Episode 273: Has Fundraising Work Really Changed much in 50 Years: A Question to be Answered
It's a wonderful day for me when you would take just a moment of your time to join me, Randall, on this or any edition of Around with Randall. I had an interesting conversation. That kind of led to an email follow up with Steven from Fort Worth, Texas, around the evolution of philanthropy. And what we're really talking about was the evolution of the relationship building process.
And because of my gray hair, and that I think some of the experiences I've had have been helpful. There was a thought around, hey, it's really different. This all kind of led me to think about is what we do when we talk about the relationship, parts of philanthropy, with donors, with prospects, different than it used to be.
And this is what we want to try to deal with today, to try to figure out that the basics may not have moved as much as we think. So we'll kind of take a step forward and look where we are now. We'll take a step back and look maybe at some of the evidence from the past, which I think is kind of cool, and then some tactical things that we keep in mind that are consistent between the two time frames.
So let's start with the big picture. That life today is dramatically different than it was decades ago. I'm not here to say I'm living as Neanderthal. When we talk about things like doing research, we used to be able to take weeks to do that. Now we can do it literally in less than a minute. That travel and data management reporting was different in many ways.
I remember my first database, DOS driven CRM, which means you had to use keys to like keep track of things. And we liked Excel spreadsheets because they were actually easier to use. We've seen the world reduce what I might call friction in the work that goes on, but one element that I don't think is probably changed is that gifts, particularly major principle planned gifts, all subcategories of kind of the bigger major gift opportunity still originate from the human relationships that we build with the people who have those resources today.
Central claim or objective in this podcast is to really evolve beyond just the technology that's in front of us, to figure out what it is that's most important, and how do we help donors commit to that? So, let's go back and clarify what we're really talking about. Relationships, by definition, at least in our profession, or at least the way I try to couch them, are not casual rapport.
They're based upon trust. They're not episodic meaning. Periodically we maybe see them. We're constantly building upon them. And as we've heard from Nathan Chapelle in his book Generosity Crisis, they're transformational, not transactional.
That the things that develop these relationships, in my opinion, are credibility. Trust. Most important thing we have in our business, the understanding of where they are versus where we are and how we meet in the middle, more probably based on what they want than what we need. That relevance of someone's involvement gift is paramount to how we work with people to say, look, your involvement is going to change lives and whatever that way is, and that gift officers have to have some level of what I would call self-actualization.
I've talked about this with Maslow, Abraham Maslow, and the hierarchy of needs. Kind of a sense of confidence. They know who they are. They're okay with that. I truly believe that technology can support any one of these four things, and that it's that they're structured in this idea of building this deeper, more meaningful process. But technology alone cannot substitute for anything that we do that's based on trust.
On that relationship building. Donors still make decisions based on belief, confidence and emotional alignment, and that human judgments are formed by interaction, not by automation. If we believe this, and I think people who are in the profession long enough, if you're new to the profession, listening to me, maybe you'll trust me that these things are paramount.
Then let's go back. Before we look forward, one of the people when I began my career in the last century.
Was someone by the name of Hank Russo. For which, if I mention that to anybody under the age of 45 or 50, I mean, maybe even a little older, they would have no clue. That is Hank Russo is the founding name founding person, along with his wife, Lily. School of philanthropy, although that's not where it started. It started in 1974, in San Rafael, California.
Hank Russo believed that educating people who wanted to be fundraisers was actually a career pursuit, that there were an educational model that could be used to teach best practice. So much so that in 1987, his efforts that started 13 years before that were rolled into the School of Philanthropy at the University of Indiana, which eventually has now become the Lily School of Philanthropy in Indianapolis.
This is a forerunner in what we do, and you can throw in a Jerry Panisse and some others, but I think Hank Russo was kind of the foundational member of kind of institutionalizing, systematizing what we do in books and writing and teaching. What did he say? If this hasn't changed very much? Wouldn't we think that it should be somewhat the same?
