Tag: fundraising

May may make my head explode

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May.  Why does May always have to be so busy?

In November I agreed to chair our church’s capital campaign.  It’s a great way for me to give back and it’s good experience, from a professional standpoint.  I’ve never been a part of a capital campaign before.  

When I took it on, I didn’t anticipate being back at ACS and having two, let alone one, fundraising event in May.  But, here I am trying to juggle a fundraising event on May 2, a big giving day campaign on May 6, a fundraising gala on May 16 (my birthday!), and a capital campaign launch on May 18.  

Luckily, once I get through May this craziness will pretty much be all over.  But in the meantime, trying to juggle my work schedule, capital campaign commitments, family responsibilities, and life (my kiddo’s birthday is May 19) is starting to hurt my head.  

Change all around

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We are experiencing some major changes in the Riddle family this summer. Here are some highlights:

Me
I started my new job as Director of Development at City Year San Jose/Silicon Valley. If I hit the lights right, it only takes me 4 minutes to get to work! With yesterday and today as agency holidays, it was a short yet awesome first week. I work with a bunch of rock stars. Seriously, there is so much talent on this team and I’m privileged to be a part of it. On day 2 we had a staff retreat to kick off FY14 and it was amazing. Currently I’m reading a ton to get myself caught up on culture, history, impact, etc. Everyone has been extremely welcoming and helpful, providing a lot of explanations and helping me decode the gazillion acronyms (side note: I can’t speak to the corporate world because I decided pretty quickly it wasn’t for me, but I’ve come to the conclusion that nonprofits LOVE acronyms. And not just a few of them – a lot of them).

Ryan
My husband is also about to experience some professional change. He isn’t leaving Box, but come 7/15/13 he’s starting as their first Technical Productivity Manager. I’m so excited for him and this new role!

Nolan
With my new job closer to home, Nolan is getting ready to start at a new daycare later this month. Today, he and I went for a 3 hour enrollment visit to meet his classmates and new teachers. I’m so glad he is social because we walked in and he went straight to the group of kids, picked up a toy, and sat down to play. It’s pretty different than the home daycare set up he is accustomed to, and he’ll be the youngest in his class, but I got a good feeling for it today and think he’ll end up loving it there too.

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Sitting like a big boy at snack time

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Taking part in story time

In-Laws
In the last month, my in-laws have moved to the Bay Area (all of them – mother, father, sister, and soon to be brother-in-law) meaning that we now have family within 15 minutes of us! When we moved to the Bay Area 6 years ago that was the thing I was going to miss most – being near family. Turns out if you have a kid, they will come ;)Almost everyone has jobs and we are so excited that Nolan gets to grow up with family nearby!

Our Christmas letter is going to have a lot of content this year!

An incredible ride

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Here we are. The end of an era. My last day of work. I’ve had 2 full months to prepare for my departure from ACS, but the amount of time has almost made it harder. It’s like pulling a band aid off – if you do it slowly, you think it might hurt less but it actually ends up drawing out the pain. This last week I’ve been far more anxious than I thought I would be. Waking up a full hour before my alarm for the last week, trouble emptying my head at night, a twisty stomach, and a sudden outbreak of canker sores (I swear I haven’t touched any nuts or chocolate in the last 2 weeks!) are physical reactions I never thought I’d have.

Yesterday was the day I was dreading most. Saying goodbye to my boss. We both agreed that our exit lunch was strange and that neither of us knew how to have closure on our 5+ year relationship. We even had lunch at the same restaurant where 5 years earlier he asked me to apply for the director role. It didn’t help. We have been each other’s workplace support systems. We’ve been each other’s rock through years of ups and downs. How do you find closure on that? When he left yesterday, it was the last time I would see him in the office as his employee. There were tears. We hugged. He has been so much more than a supervisor to me: he’s been my mentor, role model, and friend. Aside from supervisor, those roles he has played won’t change, but it will be a transition that will take some getting used to.

ACS is really where I grew up. I came to this organization as a fresh 22 year old, newlywed, recent college grad, and pretty new to the real world. I leave a 28 year old, mother, homeowner, experienced professional, with a career. Thanks for everything, ACS. It has been an incredible ride.

Difficult decision, exciting news

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I haven’t posted in a while because a lot of what I have been wanting to write about has been top secret. I tried to steer clear of my blog for fear of accidentally letting something slip. However, now that the decision has been made and the appropriate people have been informed, I can officially announce my news: I have accepted the position of Director of Development at a national organization’s Silicon Valley site.

It was an extremely difficult decision. For the most part, I have really enjoyed working at my current organization. After being there 5.5 years, I know it inside and out. I know the key players and have built solid relationships with donors, funders, and board members. I like my co-workers and have a great boss. And, there are no surprises – meaning that I know what the challenges, flaws, and areas for improvement are. I love the mission of the organization and know that we do good work in the community. So why would I leave?

A lot of factors played into my acceptance of this offer. I am ready for a new challenge. I want to work in the community in which I live. I am tired of commuting and do not want my son to have to spend so much time in the car each day on the way to and from daycare. I have a vision for my career and in order to get to where I want to be, it is time for me to broaden my experience, work in a different environment, and fundraise for a bigger budget. Contrary to what people may think, it was not really about a higher salary or better benefits…though that didn’t hurt.

