I am launching a coaching program for development officers. I will help you set and achieve your goals and provide emotional and tactical support.
Each coaching plan will be customized for the individual with two meetings each month.
Coaching clients will work with me directly in setting priorities and developing fundraising and acknowledgement programs and many other facets of fundraising. Please contact me directly if you’d like to know more.
We’ve had two Connecting Coffees already in 2013, both of which were filled to capacity with talented and thoughtful people. I am trying to increase the frequency of the events to accommodate all of the people who are interested in these programs. Here’s what people said they’ve learned:
Volunteer Management
Development Officers
Thank you to everyone who participated!
Here are the stories I wrote for Generocity.org this year. It's a nifty little website that, gasp, focuses on positive things happening in and around Philly. No, I don't mean a bottle of Firestone Walker 17 Year Reserve showing up at the Pour House beer fest this summer. I mean non-profits and the people who run them striving to make the region a better place.
Gave away my soul.
Giving back to get it back.
Given what I know.
— Ava Wood, featured in Giving Back: A Tribute to Generations of African American Philanthropists
Nonprofit professionals are emotionally committed and professionally passionate about what they do. And they have to be, because working at a nonprofit organization certainly isn’t easy.
We’re not paid as well as our peers at for-profit organizations. We work long, sometimes erratic hours. We think about how to solve problems well into the night. We never have enough resources to do what needs to get done.
And the simplest thing can become difficult: no one added postage to the postage meter, so we dig into our purses for a stamp to get that letter out. No, we don’t have “people” to do that, we do that.
Compound those types of situations with additional stress: it’s time for the annual fundraising appeal, the grant application is due in 5 days, your client is headed to court, and someone forgot to add more postage to the postage meter.
We also don’t talk with our peers to find out what they’re working on, so we start to think we’re the only ones facing these issues.
Article written by Ashley Tobin for Generocity summarizing the November 2012 Connecting Coffee
Generocity posted a story about the networking series.
Dear Nonprofiteer:
I was wondering if it is ethical for an Executive Director to donate to the organization she runs, designating her donation to bonuses or pay raises for the employees that work for her. She is not paid, thus can remain on our Board. Seems like a conflict to me.
Signed, Wondering
Dear Wondering:
The Nonprofiteer sees a conflict of interest in the situation you describe, all right, but it doesn't have to do with the donation.
