Mazarine: Charlotte, why did you go to Uganda originally?

Charlotte: I came to Uganda with VSO (Voluntary Service Overseas) on a two-year placement as the Marketing Development Manager for the Uganda Conservation Foundation (UCF). It was my dream job: marketing elephants! But when I say it’s my dream job, making it all happen can be a real challenge at times.

I’ve wanted to live in Africa since I was a teenager and always wanted to do VSO (the British version of Peace Corps). Twenty years after my first phone call to VSO, I’d finally acquired the skills and the life experience to help me spend two years living in and contributing to a developing country.

On a good week, we’d go on safari. (I still have to pinch myself!) It’s a day’s drive to Queen Elizabeth National Park and we would usually include an impromptu game drive. Reconnecting with the field projects is crucial, and of course fun!

Most of the time however, I wrote funding proposals, reports to donors and developed our Facebook page. My role was to raise UCF’s profile, fundraise, communicate with donors, help develop the local team’s skills – and fundraise some more! There were weeks when my job, plodding away on the laptop, was as routine as any other office worker’s, but then I remembered: I’m in Africa! And I’m helping protect elephants!

The VSO philosophy is sustainable development through sharing skills. This year I recruited a Marketing Officer who I continue to mentor, thus passing on my marketing skills to the local team. It means my VSO placement should have a long term, sustainable impact on UCF.

A key part of the role was sharing skills. Western IT skills, for example, are typically much more advanced than the average Ugandan’s and people tend to learn from each other (passing on the mistakes as well as the learning). You can really increase a person’s productivity through sharing simple PC skills that the average Westerner takes for granted. VSO teaches you to show people how to do things for themselves. It’s empowering and quite humbling to be a part of it. There have been some very frustrating and challenging times over the past three years but I can look back now and see some big improvements in terms of efficiency, team morale and organisation profile. It makes me smile to think I’ve been part of that.

Mazarine: What do you like best about Uganda?

Charlotte: That is such a difficult question, there are so many ways to fall in love with the country! Ugandans are wonderfully friendly people, and they will put themselves out to greet and welcome you. The countryside is beautifully diverse, the weather is (generally) fantastic and the country has the most incredible biodiversity: gorillas, chimps, elephants, lions, leopard, giraffe and zebra and 1,060+ species of birds. It really is paradise on earth.

Ugandan kids

The pace of life is slower: the work culture, travelling to meetings (because of the terrible traffic and enormous potholes) and even the time it can take you to cook dinner (after you’ve haggled for your purchases then boiled and filtered your water). The internet can be slow or off for days, people are sick more often, heavy rains can prevent people getting to work, the electricity can go off without warning – it can wear you down! But, people take the time for each other, it’s a simpler way of life. Modern life is so stressful – the choices I’m faced with when I travel home to the UK boggle my mind!

Mazarine: What have you found blogging helps you do?

Charlotte: I started my personal blog so friends and family back home could keep up to date with my adventure as a volunteer. I’ve often kept a diary when I travel so it was the logical thing to do. Blogging quickly became my biggest pastime. It was a way for me to process and try and make sense of the new world around me and gave me some creative time out from the formal proposal and report writing for UCF.

Over the past two and half years, promoting my blog via Twitter and Facebook has allowed me to connect with bloggers worldwide, which has helped me develop my creative travel writing. (My blog has appeared on Lonely Planet since 2009). After my VSO contract finished, in October I joined a Ugandan travel company. Conservation and tourism work hand-in-hand in Uganda, so it was a natural step for me. I can continue to support UCF in my spare time too, an added bonus. (I joke that I’ve been promoted from being a paid volunteer to an unpaid one!)

Blogging and social media have given UCF a global platform. It puts us up there with the biggest and the best, it’s made everyday communication with our donors simpler, and has given our fans the opportunity to interact with us on their terms.

Mazarine: What is your take on fundraising internationally in Africa? Tips? Tricks? Must dos? Must not dos?

Charlotte: It’s the same as anywhere in the world  - never take your donors for granted. Befriend them, get to know them, keep them up to date with everything you’re doing, even if it’s a photograph with a good strapline. There are many organisations out there who would love to support successful projects, and innovative ideas, you just need to find them. Often these recommendations can be made through existing donors.

UCF gets the majority of its funding from the West, thus it’s crucial that we have a good Internet connection and are able to maximise social media. It took me two years to get the hang of using Twitter in Uganda, the system distrusts users from Africa, it seems, and thought I was a hacker! (I had to ask my sister in the UK to log on for me. This reactivated my account and since then I’ve been able to have access again). Once I got the hang of it, it’s been the best medium for networking.

Travelling to the UK every six months also gives me an opportunity to get up to date with the latest technology trends. Much of the technology is not available in Africa; if it is available, it is much more expensive and has limited resources. Virtually everyone in Uganda owns a mobile and we are actually quite advanced in terms of SMS use for marketing and financial transactions using mobile phones. This is because very few people have bank accounts and, outside the cities, people don’t have computers or Internet access. So there is technological innovation, and it’s interesting that it’s taken a different direction from the West.

International donors have standards that developing countries may find very difficult to achieve and maintain. This relates to use of English language, good grammar, timekeeping, financial transparency, ability to use different computer programs, presentation skills. This does mean that small and local NGOs are at a huge disadvantage and simply don’t qualify, in terms of resources, to submit a winning funding application. It means that English language skills are much in demand, so that does give plenty of opportunities for Westerners who would like to support project funding overseas. If you get it right however, money from the West can go a very long way in a developing country.

