For new fundraisers, asking individuals for donations face to face can be daunting, nerve-wracking, and uncomfortable. Inspired by Marc Pittman’s account of his first experiences as a fundraiser, The Chronicle talked with other veteran fundraisers about their first experiences asking donors for big gifts and what they’ve learned since then. Despite an initial lack of comfort, these experts agree that time and practice can make interactions with donors feel far more natural.
Scott G. Nichols, senior vice president of development and alumni relations at Boston University
An early experience: Scott Nichols brought a volunteer along to ask a prospect for $5,000 for a Bucknell University campaign. They sat down for lunch at an upscale restaurant, and the prospect immediately turned to the volunteer and said, “Let me cut to the chase, I’m going to give whatever you gave.” “I was gobsmacked,” Mr. Nichols recalls. “I remember thinking: Whoa, wait a minute. We didn’t even get an appetizer and we’re right at the bottom line!” According to Mr. Nichols, the prospect then asked the volunteer, “How much did you give?” And the volunteer responded “$5,000.” “Then that’s what I’ll give,” the donor replied.
Later wisdom: “That was such a cogent lesson in peer solicitation,” says Mr. Nichols. “It supports the old fundraising rubric that if you want to raise a million dollars, send a million-dollar donor to ask a million-dollar prospect.” While volunteer solicitors are less common today, putting more of the burden on staff, Mr. Nichols says, he learned the importance of being a good matchmaker. “It had nothing to do with me, the development officer, aside from matching up the donor and the prospect,” he says.
Mary Nemerov, chief advancement officer at the Sierra Club
An early experience: For her first big ask, Mary Nemerov recalls, she put on a nice dress and met the prospect at the construction site where his new office was being built. “It was literally just a pile of metal,” she says. “I remember propping myself up on the edge of the construction area.” She was nervous going into the meeting, but the unusual environment proved to be an advantage. “It was so bizarre that I just went for it,” she says.
Later wisdom: “I think of the best donor meetings I’ve ever had — and the crazier the environment, sometimes the better the meeting.” In this case the donor was in control and at ease, and the environment also provided a lot to talk about. He was proud and excited about the space, which made it much easier to talk to him. “Sometimes sitting knee to knee in a small office over a little table actually makes donors uncomfortable,” Ms. Nemerov says. “Meet the donor in their element.”
Don Souhrada, vice president, Ter Molen Watkins & Brandt, a fundraising consulting firm in Chicago
An early experience: After supervising student fundraisers at Indiana University, Mr. Souhrada moved to Butler University, where he made his first face-to-face solicitation with a scientist at Eli Lilly. “I felt like I had something to prove,” he says. “I was very anxious.” The conversation flowed easily for most of an hour, but he struggled to make the ask. With about three minutes left, the prospect looked at his watch and said, “I’m going to need to get going.” So Mr. Souhrada blurted out a request, asking if the prospect would join the Ovid Butler Society, which started with a $1,000 donation. “For me to bring this up, literally as he said that he needed to leave, was very awkward, and certainly didn’t put me in great place to secure a gift,” he says. The donor was uncomfortable and wanted to escape because he saw Mr. Souhrada struggling, he recalls.
Later wisdom: Eventually Mr. Souhrada realized he was thinking about these face-to-face solicitations the wrong way. “I had to go back to the way I would train a student,” he says: Build rapport, express reasons to give, make an ask, listen to any objections, deal with the objections, make a smooth transition to another ask. “You have to think a few steps ahead to where you want to take the conversation.” If the fundraiser is listening to the prospect and thinking about how to proceed, Mr. Souhrada says, “you will make the opportunity to present the ask.”
Scott Justvig, executive director of development and communications for the Salvation Army’s Chicago Metropolitan Region
An early experience: In his mid-20s, Scott Justvig worked as a planned-giving fundraiser for the Salvation Army in Indianapolis. At an initial donor meeting, he was too conservative with the amount he requested. In return, the donor was blunt. He said, “Scott, you should not have come to see me,” Mr. Justvig recalls. “The most important thing that I have is my time, and I’ve given you my time because you said you have something of urgency for the Salvation Army that I needed to be involved in. You came and asked me for a gift that people who work for me have the authority to commit. Next time, ask me for a gift that is worthy of my time and support.”
When he stopped offering donors a litany of statistics and started showing them how their giving could make a difference, he started getting larger gift commitments.
Later wisdom: “I learned to do a better job of matching the request with the resources of the donor and the inclination of the donor,” he says. “It’s not necessarily the end of the world to ask the donor for more money than you might think.” And as Mr. Justvig reached the point of making his own charitable donations, he realized how important it was that his gifts make a difference to the organization. “It’s not about giving the gift, it’s about making the impact,” he says. When he stopped offering donors a litany of statistics and started showing them how their giving could make a difference, he started getting larger gift commitments.
Drew Wynn, senior director of emerging major gifts, stewardship, and foundations at the Humane Society of the United States
An early experience: In the 1980s, while working for a legal advocacy organization called the Bazelon Center for Mental Health Law, Mr. Wynn went along with his executive director to discuss an ask that had already been put forth through a proposal. Mr. Wynn had made the decision to “come in low,” asking the leader of a major charitable trust for $35,000. The donor asked Mr. Wynn, “Why are you asking for $35,000?” He responded, “You don’t really know us as well as you might to make a larger investment.” The donor replied, “We’ll give you $60,000.”
Later wisdom: That conversation three decades ago, Mr. Wynn recalls, was framed in the context of what the nonprofit could accomplish, rather than in terms of what the donor wanted to see accomplished with the gift. The donor was “really interested in the work and interested in being philanthropic,” he says. By contrast, many donors today have different expectations for their gifts, and good fundraisers must adapt their approach, he says. Donors often want organizations to do something specific with their money, as if the philanthropy were an enterprise in which they’ve bought stock. “A lot of the conversation with donors is about investment and partnership and negotiating impact and outcome of the gift,” he says. “It’s more about the deal.” What’s less common now, he’s found, is a successful appeal to a donor’s philanthropic interest.
Julie Parr, senior director of development at the Yale Cancer Center at Yale University
An early experience: At the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, Julie Parr’s first assignment was to encourage alumni to give $125,000 during a five-year period in honor of their reunion. Her first solo visit occurred just two weeks into the job. She asked someone who was attending a 15th reunion to give $125,000 — a bigger ask than any she had made before. The donor said yes. “I was very surprised and encouraged and gained a lot of confidence,” Ms. Parr says. “What felt scary became less scary after I got that positive feedback.”
Later wisdom: Although that first experience made fundraising seem easy, “I now know that it’s actually not,” says Ms. Parr. Young fundraisers are often under the impression that the ask alone leads to a gift, she says. That’s generally not the case. “The good feelings, the warm-and-fuzzies that an alumnus or a patient has, that’s engendered over a lifetime relationship and is what makes the person want to give,” says Ms. Parr. “Any gift of substance, whether it’s a $1,000, $1 million, or $10 million” requires “a lot of thought, heart, and feeling.” Establishing the connection between the donor and the organization, she says, is “a cooperative effort among many people — gift officers, doctors, members, sometimes other alumni, students. All of these forces come together in the best cases of philanthropy.”
