Those words were spoken to me almost two years ago this week by a Texas Gentleman, Gerald Franklin.  This Houstonian embodies everything you think about Texans and their love of their state.  He is big, outspoken, dedicated and lovable.

Gerald started a firestorm at the National Exchange Clubs and their Foundation in July, 2008.

First, some background.  You need to know that chief among Exchange’s service commitment is the prevention of child abuse.  They have been after this for over 30 years and have established nearly 100 Child Abuse Prevention Centers across America.  They are the leader of this movement, generating over $50 million a year for this cause through their Centers alone, and much more in the work each Exchange Club does through gifts and volunteerism.  It is huge.  Their impact on Child Abuse Prevention is well over $300 million.  Nobody else is doing that.

Gerald created this firestorm by hiring a fundraising firm to help them fund their Foundation’s efforts for the cause.  We all like to think that philanthropy is easy and free.  All kinds of issues that are commonly misunderstood arose.  They don’t matter now, but as a national service organization, they are, of course, naturally very democratic.  Everyone has a voice—in Exchange’s case that is 23,000 voices.

I digress.  But you need to know that Gerald is a former national president of Exchange and probably their largest contributor.  But on that day when he signed the contract with our firm, Gerald said to me, “Bobby, we gotta do this.  We have hired several others before you.  This may be our last chance to get ‘er done.”

On Thursday at the NEC National Convention, the Hartsook Institutes for Fundraising will honor Gerald Franklin with its prestigious Growing Philanthropy Award; his award will be for Persistence and Tenancy.  Gerald joins a small but distinguished group of Growing Philanthropy Award recipients including the Heritage Foundation; The Kresge Foundation; Harvesters, America’s Food Bank, Past Senior Vice President of Purdue University Murray Blackwelder; and the Hartsook Chair in Fundraising at Indiana University, Adrian Sargeant.  This is the only award that honors those people and institutions that aggressively go above and beyond not to just sustain philanthropy, but to literally grow it.

Here is an illustration of what Gerald did in the first quarter of 2009.  Do you remember that period, or are you like me—would you just as soon forget it?

Our firm recommended that in order to gain confidence, Exchange establish a Challenge Gift of $1 million to start their $5.5 million campaign.

But where would Exchange ever get such a Challenge?  They as a national had not raised much money.  While some clubs had done very well, the national organization had not.

So we went to Gerald and asked him if he would provide leadership for assembling a select few of his Exchangites to commit $1 million.  He not only agreed, but gave the first significant gift.  That gift motivated Mike Jernigan of South Carolina to give, then Rick Gordon of Southern California, and then back to Gerald to give more, and back to Mike to give more, and finally to Ken Warner of Terre Haute to give . . . and guess what?  Back to Gerald, while attending a rodeo to give one more time, rounding out the gift to $1 million.

I could be wrong, but I think each of these pioneers gave the largest gift they had ever given in their lives—in the aftermath of the worst recession in American history.

A new million dollars of philanthropy occurred on March 11, 2009.  These four men grew philanthropy, and Gerald Franklin was their courageous leader.  Each of them–“the Challenge Partnership”—nominated Gerald for this award.

Exchange has until March 11, 2011 to raise $2 million more for a total of $3 million to get the $1 million Challenge Gift.  In the first 16 months of the challenge they have raised $1.7 million. so they have raised a total of $2.7 million.  They might well have the challenge met at their National Convention this month.

Many of those who have given thus far have also given the largest gifts in their lives.  They will be honored at the convention as well.

Frankly each of the Challenge Partners deserves this award, but they all know Gerald was always behind them, supporting them, and guiding them.  It rains a lot in Houston, but on July 23, 2010 day the sun will be shining a spotlight on Gerald.

Who is that person in your organization who steadfastly, surely and tenaciously supports your fundraising?  Have you considered where you would be, if not for this person?

Have you not just thanked, but expressed your full appreciation to that person?  If not now, when?

Yes, Curiosity.

