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Black Sheep
Fundraising:
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Retail Online The book can also be ordered through Amazon.com by clicking on http://tinyurl.com/fab32, OR,
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Jay S. Mendell is professor of
nonprofit management Jay earned an M. A. from Vanderbilt
University |
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Stigma. it can be overcome. Do not let negative thinking deter your face to face fundraising.Do you believe that prospects will decline to make generous gifts to your nonprofit because it is stigmatized? Do you believe that they fear that your stigma will attach itself to them? If this is what you believe, you are wrong, and you are denying yourself badly needed funding. Generous donors want to solve the community’s problems. You can obtain generous donations for your “black sheep” cause. Do you believe that your prospects need to totally identify with your clients?I thought so, too. I was wrong. And I missed golden opportunities to raise badly needed funds. Yes, I was wrong, wrong, wrong.Hello. I am Dr. Jay Mendell, a tenured professor of nonprofit management. I teach grantwriting and fundraising at Florida Atlantic University. I have personally taught, coached, and developed hundreds of women and men in human and health services here in South Florida, where we are severely stressed by crime, hurricanes, immigration, drugs, aging, poor education, and you-name-it--and where the competition for funding is keen and fierce.. For several years, I taught my students that they had to persuade their prospect to look favorably on all three factors--their cause, their nonprofit organization, and themselves, the fundraisers. As I’ve said, I was wrong. Several years passed, and my graduates began to tell me that they had, in fact, obtained generous gifts from men and women who were not especially sympathetic to their cause and did not identify with their clients, but who took a great deal of interest in solving society's problems. Over and over, more and more often, I heard the following question from my graduates. “Don’t you understand that there are many, many, reasons that a prospect will make a substantial gift?” Eventually, I saw the light and learned from my students. Then my research began. Scarcely a day passes that I am not on the phone with my graduates, and often they share their problem solving skills. They very frankly and openly reveal what the “real world” (the world after the university) has taught them. They have told me that I should write down what they discovered for themselves and they have shared with me what they learned about prevailing over stigma in fundraising. I have finally written it down in Black Sheep Fundraising: Rethinking Major Gifts for Your Stigmatized Cause. Are your clients more stigmatized than these?For seven years I was a funding consultant for a dynamic, progressive center for persons with addiction or alcoholism. Every one of these men and women was indigent and had a court record, or HIV, or a mental disorder. Many of the men were domestic batterers, and some of the women were sex workers. Mostly I wrote grant proposals, since I assumed that “white sheep” donors would not link their names with our “black sheep.” I assumed that they assumed that our stigma would attach to them. I assumed wrong. (As folks say, “assume” makes an “ass” of “u” and “me.”) There are principles you may adopt, to build the rapport, trust and acceptance that will lead to a major gift.Do not scold, criticize, or re-educate your prospect.Psychologists have shown that it is practically impossible, in a few hours, to change someone’s mind if they are not eager to learn. Never mind how much evidence you have and how many winning arguments you think you have. Instead, find something you and your prospect can agree on, and proceed from there. Remember, your job is not to correct the prospect’s “wrong thinking.” Your job is to build rapport, trust, and acceptance. I’ve recently read over two thousand pages on why people agree or disagree with persuasive arguments, and I summarize them in Black Sheep Fundraising You cannot win the never-ending argument over “Disease vs. Character Defect.”Are your clients diseased, or are they morally deficient? In Black Sheep Fundraising, there is a chapter on how to avoid an argument you cannot win. Learn to view your “black sheep” cause from the “white sheep's” viewpoint (but remain committed to your cause).You cannot understand what the prospect is asking you if you do not understand “where they are coming from.” There is one database you can visit on the Internet to see your stigmatized cause through a prospect’s eyes. I’ll tell you where it is and how to use it. You need to practice answering questions about your stigmatized cause.Ten of the toughest questions you will ever hear are in one chapter of Black Sheep Fundraising. Be prepared to answer them by carrying out the exercises I prescribe. Realize that your prospect wants something in return for a generous gift.It may be appreciation. It may be recognition. It may be the opportunity to “give back.” There are many motivations. Prospects may or may not consciously understand what they want in reciprocity, but they do want something, and you had better listen carefully and determine what it is and offer it if you can. Listen carefully and discreetly. Ask the right questions. Think about it this way. The fundraising visit is about them, not about you. Develop your listening and questioning skills.To find points of agreement leading to rapport, trust, and acceptance, you need to discover what mental models, prejudices, frameworks, and stereotypes the prospect holds. Consciously or unconsciously, how does their mind relate to your “black sheep” cause? Possibly you talk too much and listen too little. You should be listening more and discreetly asking productive questions. Effective listening and questioning are described in several chapters of Black Sheep Fundraising. There is a list of ten questions that are particularly effective in revealing conscious and unconscious mental models. You’ll find them in Black Sheep Fundraising. When you tell “black sheep” stories, tell them like Homer, Shakespeare, and Hemingway.After reading the greatest legends, novels, and dramas of all time, from all over world, the famous mythologist Joseph Campbell identified the elements of a compelling story. You can and should use Campbell’s elements when you tell true stories about your cause. I’ve written a chapter on storytelling for Black Sheep Fundraising. Here are several frequently asked questions.(1) Is Black Sheep Fundraising a comprehensive introduction to fundraising? No, but the book provides Web addresses from which you may instantly download the best free fundraising book we have ever seen. (2) Is Black Sheep Fundraising a comprehensive introduction to grantwriting? No, it is a book about face to face fundraising. (3) Suppose I buy a copy and don’t find it useful. What can I do? Donate it to a nonprofit that will find it useful, and remember to take a tax deduction. (4) I don’t think my nonprofit is stigmatized. Why should I read Black Sheep Fundraising? Ask yourself the following questions. “Am I incorporating the storytelling principles of Homer, Shakespeare, and Hemingway?” “Do I really understand the mindset of someone who objects to my cause? Can I understand what is behind polite rejection?” “Do I have superb listening skills? Really?” “Do I have superb questioning skills? Really, truly?” If you answered “no!” to even one of these questions, ask yourself if a few hours of reading are not a good investment.
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Read an excerpt on black sheep storytelling. |
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