Fundraiser, Lawyer and Lobbyist: these are my three roles.  I always wanted to be a banker, but I didn’t take that road.  It’s just as well.  These days, I think I made the right choices.   I’m proud of each of my career paths. My clients, employees, and friends are better off because of those choices.

I used to joke about how these three professions are perceived.  You know I never miss a good punch line.  It’s almost too easy to make people laugh at finding one person who has chosen these three careers.

No more!  I have made it clear that I am devoting the rest of my life toward changing the quality of the fundraising profession.

I can’t change how lobbyists or lawyers are perceived.  But I can damn well have an impact on the perception of fundraisers.  This is not a measure of the quality or character of those who, like me, chose this career path.  It is a fundamental preparation problem.

We call fundraising a profession.  It’s mixed, though, and that’s putting it gently.  Plumbers have a better set of standards for their profession than fundraisers!  Let’s take a lesson from this profession.  You might not know it, but plumbing and fundraising are a lot alike.

Plumbers, in the end, either get water flowing or stop it.  Anything in between is not acceptable. Fundraising is that way: you either raise a buck or you don’t.  Like plumbers, fundraisers get credit for someone else’s good work.  The guy who installed the dishwasher did a great job.  So when the next plumber puts in the garbage disposal, it works great!

Fundraising is the same.  We value and appreciate donors, we recognize them and we use the money the way the donor intends. The water runs when it is supposed to and doesn’t when it shouldn’t.

But plumbers have more reliable standards than fundraisers for telling the consumer whether they can depend on us to do the job.

In an interview with a prospective client today, I was hit with the same old stuff:  Why don’t you raise money on a commission? Can you guarantee success?  We have hired people like you in the past, and they didn’t raise anything.

Okay, I am a conservative, and I’m not usually in favor or more controls.  But I think it is time for us in the fundraising profession to consider some oversight.  Not from the IRS, but from the commerce department.   The refractory issues are not that of the IRS.  The question is, “are we competent to do our jobs?”

We know what needs to be done.  The Hartsook Chair at Indiana University established the only licensure for fundraisers in the UK.

Fundraisers need to be held accountable for what we say we do.  I am weary of having to defend fools who set up shop as fundraising consultants or join national groups or attend classes and get certification from prestigious universities for sitting in a seat and never demonstrating they know how to identify, let alone cultivate or solicit, major gifts.

I am proud of my profession.  We have accomplished incredible, seemingly impossible tasks.

I am doing something to improve it.

What are you doing?

Harder to find? Yes.

More difficult to close?  Darn right.

Creativity required?  Absolutely.

I will be participating with the Chronicle of Philanthropy in a live discussion on getting million dollar gifts in this economy next Tuesday, February 9 at noon EST.  It should be interesting, so plan to join us: http://philanthropy.com/article/Seeking-Big-Gifts-in-Tough/63880/

Readers of my blog will know that my company and I place much of the responsibility for fundraising success on the fundraiser’s back.

I have written before about the research on million dollar gift lists; several organizations try to manage them.  My mentor, Art Franzreb and I gave his Million Dollar Gift List to Indiana University.

While they serve a purpose, obviously there is difficulty with all of these lists on two fronts: 1) they can only represent reported million dollar gifts, and 2) the reported date is frequently distanced from the date of the gift.

I honor and respect the effort to understand giving, and I realize we can’t report what we don’t know.  But making casual deductions about giving based on these lists can be misleading.

In my 40 years in fundraising, I have observed that most reported gifts are made to higher education, health care and an individual’s own foundation.  You see very few reported gifts to the Salvation Army, food banks, or children’s causes.  Does that mean they don’t exist? No, but for a myriad of reasons donors and/or organizations do not publicize them immediately, if at all.

I often use my own $1.5 million gift to Indiana University as an example.  The gift was made in March 2006, but it was reported on October 12, 2006—almost eight months after the decision was delivered to the institution.  My most recent $1.2 million gift to Avila University was shared with the University in May, 2009, but announced December 5, 2009.  Again, eight months after the decision was made.  And I have made a third million dollar gift that won’t be announced for the time being.  It was made in early 2008!

Anomalies?  Hardly.  In each case the institutions decided the appropriate time to announce the gift, not me.  So much for using those lists to tell us who is raising million dollar gifts and when.

So let’s assume—because I’m telling you it is—that million dollar gifts are being given away all the time.

What does it take to find a million dollar gift today?

Persistence and tenacity, as always.  But now more than ever, there must be an intense interest in getting on the side of the donor.  Here are five tips for you to take or leave.  If I were you, I would take them.

1. Listen for success. Fundraisers are like everyone else in that they can get sucked into a media-driven “everyone lost money and no one is giving away” mentality.  “Nobody” and “everybody” don’t do anything.  But if we aren’t listening, success will pass us by!

2. Be aware.  There is a sensitivity to making large gifts during a struggling economy. One million dollar donor didn’t want his gift announced because he had laid off 10% of his work force.  Even though this gift came from him personally, he was afraid of what his employees would think.  So there was no announcement, at least not yet.

3. Work with the donor.  For a social service group, a campaign leader wanted to make a million dollar gift based on the sale of land. He was going to wait until it was sold.  Instead, we created a contract pledge in which he gave the organization $1 million or 10% of the sale, whichever was greater.  Five professional fundraisers had walked away from this donor because their organization wanted all the money at one time. This deal was signed December 21, 2009 and guess what?   A buyer is closing on the sale on May 1, 2010. The social service institution who got on the donor’s side made a million dollars, at least for now.  They made a friend for life.  It’s the donor’s asset, not yours.