So, what he said was, is that things like frequent contact, direct conversations, listening, discipline, personal presence, and long horizon patience are all cornerstones of building trust.
And although the verbiage is different, and maybe the methodology in which we execute them is different, none of these principles are dependent on this technology or are limited by era. That we're rooted when we do it well in this basis of trust. And we're back to no cash reporting, no periodic updates, not transactional, that we're building trust. That's what I talked about before.
Then you put Hank Russo's work around this from 1974, in the educational pursuit. But he was doing this in the 60s and 50s as original work. What we find is that time has passed, but the infrastructure and infrastructure has been modernized. But human decision dynamics have not.
And this begins a disconnect, a what might be construed as a misconception. And this was the conversation I was having with Steven, is that the that Steven was positioning this as well? The world in which we work today is just different. So the way in which we do our jobs should be different. And I half agree with that.
If you're still researching someone by spending five days on the internet instead of using ChatGPT and say, hey, give me a profile of so-and-so, and here's a little bit of the details of who they are, then you're wasting your time. I would not argue that. But is that alone going to bring a gift from Bob or Cindy?
And in some ways, I believe that we've allowed technology evolution, the modernization of gene therapy to overshadow what's really important.
And that then leads to this frustration. Why are we not getting more gifts? And then we hear the I don't want to call them excuses because I don't think that's fair. But the rationale maybe I hear from gift officers as to why they maybe don't have the success they want. Well, I need better data. It's my portfolio. It's the problem, a timing.
I just don't get the data in timely fashion or I can't get to the people when it's appropriate. My system and I mean not like health care system or university, but the systems in which we operate, the people and the and the processes we build constrain me in this. As I go along, I'm becoming more pushy, belligerent about saying balderdash.
That's just simply not true, that these are excuses are there examples and times where some of these things are actually more legitimate than others? Sure. I'm not going to argue that. But really what we're talking about is at times a failure to build relationships. Relationships when we build them, take effort. There's uncertainty and persistence is needed. There's frustration when things don't go well.
I really looked at the best donor relationships that I had five, six, seven, eight, and nine figure gifts.
As almost needing the same professional, not personal emphasis on effort and being persistent and not letting frustration get in the way of what the long term goals were. As my marriage, which there's nothing more sacred to me than that.
What is it that I have to do to make them feel empowered as donors or prospects to make connections? But all, all the time. Always building upon trust.
The difficulty that we have here is kind of this inherent conflict that we use these excuses when really relationship building is the cornerstone of what we do and how we do it. And that when we make these excuses, it's we're reframing it as structural failure. And it's not major gift. Fundraising is about trust. Exposure. Meaning contact. Meaning in person and initiative.
And I talk about this in the things I look for in gift officers. I don't look for 25 years experience. I don't recommend that. I say, do they have fire in their belly? Will they show up and stay late? Number two, do they have a sense of resiliency? If something bad goes out or happens, they don't crumble in the corner for three days and don't know what to do.
They get over it. Somebody does want the meeting. It's okay. Make the next call. And the last thing is, is that they can communicate, right? Verbalize. Most important listen. And in that also represent the organization in the best way possible. No era regardless of technological sophistication, alters the sequences. These needs gift officers have to succeed through repeated meaningful donor engagement, through trial and tribulation, hurdles and obstacles everywhere.
And be willing to be nimble and be hopefully positive about the ability to build relationships. These fundamentals persist. They aren't any different. And in doing so, what we find is success by those who actually do them. So what are the tactical pieces up to that? I always make sure we have tactical things in these podcasts. What can you do today to focus on, to work on, to be a part of, to, to, to learn and understand that are going to make you more successful.
There are six today. These are the six things I think I find and see and read and know from Hank Russo that I believe today are just as much true. And if you can take these six and use them as a template to say, I can do them, and I'm not going to let the obstacles or the excuses get in the way.
