The Good Steward

While reading this New York Times article about ghostwriting for celebrity cookbooks last month, it made me think about how fundraisers spend their careers writing in the voice of their organizations and its leaders.  Now I don’t think that we require the same sort of acknowledgment as book ghostwriters, but I wanted to draw attention [...]

Greetings from Toronto Pearson International Airport!  As I write this, I’m waiting for my connecting flight to get to the AFP International Fundraising Conference in Vancouver.  Since the airport has free wi-fi — I knew that I could trust my neighbors to the north — I can share this with you in reasonable real time. [...]

As I write, I am preparing for the 2012 Association of Fundraising Professionals International Conference in Vancouver, Canada.  I am proud to be one the AFPeeps, a group of fundraisers who are helping provide social media coverage of the conference and some short training sessions for the attendees. I will be live-tweeting and live-blogging from [...]

After attending the Association of Donor Relations Professionals New York City Regional Workshop last Friday, I am feeling a bit refreshed and full of new ideas to try in the next year.  It’s one of my favorite times of the year, as the conference season is getting under way.  I say it all the time [...]

Earlier this month, I participated in a special online chat sponsored by #fundchat (a weekly Twitter chat for fundraising professionals — which you should take part in if you are on Twitter!) on the topic of “Capitalizing on Capital Campaigns.”  Special guests Ian Adair and Nathan Hand shared their insights on the full gamut of [...]

As National Mentoring Month 2012 draws to a close, I wanted to profile a young fundraiser that I have been mentoring.  I have had the pleasure of knowing Leticia John for probably about three years or so.  Leticia is the Development Officer at The Whitby School in Greenwich, Connecticut, with prior experiences at Iona College, [...]

Since January is National Mentoring Month, I wanted to take this opportunity to profile one of my fundraising mentors, Michele Minter, the former Vice President of Development at The College Board and former Director of Development at Princeton University.  Michele is currently working as the Vice Provost for Institutional Equity & Diversity at Princeton.  I [...]

While looking through Lynne Wester’s website last year, I came across a sample donor survey that she used and this inspired me to integrate these surveys into my stewardship efforts.  As a result, I included a survey and return envelope with the annual President’s Report to Donors (which went out in hard copy and via [...]

Happy New Year TGS Readers!  I hope that your new year is off to a great start; mine has been very busy and chock full of experiences that are leading to plenty of new ideas to share with you this year. I cannot come into 2012 without thanking you for affirming me by reading this [...]

As my fellow Americans are coming off of the Thanksgiving holiday, I thought it would be a good time to share a few ways to be more impactful in how you thank your donors.  To be clear, I see saying thank you as something that is not done only once after a gift is made, [...]