Ideally you should always aim to get some of your revenue locally. This gets better local buy-in for your project (brownie points for advocacy campaigns, long-term survival of the organisation more likely, etc), and means you’re less at the mercy of foreign currency regulations, global recessions etc! That said, the Ugandan shilling has devalued so badly (current inflation is 30%) that funding from international donors is going even further than normal. We can’t expect this to last for long though, and it’s certainly not a fundraising strategy.

The average Ugandan doesn’t have much spare cash. Everyone goes to church and many will people will pay a tithe (possibly 10% of their salary will go to the church). This money is supposed to support those in the community who are in need. Charity fundraising is generally on a small scale, but big companies do sponsor various types of events and causes.

Mazarine: For projects donors will never visit, how do you create a connection to your mission?

Charlotte: Few of our donors have had the ability to fly out to Uganda to meet our projects. Our reports include lots of photographs. We bring back data on stories from the field, invite them to our events and speak to them on the phone. Our reports are very colourful and full of lots of big photographs and data that shows the impact of what we’re trying to achieve. We feature lots of people – and of course wildlife! We also include quotes, from members of the community, the wildlife Rangers, etc. This really brings our reports to life. All our reports include live links to our website and Facebook and Twitter and we always encourage people to engage with us online.

Uganda Conservation Foundation

If we had the money, we would make video too – and I’d certainly recommend that to anyone trying to make a connection. For us in Uganda, the other issue is Internet connection. It’s so slow that uploading videos is not something that we can do regularly, it just takes too long. However, the Internet infrastructure is slowly improving.

Mazarine: Do you fundraise from the local community as well? If so, how do you find your language shifts from talking with overseas donors versus talking with local donors? Do you ask for different things? Do you try to connect them with the mission in a different way?

Charlotte: We do fund raise from the local community, but predominantly from the corporate community, many of whom are westerners.

We have a corporate membership program, and we accept in-kind sponsorship as much as cash donations. Having these business friends whom we can call in favours from, is incredibly useful. A note of warning though, this feelgood factor doesn’t always give you the best service. There is a feeling that paying clients get a better service than we do, but if your cash strapped small organisation, it might be enough to keep you going.

In terms of Ugandans, their support is very important, as these people are the ones that can effect behavioural change in the long term. Our language very definitely changes, as do our messages. For example, most of our international donors are conservation organisations, thus our message is heavily focused on wildlife and habitat management, protecting human populations in order to protect the wildlife populations.

To local subsistence farmer communities in the national parks, the messages are different: we want to protect you and help lift you out of poverty and are investing in your community through education and income generating projects (beekeeping, digging of elephant trenches, slashing of the Bush). In return, communities are warned that the penalties for poaching are higher than they were before, but it does mean that you, your family and your livelihood will be better protected (from crop raiding animals) by the wildlife Rangers.

For the average Ugandan who lives in Kampala, for example, the message is that tourism is the number one foreign revenue earner. The majority of tourists come to Uganda for the wildlife. This wildlife is under threat but you can help protect it and thus help develop your country. We encourage people to be proud of their heritage. Many people don’t have money to spare to give UCF. That they hear our message is more important than them supporting us financially. You would simply not think of asking them to become members but you would refer them to Facebook, something which Ugandans are really crazy about!

Mazarine: Do you also run the volunteer coordination/recruitment and events for the Uganda Conservation Foundation? If so, do you have any tips for people who are asked to do too much?

Charlotte: We do not recruit volunteers, generally speaking. We have had one full-time VSO for two years at a time, three times in our history.

Many people approach us, asking to do voluntary work, but they’re not usually clear about exactly what it is they’re going to offer us and I’m afraid represent more work for us than opportunity. A volunteer has to be managed in the same way as a paid member of staff.

In terms of being asked to do too much, if you’re coming to an organisation and have a good skill set, it might be assumed that you can do all kinds of things. Have your role as clear as possible in your mind, and on paper, and communicate this with your colleagues. Do this more than once! Don’t rush to do everything, allow people the chance to try. VSO quite clearly warns us that we are unlikely to achieve the same amount of work as we would back home. You are working in a new culture with many limitations, so you have to reduce your expectations of yourself. It can be frustrating, it really can!

Mazarine: What’s one thing you wish you had known before you started in the NGO/Charity/Third Sector world?

Charlotte: I wish I’d appreciated how much free support is available online. I wish I had connected with you three years ago!

(Aw! Thank you Charlotte!)

Mazarine: How do you do marketing in your job? What resources and tools would you recommend for someone starting to market a charity in Africa?

Charlotte: Network as much as you can, attend external meetings, join groups, socialise.

Make Twitter your friend – this is the best way to meet people who are doing the same thing as you, same job in a different country, or related organisations in the same country as you. They will give you ideas and connections, and keep you going when you’re struggling.

Invest in an Internet dongle, a decent laptop, a Skype headset and a digital camera. Back everything up regularly!

Use Facebook to connect with your fans. Write a blog – and write it regularly. Spend time tagging it well and do some research on how to promote a blog. There are tons of free resources available to you. Have catchy subject headers, for example, and include at least one eye-catching photographs each time you post. Integrate everything so that news appears simultaneously across all your social media.

If you have a budget, considering using SMS for targeted messages. In Uganda, these have been particularly successful for encouraging people to have HIV testing for example.

I have a design and print background, and I was lucky enough to have an ex-colleague who developed some free report, presentation and newsletter templates for us. Having a professional, consistent image immediately improved our profile with our donors. You can download some fantastic free templates online and customise them with your organisation colours. If you can then insert photos and distribute by e-mail, your costs are very, very low.

