The Generosity Network: New Transformational Tools for Successful Fund-Raising

by Jennifer McCrea, Jeffrey C. Walker, Karl Weber

Overview

The Generosity Network is the essential guide to the art of activating resources of every kind behind any worthy cause. Philanthropist Jeff Walker and fund-raising expert Jennifer McCrea offer a fresh new perspective that can make the toughest challenges of nonprofit management and development less stressful, more rewarding—and even fun.    
            Walker and McCrea show how traditional pre-scripted, money-centered, goal-oriented fund-raising techniques lead to anxiety and failure, while open-spirited, curiosity-driven, person-to-person connections lead to discovery, growth—and often amazing results. Through engrossing personal stories, a wealth of innovative suggestions, and inspiring examples, they show nonprofit leaders how to build a community of engaged partners who share a common passion and are eager to provide the resources needed to change the world—not just money, but also time, talents, personal networks, creative thinking, public support, and all the other forms of social capital that often seem scanty yet are really abundant, waiting to be uncovered and mobilized. 
            Highly practical, motivating, and thought provoking, The Generosity Network is designed to energize and empower nonprofit leaders, managers, donors, board members, and other supporters. Whether you help run a multimillion-dollar global nonprofit or raise funds for a local scout troop, PTA, or other community organization, you’ll learn new approaches that will make your work more successful and enjoyable than ever.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780770437794
Publisher:	Harmony/Rodale
Publication date:	09/24/2013
Pages:	304
Sales rank:	925,918
Product dimensions:	6.20(w) x 9.30(h) x 1.00(d)

About the Author

Jeff Walker, former chairman of the global private equity fund CCMP Capital, serves on the boards of New Profit, Berklee College of Music, the Morgan Library, the Millennium Development Goals Health Alliance, and other nonprofits. He has been an executive-in-residence at Harvard Business School and a lecturer at Harvard Kennedy School for nonprofit leadership.
 
Jennifer McCrea, a twenty-five-year fund-raising veteran, is a Senior Research Fellow at the Hauser Center for Nonprofit Organizations at Harvard University, where she leads the course in exponential fund-raising. She has worked with a diverse group of nonprofit organizations, including Millennium Promise, Acumen Fund, DonorsChoose.org, Grameen America, Teach for America, and many others. 
           
Karl Weber is a writer and editor, specializing in topics from business and social issues.

Read an Excerpt

Introduction 

Read this First

The Generosity Network is for all those who are deeply committed to a cause and want to attract others to join them in partnership. That includes those charged with raising funds and attracting resources of other kinds for charities, nonprofit organizations, foundations, universities, hospitals, and many other worthy causes. It includes anyone who works in one of the 1.8 million organizations that make up America’s nonprofit sector, or the 10 million nonprofits around the globe, since virtually all of those associated with nonprofit organizations have important roles to play in attracting the support (financial and otherwise) of people they come in contact with. 

It also includes the millions of Americans who devote part of their time to a favorite organization or cause, whether it’s a local charity; a church, synagogue, temple, or mosque; a beloved alma mater; an artistic or cultural institution; a service organization; or the community PTA, Girl or Boy Scouts, Little League, or library. 

For all these readers, this book will provide ideas, tools, techniques, and approaches that will make attracting and working with partners easier, more effective, and more fun (for some samples, see the list on pages 6–7). Not only will you be able to raise more money than ever before, you’ll also succeed in attracting more resources of every kind—including time, talent, connections, and institutional support. And this in turn will make it easier for you to achieve your organization’s goals, bringing personal and social benefits to everyone you touch.


Eleven of the Secrets You'll Learn by reading The Generosity Network

1. Why reshaping your relationships from the transactional to the transformative is the crucial secret to creating generous, long-term connections.

2. Why the jazz band is a powerful metaphor for a nonprofit organization and its partners—and the simple steps you can take to build your own band (and produce some truly amazing music).

3. How to identify the psychological and spiritual obstacles that are keeping you from being an effective fund-raiser—and how to overcome them, once and for all.

4. How to conduct a first meeting with a potential donor that moves from “that was nice” to building a deep and growing relationship—a totally new approach to connecting with people who can help any organization build an impressive roster of partners.

5. Straightforward, little-known methods to defang the monster most dreaded by every nonprofit fund-raiser: The Ask.

6. How small, inexpensive dinner events can spark more partnerships—and yield greater long-term financial benefits—than the traditional fund-raising gala.

7. How a trip around the world—or around the corner—can transform an indifferent acquaintance into a passionate lifetime partner.

