A Transactional Nation October 30, 2006

Are your relationships with donors merely transactional?

About 10 days ago I was at the Social Venture Network conference in Tucson, and heard Michael Lerner speak about the nature of our relationships in American society (Canadian friends and others, you'll appreciate this). Lerner is what he calls a "spirtual progressive", a Rabbi who talks about the power of generosity and trust.

At the conference he said something to the effect that relationships in America have become harmfully transactional, with people asking "are my needs being met" in marriage and friendships, and "looking for a better deal" elsewhere, a "competition of win or lose vs. anyone else.

Then he said one of the most powerful things I've heard in a long time: "is your personal income compensation for a wasted life?" Wow.

Let me try to tie these two concepts together and relate back to your donor relationships. You work at your mission for a reason. There are plenty of jobs that pay better (and btw, you deserve comparable private sector pay for your analogous nonprofit job), but you work where you do because you want to help change the world, people's lives, your neighborhood, etc. Or you want to promote something for the greater good. It's your mission, It's not just a job. Your salary is very unlikely to be "compensation for a wasted life"; if it were, you wouldn't be there.

Tell your donors that. Not in those words, but I think it's important to lose the scarcity mentality so common in nonprofits, both in how we compensate ourselves and in how we promote our causes. Your cause and your mission are shared with your donors, except you are the one on the front line doing the difficult part. You show up, and that's harder than writing the check. And your donors are supporting the shared mission with you through your work.

It's a shared mission. Asking your donors to step up and support your shared mission is easy. You provide the labor, passion, plans, and direction, and they provide the cash to keep it running. You are, in fact, doing them a service.

So when you nurture your donor relationships, understand that they must not be merely transactional. Yours is a shared mission, and while you should be grateful they share the mission enough to share the burden of keeping it going, they are also grateful for your part of the shared burden, which is the dedication of most of your waking hours to the daily tasks of improving the world through thousands of small steps. When you ask for donations, it is not for you or your expenses, it is for your shared mission.

And your income, then, is a necessary part of the shared mission, the completion of a partnership between you and your supporters. Thoughts? Click Comments below.