There are thousands of charities crying out for decent marketing in Africa. There are some fantastic initiatives and it can be difficult for people to know which one to support. Keep your objectives clear. Report regularly to your donors and communicate with your supporters.

Mazarine: Do you also do grantwriting? If so, where do you go to look for grants for Uganda?

Charlotte: Proposal writing has been a key part of my job. Most of our funds are from existing donors, and they in turn recommend new donors for us to approach. We research donors that support similar organisations to our own, in Uganda and in other African countries. We also approached the big aid agencies, like the European Union the US Fish and wildlife service, etc.

Although UCF came into being to protect elephants, over the past 10 years in operation, we’ve widened this to cover poaching, human wildlife conflict, conservation education and livelihoods of subsistence farmers. Put your creative hat on and think how your projects touch on different issues, and different groups of people. One project may have many different areas of influence and impact; try and work out what these are. Understanding these will give you ideas on new people and organisations to approach.

Mazarine: What is your plan for the future? Where would you like to be in 5 years?

Charlotte: I was not the first VSO who wanted to stay in Uganda and first extended my contract by six months.

I now work for a travel company based in Kampala. I’m hoping to develop my travel writing further and in 2012 I am writing a ‘coffee table book’  about Uganda. This is due for publication in October.

Whether I’m based in Africa or back in the UK in five years, I know that my heart will still be in Uganda and that I will be working in the travel business. I feel there are tremendous opportunities for helping develop and promote tourism – across East Africa.

Thank you so much Charlotte! Even though I too have volunteered and done grantwriting overseas, I did it in Indonesia, and it was a very different time than it is today! I learned so much about international fundraising, marketing, and volunteering from your interview. Thank you! (if you have any questions for charlotte, or if you’d like to learn more about volunteering or working internationally, please visit her blog, Diary of a Muzungu, or follow her on Twitter @CharlieBeau)

Are you fundraising for Africa? Read this! originally appeared on Wild Woman Fundraising on January 23, 2012.

Because of my posts about being a nonprofit wage slave, and being unable to make rent on a nonprofit “salary”, someone took issue with this. Actually, more than one person did, and I’m glad about it. I got a reader email saying,

“I HATE YOUR PITY PARTY! IF YOU DON’T LIKE HOW YOU’RE PAID IN NONPROFITS THEN GET OUT!”

And some other, less choice words.

And well, shoot man.

What are people who want to change the world supposed to do? Some of us are best suited to being social workers. Some of us are best suited to being therapists. Some of us are best suited to being bus drivers or nonprofit office managers. We still deserve a higher wage. I will show you why.

Here’s my question for you.

Why should people in the nonprofit sector make less than every other sector?

Rick Cohen on Blue Avocado says, “It’s official, we’re paid less than any other sector.”

Proof:

And it's not like we're going to get paid significantly more in other sectors.

The fact is man, wages haven’t risen since the 1970s in most sectors.

Proof:

More Proof:

That means MOST people, not just nonprofits, are getting the short end of the stick. Especially women. Especially women of color. So even if we “get out of the sector” it is not much better out there than in here.

And people from every economic strata, such as doctors, nurses, air traffic controllers, hotel maids, pepsi truck drivers, are getting shafted. Here’s a post I did about how no sector is safe. Using data and detailed economic research and in-depth investigative journalism from Mother Jones. One of the top progressive nonprofit news sources in the US.

Starting your own business is not the answer.

You ended with a “start your own business” rant and frankly, that’s not a reality for most people. We shouldn’t have to start our own businesses to make a living wage. Not everyone is suited to being an entrepreneur.

America is also not one of the best places to start a business, contrary to popular myth. The best places? New Zealand. Canada. Australia. According to DoingBusiness.com, the US is ranked 13th in ease of starting a business.

Maybe next time you criticize someone wanting to help people get paid more, you should do your own research into this issue. It’s easy for you, as an english-speaking white man with a cushy job at a foundation in America with many resources to get started as an entrepreneur.

Have you ever stopped to consider what the barriers are for a black woman with two kids? A single mom of any color? What about a black man coming out of the judicial system? What about a hispanic man who may not speak English?

Income equality will help EVERYONE’s standard of living rise. And that IS worth fighting for.

We need to speak for those who need our support to get pay parity. Income equality. Equal treatment no matter what the color of their skin, their sexual orientation, how long they’ve been unemployed, or how many children they have or are planning to have. Maybe you’ve never experienced this discrimination personally, but let me tell you, it’s out there.

The Spirit Level Book (a must read!)

In a truly equal society, as argued in “The Spirit Level, Why Equality is Better for Everyone,” by Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett, say:

Since we finished writing The Spirit Level in the spring of 2008, there have been many more studies reporting relationships between inequality and health. Nine of the new studies look specifically at rich, developed countries. Seven find, as we do, that health is worse in more unequal societies.

AND

“There is now evidence that inequality played a central causal role in the financial crashes of 1929 and of 2008. We suggested that inequality leads to increases in debt. It turns out that they are intimately related.” For more details, check out this article.

So if you think that it doesn’t matter that people at nonprofits don’t make enough money, then you’re basically saying that you don’t care that people who want to make the world better are less healthy, and that we have more giant financial crashes.

From the same article above:

“In his first major speech as leader of the Labour Party (in the UK), Ed Miliband said: “I do believe this country is too unequal and the gap between rich and poor doesn’t just harm the poor, it harms us all . . .”"

Let me just clarify this once and for all.

THIS IS NOT A PITY PARTY.

I’m here to call attention to disparities. I’m here to be a cultural critic. I’m here to help people think about how they want to change their worlds, their nonprofits, their lives.

