 Thanks for joining us for another episode of The Nonprofit Show. I'm Julia Patrick joined today by Jack Nacho Alotto, CFRE, one of the rock star trainers with Fundraising Academy. Fundraising Academy is super generous. They give us one of their talents every Friday to go over questions that come in throughout the world with people talking about the nonprofit sector, the ecosystem of it, problems they might be having. Sometimes it's a head shaker. Sometimes we don't agree on the answer. Sometimes as Jack said, you know, we might not have the right answer and that's okay. So we want to welcome you. We also want to welcome all of our sponsors once again, everyone from Bloomerang, American Nonprofit Academy, your part-time controller, be generous, Fundraising Academy at National University, Staffing Boutique, Nonprofit Thought Leader, and Nonprofit Nerd. If you would like to get to any of our archives, you can find us on Roku, YouTube, Amazon Fire TV, and Vimeo. You can also listen to us on podcasts wherever you like to stream your content. This is something that our intrepid executive producer Kevin Pace started for us this year. It's really fun and super exciting. So again, we can accompany you wherever you may be on podcast format. Okay, Jackalotto, I'm super excited to have you because I always am so intrigued by the things that you say and the things that you answer. Let's get going. Devin from Atlanta, Georgia writes in, While we did our 2023 strategic plan with goals back in October, good job starting early, we did not really create a method for tracking them with the board. Do you have any suggestions? Yeah, my first suggestion is your strategic plan is incomplete. Without a tracking mechanism, there's no accountability, there's no timeline, there's no who's responsible for what. So I would pull that strategic plan out and complete it. Accountability, when you start tracking your goals, am I achieving my programmatic goals or my fundraising goals, whatever, that brings accountability. And accountability is one of the most important things we do as fundraisers, as nonprofit leaders. So you got to pull that back out and take a look at that and add that tracking mechanism, that accountability mechanism to that strategic plan. You know, Devin, it sounds to me like you did your goals. And I love, Jack, what you said that accountability in measurements needs to be a part of a strategic plan. And goals in a strategic plan are two different, they go together, but they're two very different things. I've been on boards where, and you specifically write, create a method for tracking them with the board. If you have a board portal, this is really easy because that can always be front and center. It can even be on a dashboard. So every time your board members go in to that portal, they'll see it. But back in the day, I mean, I've been on many boards where they started every meeting with a giant like 11 by 17 printoff of what, you know, the metrics were and passed it around for everyone to see and to report on and to understand with a strategic champion. You know, from the board that's not shaming anyone necessarily. That technique, I, you know, what that example you just gave, Julie, is perfect because then it creates a culture of accountability. Yeah. And that's really important for nonprofit organizations. The accountability is not just for staff or fundraisers or social workers who are working in programs. It's everyone, including the board. Yeah, I agree. And, and I think sometimes what happens is, you know, the board does this heavy lift and then they walk away and they're like, Oh yeah, that's right. And at the end of the year, it's like, we did it or we didn't. And yet the staff is having to deal with this every day. Hopefully they're working in concert on this as well. Right. And that track, when you have, when you're tracking your goals, and if you're not meeting your goals, think about the collective wisdom that can come with meeting that challenge that you're having in achieving your goals. When your board is involved and say, Hey, well, maybe we should pivot here or do this or the ideas that collective cauldron of ideas may help you really start to really get on track again. Right. Right. And I think, you know, we all can agree that when you have a goal or when you have the strategic plan, it just makes for better management, better systems. It's tough, and it can be hard and frustrating. But shoot, if you don't know where you're going, you're just going everywhere, right? That's right. That's strategic plans, fundraising plans, any plans whatsoever. That's a tool of management. You manage your organization based on those plans. And when you're not meeting those plans, that's that tracking part of the question that Devin asked us. Yeah. Devin from Atlanta, Georgia, I hope this helped you because I think you're like what Jack said, you're there, but you need to go back because you're not quite there, there, right? So good luck to you, my friend. Hey, Sammy from Ithaca, New York. It just makes me feel cold to say Ithaca, New York. Cornell, Cornell. Cold Cornell. Yes. Sammy writes, we're seeing