Welcome to Philanthropy 451. For those of you who don’t know me, I’m Lisa Greer. I’m a businesswoman and entrepreneur, and my husband and I had the good fortune of being able to become “major” donors about ten years ago. Prior to that, I had a mostly paycheck-to-paycheck existence — I had a great career, but I was the main breadwinner with a growing family, and I lived in an expensive city (Los Angeles). I gave what and when I could, but when asked to contribute to a charitable organization, I was the one usually saying “Well, I can contribute time, but I just don’t have the (financial) resources to do more.” It sometimes felt a bit pathetic, but it was the truth.
When we knew for certain that we had become a part of the 1% (that wasn’t a pejorative term then), one of our first impulses was to determine our philanthropic path — that is, decide who we were going to donate to. It never occurred to us to not think that way, and I still find it very very strange that people with money don’t consider themselves obligated - and privileged - to use that money to make the world a better place.
It took some time to figure that all out, and we stumbled a lot at the beginning. How do you determine how much to give to an organization? How do you know that a particular charity asking for money is “for real”? Do tax deductions fit into that calculus? How do I make sure that, now that we have “money”, we — and our kids — don’t become jerks? Do we need to set up a foundation?
Along with way, we learned a shocking reality. Many of the organizations that we looked upon as almost “saintly” were actually run badly. More than a few had been involved in scandals involving money and/or really bad behavior.
Then, when we did find organizations we trusted, we found that they wouldn’t even speak to us, because we weren’t “on their list”. When I made a large contribution to a school or a non-profit that appealed to me — and I had not been personally solicited for that contribution — I got confused calls or emails from the recipient.
Maybe I was naive, but I thought that professional fundraisers of well-known non-profits would be honest people who were in their line of work because they truly, truly believed in the good work of the organization they worked for. Any many are! But many are not.
I also thought that these people asking me for money would do their pitch as professionally as people in the for-profit realm. That is, I thought that they would know about basic business protocols. Budgets, run-rate, overhead costs, near and long-term goals, business strategy, competitive set, unique “selling” proposition, etc. were all things that I really believed every business — for profit or non-profit — would live by.
I was wrong. And the situation isn’t getting any better.
This newsletter is my way of sharing my dismay and frustration when dealing with development execs/fundraisers. On one hand, I truly want well-meaning, impactful charities to succeed, but on the other hand, I find myself wanting to run screaming from the room when I have to speak or interact with yet another fundraiser. Yes, many of them are terrific and highly professional – but they’re few and far between. Most are either nervous and self-conscious and frightened, or they’re pompous, arrogant, condescending and sycophantic. Why?
I know that other donors – most, if not all of them – feel the same way as I do. I want to bring our perspective to the millions of people who work in charitable organizations, as well as to the schools who teach non-profit management and fundraising. Sharing the mistakes, annoyances, and stories of stupidity that donors put up with just might help fundraisers do better. Most donors don’t want to take the time to voice this, so most non-profits don’t have a clue as to how donors really feel. I’m going to put it all out there, so that non-profits and fundraisers can learn, and so that other donors can feel that they’re not alone in their frustration.
Finally, I’m going to highlight bad behavior by non-profits AND by donors. It’s important for all of us to understand that the future success of non-profits depends on mutual trust. We need to learn from the bad actor stories, and admit that they got to be bad actors because of the system that allows (and often encourages) their behavior.
In the next issue, we’re digging into the numbers, so you can learn just how dire this situation is.