I had a real ah-ha moment this week.
I find it a bit embarrassing to admit that my epiphany was
the direct result of a random Google search. But, it was, and sometimes you take inspiration when it
comes.
In any case, I stumbled upon a blog post by a fundraising
consultant/prospect researcher named David Lawson (read Lawson's post
here). Lawson contends that we've missed
the boat in our efforts to be donor-centered. What we really need to be – and what our donors want us to
be – is mission-centered. He notes
that when he gave his grandson a train, he wasn't waiting around for the thank
you note (though I would argue that's still no excuse for not sending one!),
but what he wanted was to see his grandson enjoying it.
Lawson challenges us to "imagine the thank you letter
being replaced by the mission letter." Our donors, he argues, should "form bonds not with the
askers, but with the people whose lives they have impacted." That's pretty deep and I've been
pondering exactly what that means for a few days now.
My best conclusion thus far is that the real sweet spot
comes in the intersection of the donor-centered and mission-centered
approach. What we all really want
to know is that what we do makes a difference. When I donate, I don't want to be
thanked for writing a check. I want to be thanked for making it possible to
make progress on an issue I care deeply about.
If we go back to Lawson's train analogy, he really, I believe, wants to know not just that his
grandson likes playing with any trains, but specifically with the train he
picked out. There's mission and donor-centeredness there together.
My role as a fundraiser – a broker of dreams – is to not
only appreciate and provide positive reinforcement for giving, but to be the
translator for how giving becomes progress toward a better world. I suspect we don't always do that
translation very well because we assume that real progress is big and splashy
and game-changing. But, the
reality is, most nonprofits are working on really tough, complicated problems –
issues that have not been resolved by the marketplace or government
intervention. So the progress may
at times be slow, or in fits and starts, or maybe in the form of learning what
doesn’t work.
Yes, game changing moments occur. But I need to be sharing all of the progress along the way
with our donors, because they make all of that progress possible. And, I need to frame all of that impact
from a donor-centered perspective.
So, I'm thinking about my role a little differently. I'm a translator: I translate an individual donor's
choice to be philanthropic into impact. I've got some brushing up to do on my vocabulary and
I'm still not sure I know all the grammatical rules for being such a
translator, but I'm eager to try.
What's your response to Lawson's idea of replacing the
thank you letter with the mission letter? How would you do it?
