Why I wrote this book
One of my early reviewers, Rory Green, asked a personal question.
"Why," she wondered, "does communicating well with donors matter so much that you devote countless hours to speaking, writing, blogging, authoring, teaching, mentoring and talking about it? Beyond the fact that communicating well will raise more money — which it does — why do you care? I'd love to know."
I often speak about Princeton University's fundraising methods, because they rank, in my view, among the very best in higher education.
Princeton has a robust, carefully cultivated, long-standing "culture of philanthropy." During freshman orientation, I'm told, someone august introduces each incoming class to the notion of "the given university," first talked about in the 1930s.
The star-chitect buildings you see around you? Thanks to philanthropy. The jaw-dropping faculty of world-class minds and Nobel laureates you will see and meet and learn from? Thanks to philanthropy. The lush endowment that allows more than 60% of you freshmen to receive scholarship aid? Thanks to philanthropy.
Rory, here's the thing: I am a "given human being."
I owe. I owe. So it's off to work I go.
I was fortunate to be born into a family that insisted on a college education.
My dad didn't have one; he worked in a factory all his life.
My mother got her CPA at night school, taking buses to Boston by her lonesome. You know that painting by Edward Hopper called Nighthawks? An almost empty diner late at night? That's how I see my mom: bouncing alone in her seat on a nighttime bus, riding into Boston, to get ahead, to get a better-paying job, to help her family.
I grew up in a small house built on the GI Bill, the gift of a grateful nation to WWII service members like dad.
I was fortunate to be in a high school history class taught by a man who each year hand-picked one student and tried to arrange admission and aid at his alma mater, Brown University.
Which became my alma mater, thanks to him. I got a BA and an MA there. That MA was also a gift, from a professor who took a special interest in my poetry and saw promise inside my confusion, narcissism, and mental illness.
By the way, Rory, I was neither grateful then nor was I trading sexual favors for these life-changing gifts. People just helped me because they could and wanted to.
So now I owe. I owe. And it's off to work I go.
I always wanted to be "a writer." Even when I could scarcely read, I knew I wanted to write. That would be my life.
Over the years I've tried everything. I've published small books of poetry and "literary" fiction; my high-water mark was a "notable" review in the New York Times. On the commercial side, I succeeded at public relations. I succeeded at employee communications. I succeeded at corporate communications. I succeeded at advertising. I succeeded at direct mail. And then I encountered fundraising.
Once again, I owe thanks.
My wife, Simone Joyaux,[1] introduced me to the nonprofit world. I'd sold lottery systems. I'd sold roof membranes to manufacturers. I'd sold adult education to the masses. But I'd never, before Simone, tried to sell an individual on making a gift.
I had a lot to learn, it turned out.
This book, like all my earlier books, stands on many generous shoulders (yours included). No one in the fundraising world has ever refused to share their knowledge with me. No one there was ever impatient with my ignorance. Some experts, such as Sean Triner and Christiana Stergiou, have even invited me inside their home for extended stays.
You ask, "Why do I care?"
Because in my transition from commercial copywriting to fundraising, I saw that the nonprofit sector was, as Adrian Sargeant has also observed, a couple of decades behind other marketers. I knew (I did not guess) that nonprofits could in fact raise FAR more money if they would only adopt better techniques and recent research.
I also saw — in testimony arising from the thousands who annually attend my workshops — that there was an evil abroad in nonprofit land: the Evil of Ignorance. I heard the wails of fundraisers second-guessed by ill-informed bosses and boards. There was a disturbance in the Force.
I hope this book reduces that too-common ignorance to a mild irritation. Missions need funding. Visions need funding. Ignorance: be gone, please. Yes, you're well intentioned. But, no, you're not helping.
I hope, Rory, that somehow, this somewhat answers your question.
[1] Author of Firing Lousy Board Members, Strategic Fund Development, Keep Your Donors, among others.