Questions build relationships.  Interest in others and in what they are doing gives you insight into their soul.  My good friend now passed, Oliver Elliott taught me so many things, but the first was that it was okay to ask questions.  The ground breaking question to ask all who you encounter in a fundraising environment, “How did you become successful?” is well known by those who follow me.  And don’t just ask it because I suggested it, do it because you care about the answer. When I asked this question of Oliver, he told me he could give three to seven percent more than others of his net worth because he didn’t borrow money to finance his investments.

My new good friend is Jim West of Pittsburgh, Penn.  He is a great entrepreneur, businessman, and activist.  I asked Jim about how he became successful, and he told me the story of himself as a young boy in the second grade whose teacher commented to his mom, “Jim will never be anything more than a shoe salesman.”  Can you imagine hearing that as a child or parent?

Jim told me then, “I have spent the rest of my life proving her wrong.”  He has not only succeeded as a businessman, but as a father, husband and community leader.  I am a better person because I got to know Jim West.  He has taught me how to value an apartment complex, the investment risks in commercial real estate and the pride of a father.  Jim knows I raise money for a living and he is a big supporter of one of my clients.  But more than that, Jim knows I am interested in knowing him.
Frank Barton, who probably single handedly launched me on the career that has served me so well, was one of the co-founders of Rent-A-Center, now commonly known as RAC around the world.  Frank became my son’s godfather, and his wife Patsy who is still a close friend became his godmother.

Upon my asking him if he would like to invest in a publishing company I was going to start, he told me, “Bob, you can’t afford the rate of return that I would expect.  Stop buying those Jaguars and Mercedes and put your own money in it.”  Now more than ten years later that micropublishing house is worth several hundred thousands of dollars and it is all mine.  (Thank you, Frank!)

What does this have to do with fundraising? Everything!

I listen to how people become successful, I can measure a company that isn’t leveraged, I respect people who were humiliated early in life and overcame it, I understand the pitfalls of debt, and I could go on and on.  When I listen, I never cease to learn something important, find amazement at unstoppable resilience, or be humbled by an “obvious” life lesson I’ve somehow missed, even at my age.

My good friend Murray Blackwelder, who is probably the best fundraisers in America, visited with me at my summer place in Maine for the Fourth of July.  We have worked and known each other for 30 years.  We like swapping stories of the past.

He remarked, “How do you remember all those details and stories of our past?”

His wife, Diane, said, “Bob is curious.”

I’ve been called a lot of things in my life, but “curious” is one of my favorite.  I have spent a great deal of time absorbing, valuing and cherishing others’ life stories of their failures and successes, struggles and moments of grace, disappointments and dreams.

I’m a lucky man to have crossed paths with so many interesting and qualified teachers.  They have made me the businessman, fundraiser, and person I am.

Want to be a Major Gift Fundraiser?  Be curious.

What do you think makes a good fundraisier?

Did you get that?  Neither one called in over a seven month period!

Giving went down $10,000 as a result of negligence on the part of two fundraisers.

I know both of them.  They had both had talked a lot about how difficult fundraising was for them in this economy.  And yet, they walked away from a gift.

That baffles me.  Why would they do that?  Are they too busy to raise money?  Are they worn out by “beating the streets?”  Did they say “no” for him?  What do you have to do?

It reminded me of a fundraiser for a domestic violence facility who said last year, “This is why we have reserves.  We shouldn’t be asking people for gifts now.  Nobody is giving any money away.”

So three different fundraisers, for very different causes, bought into the common view that no one was giving away.

Did you see the latest Chronicle on Philanthropy article on 50 large institutions that have had increased fundraising in the first quarter at more than 30% over the past year?

You may be hearing two stories.  One story is that “people are saying” no one is giving money away.  The other is based on fact and last quarter data on actual dollars raised.  It says money is available for those who are willing to go the extra mile, get creative, and demonstrate a compelling, urgent need.

Which story do you choose to believe?

Well, today the intercollegiate game is being broadcast.  It is Wichita State University vs. Some School in Indiana I have never heard of (good Catholic school).  Looks like WSU will win its 11th national championship in 30 years.  They have always been good.