My prescription for positive change? Unionize. Organize. Get clear about what you want to change and then change it. I’m not going to change it for you. But I’m not going to pretend that business as usual is just fine with me.

Wake up man! This is NOT a meritocracy.

And this is not a pity party. This is a call to action.

Do you understand me now?

You can tell the pioneers, because they’re the ones with arrows all over their chests.

I’m happy to stand beside Dan Pallotta, a white man who writes for the Harvard Business Review, and author of “Uncharitable” and agitate for a stronger nonprofit sector, to agitate for everyone who is getting underpaid at nonprofits right now. To agitate for better pay and better treatment for everyone. If that means unions, then so be it. If there’s another way, I’d be open to hearing what it is.

I’m happy to speak up. And I hope if you feel the same way, you’ll leave a comment, email me, or say hi on Twitter.

Are you new here? Welcome! Sign up for my newsletter and get fresh nonprofit fundraising, management and career ideas monthly!

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This is not a pity party. You understand? originally appeared on Wild Woman Fundraising on January 16, 2012.

Fact: Your job can be a wonderful place, but over 65% of Americans do not like their jobs. Even if you think you can just keep your head down and work hard to get promoted, only 33% of nonprofit executive level positions are filled from within. Even if you have passion for the mission, it’s not enough to keep you from getting the short end of the stick with your nonprofit salary.

It gets worse.  You live on credit, because you can’t save on your tiny nonprofit salary. Your boss expects you to dress like you make $100,000 more than you actually do. You know that most nonprofit fundraisers will stay in a job from 12 to 18 months. Until they leave, voluntarily or otherwise. With at-will employment, if your boss asks you to work over the weekend,what are you going to say, No?

Your boss can fire you on a whim, without any reason at all. And even if it’s totally unfair, there’s nothing you can say, because you signed the at-will employment contract.  So there goes your paycheck, your rent money and food money. There goes all those long hours, down the drain. You slaved away, made them hundreds of thousands or even millions, and now you’re out. There goes your career. Who wants to hire someone who has been fired? What can you do about this?

Are you looking for a nonprofit job?

Have you been looking for months, going from coffeeshop to career counselor to alumni groups, trying to find a way into a job?

Or if you are employed, are you unsure about the next steps in your nonprofit career?

Do you want to be paid more? Do you feel stuck where you are?

Solution:

Click Here to take my January 18th webinar on Moving On Up In Your Nonprofit Career, which answers:

1. How can you never miss a job posting, ever again?
2. How can you create a compelling cover letter that gets results?
3. How can you relate unrelated experience on your resume?
4. How to ask good interview questions to find out if your boss will be a bully, or if they have unrealistic expectations for your position?
5. How to talk about your accomplishments without bragging?
6. How to answer the tough interview questions?As well as interview questions you don’t have to answer
7. What is successful followup etiquette?
8. How can you dominate LinkedIn and really work your profile?
9. What are some of the best ways to step into leadership roles at nonprofits?
10. How can you deal with new fundraising job overwhelm AND get it all done?
11. What are the three conversations you MUST have with your boss to be successful?
12. How can you gather a team of people around you to help you achieve your goals?
13. How can you successfully negotiate for a higher nonprofit salary?
14. How to get recognition for your accomplishments?
15. How do you show people your value as a leader?
16. How can you get more responsibility and learning opportunities at your job?
17. BONUS: Real Case Studies of how different nonprofit professionals moved on up in their careers in the last 2-3 years.

Intrigued? Click here to Sign up now!

The following 7 bonus materials are included with this webinar:

1. Worksheet to help you really shine in your interview
2. Sample Cover Letter that really works!
3. Sample 3 month review for you to show your progress to your boss, what to track, what not to track.
4. Cheat-sheet of good questions to take to your next interview
5. Linkedin Profile Checklist
6. A full list of national and international websites where you can find nonprofit jobs
7. E-Article: Getting that Fundraising Job & You’ve Got the Job, Now What?

It’s hard out there. Many people just say “Stick with it! You’ll be rewarded!” But according to the Bridgespan Group, most nonprofit staff are NOT being groomed for leadership, and only 33% of the time do people from inside the nonprofit even attempt to fill senior leadership level positions. That means most of the time, you will have to make a leap to another nonprofit to move on up.

In this hands-on, how-to webinar, you will get advice and materials that are easy to use and created especially for you, the busy fundraising professional who barely has time to eat lunch, let alone search for a new job. I make it easy for you to succeed in your new position or in your search.

Let this webinar show you the right way to secure an early win. This webinar provides sound advice on must-do tasks for your first days on the job, and guides you every step of the way through the interview, as well as assisting you through your first meetings with your new boss. Whether you’re looking to make that next lateral move for a fundraising job, or you simply want to communicate better with your boss and co-workers, this webinar will help you.

Have you been offered some position and are you trying to convince yourself you want that nonprofit job? Remember this adage “If you can take it or leave it you should leave it. Make room for something new and magical to take its place”

Step-By-Step Live Demonstration: During this webinar, we will go through how to set up RSS feeds for jobs in real-time, learn how to talk about your accomplishments with real-life examples, how to show your accomplishments when your measurements can’t be dollars raised, and go over key conversations you need to have with your boss step by step.

February 29th, 1:00-2:30pm EST, you can get started moving on up in 2012, to make this your best year, careerwise! Join me.

Why should you learn from me?