You're going to drive more success. And that's really what we all want. Six things. Number one, initiate con tact consistently. Relationships don't self generate. They just don't happen. Trust doesn't happen. Outreach is the first step. I'm hearing from more gift officers more clients about. It's harder and harder to get in front of people. Well, I think that the current economic environment, which is not bad but is uncertain, futures to try and figure out what to do.
That people are a little bit less willing to see us because they don't want to say no. If we're doing this right after three quarters time, we're not even asking for anything. We should be stewarding and thanking and just connecting. But it's hard. And this was a conversation I had with a client, actually three, gift officers, one being the leader about you've got to make 3 to 5 phone calls, 2 to 3 emails.
You cannot just say, oh, I made the call. They didn't call me back. And that's what I sometimes see as an excuse, which goes back to this idea of, you know, hey, you know, there's an obstacle. What do I do? You overcome it. And that contact, that initial contact is critical from pipeline development to reestablishing relationships with people that gave years ago to people that have given recently. But you can't get ahold of.
It's a relentless pursuit and aligns perfectly with what Hank Russo talked about in terms of building out those relationships that there's frequent contact, direct conversation. Number one, initial contact consistently or consistency. Number two is prioritizing real conversations. And I still is directly from Nathan Chapelle. And the idea of radical connection. The dialog reveals motivation, hesitation, readiness in such a way that if you're not having active discussions, you'll never know.
I truly believe that some of the best gifts I've ever been involved with, they happen to be large and I deserve no credit. The donors make the gifts, but they told me where they wanted to go with their gifts. But it didn't happen because of email. Yes, we used email. Yes, I use texting. But the ability for me to grow what the relationship could be was based on face to face dialog, and it was sometimes casual, sometimes a little more formal.
But it wasn't through the prism of technology.
And this is back to Hank Russo direct conversation and listening discipline. It's hard to have these things if you aren't in front of them, which is the fourth thing he talked about personal presence. You're there. I understand that technology has changed the way we communicate, but it doesn't change the way we build trust until at the largest levels, you want 20 bucks from a donor?
Yes, you can do that via text. That's not what I'm talking about.
Which brings me number three. Show up in person when it matters. How do you do this? This means being creative when you're in the area. Drop them a note. Stop by with a little gift. Even when you don't have an appointment, invite them to something casual. I believe, and I know there's a cost to it, but I got more out of my country club membership and tickets to events where I would call and say, come on, just come with me.
The best one was when early on in my career, when I was in Minnesota, we had a hockey team that was really, really good and they played the state hockey tournament. If you've never been the state hockey tournament in Minnesota, you should go. I don't care where you live because it's an unbelievable thing. Sold out. 20,000 people come in to watch high school hockey.
It's fascinating. But our board chair was connected, an organization that had a box. And so the first year I got there, we make the state. We actually, I think want it that year, but three games. And I said I need the box. Can I get the box. The sweet they said yeah, yeah it's free. Go ahead. And I ordered food and I brought in people and the headmaster's going crazy, like, what are we doing?
I said, just show up and be quiet and you'll figure it out. And it was unbelievable. We had just people just talking at it, and we did it for three straight days. And by the end everyone's like, okay, we got to do this every year. Which led to a how do I access people? And that isn't formalized sometimes.
Sometimes it's informal and fun. Show up in person when it matters. Number four is listening to decisions relevant to signals. Effective gift work depends on an understanding of the donors values, concerns, and timing. It isn't about what we need or what we want, but what they want to do and when they want to do it. Which brings us back to Hank Rousseau about, listen, discipline, long term patience may take some time to figure this out, and that personal presence to be in front of them.
All this to say is, is that the signals are given all the time. In conversations. I talk about having two years in one mouth, two years to listen one day speak. Use them proportionally. Ask open ended questions and what you get is a playbook of what people want to do. They made ask. I need a little help. We can do that.
They don't ask unless they trust you. Listen for those signals. They'll tell you I'm interested in this and not in that. I've given to this in other places, but I haven't done this. I don't do this. Or, you know, we just sold the business and I'm trying and figure out what to do with taxes or which just had a financial reverse.