4. Find out where it is.  Somebody’s making money all the time.  I know a residential apartment owner whose banker is telling him to raise his rents because his occupancy is too high. There is a medical building contractor who’s never trusted the stock market and has invested exclusively in CD’s.  And a petroleum transporter whose family has been doing in the business for 80 years who’s recession-proof.  How about the banker whose privately held bank had a temporary loss in stock value?  He pledged $18 million last October—a gift that is yet to be announced—to his favorite public service nonprofit through his own foundation, along with $80 million in gifts (unannounced) that benefit five charities.

5. Make bequest giving a priority.  Almost 96% of all planned gifts are bequests.  Now is the time to tie them down.  Earlier research clearly illustrated that 85% of all endowments were created when someone died.  IRA’s are horrible devices to transfer wealth to family.  Twenty years ago the IRA business was rampant to professionals. Now we have millions of over funded IRA’s.  Another banker I know had a $1.5 million IRA that was to go to his family—all cash.  He changed it to a gift to a hospital and at 62 years old bought a second-to-die single premium life insurance policy for $200k with a $1.5 million death benefit.  So now the family gets the money and so does the medical center.  Make sure you’re the one that’s there when those decisions are made.

Okay, now I have given you the ways to get million dollar gifts.  Certainly, a nonprofit and a philanthropist must exist in order for these gifts to occur, but I will also share the three secrets of million dollar gifts that no one else will tell you:

1. It is the fundraiser.

2. It is the fundraiser.

3. It is the fundraiser.

Fundraisers, the brokers of philanthropy, carry the responsibility for million dollars gifts on their backs.  Which fundraisers among us will boldly carry that weight?  And who will say it’s too heavy and hand it back to the nonprofit, the philanthropist, or the economy?

I am looking forward to being with Holly Hall, Bob Carter, vice chairman of Changing Our World and Lisa Thomson, associate director of gift planning at the Nature Conservancy on Tuesday, February 9, at noon Eastern time Center of Philanthropy’s webinar.

Stories?  Frustrations?  Share them with me.

What was to be a Day of Service designed to help nonprofits with their funding needs turned into four days.  As a part of the first National Growing Philanthropy Conference, Hartsook Companies, the Avila University Hartsook Institute for Fundraising, along with The Greater Kansas City Community Foundation, sponsored this event.  We expected 12 nonprofits to take advantage of our highly skilled and talented Hartsook teams.  Instead, over 50 signed up.

This wasn’t just a “drop by and get some advice” event.  This was a hands-on commitment to growing philanthropy.  Each nonprofit agreed to participate in a pre-consultation interview, bring at least three people including at least one board member, agree to three action steps as a result of the two-hour session, and be available for a follow-up in 60 days.

In mid-December we distributed the announcement that nonprofits with funding challenges were invited to participate.  On the first day of the announcement, 23 nonprofits responded.  The second day, there were 31, then 36, and so on.  We decided, to the extent possible, we would turn no one away.  By mid-January, over 50 had signed up.  Our Institute at Avila University in Kansas City found a bigger room and we recruited more consultants.  The program was held on January 20 and 21, and will finish on February 11 and 12, with 16 Hartsook consultants working with nearly 200 board members and staff of Kansas City area nonprofits.

The morning of January 21, there were six groups engaged at one time with two or three consultants working with each nonprofit.  Each of our consultants has wonderful, inspiring stories to tell but since this is my blog, I will tell mine.

I worked with four very eclectic groups: a community symphony, a health education center, a children’s home, and the felony-to-work organization, Beyond the Conviction.

So I began my day with three men who represented convicted felons.  I am so thankful to them and to the scheduler that they were my first visit.  They expanded my horizons.  If you think you have trouble raising money, try doing it for felons!

Mike Jackson, Ruben Paiz, and Patrick Danley were articulate, thoughtful and, frankly, successful.  I asked what their goal was and they said, without hesitation, “safety first—for the public and the felon—and developing the best-qualified job seeker.”

Like every nonprofit, they have a mission and a need.   Through a long conversation, we developed a three-point plan.  They have placed staff at some of the largest corporations in the city.  I told them those were their prospects, along with their board members.

The Hartsook team and partners knew going in we wouldn’t change the world in just two hours.  But we also knew the power of a plan, no matter how small, when combined with goal-oriented, committed individuals.

Well, two days later Mike proved our point.  Already, he had contacted the community foundation to establish his Donor Edge file and was on a schedule to get in front of two of his major supporters.  Each of these groups has moved dramatically as a result of their efforts and our work.

I couldn’t be more proud of the men and women of Hartsook who made this day happen.  Beyond helping these nonprofits, the payback was how good our team felt by giving of their talent, which just happens to be fundraising.  Ask any nonprofit where their needs lie.

As fundraisers we spend a lot of time celebrating philanthropy and little time highlighting what we do: fundraise.

You may get tired of hearing that Hartsook Companies and Hartsook Institutes are committed to GROWING PHILANTHROPY.  It’s not just talk.  Ask Mike, or any of the other 149 people we worked with.  It is real, and it is happening right before our eyes.