Because: Not only am I the author of The Wild Woman’s Guide to Fundraising, I have connected nonprofit jobseekers and employers for over five years, and I have:

• Directed successful nonprofit career fairs
• Looked at thousands of resumes
• Coordinated a successful nonprofit job club in 2010
• Connected jobseekers with career speakers in a variety of industries
• Facilitated client job searches resulting in successful jobs in nonprofit and government
• Raised millions for nonprofits
• Moved on up from Development Assistant to Development Director and Development Consultant.

Click Here to Join Me on January 18th. I’ll be giving away more secrets than I’ve ever given away before, even in my book!

Is your nonprofit career in danger? originally appeared on Wild Woman Fundraising on January 6, 2012.

Are you getting to the age when you are not interested in accepting $28,000 a year anymore? Yeah, me neither.

Did you know that the way executive salaries have ballooned in the last twenty years, we should all be making $50,000 per year MINIMUM? Yeah, that’s so far from the current typical nonprofit wage as to see the curvature of the universe.

Have you ever wondered how to negotiate for a nonprofit salary?

It’s a little trickier than negotiating for a for-profit salary, because they can always pull this line on you, “HOW MUCH DO YOU BELIEVE IN THE MISSION IF YOU WANT TO GET PAID MORE” Etc.

But you DO need to get paid more. Because we are the lowest paid industry. Unless you’re working at a hospital or university. Then you’re probably getting paid a little better. But check out this chart.

(this graph is from Blue Avocado)

See? I told you! Even government workers get paid more than you. So, think of your future, think of saving for retirement, think of paying off your student loans, and think of NOT EATING RAMEN EVERY NIGHT OKAY.

You have to do your research.
Here’s a study from Guidestar on what executives are getting paid. And if you look up the nonprofit you’re considering applying for a job for on Guidestar, you can see what the current ED makes and look at what they’ve made over the last two or three years as well. If you’re not gunning for an executive level job, then just maybe cut that salary in half and that’s probably what you’ll be making, or less.

You have to tread carefully, and know what to say. But WHAT DO YOU SAY?

Case Study:
Yesterday I had this conversation with my friend, let’s call her Donna.

Donna had been an executive director for over ten years at other organizations, and for two years, she has been looking for a new job. She did jobs on the side to get through, but her unemployment had run out and she was struggling.

I had an RSS feed set up for nonprofit jobs, and when I saw this executive director job, I jumped on it and sent it to her. Then she replied and said thank you! And then she asked me to check out the 990 form on Guidestar for her, and I did, and I said,

“Uh Oh, you are NOT going to make a high salary at this place, their budget is pretty small” and she said, “Well, that’s okay.”

Then she asked me to look at her her resume and cover letter. So I did, I rewrote them and reformatted them and sent them back to her. We had a couple of weeks of interviews, phone, skype, and in person, and I celebrated with her that she had got that far, trying to not expect more…

Then last week she called me and said, “IT’S ALL YOUR FAULT” and I said, “REALLY” and she said “I GOT THE JOB!!!!” And we did a little victory dance over the phone, and she stopped by with flowers for me.

When she stopped by she explained to me what was going on at this nonprofit. It’s a small, rural nonprofit and they do have some government grants but they depend mainly on their yearly event (for which nothing has been done yet) and they are struggling. They need new case managers and everyone is trying to pull together.

When I asked her how the salary negotiations went, she told me she had to really fight to get $65,000.

“How did you do it?” I asked.

She replied,

“Here’s what happened. We were in this room, and the contract was there, and they were pushing me to sign it, and I looked at the bottom, and it only said $60,000. And I just sort of sat there and looked at it. And one person there said, “Is there something wrong?” And I said, “In all of the places this job was posted, the salary range was from $50,000 to $65,000.” And then someone else said, “Well, with your qualifications and the salary research we did for this region blah blah blah” but she didn’t have to listen to that person, because her experience is over 10 years of executive level experience, and so I said nothing and then the first person said, “Donna, what will it take to make you happy?” And I said, “I need to see that the board is behind me and believes that I can raise this money” and then the first person quickly took the contract back and crossed out $60,000 and wrote in $65,000″ and then I signed it and that was that.”

I actually clapped at this point and she smiled. She said, “It would have taken me 10 years to get a $5,000 increase in salary, and I knew I had to negotiate it now.”

Then she told me, “Between you and me, they are going to get half of that money back because I am going to buy two tickets for their gala and give $100 a month to this nonprofit, so that I can ask each board member to do the same.”

I thought that was really smart. So if you’re going up for an executive director job, you should build in some buffer that you will be donating to the nonprofit as well.

Are you inspired by this case study? Want to get a nonprofit job, FAST?

You can hire me to look over your resume and cover letter too.

I happen to be teaching a free webinar about moving up in your nonprofit career this December at CharityHowTo.com.

You can also get the Nonprofit Career Guide Free

Or the Wild Woman’s Guide to Nonprofit Management for just $9.99 til December 31st, 2011!

PS.
Here are some more resources on nonprofit salaries
Rosetta Thurman’s blog post on salary negotiation
Allison Jones’ blog post on salary negotiation
Blue Avocado’s Jan Masoka on how much executive director salaries should be

Are you new here? Welcome! Sign up for my newsletter and get fresh nonprofit fundraising, management and career ideas monthly!

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Case Study: How to negotiate your nonprofit salary? originally appeared on Wild Woman Fundraising on November 10, 2011.

Managing Up, How does it work?

Have you ever known a boss or a person in management who just seemed to be there by luck, not by skill or management ability?

Have you ever known a nonprofit leader who didn’t know about nonprofits, but wasn’t aware of how much they didn’t know?

Have you ever heard of the term managing up?

Where does this term, managing up, come from?

Do you know about the Dunning-Kruger effect?

