Whether you’re running a small, medium or large fundraising organization, you can probably identify to one degree or another with Jennifer Nicely’s dilemma.
She wants to preserve as sacred the time she spends with prospective donors – “because ultimately that’s what you’re here for.”
Yet, as president and chief development officer of the five-person Memorial Health Care System foundation staff in Chattanooga, Tenn., she also wants to preserve her seat at the table of the system’s executive management team. Understandably, she worries that missing too many meetings will diminish the power of philanthropy within the system, but acknowledges the “amount of time spent on true fundraising, true donor development, gets sucked away and sucked away.”
But distractions from the main thing are not isolated to small staffs. Read more