Cultural Differences in Donor-Staff Conversations
I’ve written a lot about the role cultural differences play in travel, particularly, donor trips. But in this article, I want to bring the message of intercultural awareness home to a more familiar territory: staff interactions with donors. Specifically, I’m talking about those the one-on-one meetings that development officers, board members, and executive directors have […]
Empathy Is Not the Endgame
As a follow up to my foundational article, “What You Thought Was Empathy Was Actually Sympathy,” in this article I dispel some misconceptions about empathy and provide tactical pointers to help nonprofit professionals better embody empathy in their work and avoid the pitfalls of sympathy. Empathy is not about emotion…it’s about understanding Rather than try […]
What You Thought Was Empathy Was Actually Sympathy
Empathy has come to have a bad rep lately. After enjoying years in the spotlight as the antidote to just about everything from prejudice to poverty, empathy is now being rebranded as the cause—not the solution—to those problems. The arguments are not insignificant. Psychologist Paul Bloom has been a long-time critic of empathy in the […]
Reaching Out to Donors about Systemic Injustice: 4 Tips and 10 Conversation Goals
While many inspiring leaders and activists have stepped up to create and share resources on how to respond to the current movement, my colleagues in the fundraising space have lamented the lack specific ideas and tools for having critical conversations with donors. These conversations can feel daunting for organizations whose missions don’t explicitly include the […]
Difficult Dialogues with Curiosity and Intention
We live in a time when remaining silent on critical issues is no longer possible. Even if we have been living lives of relative comfort—the lives of our friends, families, and neighbors are at stake. You know that you need to have more honest, transparent, and authentic conversations with donors, volunteers, and colleagues on race, […]