I was made aware of the opening by my mentor, who encouraged me to take a look at it because she thought it was an organization I might be interested in. She was right. I submitted my résumé and didn’t hear anything for over a month. I assumed they weren’t interested and didn’t sweat it because I had a job. I was surprised when they finally did contact me because I had applied so long ago. It was an intense process…8 interviews (3 in-person, 5 by phone), each lasting 30-90 minutes, with people from the San Jose/Silicon Valley office, as well as in Boston, Seattle, and Los Angeles. I did as much interviewing of them as they did of me. I wanted to make sure this was 1) the right fit, 2) an organization I could be passionate about, 3) a fiscally responsible organization, and 4) the best decision for me at this point in my career and life.

A few thoughts about my new position. Working with a national organization has a lot of perks, career advancement and the occasional trip to the Boston headquarters, being a couple. While my title is Director of Development, specifically I’ll be handling individual giving, major gifts, events, and strategy. There is no real individual giving program established, so my big task (which is a little scary, but exciting) is to get one going. My new office is down the street from where I live. If I wanted to, I could walk. Even if my office hours are slightly longer than what I am accustomed to, the time I will save in my commute is HUGE.

I’m a little torn about my son’s daycare situation. I know we will find something closer to home and that it’ll be great, but we (all three of us) love his current provider. He has been there since he was 2.5 months old. They are practically his second family. We’ll keep him where he is until we find new arrangements.

I was able to negotiate a start date of July 1 so that I can finish out the fiscal year at my current job. We have a big fundraising event in 2 weeks and I want to do what I can to get things organized and document a lot of the things I do that have lived in my head for 5 years.

This experience, of informing and getting ready to leave my current organization, has been far more emotional than I expected it to be. I am lucky and blessed to be in this situation. Not everyone can say they genuinely like their job, the mission, and the people they work with and are moving on mainly because of a bigger opportunity/career advancement. I couldn’t have asked for a better starting point to my career and look forward to this next chapter.

Mission driven vs. funding driven decision making

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I recently had my first experience negotiating a contract with a county. It didn’t go so well. Coming from a small organization, we thought getting a contract would be a long shot but figured, you never know. Imagine my shock when I received word that we had received the grant and would be going into contract negotiations.

It was a process like no other I had experienced. In my experience with grant proposals, you write what you do or are proposing to do and then if the funder likes what you have presented, they fund you or not (this is a dumbed down, very basic synopsis of a grant maker’s process…I know there’s a lot more to it, but this is the gist of it). I won’t get into the specific details of this process, but let’s just say that from the minute we sat down, they fired off questions at us. They liked the idea of what we were proposing – but they wanted us to change substantial parts of our proposal and had certain expectations that we realistically would not be able to meet. After a lot of discussion on our end, we formally withdrew from negotiations.

Not every organization and leadership team would have made that decision. Especially not in these cash strapped, financially strained times. However, I think situations and decisions like this should ALWAYS go back to the mission of the organization. We looked at our mission and realized the changes they were asking us to make would be a stretch and not directly tie back to our mission. We looked at our strategic plan and saw that if we accepted one of their requests, we would be completely ignoring a very clear direction laid out in our long range plan. We looked at staff time and resources. We ultimately did what was best for the organization and all those involved.

Sometimes, saying no, IS the best thing to do. Allowing funding to drive programmatic decisions can become a dangerous path to go down. What happens when that funding cycle ends? Or if, like a lot of government funding, it dries up? How will you sustain that program and keep it going?

If you want to read more about keeping an organization’s mission at the heart of decision making, I highly recommend Peter Brinckerhoff‘s book, “Mission-Based Management: Leading Your Not-For-Profit in the 21st Century.”

The way we think about charity

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Today I watched Dan Pallotta’s TED Talk from earlier this month. If you haven’t seen it yet, take 18 minutes to watch it. It’s called “The Way We Think About Charity Is Dead.”

I’m not sure if I agree wholeheartedly with all of the points he made (for instance, I get his point about nonprofit salaries but also don’t think organizations should go overboard in how much they are paying staff – yes, we work just as hard as those working at for-profit companies, but that doesn’t mean CEOs or Executive Directors of successful organizations should be making exorbitant salaries). However, for the most part, his message is something that people, particularly foundation/corporate funders and individual donors, need to hear. And that message is that organizations need to be encouraged to spend money on overhead. Allowing nonprofits to spend money on overhead provides for innovation, more money to be raised, happier employees, higher levels of productivity, and most importantly, social change on a larger level.

The saying “you have to spend money to raise money” is true. I often feel like if I had more resources at my disposal to use better tools or hire more staff, so much more money could be raised, and by default, so many more people in the community served. This whole concept of keeping overhead (management, fundraising, and operational expenses) at 25% or below (I actually feel the expectation is to keep it far below that, even if 25% is the “standard”) is crazy. I hope people like Dan Pallotta continue to spread this message and that those in the grant making/world of philanthropy start listening.