It's not the best time.
That has not changed in the 50 plus years since the fundraising school was started in 1974. Number five patience is critical. Practicing discipline. Follow up in that patience is essential that we're not interested in interactions. We're interested in reliability and continuity in the relationship. If all they ever do is hear from you every six months or ten months or a year, I'm not sure how that's reliable or continuous.
It's episodic. And this goes back to what Hank Russo talked about with frequent contact, you have to be managing the relationship with contact teeth and the largest levels every month, every 45 days. And maybe an email just saying, hey, I saw this article, thought of you, or you find out that the grandson or granddaughter played in a tournament.
Hey, I saw this. I thought it was kind of cool.
It doesn't have to be huge, but it does have to be, I think, meaningful and maybe emotionally meaningful. But as we reliable and continuous practice the discipline of follow up, and that's not even getting into the stewardship elements which we should be required to do anyway. I'm talking about deepening the relationship. The last is treat discomfort as inherent to the role.
What we do is not easy. It is a profession. Uncertainty and rejection are part of that. Which goes back to what I talked about a few minutes ago, about things that I look for when I recommend hiring somebody or a client. Sometimes I may interview people. I'm looking for resiliency, like, hey, you're going to make ten calls. Two are probably going to say drop dead.
Five are not going to be they're not call you back. And we're looking for the 1 or 2 that might say, you bet, I'd love to see you. Those are the people I want to be in front of. And then we begin that relationship building process or continuum. We have to treat discomfort as part of an inherent. Example of our everyday existence.
It shouldn't be easy. It should be hard. The best things in life are. And if we don't treat this discomfort and work through it and walk over it and move around it, but not be stopped by it, what we end up with is stagnation. And this is that long term patience that Hank Rousseau was talking about.
Six things that are consistent from the starting point of the fundraising school back in 1974, in California, now with the Lilly School of Philanthropy in Indianapolis, they're initiating contact consistently. They are prioritizing real in-depth conversations that you're showing up in person when it matters that there's listening for where the donor wants to go, because they're giving you signals that there's practice in the follow up.
Having discipline to continuously be engaging and finally to treat discomfort as inherent. It's we're going to work with it. There is a consistency over time in building relationships. Tools have modernized a little bit how we do it. Systems have expanded. Expectations are shifting, but the relational engine of philanthropy remains unchanged. Great gift officers distinguish themselves not by mastering complexity, but by executing enduring fundamentals consistently.
Trust. Being present. Direct conversations. Listening. Discipline. Personal presence. Long horizon. Patience. They were true in 1974 when Hank Russo started the school, and when he wrote his book in 1987, The Achieving Excellence in Fundraising The True Today utilized tools to make it faster, better, more effective, more efficient. Don't change who we are, don't change. Try to what we do, which is to do what's in the best interest of the donor, the organization, our community.
And when the three mirror together, that's when we have success. And that only comes by one simple factor relationship building based on trust.
Don't forget check out the blogs two per week at Hallett Philanthropy backslash blogs. Get it feed right into your inbox, and if you'd like, you can reach out to me a podcast@hallettphilanthropy.com. Today was a little bit of a reset for me about focusing kind of big picture with some tactical elements, but I think it's important because our nonprofits need this.
They need you to be the most effective, the most inventive, the most creative, the most driven. Because they need this money not for ego or elevation of standing, but to take care of people. Remember my favorite saying, some people make things happen. Some people watch things happen. Then there are those who wonder what happened. Were people Europe someone organization is an organization that makes things happen for the people, the places and parts of our community that are wondering what happened that hasn't changed at all in the history of philanthropy doesn't mean money means love of mankind, love of humankind.
And that's something we can all aspire to, whether in 1974 or in 2026. I'll look forward to seeing you the next time, right back here on the next edition of Around with Randall.
And don't forget, make it a great day.