Kruger and Dunning proposed that, for a given skill, incompetent people will:

tend to overestimate their own level of skill;
fail to recognize genuine skill in others;
fail to recognize the extremity of their inadequacy;
recognize and acknowledge their own previous lack of skill, if they can be trained to substantially improve.
(from the wikipedia page.)

This relates to Peter’s Corollary.

“Peter’s Corollary states that “in time, every post tends to be occupied by an employee who is incompetent to carry out their duties” and adds that “work is accomplished by those employees who have not yet reached their level of incompetence”. “Managing upward” is the concept of a subordinate finding ways to subtly “manage” superiors in order to limit the damage that they end up doing.”

How can you manage up?

Well, let’s assume your boss is a prime example of the kruger-dunning effect, and they don’t know what they don’t know, or worse, they assume that they know more about your job than you do, when in reality, they know nothing.

So, if this is the case, how do you get the message across?

First, set boundaries and expectations in your interview, straight out. And if it’s too late for that, then in your next meeting. Say, “Here is how you should measure what I’m doing.”

1. Measure fundraising not just in dollars raised, but in number of people touched.
2. Measure how well you’re doing your job by rebranding and polling community members about what they think of your nonprofit.
3. Measure how many grants out the door, not just which grants you won.
4. Measure the engagement of old and new volunteers and board members. Have you been having more meetings? What new initiatives are you planning?

If you can succeed in turning the conversation from “Where is the money” to “How can we get everyone to take responsibility for fundraising” then you will have succeeded in getting more help and managing up.

Any other tips for managing up? Please leave a comment!

(Also, if you are in a situation where you just want to tear your hair out because of a boss or coworker, we are about to make an app to help Stop Workplace Bullying and you can totally get to the bottom of that problem.)

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Are you managing up? Where does that come from? originally appeared on Wild Woman Fundraising on September 2, 2011.

Nonprofit fundraisers often have a hard time saying No. Perhaps it’s because we are so good at creating community and relationships. We are trained to say yes, to do sales, marketing, customer service to make everyone happy. Today I want to teach you about some ways to vet a nonprofit before you work there, in your job interview, so that you can learn whether or not to say no to a job when it’s offered to you. This can save you a lot of time and trouble in the long run.

Since the average tenure of a fundraiser in a nonprofit organization in America is 18-24 months, then chances are you’re going to be looking for a job soon, if you’re not already. Have you been burned out by a job? Would you like to learn how to make the best of a nervewracking situation?

Here are some questions that you can ask in your interview, and why you should be asking these questions.

First and most important question.

1. How much was raised last year and How much would I be expected to raise in the first year?

The reason you want to ask this question is you want to know right away if they have realistic or unrealistic goals for your position. Chances are, you are the sole fundraiser in the organization, and if they expect you to raise $1,000,000 after raising only $450,000 the year before, with a staff of one, that is setting you up for failure. You can choose to stay in the interview or go based on how they answer this question.

2. What is the focus of the strategic plan right now?

This will help you see if they are an expansion phase, a contraction phase, or a stasis phase with the organization. If they are in an expansion phase, such as building a new building, you might ask, “Has a feasibility study been done?” or if they’re in stasis until the economy gets better, you might ask, “Have donations fallen from two years ago?”

3. What is the focus of the development plan?

If they say, “What development plan?” or “You’ll have to make it” you can be certain that they need your help, but also you might want to query them further on if they’ve ever made a development plan, if the previous development person made a plan, or if everyone just makes it up as they go along. Remember, the more systems you have in place, the more you will be able to raise money.

4. How many times has this position been filled in the last four years?

If they say, “You will be the fifth person in as many years” then you know that you have some serious questions about whether or not you want to get involved with this organization. High turnover means something is up. Remember when you’re dating and people say, “It’s not you, it’s me?” In this case, that would be spot on. It really is them. Ideally you want to find a nonprofit where the previous person is available to train you. If they are not available, that’s another red flag.

5. What sort of qualities would you like to see in the person who fills this position?

This will help you watch them think about the previous person in the position, and you might be able to glean something from their answers about what they liked or didn’t like about this person.

This will lead you to the next question:

6. For your boss: What is your management style, and how often are there supervisions and staff meetings?

This requires you to know yourself enough to know how often you like to meet. So ask yourself this before you go into the interview. Generally, I like to have quick, once-weekly meetings with my boss to keep communications smooth and flowing. This redirects me when I’m going off course. Some of the worst organizational communication I’ve ever seen is in organizations that are smaller than 20 people. It’s incredible how people will simply not communicate with each other. Your office will break down if communications are not kept open, and this can lead to new levels of tension and hostility, so do try to get as many meetings as you need with the people you need to be in close contact with.

If you get to talk to the Executive Director or CEO during your interview, here are some questions I would ask.

7. How much of your job is currently major gifts, and how much would you like it to be?

8. What are your priorities right now? Advocacy? Allocation of state funds? Collaboration? Maintaining the level of service, but not expanding?

9. What are some difficult decisions that need to be made? Staff cuts? Budgets? Funding cuts?

You need to know answers to these questions. If your executive officer is not comfortable making major gift requests, but prefers all fundraising be foisted onto you, then they are not taking responsibility for the fiscal health of the organization. And this can tell you whether or not you want this job. When and if you meet with the Executive Director, you want to know if the organization is in trouble, or if it’s in stasis, or thriving. Usually, by this point in the interview, if they tell you how much turnover there’s been, how much they’ve made in the last year and how much you would be expected to raise, and what the focus of the strategic plan is, you should have a pretty good idea of how they are going to answer these questions, but it doesn’t hurt to ask, to show that you care about the pressures they are facing, and that you want to help by being the best fundraising professional that you can be.