more board members joining a lot of other boards. This is an interesting question. Do you think there should be a limit? Of course, we would start this policy in 2024 to make sure everyone is aware of this in advance. I got to say, I work with an organization in my community. It's a chapter of a very large organization and they do not allow their senior, like their board chair and their board chair elect. And I think like one other, I can't remember who it is, one other job description to be on any other executive committees or higher level boards during their tenure. Yeah, I've heard this. I think the key here is to have board members sign a confidentiality agreement. Yeah. Maybe you're a board junkie and you have to be on the ballet, the opera, St. Vincent Paul, Jewish community and family service. You want to be on all of them because you really care about your community. Here's the thing. When you sign that confidentiality agreement, you cannot share donor information from one organization to another. You cannot say, hey, I'm on the board of the ballet and I just see that Julia Patrick gave us $10,000. Maybe you should be asking Julia Patrick for $10,000. That's a no-no. And a confidentiality agreement must be signed. Here's the other thing, to protect our clients. I've served on boards of organizations that are working with marginalized communities. I had to sign a confidentiality agreement that I would not share the names of individuals who are benefiting from services or clients of the organization. It's just not good to do that. Right. To me, Sammy, Jack, what you just said is really magical because it kind of goes back to board policies, but also board education and just letting people know this is a practice that we assume this is a standard that we maintain. And yeah, we need to kind of be thoughtful about that because it's a tough thing. And I'm all for understanding what those policies and measurements are. I mean, if you worked in the for-profit world, you would know that if, let's say, for example, your company is doing research or product development, you can't share that. Right. And that's kind of what's going on in the nonprofit sector. Right. Yeah. I think we need to be- And you know the other problem that happens when somebody serves on a lot of boards, they're going to go to board A and they're going to come back to you and say, you know, I'm on the board of the ballet and we have this fabulous thing that we're doing. And I think we should do it here. Sometimes that's a good thing, but sometimes that's a bad thing. You know, there's not always that crossover between the good policies or procedures at one organization to another doesn't always transfer. So your staff is going to- Sammy, is going to be dealing with those good ideas, the good idea that we found out on XYZ board. Right. Yeah. It's an interesting thing. I think one of the things that we're seeing is we're seeing people age off of boards. We're trying to build more board diversity. So I mean, there's an opportunity here to get new voices and new types of people. And at the same time, we have a shrinking pool. And so I think it's not, it's something we're going to be seeing more and more of people being on multiple boards because we just haven't been able to cultivate or we haven't thoughtfully cultivated this next gen leadership of board leadership. So it's kind of like one of those dicey times that you kind of need to understand. Devin, or excuse me, Sammy, before we move on to our next question. Yay team and understanding that if you're going to launch a policy, you launch it out, you let everybody become comfortable and then you do a time set so everybody knows when it starts. The thing about any policy you make for the board, whether it's this one or anything else, you have to give the rationale why you're doing it. And when you give that rationale, you're going to define the parameters of why you have this policy. And maybe you don't need the policy, just define the parameters. These are our expectations. Maybe it should be in your board job descriptions, whatever that is. So there are lots of ways around this without having a strict policy of you cannot serve on any other boards. Yeah. Yeah. I love you. I love that idea too. Putting it in your guidelines and maybe not your policies. Yeah, that's a cool, that's a cool idea. Okay, Sammy, I hope this helped you and I hope you warm up. Richard from Houston, Texas writes in, we're trying to recruit higher new talent into our development team. It has been suggested that we offer to pay for CFRE accreditation as an incentive. Do you think this is a perilous idea? Oh, I think it's a great idea. And you know, Julian, last week, one of the things we talked about looking towards 2023, one of the big issues you talked about was staff retention. Yeah. You want to retain your staff? It's not only just the CFRE, it's giving them the time to come every day at 9 a.m. Pacific time to the nonprofit show. It's enrolling them in the fundraising academy. It's letting them watch webinars. It's paying for their CFRE application. Staff development is a key to retention, just