8. Direct from your favorite video game: how avatars are forging profound, real-time links between nonprofit organizations and partners halfway around the world. 

9. Specific steps you can take to turn a disengaged board into an energized source of ideas, talent, networking links, and financial support.

10. How today’s social media and technology tools can help even the smallest organization create personalized connections with enthusiastic supporters from around the block—or around the globe.

11. The most powerful and effective communication tools you can use to connect with partners—and the horrific language and messaging turn-offs you’ve probably committed.


Know Yourself,
Know Others,
Know How to Ask

First, a word about the overall approach and perspective of this book.

There are dozens of books about nonprofit fund-raising. Many are interesting and well-written, offering tips and techniques that we’re sure have proven useful to numerous readers. But there’s a significant gap in the fund-raising literature that we aim to fill. Practically all the existing books are strictly transactional in their orientation. They treat fund-raising as a branch of salesmanship and so focus on strategies and tactics analogous to those used by salespeople. The goal: to close the deal, which in this case means to get a check from the donor.

We find this view of fund-raising woefully inadequate—and ultimately ineffective. We believe true success in the nonprofit sphere requires a complete shift in the way we think about fund-raising, from the transactional to the transformative.

The traditional approach to fund-raising is one of the main reasons why most of us in the nonprofit world think of fund-raising as a necessary evil—something separate from the mission of our organizations, something to endure for the sake of a greater vision of the world in which we want to live.

But when it’s viewed properly, fund-raising is not a necessary evil. It’s sacred work, a beautiful practice characterized at its best by compassion, joy, commitment, and partnership.

It grows from the core conviction that we all want to make a difference with our lives and that, with the unique resources we each have to offer, we can tackle some of our planet’s biggest challenges and opportunities. There is beauty in that conviction and in the prospect of living our lives in accordance with it.

Part of the reason for our misunderstanding lies in the very word fund-raising, which places the spotlight on money alone. And while of course money is a critically valuable resource in the good work we all seek to do, there are other resources that are equally underactivated: time, creativity, networks of relationships. The Generosity Network uses the broadest possible definition of fund-raising, referring to the activation of all resources in support of worthy goals, projects, organizations, and visions.

There are other common ways of thinking about fund-raising that blur reality and hamper our effectiveness. One is to talk about it in terms of “asking for help.”

That’s the language of dependence. It transforms the fundraiser into a supplicant on bended knee, seeking assistance in a world of scanty resources from a wealthier, more powerful donor.

In The Generosity Network, we invite you to shift from “asking for help” to exploring how all of us can work together in pursuit of a common vision using the unique resources we each have to offer. When we think in those terms, we soon find that the sense of dependence and scarcity disappears. Instead, we discover that we are living in a world of abundant resources, and that we are simply waiting for a team of partners to arrive who will call upon the floodgates to open.

So this is not just another book about how to be a more persuasive salesperson, another book about tactics and strategies for more effective fund-raising, or even another book about how to find and tap into your donors’ passions. Our message is a new one: True generosity is rooted in relatedness. Fund-raising is, above all, a form of connection. And the greatest gift we bring to our partners is not just the chance to support important work, but rather the opportunity to join and build a community of people who are joyfully discovering their unique gifts and applying those gifts to meet specific challenges. That’s how we really move the needle on the most urgent challenges of our time.

Table of Contents

Foreword: Love in Action by Deepak Chopra 1

Introduction: Read This First 5

Part 1 Giving, Getting, Growing

1 The No "Other" Way

The Radical Transformation at the Heart of Generosity 19

2 Connecting Through Narrative

The Power of Your Story 43

3 Building the Band

Creating Community Around a Cause 67

4 The Care and Feeding of the Band

Enriching Your Relationships with Your Team Members 97

5 It's Not About the Money

From Transaction to Transformation 123

Part 2 Fund-Raising as the Art of Connection

6 The All-Important First Meeting 155

7 The Ask

Wrong and Right Ways to Say "Join Us" 171

8 The Jeffersonian Dinner and Other Community-Building Tools 193

9 Tapping the Power of the Avatar

You Become the Other 225

10 Building an Empowered, Collaborative Board

Turning an Underused Resource into a Source of Strength 237

Epilogue

What Does Success Look Like? 273

Recommended Resources 277

Exponential Fundraising Participants 279

Index 281

Editorial Reviews

This is a brave and important book, a book that dares to turn fund-raising from ‘us and them’ into ‘us.’ I hope everyone who cares about a worthy cause will read these ideas and put them into action.”
Seth Godin
Author of The Icarus Deception


"For everyone who seeks true partnership with others, The Generosity Network has lessons on the practice of relationship, dialogue, and the deep connections that energize people and communities to turn visions and passion into reality and results."
 
