Mike Geiger, CEO of the Association of Fundraising Professionals, has announced he is stepping down from the group at the end of the year. Geiger spoke with the Chronicle about his decision and what it means for the organization moving forward.
During his time at AFP, Geiger helped the organization get out of debt and provide relevant content for members. He is proud to note that a recent member survey found that nine out of 10 members agreed with the statements that AFP was a source of reliable information and that they were proud to be AFP members. So why leave now?
“I’m a big believer that CEOs shouldn’t stick around for too long,” Geiger says. For him, five to eight years feels like the sweet spot. Geiger, a CPA by training, says he was thrilled to dig into AFP’s finances, noting that when he joined, “AFP owed more money than it had.”
Geiger also worked to create an inclusive feeling within the association. Cherian Koshy, an AFP board member who has worked closely with Geiger, said he focused on shrinking the globe so AFP members in disparate parts of the country and world all felt part of the same community.
“We were all sort of disconnected but for our chapters,” Koshy says. “Now we’re really hyperconnected in lots of different ways through the fundraising profession. There was a lot of effort put into maintaining connections.”
Geiger says that was important. “The thing that really came out of the pandemic that we focused on was the concept of community,” he says. “Trying to make it small. It’s a large organization with members all over the place, but everybody wants to be a part of a community.”
The Road to a Smooth Transition
There are a few things an organization can do to make leadership transitions go well, says Glenn Tecker, a consultant who specializes in association leadership and has seen hundreds of leadership changeovers. He recommends that associations hire an outside search firm and have a strategic plan in place. That way the firm and board can seek someone with the skills to implement that plan. Without them, organizations “run the risk of picking someone on the basis of style rather than on the basis of competency,” Tecker says.
AFP seems to agree. The organization plans to hire a search firm and has a strategic plan that was approved and will go into effect on January 1, 2025.
Tecker says when the separation is amicable, as it is in this situation, it’s helpful to get input from the exiting CEO on what skills are necessary to excel at the job without involving that person directly in the hiring process.
Right now, that seems to be where Geiger is. He says he’s glad to help out wherever he can but will let the board take the lead on where it wants his input.
If the leadership transition is smooth, there typically isn’t a significant impact on members, Tecker says. With several months’ lead time and an amicable separation, transitions tend to go well.
What Lies Ahead
Looking back at his tenure, Geiger says he is proud of the work AFP has done on inclusion, diversity, equity, and access (IDEA), with the goal to help an organization that has been predominantly white bring in more fundraisers of color. Geiger says that even as many diversity initiatives generate controversy across the country, he doesn’t believe AFP will shy away from its IDEA goals as it moves forward with a new CEO.
“The challenge is going to be: What’s the pushback outside of AFP and how do we manage that?” he says. “How do we bring people with us? How do we continue that work that we’re doing?”
AFP plans to ask members for input on the search for a new CEO, although how that will happen hasn’t been finalized. Tecker says having members discuss “what they see as the appropriate and desirable future of the organization” and feeding that information into the search is typically helpful. He says it makes members feel involved and ensures the board doesn’t overlook a key component members find important in leadership.
Geiger says he’s content with his decision to step down.
“We are much stronger today than seven years ago,” he says. “That’s probably the thing that every CEO wants to be able to say. So I hope that the next CEO, when he or she leaves, AFP is even better than what it is today.”
