"Have to..." burns up a lot of energy, money, and time. "Want to..." generates limitless resources. "Have to..." waits until the last minute to do something and then only to get it over with. "Want to..." can't wait to take action. "Have to..." gives as little as it possibly can. "Want to..." always wants to give more than it reasonably can. "Have to..." hates to see you coming and eventually stops coming around. "Want to..." always shows up and wants to know about next time.

This post is part of my year-fundraising series. This fall, you can follow along here to receive training and tools that will help you launch your own year-end fundraising campaign. The lessons I'm offering are best for small nonprofits (five or fewer employees). Ready for an amazing and successful Giving Season? Rock 'n' roll. If you’re following along with the Merry Year-End Fundraising program, you now know: With whom you need to communicate (partners, friends, acquaintanc

This post is part of my year-fundraising series. This fall, you can follow along here to receive training and tools that will help you launch a year-end fundraising campaign by October 1. The lessons I'm offering are best for small nonprofits (five or fewer employees). Ready for an amazing and successful Giving Season? Rock 'n' roll. You don’t have a year-end fundraising campaign unless you have a goal. The right goal is the “X” on the map that leads to buried treasure. The w

This post is part of my year-fundraising series. This fall, you can follow along here to receive training and tools that will help you launch a year-end fundraising campaign by October 1. The lessons I'm offering are best for small nonprofits (five or fewer employees). Ready for an amazing and successful Giving Season? Rock 'n' roll. I’m sorry. I made the mistake of thinking I could keep working on my year-end fundraising series while on family vacation. I should have known b

This is the second post in my year-end fundraising series. In August and September, you can follow along here to receive training and tools that will help you launch a year-end fundraising campaign by October 1. The lessons I'm offering are best for small nonprofits (five or fewer employees). Ready for an amazing and successful Giving Season? Rock 'n' roll. If you read the first post of my Merry Year-End Fundraising program, you’re making a list of people who care about you,

This is the first post in my year-end fundraising series. In August and September, you can follow along here to receive training and tools that will help you launch a year-end fundraising campaign by October 1. The lessons I'm offering are best for small nonprofits (five or fewer employees). Ready for an amazing and successful Giving Season? Rock 'n' roll. Let's start here: I don't want your year-end fundraising to just "get by." I want more for you than just a successful yea

This is embarrassing. Back in college, Friday nights were a big deal to me. Something fun was happening somewhere and my mission to find it started around Tuesday. Now, here's the embarrassing truth: What was happening on Friday night was not nearly as important to me as with whom. That meant getting the "coolest" kids to invite me to hang out with them. SMH. I developed a little system I used each week to get with the coolest crowd on Friday night. I called it "keeping my op

In the United States, there are 1,571,056 nonprofit organizations. That's one nonprofit for every 202 people who live in the United States. This year, about one out of every four U.S. residents will volunteer at one of those nonprofits. Friend, if you're leading one of those nonprofits, I hope you see just how influential you can be. Most of the time when we talk about nonprofits, we talk about the difference they make in the lives of the people their programs serve. We talk