At the risk of sounding like the father in My Big Fat Greek Wedding, the roots of the word “Philanthropy” come from the ancient Greek. “Philanthropy etymologically means ‘the love of humanity’ – love in the sense of caring for, nourishing, developing, or enhancing; humanity in the sense of ‘what it is to be human,’ … Read more
We’ve all seen it happen – an individual or organization in desperate shape, entirely out of options, when a seeming miracle occurs. A check in the mail. An invitation to speak. A long-forgotten friend calling to say, “I’ve been thinking about you.” We hear all sorts of explanations. The universe conspiring on our behalf. God’s … Read more
In December of last year, we made the last minute decision to do a year-end fundraising campaign for the very new organization that is Creating the Future. In the spirit of transparent engagement, we promised to share what would normally be kept secret – everything we learned from that campaign. That is what this post … Read more
“Money is a limited resource. We can’t fund everyone.” Those few words encompass the most insidious assumption at the heart of competitive grant-making and competitive fundraising. The “reality” created by that assumption is the source of all the fear and the overwhelming sense of scarcity that undergird this work, everywhere around the world. For years … Read more
The first-ever, last-minute, Creating the Future year-end appeal is now officially over. Yes, if you still want to give, your funds will be hugely appreciated. But we have stopped the fireworks, the tweeting, the videos, the letters. We have declared victory, with just $1,000 in the bank from this campaign. No, that is nowhere close … Read more
Our open, transparent year-end appeal is happening! As of this morning, we had topped $1,000 in our last-minute appeal. We are excited! Our commitment has been to share our strategy, our targets, our goals and our progress. And while I blogged our goals and budget last week, we are learning that doing a campaign with … Read more
Fundraising – the place where everyone feels they have to hide, work competitively, and whatever they do, NOT to share what they learn (lest they lose their competitive advantage!). Well I guess we will just see if that is the case! As we announced last week, we will be doing our year-end fundraising appeal entirely … Read more
I thought it was going to be easy. Yes, I know, famous last words, but I really did. In a post early last week, I asked whether or not we should do a year-end fundraising appeal. We received many responses to that post (sadly, most of those responses were off-line – what is it about … Read more
As I noted in yesterday’s post, Dimitri’s and my decision to immediately begin running Creating the Future full time means we need to start fundraising, and fast! (Truth is we probably needed to start fundraising months ago, but starting now will just have to do…) And so, given that it’s the end of the … Read more
An organization Dimitri and I love is about to die. Everyone says it is a casualty of the economy. We know that is not true. Even when times were good, the ABC Group was struggling. And so five years ago, when we were teaching an earlier version of our “Building Engaged Support for Your Mission” … Read more