Scott Kriens 
Chairman, Juniper Networks 
Director, 1440 Foundation
 
 
“For decades, Jennifer McCrea and Jeff Walker have been guiding and advising the leaders of many of today’s most effective nonprofit organizations (including mine), in fields ranging from poverty relief and education reform to healthcare, the arts, and the environment—with truly impressive results.  What a blessing that they’re now making that same wealth of insight available to all of us through The Generosity Network.”
 
Quincy Jones
Musician, composer, producer, arranger, conductor
 
 
 “No one knows the art of fundraising, from both sides of the table, like Jennifer McCrea and Jeff Walker.  In a time that demands new thinking and innovative approaches to fundraising, I’m delighted they’ve now made their unparalleled wisdom and call to action available in the form of this wonderful, invaluable book that promises to transform what it means to be a nonprofit leader and partner."

Teri Schwartz
Dean, UCLA School of Theater, Film and Television
 
 
"Like strong and caring friends, Jennifer and Jeffrey encourage us to look inside ourselves, ask the tough, deep questions that reveal our limiting thoughts, beliefs and habits and then give us wise and practical counsel on how to change course. Be courageous enough to trod this internal trail and you will unleash your own potential, transform your organization and change the world."
 
U.S. Congressman Timothy Ryan
 
 
“Of the many important insights this book brings to fund-raising, the most important is that networks undergird all social undertakings, and along networks flow talent, connections, wisdom – and funds.  This book is about successful organizations, and the different forms of success, including fund-raising, reinforce one another.”
 
Teresa A. Sullivan
President, University of Virginia
 
 
“In today’s troubled world, the work of nonprofit organizations is more urgent than ever.  That’s why the ideas in The Generosity Network are so important.  Whether you mission is to save the planet—or just make your little corner of it a whole lot better—you can’t afford to ignore this marvelous new book.”
 
Goldie Hawn
Academy Award winning actress and producer,
Founder of the Hawn Foundation
 
 
"Jennifer McCrea is a force of nature and one of the few people I know that actually enjoys asking people for money. She and Jeff Walker have provided an incredibly rich and valuable resource for those out there struggling to raise money for important causes." 
 
Scott Harrison
Founder and CEO, Charity Water
 
 
“Along with Sex and Religion, Money is one of the Great Unmentionables. It makes people nervous and brings up visions of power, property, and ownership, and all the crud around it makes raising money especially difficult. This book teaches us how to lighten up, to peel away all that scuzz from both ourselves and the job in hand.  Connecting people for a higher goal turns a fundraiser into a dating agency for world changers.  It's wonderful to see, in a world full of horrors, that compassion and generosity have found such effective allies as Jennifer and Jeff . . . !”
 
Peter Gabriel
Musician
 
 
"Jennifer and Jeff have captured the great joy of fundraising.  Their book will prove to be inspirational to many volunteers and staff."
 
Suzanne Helm, Vice President of Development, Council on Foreign Relations
 
 
“No one knows the art of fundraising, from both sides of the table, like Jennifer McCrea and Jeff Walker.  They have personally guided me through this process and this book only adds to the wealth of knowledge they have shared with me over the years. I’m delighted they've now made their unparalleled wisdom available in the form of this wonderful, invaluable book.”
 
Barbara Bush, CEO, Global Health Corps
 
 
“So heartened to see these true fundraising sages sharing their distinctive approaches with a wider audience. Three elements make The Generosity Network remarkable: the core partnership approach (we’ve all heard it, but they embody it); the importance of genuine self-reflection regarding your own attitudes about money, wealth, and giving before soliciting others (which nobody talks about and is such a fundamental and enlightened starting place); and the spiritual element to fundraising (which is central to all real giving).  I’m not only a better fundraiser, but a far better person from having learned from them.” 
 
Laurence Jahns, Senior VP Advancement, Robin Hood Foundation
 
 
"Jennifer McCrea and Jeff Walker have written a seminal new chapter in the history of the fundraising profession. The Generosity Network exponentially broadens the dynamic range of the profession. It will make fundraisers weep with ecstasy at being understood. It will transform the entire way those looking to hire them think about what they should be looking for. It elevates the profession from the province of begging to realms of joy and artistry.  Why should tech entrepreneurs be the ones having all the fun? Is it possible that raising the funds to end malaria or cure breast cancer could be every bit as fulfilling as building the first electric car company? The possibility has never before been considered. It has now."
 
Dan Pallotta, author, Uncharitable

From the Publisher