keeping staff. You want to keep them, then give them professional development. So, Jack, what would it be, what would be the approximate cost for a nonprofit to do this? Because it sounds to me like, when Richard writes, is this a perilous idea? He's thinking, wow, we're going to take people, pay for this, and then they're going to go somewhere else. You don't have to pay the entire application cost. And I am for sharing it, giving them some buy-in. When they have to pay for part of it, then it becomes more that they want to succeed. They have some skin in the game, a dog in the fight, whatever metaphor you want to use. So, I really do think it's important for organizations to say, we're going to support your application for CFRE. And if you're not an AFP member or another organization, it's like $800. Maybe say, we're going to give you $500 towards that. We're going to help you pay for some of the materials that you need for success. The same thing goes for the fundraising academy, whatever the cost is. The other thing is, remember, there are so many free things that you can access around professional development. I'm going to go back to mylearningportal.org at the Fundraising Academy. It's free. You can access blogs and webinars, all kinds of things there. And we're not the only ones doing this. Many of your other sponsors do the same thing. You know, I liked what you said, and I hadn't ever thought of this, but allowing time. Because sometimes it's not just the cost of a registration or ticket or whatever, but it's time. It's saying it's okay. You're not goofing off if somebody walks by your computer or sees you on Slack and you're taking a webinar or you're doing a lesson. You know, it's an investment. Richard, yeah, I think this is something you really need to look into, because it's a heck of a lot easier to keep somebody and nurture somebody along and then going back out into the marketplace and starting all that. Costs a lot of money to hire new staff. You know, there's a lot of investment. You've got to train them. They've got to bring them up to speed. Try to keep the ones you have. They work for you. They convince people. Yeah, absolutely. Well, Richard, I hope this really helps you and good luck and let us know. And if you're a part of an organization that's doing this, I think that'd be really cool. I'd love to know more and more about that. Okay, fun development committee from New Orleans, Louisiana. This is great. We asked a question last week and are back for more. They're right. This is an odd question. But do you think we should actively search for younger fundraisers in order to work better with younger donors? No one's ever asked this question. And I'll tell you what, it's sort of, you know, when I think about this question, you know, where does it go? Okay, so you hire younger, let's say millennia to work with millennials. Do you hire men to work with men? Do you hire white people to work with white people? Where do you go with this? You know, how does it end? I guess I don't like the rationale. And I'm not sure what the rationale is because the question doesn't say, but it kind of says that, you know, younger people can relate better to younger people. I got to tell you a story. Many years ago, I sat in a group of people and we were talking about what a donor looks like. And one of the members of the committee said, well, men make all the gifts, men, which is totally not true. And I said, that's not true. Women are the biggest philanthropists in this country. And you know what he said to me? But men write the checks. And after the meeting, I said to myself, I'm never working with that person again. And I think I told my supervisor, I can't be in. And I never did. So I mean, what does this lead? Rather than ask this question, do you know what I would like you to ask? What makes a great fundraiser? Yeah. And it's integrity. It's authenticity. It's the ability to develop a relationship. It's having values. It's focused on your mission, your vision and your values. It's not your age. It's not your gender. And it's not the color of your skin. Okay. Wow. Hair on fire moment. You know, I just immediately was like, well, hell, yeah, I didn't even think of all those things that you just said. I, wow, okay. I really appreciate what you said, Jack. And I think you're right, because your first, your first phrase is, well, where does it start and where does it end? Yeah, very, I don't know where it ends. What's down that road? When the logic tells you that only millennials could work with millennials, where does that take your thinking? You know, okay, I really, really, you've given me something to think about. I really appreciate this. And let me tell you, Julie, as a baby boomer, I'll talk to anybody. Well, you know, it seems to me that maybe the question is to, or the answer is to look more at like your marketing and communications and understanding what these different demographics are interested in, you know, that whole know thy donor concept, like understanding what the donors want, maybe that's, maybe that's the core of what an answer should be. Yeah. How about this, Julie? We