But they were not up to the task of the Hubbard Collingsworth and Lyle Dresher years ago at Emporia State University.  In 1969 ESU won the NATIONAL COLLEGIAT E BOWLING TITLE.  I used to have a jersey to prove it.  Ron Loewen was a part of that support team at ESU.

Why would I bring this up?

You know my mind works in mysterious ways.  ESU beat University of Kansas, WSU, Indiana, and many other schools to be the best. ESU was a little nothing in comparison to those other schools.

But in bowling we were the best.  We were the undisputable #1.

Who would have known that I would be involved in three national championship teams?  ESU Bowling, Wichita State University World Series Championship in 1989 (30 years after my bowling championship); and then in 2010, Hartsook Companies is the largest in the world.

Each one of these victories marked an opportunity seized.

That is where you have to be in fundraising.  No excuses.  No whining.  No turning back.

Your drive has to be pure, your goal has to be exact, and your reward, total victory.

You can feel a lot of pride about how many times you’ve tried and how hard you’ve worked.  Some of it may even look good on a resume.

But ask anyone who’s breathed the air at the top:  there’s nothing like being #1.

John, Dave and I struck up a conversation about life and its struggles.  At one point John asked me what I do.  It’s always a challenge for me to explain, since most people don’t know about the business of fundraising.  They always think of a beggar approach.  My decision to come clean about what I do is based on whether I want to take the time to educate the person asking.

This time, I took the longer course of education and explained that we raised money for large campaigns for college, hospitals, the arts and others.  John seemed to get it and asked some really good questions about how it works.  He has a small business recalibrating measuring devices and graduated from a good school in Vermont.  In fact, he had just finished a job for them in their labs.

As we were talking, John recalled being asked to lunch by a representative of the college several months ago.  He had gone to an alumni reception and thought they probably believed he had some money because he works around science things.  (My assessment is, he is doing just fine).  Anyway, he went to lunch with Steve from the college.  They had a good talk about old times and what was going on at the school.  Time was going by and finally John said, “Well, how much do you want?”

A surprised Steve responded, “We usually don’t talk about money until the third lunch.”

John asked again, “How much do you want?”

This time Steve said, “We were thinking of asking you for $200 a month for 5 years.”

My math says that was nearly $10,000.   That’s a nice gift for a first gift from John.  John had brought along his check book and wrote out a check for $1,000.   Steve hurriedly took the check and thanked John, explaining he was running late for another meeting at Dimillo’s, the local boat restaurant.

John said he hasn’t heard from Steve again.  He was wondering whether he was going to get the other two lunches he was promised.

You know I’m working hard to add research to our work as fundraisers.  Certainly, for the fundraiser to work out a strategy before meeting with John was a good idea.  He obviously decided it was going to take three visits to get a five year, $10k gift from John.

This may have been appropriate—I don’t know, but I think John thought it was silly.

We need guidelines.  Early in my career I heard a guideline that you should thank a donor seven times before asking for another gift.  I never thought that was literal; rather, it was an affirmation that you need to express appreciation before barging in on another ask.  However, I once had a young fundraiser who told me he had thought of six ways, but could I help him with a seventh?  It was time to ask again, and he was keeping track.

Along with strategies and guidelines, I guess what we need to teach is thinking.  If we want to fundraising to be a profession, we need to learn how to think like a fundraiser.  Lawyers don’t simply learn the law, they learn how to apply law and think.  Doctors learn the science of the human body, certainly, but they also learn how to make judgments and decisions based on their understanding of medicine.  They don’t just administer a pill or give a shot.

Fundraisers have to make judgments, too.

My company recently took over a client who had retained a wealth screening service for an analysis of their data base.  When they got the reports back with a suggested gift size, they took the unusual step of handing out the reports to their donors and asking them to make those gifts.  Yes, I said they took that report and laid it in front of the donor and asked them to make that gift.  Stupid at best, incomprehensible at worst.

I’m embarrassed when I hear yet another story about bumbling, inept fundraisers who lack judgment and sensitivity.  I can’t defend them.

Next time someone asks me what I do, I might tell them I’m a bartender at the Dry Dock.  Now, that’s a profession to be proud of.