The Art and Science
of Nonprofit Fundraising
Your board of directors can be a great resource for successful fundraising. A well-formed and motivated Board provides leadership, annual donors, challenge and special gifts, and an introduction to networks of potential donors and partners. LAPA can help you develop the Board that will drive your organization into new growth and success.
How engaged is your Board and how well are they serving your organization? LAPA can analyze their levels of engagement and contributions, and help you chart the course to a stronger, more engaged Board and stronger committee structure. We can even place a board coach in your executive committee and board meetings to help the board deal with their own growth and development.
Finding the right new Board members requires time and patience. Let us help you find the best candidates and structure the best ways to get them engaged and involved. We follow a rigorous recruitment selection process that has produced real results for our clients.
A day or a weekend away with key Board and staff members can be a terrific way to build connections, communication, and engagement. Let us help you plan and facilitate a retreat that will leave your Board and team energized and inspired. Our retreats can be based on a tried and tested survey that is administered a month before the retreat, and then the findings from the survey form the basis for the retreat.
Nationwide Leadership Council Formed to Boost Unrestricted Support:
The Council for Adult & Experiential Learning – CAEL (www.cael.org), urgently needed to boost their annual unrestricted support. CAEL’s mission, to link learning and work, is anurgent need because doing so helps adult learners secure higher paying jobs and, therefore, strengthens the American economy. At present, the competitiveness and readiness of our work force do not match our country’s need for highly skilled workers. A dangerous breakdown exists in our national labor market. According to the U.S. Census, only thirty percent of our citizens aged 25+ have a bachelor’s degree or higher. This means about 169 million Americans of working age lack a formal degree. A substantial number of them are adults who left college primarily due to a shortage of time and/or money. CAEL's overarching goal is to make possible “meaningful learning, credentials and work for every adult.”
The Challenge:
In the course of doing their work, CAEL often has to invest in expensive processes to get issues addressed and problems solve. Processes like convening disparate bureaucratic parties to talk about how to solve complex problems within our education and workforce development systems. Conferences, research, white paper presentations, private meetings may seem simple enough but the costs added up! To seize on innovative policy work, CAEL needed about $1 million boost their annual revenues. Where would it come from?
Our Solution:
CAEL contacted LAPA Fundraising to talk about the dilemma and after a few conversations, LAPA recommended that CAEL’s annual fund could be boosted by establishing a national Leadership Council. CAEL’s Leaders Council, it was proposed, would be a dedicated group of community leaders who give input to CAEL and provide access to their networks as well as philanthropy. Two dynamic co-chairs were approached and agreed to volunteer to lead the effort. LAPA wrote the charter for the Council, it’s case for support, and all of the procedural documents. Wealth vetting was conducted to assure that the leaders surfaced had the capacity to give at the $25,000 level and above. LAPA provided executive coaching throughout the assignment in-person and by phone.
Results:
CAEL’s National Leadership Council was established and is growing its membership slowly but surely. CAEL’s CEO, Pamela Tate, has been behind the initiative from the start and has integrated recruitment of new members into her daily work. CAEL took a three year view for deepening this new effort, and their current funders have been impressed with their discipline. A Special Fund was created to capture the $1 million annual need for unrestricted gifts, and donor giving policies were adopted by the Board of Directors to properly guide the management of the Fund’s gifts. The Council is up and running and growing, aimed at addressing the dilemma of needing unrestricted support.
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