• Home
  • About
  • BOOK!!
  • Contact/FAQ
  • Shop
  • Speaking
  • Support NAF!
  • Advertise
  • Report Crappy Funders

Nonprofit AF

Exploring the fun and frustrations of nonprofit work

NAF logo
NAF logo
  • Home
  • About
  • BOOK!!
  • Contact/FAQ
  • Shop
  • Speaking
  • Support NAF!
  • Advertise
  • Report Crappy Funders

donor hoarding

The Nonprofit Hunger Games, and what we must do to end them

Posted on August 3, 2015 by Vu

Katniss-Violence-Mockingjay-2A while ago, at a leadership seminar I was a participant in, I sat down at a random table and met a really nice older couple, along with another participant in the program, “Jane.” We all got to talking, and it turned out the two seniors were major donors to Jane’s organization who also happened to like Vietnamese food. I said, “Hey, I know a great Vietnamese restaurant! I’d love to take you sometime. Maybe the four of us could get lunch together.”

There was a 20-second stare down between Jane and me. The breeze died. Tumbleweeds rolled in the background, and a horse snorted nervously. Vultures circled overhead. “Yes…” said Jane, “I’ll connect all of us.” She never did. I ran into her at another event, and she introduced me to others as “The guy who tried to poach my donors.”

Why am I telling this story? One, to warn Jane that I will not rest until I find those donors, and I will have lunch with them, and I will persuade them to donate to my organization, and she won’t be able to stop me, because I will not sleep or eat until I share spring rolls with peanut sauce with them and a check is in my hands, muwahahahahahahah! MUWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

Two, to illustrate the fact that the Nonprofit Hunger Games are going too far and are destructive to our sector’s collective mission of making the world better.Continue reading →

Posted in Donor Relations, Funder Relations, leadership, nonprofit field, Zombies 7 Comments

Primary Sidebar

Grant Station Ad

Support NAF
FOLLOW NAF BY EMAIL. MAKE TUESDAYS SUCK LESS!
Enter your email address below and get notice of hilarious new posts each Tuesday morning. Unsubscribe at any time.

Random Posts

  • 10 lessons nonprofits can learn from The Walking Dead
  • Collective impact and what progressives can learn from conservatives
  • All right, we need to talk about nonprofit salaries
  • 8 grammar mistakes even smart and sexy people like you are making
  • Hey, you want nonprofits to act more like businesses? Then treat us like businesses

Share NAF

FOLLOW NAF BY EMAIL. MAKE TUESDAYS SUCK LESS!

Subscribe to Blog via Email

Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Join 51.5K other subscribers

Recent Posts

  • Funders, please stop trying to be unique snowflakes
  • How to stay motivated when everything is on fire and you look and feel like crap
  • Instructions on not giving up: Let’s conserve our energy for the battles ahead
  • Brutally honest answers to 15 pointless questions our sector keeps asking itself
  • The Tide is Surging: The No King Protests and the Beginning of the End of Fascism in the US

Categories

  • AI (1)
  • Board Relations (32)
  • Capacity Building (31)
  • Community Engagement (79)
  • Community organizing (10)
  • Cultural Competency (46)
  • Data (7)
  • Donor Relations (48)
  • ED Life (86)
  • Finance (34)
  • Funder Relations (179)
  • funding (17)
  • Fundraising (212)
  • Grantwriting (119)
  • Hiring (6)
  • Humor (59)
  • leadership (86)
  • Marketing (6)
  • nonprofit (9)
  • nonprofit field (311)
  • Office Culture (82)
  • Personal (36)
  • philanthropy (35)
  • Policy and Advocacy (21)
  • Race, Equity, Diversity, Inclusion (119)
  • Random stuff (89)
  • self-care (26)
  • Special Events (25)
  • Staff Dynamics (30)
  • Uncategorized (40)
  • Unicorns (62)
  • US Culture (17)
  • volunteers (4)
  • Work-Life Balance (31)
  • Writing (1)
  • Zombies (14)

Archives

Tags

board board of directors capacity building collective impact communities of color community-centric fundraising community engagement cultural competency diversity donors equity feedback foundations funders funding funding dynamics fundraising game of thrones grantmaking grants grantwriting hiring hummus humor inclusion leadership nonprofit nonprofit funding nonprofit humor overhead oxford comma philanthropy power dynamics race restricted funding salary Seahawks self-care social justice special events sustainability taxes Thanksgiving unicorn unicorns

© Vu Le NWB Consulting
Design: SN