Your Nonprofit’s 360Win

Chapter 5 “R” S.T.O.R.I.E.S. Step R= Regular Reviews (i.e., Your Strategy Sessions) are a Recipe for Results “Now that you’ve learned about and worked with peak stories, this chapter will guide you in holding Donor Engagement Strategy Sessions. Strategy sessions are where you review your top donors or prospects and reflect together on peak story-related ways to move them up the spiral and closer to your organization. **If you don’t have enough information about many of your donors, you might consider holding a “Prospect Review Session” before you conduct a strategy session. See further along in this chapter for more information. Even though we generally refer to donors/prospects in this chapter, if you are focused on engaging another type of role, person, or stakeholder group, you could substitute them for “donor.” Examples might be: • board chair prospects • board member or committee chair prospects • emerging leaders • potential partners (other organizations or funders, for example) • potential new group of program participants • under-represented populations to recruit for staff • under-represented populations to cultivate for donors or • under-represented populations to cultivate for board The wisdom of strategy sessions Regular strategy sessions help you move prospects/donors towards their first or next major gift or planned gift because the sessions support you in discussing, taking action on, and following up on customized major donor plans. How confident would you be if you knew you had an organized, strategic, customized, and supported approach to your major donor work? Would knowing this help motivate you to put regular time into it, to make it a habit, even though keeping regular time open for this can be very challenging? Effective major donor work does require some of the same things that any successful long-term project work requires. It is a unique kind of work, and you are courageous to take it on. The time we spend in major donor work is time spent ensuring the future for your program participants, members, attendees, and your organization as a whole. When we do our major donor work, it helps if we are both organized and strategic about it. We want to get the work done in a way that creates the most promising path forward by leveraging all available resources. Resources include information, time, energy, money, and organizational support. We want to use the information we have about the donor, combined with the information we have about ourselves and our organization to create a customized plan and next steps for our top donors. This requires investing time on a regular basis to keep the momentum up. The more organized we are, the easier it is to actually do this process. If we have the most recent information on interactions with donors, have a regularly scheduled strategy meeting time, and have the involvement and support of others (such as those in our organization involved directly in fundraising or in marketing, communications, or outreach), we are well set up to make significant progress on our major donor relationship building plans. The Relationship-Building for Prosperity model with the Donor Engagement Strategy Session Guide are a user-friendly framework for organization, strategy, customization and support. But that’s not all it takes to make progress on major donor fundraising goals. It takes creating a habit. Major gifts work is a long-term creative effort which can compete against the many urgent priorities coming at staff daily. So, how do you handle fitting in time for the important long-term work that needs to be done, along with having time for daily and/or urgent priorities? This is the ongoing tension that we all must resolve. I’m having the same issue writing this book! Writing a book is a long-term project, but working with clients, preparing proposals, marketing and networking, responding to inquiries, and paying bills are short-term priorities. The way I’ve found to balance these out (which isn’t perfect but works 80-90% of the time) is to schedule an actual time that is only for the purpose of writing, join with others who have similar goals (for accountability), and follow through by using that time for that purpose with others, thereby creating a habit of how that time is employed, to the point where it feels uncomfortable NOT to do it. The only way to make progress is to start! And then, adjust as needed. Above, I mentioned another important piece of the strategy session habit: accountability! I also mention accountability in the ART section in Chapter 4 under Tips: “How to get more of your top priorities done.” Working with Others on Strategy, with Accountability Support In Chapter 6, I talk more about a donor strategy group I helped to create earlier in my career. Over time, from experience with that group, I realized how helpful it was to work together with other people on donor strategy because it can sometimes be very challenging to make the time to do the work, get inspired, and reach around obstacles on one’s own. I noticed that other people have fresh ideas because they aren’t as embedded in the situation as I am. The experience of working with a group on donor strategy, plus many years of coaching organizational teams and groups of leaders on donor strategy led me to launch an online group coaching program using the Donor Strategy Guide detailed below. I’ve seen that people are more likely to follow through on action when they feel inspired by the good support of others to help them focus, realize possibilities, and remember their own values and strengths. Support to take action is especially effective when it includes accountability. The power of accountability support is confirmed in research. It can help us achieve our goals—especially challenging goals like raising funds from major donors for worthwhile projects! (Or writing a book like this!) I’ve made more progress on my book since I joined a writing group and set up completion deadlines with an accountability partner.”