Last questions:

10. What is the range of compensation for this position? Is it salaried or hourly? What other benefits are involved in this position? When would this position be expected to start? When can I expect to hear from you?

Depending on how well they answer the previous questions, you may decide that you want to skip these questions. Believe it or not, in the last fundraising job interview I had, the interviewer wanted me to work on salary, with no benefits, as many days per week as they wanted, as many hours as they wanted, for no extra compensation if I did a good job. This is actually illegal to ask someone to work full-time with no benefits. I doubt whether they could get anyone but the most desperate person to fill that position, and I walked out of the interview at that point.

You need to know your bottom line too. What is your bottom line salary requirement? What is your bottom line hourly requirement? Do you only work hourly? What benefits can you not live without? Is it a unionized shop? If not, why not?

I hope these questions help you in your quest for your next position. Whether you’re happy with where you’re at or whether you’re itching for new challenges, I’m sure that you will do well no matter where you land. Just remember you’ve got to see what you’re getting into before you say yes!

(This article was first printed at CharityHowTo.com)

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10 fundraising interview questions to help you succeed in your career originally appeared on Wild Woman Fundraising on August 4, 2011.

This week I will be talking with Tony Martignetti, who is pretty darn special. He just interviewed one of my favorite nonprofit peeps, Gail Perry, author of Fired-Up Fundraising: Turn Board Passion Into Action. And now he is going to interview me!

When: 1pm-2pm EST, August 5th, which is FRIDAY.
Where: Your desk! Just tune into iTunes
What: I’ll be sharing my thoughts about career, social media, grants and more. We’ll be live and taking your calls for anything nonprofit management or fundraising related. Go bananas.

Top Trends. Sound Advice. Lively Conversation.
You’re on the air and on target as I delve into the big issues facing your nonprofit–and your career.
If you have big dreams but an average budget, tune in to Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio.

Call in to my interview with Tony Martignetti on Nonprofit Radio August 5th originally appeared on Wild Woman Fundraising on August 2, 2011.

Picture from Elsie Esq from Flickr Creative Commons

So Blue-Sky thinking is being overly optimistic. Grey sky thinking is rather less so. Nonprofits seem to sit on their own hands rather than take a risk with anything having to do with spending money.

How do Charities engage in grey-sky thinking? Let me count the ways.

1. We’ve never had any money, and we can’t afford to hire someone to get us money.

2. The downturn makes it so difficult to raise new money that we should settle for breaking even this year.

3. We can’t hire this talented Executive Director candidate, they are going to want too much money.

4. We can’t hire this talented consultant, they are going to want too much money.

5. We can’t get a database, that would cost too much money.

6. We can’t spare our development/executive director to go work on partnerships, we have already given them enough work for 4 people, they need to be here, to answer the phone.

7. We want new staff to work, on salary, for a paltry sum, and we won’t pay you healthcare because you might have to work 20 hours to 60 hours per week. And Why aren’t we getting any top candidates for this job?

8. We can’t have a nonprofit union because that will make our workers lazy and demand too much. No. This is a “right to work state” and they can take their “at will employment” or we will fire them.

9. We can’t afford new computers so we’ll make do with these ten year old ones that we had donated, that crash every couple of hours. Also, we can’t afford to have an IT person come and fix them.

So those are just nine ways, off the top of my head, that I can think of where nonprofits engage in grey-sky thinking. Can you think of any more? If so, leave a comment. I’d love to get your opinion on how nonprofits sit on their own hands instead of take a risk.

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9 Ways that Charities Get Grey-Sky Thinking originally appeared on Wild Woman Fundraising on July 29, 2011.

What does your board report look like?

Are you a consultant? Does your board report look like a CYA thing? Whether or not you have a good relationship with your boss, it’s good to know what people expect. And if they have no expectations? What do you give them then?

Ever wanted to know what other one-person development shops do?

Time for radical transparency!

Here’s my board report.

ACO July 2011 Board Report
Mazarine Treyz, Development Director
Activities for end of June and beginning of July

Appeal progress
Wrote draft 1 of appeal letter and emailed to board member for editing.
Read “The 7 faces of philanthropy” book about how to get more people to give to ACO.

Grants progress
Did more grant research with NOZA database
Added grants to the grant application calendar (attached)
Applied to the X Foundation online
Met with Program Director of X Foundation, applied to X Foundation

Survey and Workplace giving progress
I need to know if and when we are going to be able to go into Dell children’s hospital, Need to know who, what they will play before I can apply for this

Graphic Design and Branding
Met with designer to talk about graphical standards for ACO, hex codes, logos, etc.
Nonprofit Brand Report from Harvard University Hauser Center for Nonprofit Organizations

“A nonprofit brand can often serve as a moral compass for the organization, helping to facilitate choices about which resources and partnerships to pursue in order to increase organizational capacity and effectiveness.” -Excerpt from this report

Sponsorships
HEB is good to approach because 29 people shop there
ATT because 9 people get their service there
UFCU 8 people bank there
Blackerby 11 people shop there

Next steps for July and August:
Finish and send out appeal letter for next season
Apply for grants with no deadline
Would like to meet with website committee on ways to get more donations on the website. Would like to go speak at workplaces about ACO with 1-3 musicians to do a little concert. Would like to move mailing list over to Aweber and add names from June concert. Work together with PR/Business Manager to highlight our players in the newsletter

Workplace Giving/Possible sources of Board Members
Apple computers
The State capital
PPD, Inc.
Freescale Semiconductor
Dell Children’s Medical Center

What does your board report look like? Does it look like this? Are you required to give information? Or different information?

