding our empathy:

Perhaps this is because, as some research suggests, people give in large part to feel good inside. That works best when you write a check and the problem is solved. If instead you’re reminded of larger problems that you can never solve, the feel-good rewards diminish. For example, in one study, people donate generously to Rokia, a 7-year-old malnourished African girl. But when Rokia’s plight was explained as part of a larger context of hunger in Africa, people were much less willing to help.

Excellent point, though this is the very nut that the Participation/Engagement/Ownership process is intended to cut, and cut gradually. In other words, at the participation stage the champion’s interest is in Rokia, not world hunger. It is through helping Rokia that the champion comes to understand both the larger context of hunger in Africa and the biblical imperative to get personally engaged in that larger context.

Kristof also suggests a change in focus, from whipping out the death stats to assuring the champion that by participating and engaging with the cause they are joining a growing movement of champions:

In the case of fighting poverty, there are billions of other bystanders to erode a personal sense of responsibility. Moreover, humanitarian appeals emphasize the scale of the challenges — 25,000 children will die today! — in ways that are as likely to numb us as to galvanize us.

I also wonder if our unremitting focus on suffering and unmet needs stirs up a cloud of negative feelings that incline people to avert their eyes and hurry by. Maybe we should emphasize the many humanitarian successes, such as the falling child mortality rates since 1990 — which mean that 400 children’s lives are saved every hour, around the clock.

It’s a point Peter Block makes in his masterful Community: The Structure of Belonging:  individuals are slow to get involved even with a cause they believe in until they can see others getting involved in the way that they themselves are being asked to get involved.

That’s one of the reasons why Transformational Giving (TG) Principle #7 says:

The relationship between champion and champion is as important as the relationship between champion and organization.

Great things are happening over at Make It Transformational, the daily Transformational Giving blog created collaboratively by the Giving and Training Officers of Mission Increase Foundation.

Check out particularly L.A. Regional Giving and Training Officer Matt Bates’ post on how a local homeless shelter’s invitation to him to come down and share a meal with the homeless men was far more impactful than any brochure could ever be:

This invitation highlights a great marketing principle: invite people to participate in the tiniest little way in your cause, rather than throwing tons of information at them and expecting them to act on their own.  Rather than hand me a brochure and ask me to watch a dvd about all the great things they do, Proyecto Pastoral invites me to directly participate in the cause of loving and feeding the homeless.

It’s part of what we’re teaching this month in our Marketing Your Ministry workshops:

Printed brochures are dead. Long live “living brochures”–your champions who, equipped by you to comprehensively impact the cause, recruit others in their sphere of influence to do the same thing.

Northern California Giving and Training Officer Tracy Tucker puts it this way:

• Printed brochures describe the ministry…while living brochures embody the ministry.
• Printed brochures flaunt the accomplishments of the ministry…while living brochures validate the cause through their lifestyle.
• Printed brochures get attention via clever messages…while living brochures get attention via changed lives.
• Printed brochures have an impact limited to statistics or stories…while living brochures have an impact that everyone around them can see.
• Printed brochures get recycled…while living brochures get involved.

Concludes Bates:

I can’t remember the last time I told my family about that great brochure I just received from a nonprofit.  In fact, I don’t think I’ve ever done this.  Have you?I can’t remember the last time I told my family about that great brochure I just received from a nonprofit.  In fact, I don’t think I’ve ever done this.  Have you?

I can’t remember the last time I told my family about that great brochure I just received from a nonprofit.  In fact, I don’t think I’ve ever done this.  Have you?

In Monday’s champion blueprint post, there’s a great line on organizational/champion relationships from Dare2Share‘s Spencer Cowan:

We are not pastors, friends or simply fundraisers to our adult Champions. A friendship can develop along the way but that is not our primary focus.

Transformational Giving (TG) principle #5 puts it this way:

A Transformational Giving relationship between a champion and an organization is primarily a peer-level accountability relationship, not merely a friendship or a mutual admiration society.

Ah, accountability! Other than sanctification, it may be the most nearly extinct of the core components of Christian discipleship.

Generous Mind Jon Hirst offers a great post on accountability and why it may be so scarce in contemporary Christianity.

Jon describes accountability as “our ultimate act of generosity”:

We are sharing with God, or with people in our lives, the account of what God is up to in our world and how we have responded. This type of generosity is the deepest and most significant because we are sharing about our eternal purpose.

It is one thing to share about your favorite movie (and that can be very significant if you share lessons you learned). But it is quite another to share your account of how God is using you and providing for you.

So why so scarce these days? Jon daisy chains six reasons:

Accountability is scarce because:

it requires that we give up freedom

giving up freedom requires trust

trust only grows in relationship

relationships take time

our time is doled out based on our priorities

our priorities need redeemed to be in line with God’s focus

• it requires that we give up freedom
• giving up freedom requires trust
• trust only grows in relationship
• relationships take time
• our time is doled out based on our priorities
• our priorities need redeemed to be in line with God’s focus

So why am I not generous with the account of my life and my actions? It starts with the fact that on most days I do not truly value the act of sharing what I know. My priorities are focused on entertainment, pleasure, accomplishment, and so on.

Why don’t we enter into mutual accountability relationships with our champions? Because we don’t value the act of sharing what we know. We value what we know. We want others to give money so we can keep doing it.

But sharing it to equip others to do likewise?

That’s a core component to discipleship…and it’s largely absent from the way we interact with individuals showing interest in our ministry. They’re likely showing interest in us because the cause is of interest to them. We’re likely to return that interest because we’re interested in their support as we impact the cause.

But mutual accountability changes the equation.

We build a support relationship with them, alright–a relationship where we support them as we equip them, by the grace of God, to impact the cause we both love. That’s what Ephesians 4:11-13 is all about.

“So when do they give me money?” is the most common rejoinder to that TG approach to relationship.

Answer:

They don’t give money to you. They give money through you as a part of the comprehensive discipleship process through which you guide them, in which you show them how to use all of their resources to impact the cause–including their money.

And let’s be clear: Getting them to give is not an act of carnival chicanery, where you shuck and jive in order to get them to write a support check , at which point you assure them, “Whoa! You really impacted the cause there! Thanks!”

That’s where mutual accountability comes in:

You need to ensure that their gift is not a substitute for them growing in relation to the cause but rather a result of that growth. In other words, they’re not responding to your financial need. Instead, they’re giving that particular gift because the experience, education, and equipping you’ve given them in relation to the cause has led them to discern, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit (not the persuasion of your fundraising letter) that this is the way they’re called to impact the cause.

As Jon notes in his post, that kind of relationship takes time….and it goes far deeper than friendship. You’ll know that you’re in track building that kind of relationship if the champion you’re coaching begins relatively early on in the process to coach champions of their own in relation to the cause…instead of just bringing them to you to coach, too.