The Five Stages of Nonprofit Board Fundraising

In the 1960s, Dr. Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, working with terminally ill patients, hypothesized her five stages of grief, popularized in her 1969 publication of On Death and Dying. Since that time, the Kübler-Ross model has been applied to just about any form of personal loss, including job loss, divorce, death of a loved one, surviving natural disasters, and even incarceration.

Imagine my surprise when I realized that nobody had yet applied the Kübler-Ross model to fundraising by nonprofit boards of directors! So, here, without further ado, are the Five Stages of Nonprofit Board Fundraising:

1. Denial - "I don't think board members should be required to fundraise." - "I don't know anybody with money anyway." - "I was asked to join the board for my other skills." - "Don't we have staff for that?" - "We're a nonprofit, we're supposed to live on the financial edge!"
   
2. Anger - "My friends will hate me if I add them to the mailing list!" - "If I give myself, why do I also have to 'get'?"- "I give so much of my time, you want my money too?" - "If the staff were doing their jobs, this wouldn't be necessary." - "It's the politicians' fault that we can't raise enough money!" - "I never should have joined this board."
3. Bargaining - "If I serve on the audit committee, can I get out of working on the event?" - "I brought in my old PC for the intern to use, that's worth something, right?" - "How about if I just mention I'm on the board in my family Christmas letter, that'll save you on printing and postage!" - "Tell you what, I know the name of a foundation that makes grants..."
4. Depression - "The economy is going to clobber us anyway, so why bother?" - "We can't compete with all those nationally known nonprofits." - "Nobody really gets our mission anyway." - "There's no point in even asking before the next election cycle, or two..." - "I read in NPQ that even the big guys can't raise any money these days."
5. Acceptance - "Do we have any brochures I can bring to my Rotary meeting?" - "Let me find out about my company's corporate philanthropy policy" - "Hey, if we each commit to just a small amount we can close that budget gap!" - "How can we expect others to spread the word and raise money for our cause if we're not willing to do it ourselves?"

As Dr. Kübler-Ross wrote, not everybody passes through all five stages, and they don't always progress in this order. Frequently people get stuck in one stage or another. Do you know any board members who are stuck on denial or anger? Of course you do: every board has these people. The important thing is to recognize the stages, and help your board move along to Acceptance and Success.

Social Media 101 for Nonprofit Consultants

Yesterday I had the opportunity to present an introductory workshop on social media to a few of my colleagues in the Fund Builders Alliance. We covered some of the basics of what social media is and is not, got into the how-tos and whys of facebook, twitter, linkedin, and blogging, and briefly went over the variety of other services available (pinterest, storify, g+, ...). It's always a great day when you can get together with a group of professionals that you respect and teach them something new. (And thank you to Karen and Leadership Monterey Peninsula for use of the conference room!)

Here's the thing though. Although I was pleased to present this workshop, and although I do offer social media planning and coaching services, I'm always hesitant to use the title "social media expert." As I told the group yesterday, "At the end of this session you will all be social media experts, for about three hours." Social media is such a constantly changing and evolving ecosystem that I believe it is a continual learning effort. Fortunately, I am fascinated by it and enjoy that effort. But I still realize that there is always more to learn.

I've been playing around with online communities in my personal life for nearly twenty years now. On a professional level, I got involved with nonprofit online discussions as a member of HandsNet around 1996. A few years later, I wound up working for HandsNet as the Director of Online Community Development. Since then I've continued to be an early adopter of many new platforms, including blogger, facebook, youtube, and twitter. But "expert"? ...

I hope to continue to learn and fascinated by social media, and I hope to continue to bring that experience and enthusiasm to my colleagues and clients in the nonprofit sector. But if you ever catch me using the title "Social Media Expert" please splash a cold glass of water in my face. Just try not to splash my iPhone, thank you.

Oh, and if you'd like a copy of my powerpoint slides from yesterday's presentation, just send me an email (contact info in the "about the consultant" section of this blog).