talked about sometimes donor centricity is not the key. You know, I think that we've doctrinated ourselves about donor, donor, donor. So we want to find fundraisers who relate to the donors on an age level. You know, it's not always the way it should be. Look for the characteristics in that fundraiser. When you're hiring somebody, look at those characteristics, which you and I have outlined. You know, authenticity, honesty, integrity, attention to values, having their own personal values, attention to the mission of the organization. These to me are so much more important than anything else. Well, and you know, Jack, it goes back to how we started this conversation today in the green room chatter about the ethics of, you know, fundraising, working with donors, not always doing exactly what that donor wants or is lobbying for, or dare I say, pressuring us to do, if it's not right and if it doesn't meet with our own ethics and our own, you know, morality, moral view of the world, for good or for bad, whatever it is, having the strength of character to be able to walk away from that. It's a really interesting conversation and one that we don't have enough. But this question, interestingly enough, ties into that bigger picture thought. You have to, I think the question comes from a desire to be donor centric. It's at the bottom of donor dominance, you know, all of those things that were our question that you and I spent 15 minutes discussing earlier, you know, and how we've got to that power that we're giving them to even decide the age group of our fundraisers is not a good idea, guys. It's not good. We have to bring some of the values that we have to them. They want to be a part of our organization. Let's share our values and equity and diversity and inclusion are our values. Let's bring it to them. Yeah. Very interesting. I mean, just off the top of my head, like I said, when I saw that question, I was like, well, yeah, but I really appreciate the lens that you've given me today. I would say that, Jackalotto, you bring me a different lens every day. It is really always a pleasure to see you come up on our booking schedule. I will admit to a lot of times I schedule myself in to be with you because I love being with you. You're my gal pal over soon. I love it. Well, you always teach me something new and you're fun and you give me a different perspective. And that would certainly was born out today. Jackalotto CFRE Trainer Fundraising Academy. Jack, before we let you go, this is the time of the year when you are doing CFRE training cohorts. Is that right? Yes. January 14th is the first day of our study group. They could message me at jalotto.edu or just find me on LinkedIn and I'll add you to the group. It's free. It's a wonderful group. I have 102 people, but I've had more than that. And it's a great way, professional development. Even if you're not seeking a CFRE, you're going to learn a lot. Okay. So really quickly, what does this look like? How do you operate this? It's via Zoom and we are going to review those six CFRE domains starting with prospect research and ending with ethics and accountability. Wow. Okay. And how long is that? So it's a three hour. It's four Saturdays for three hours. And you know what I love most about this? It's sort of like this community at the nonprofit show. We form a community. That's what we have. And we see the same people come all, you know, for those four Saturdays and they bond even beyond that. Awesome. Okay, cool. Well, I'm glad. I'm glad I remembered it that this was coming up because I was thinking, wait a minute, I think it's like a new year kind of thing. Then the exam is given when? So that participants pick when they take the exam. And they have a 12 month do it. I always say I like for them to pick just February 4th is our last do it in February while the material is still fresh in your head. Okay. And really important. Awesome. Okay, great. Well, that sounds like a wonderful thing. And so check out Jack Alotto and his training group for his study group for the CFRE. We talk a lot about continuing education and we talk a lot about, you know, certification and the professionalism within our sector. And I think that's something really, really valuable to take a look at. Hey, everybody, we want to make sure we end this episode thanking our sponsors who allow these conversations to go on Blumerang American nonprofit Academy, your part time controller, be generous fundraising Academy at National University, staffing boutique, nonprofit thought leader and the nonprofit nerd. Again, we would not be here without these folks. Hey, Jack Nacho Alotto, I'm going to queue up one of my favorite all time movies. And that is Nacho Libre. It's a comedy Jack Black, but it's all about fundraising. And yeah, I have to watch that this weekend in honor of you. Thank you so much, Jack, for being here. Thank you, everybody. Happy New Year. Happy New Year. Absolutely. Hey, everybody, as we end every episode, we want to remind ourselves, our viewers, our listeners, our sponsors, our guests to stay well so you can do well. Have a safe and great weekend. We'll see you back here.