What does your board report look like? originally appeared on Wild Woman Fundraising on July 26, 2011.

Flickr image by GinasPics

First off, if you like how I write, you are going to LOVE how I teach. Because then it’s like I’m writing, but you can hear me talk, and then we can have a conversation, too!

Here’s a neat thing: My Wildly Successful Events Webinar on how to get sponsorships on July 13th is all sold out! For the THIRD TIME IN A ROW! PEOPLE REALLY LOVE IT! I am so happy! If you just want tips on how to get mega-sponsorships, then my next sponsorship webinars are September 1st and September 27th with charityhowto. And you can sign up right here.

I also have a new Charityhowto webinar, and it’s all about appeal letters! It’s called Tons of Money in the Mail. September 14th! And here’s where you can read more about it.

And if you just can’t wait for some new info right this month, I’ve got a webinar on managing your online reputation on July 15th that has a few extra spaces left in it. Just go here to check that out!

Have you ever worked with a nonprofit leader that just would say NO to everything you suggested? Did you ever think, ‘Oh M. G. I can’t take it anymore” and run out? Did you ever want to partner with other nonprofits but feel stymied because your organization wasn’t nimble enough to take advantage of opportunities like that? Too much bureaucracy? Or maybe you just didn’t have the power to decide that partnerships could happen?

I’ve noticed some of these issues and I’ve come up with a theory of what makes an effective leader. Whether you’re getting your Master’s in Nonprofit Management or your Master’s in Public Administration, I think these can be useful for you.

Do you have what it takes to be a good nonprofit leader? As I’ve made a study of what helps people be good leaders over the last five years, I’ve come up with six key things that can make or break an organization’s effectiveness. And we all want to be effective, right?

Here are the six qualities of effective nonprofit leaders.

1. Listen to what other people tell you and say yes to their suggestions.
This is as simple as someone saying, ‘Hey, can we partner with Nonprofit X? We could get some more exposure out of it’ and then just say YES. Or if someone else says, ‘Can we get a donor database now? I’ve researched them and this is the best one’ then just say YES. It’s a principle of one of the most successful car companies in the world. Ever heard of Toyota? Anyone at Toyota can make a suggestion and it will be tried to improve the effectiveness of their processes, whatever they are. This is lean methodology, also known as Kaizen. I have a whole section in my book devoted to this concept, and it can make such a difference in terms of making your nonprofit effective.

2. Appreciate people who work for you.
You need to build relationships all of the time, and especially with the people that you work with. These people need to see that you respect them. And when you appreciate them, you show them you respect them, and why they should continue to work even harder for you. A little thank-you when they do something right can mean so much. Maybe a big smile and a “I really appreciate what you did there” at other times. But in my experience so many people don’t know how to do this. If you don’t know how to do this, watch other people who do it really well. And emulate them.

Flickr Picture by Eric Schoon

3. If you have a problem with someone, meet with people and communicate with them clearly. I guess if it gets too serious, you could always use a finger puppet to say things for you?
There is so much bad communication in really tiny nonprofits, and there’s just no excuse for it except that people need to figure out how to communicate without blowing their stack. And what I find helps the most is weekly check-ins with people in your team. Even if it’s just you and the executive director. Get in there and have that meeting. Sit in the waiting area and chat about what’s going on, what you need help with, ask about priorities, etc. If you are off track, it can be corrected quickly with weekly meetings. When you are no longer meeting, communication breaks down and then it’s just a matter of time before you don’t have a job anymore.

4. Have passion for what you are doing and share credit whenever you can.
When you have true passion for the mission, when you are connected to the deepest pains of your clients or donors and you can articulate that to everyone around you, when you really love what you do and how you do it and how it all helps others, then people are going to love working around you and with you. You connect with the pain and then you can connect with a solution. Everyone likes problem-solvers. And also people who share the credit for doing something right. So when you do your work, appreciate the people who helped you do it. When you hold up people of lower status than you, that makes you look like a generous leader. And you are if you can make it a habit.

5. Push yourself to develop new skills and go beyond your comfort zone.
This means instead of saying, “Well, we’re not doing that because we don’t know how therefore it doesn’t matter” just ask someone. Say, why should we do this? What makes it a good thing? What will it get us? And then if there’s an opportunity for you to learn something, like a more effective way to deliver services, then learn it. It doesn’t take that long to learn about what other people are doing. We are getting so interconnected now that almost as soon as an innovation happens, when it’s published online, other people can get aware of it and start to replicate it, or connect with the person doing it and figure out how to make it happen on their scale. This can help you be more eligible for grants, when you take best practices of other nonprofits and apply them to your own. It can also keep you on your toes.

6. Ask for help.
This is huge. This could be partnering with another nonprofit, this could be bringing in an accountant to do your taxes, this could be asking someone to help you with board recruitment, this could be asking your board to help you fundraise, this could be even bigger, this could be getting a consultant to help you do better organizational communication, or getting a scholarship for continuing education for your employees to improve their knowledge. Maybe they just need to learn how to administer the website better. Maybe you need to ask an event manager for help. Asking for help is different than not paying for things. But sometimes, right, there’s founder’s syndrome and/or type A stuff where you think you have to do it all and be it all and you can’t show that you don’t know something, and seriously, it is SUCH a relief to ask other people to do things for you, and/or pay them, and know that it’s going to get done.

Do you agree? Disagree? Any more qualities that you think I’ve left out? Please leave a comment.

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6 ways you can be an effective nonprofit leader originally appeared on Wild Woman Fundraising on July 11, 2011.