What do you think about that? Have you seen that in your work, and how have you noticed it?

It's almost a little bit of a surprise that half of people are not feeling burnt out.

This doesn't feel like a surprise to me at all, and the way that I've seen it play out in my work and the work that I do with organizations and executive directors is, you know, executive directors showing up to calls, especially those initial calls, and you can just see it.

Like, you can really see the burnout on their face.

And I think you had talked to another executive director, one of our clients, who kind of shared that some of our fractional fundraising work feels part implementation and fundraising, and sometimes part therapy as well, 'cause this can almost be one of the only safe spaces where executive directors can talk freely.

Like, you can't talk to your staff because you're kind of at a different level than them.

You can't talk to your board because that can sometimes be really challenging as well.

So those are the strategic decisions that you have to make with clarity and probably sooner rather than later if you're in this situation.

What do you think makes a good funder? So how would you know that there's alignment when you're doing research or when you're starting to build a relationship with someone?

The first thing that I do whenever I hear about a new funder- Or a new funding opportunity, I will jump onto their page on the CRA website.

'Cause if they're a registered charity or foundation, you can look at their giving history.

So I wanna look for funders that have historically given to similar organizations, given in similar size, in similar geography, in similar missions.

And then I also wanna see what's the reality of their giving.

They might say, "Oh, you know, we fund health and social services, and community food banks," and then you look at their giving, and actually for the last five years, like, 70% of their donations have been to arts organizations.

So I wanna see what is the actuality and what is happening in practice, rather than what they're just saying on their website.

And it's something that we just say, like, "It's okay to put our values aside for now," right? But you just end up in a situation where you just do that little by little, and then you end up seeing like, oh actually, we're completely removed from where we thought we were gonna be because we've given up our values here, and here, and here, and little by little, right? Until you're literally partnered with Amazon.

So it's a pretty interesting problem, and I often see organizations stick to grants because you're kinda scared to connect to people.

Yeah, I think that number that you quoted, the seven to 10%, is the success rate for a cold application.

So if you have had no communication with the funder or the foundation, they don't know who you are at all and you just chuck in an application, yes, your success rate is going to be around seven to 10%.

And you know, with that warm introduction, that warm relationship, that bumps up closer to about 20%, which is still, you're like, "Oh my God, 80% of these warm applications are not being funded" And yeah, that is the truth.

You know, if you're applying for so many grants, and I've seen this a lot too, where organizations will just, like, make up a project in order to get the funding, and then if you do get the funding, sometimes that project can actually be a real drain on your resources and your organization.

I remember I spent, like, 18 months trying to get a grant for an organization.

The ED had asked me to develop a program that would fit, and I finally got it and went to the program coordinator, and she was just, like, crestfallen because they didn't have the infrastructure to actually do that project.

There's someone over their shoulder looking to see that the investment was a good one.

They'll be able to do it, while a junior person will not be able to do it.

Yeah, exactly.

And I think things like the fractional fundraising model is so amazing for work like that, 'cause often organizations are in the position where they can only afford a junior fundraiser, but they also don't have all of these things in place.

So it can be a real hard position and a bit of, like, a catch-22.

Like, you need, you need a case for support, you need somebody to train your board, you need somebody who's really good at grant writing, and you can only afford somebody who is maybe, like, one to two years out of school, and you don't have that time and capacity or even knowledge sometimes for the executive director or anybody else on the team to hold hands to be able to train them, to be able to upskill them to the level that you really need.

If you're in that position, fractional might be something that you wanna explore.

It does give you access to a more senior-level fundraiser who can really set up those systems, develop those things for you.

If you're in the situation kind of assessing, like, am I ready to hire a fundraiser? Should I go fractional? Should I do something completely different? Should I do, like, professional development and try to continue doing it myself? This is kinda your episode to kinda assess where you're at now and where you can be in a year or two years, right? So Caitlin, for the executive directors listening, what is something that you'd say, "Start here"?

So this is money that should be coming to nonprofits, but it's usually just being held in trust.

Okay, let's talk about funding restrictions, 'cause that is huge, and I see so much frustration all the time, and I get so frustrated every time I hear it.

Funders only wanna fund new projects.

So incredibly frustrating for organizations because they're constantly trying to raise those operating dollars, and funders seem to just want to fund those, like, shiny, new things, and you can't keep making up new projects every year.

Our level one funders are awarding mainly those restricted grants and those project grants that cannot go into any operating funds.

They're usually, like, fund new, shiny projects.

They only fund the launch, but they will not continue to fund after that, which is so hard, especially when you build a program that people rely on.

But before we leave you today, Caitlin, what has made someone an A+ funder for you?

So it's a pretty deep world.

Yeah, and I think it's amazing.

And I love that this was one of your predictions for the future of nonprofit work.

And I really hope that it comes true because as somebody who's been in the nonprofit space for 15, 20 years, I've never worked in an organization that had HR.

And that is crazy because it is something that feels like a luxury sometimes in nonprofit organizations.

But in every single organization I worked in, we needed HR.

So to be able to have access to these experts and access to these resources and this support at a cost that is going to work for smaller organizations is amazing.

I don't know if you've seen that.

Like, how do you find these people? What do you think?

My first stop is always with the board.

If I find something where I'm like, "Okay, this feels like a really good fit," I'm gonna reach out to my board members, and I'm gonna ask, "Okay, does anybody know anybody or can make a warm introduction to this foundation?" And like, I don't care how tenuous that link is.

If I can get some kind of a connection and some kind of an intro, I'm gonna go for it.

So that is like my first stop, like that warm connection is ideal and like that is your best chance at getting a meeting.

And I have gotten meetings with organizations and foundations that have very clearly said on everything that they publish, "We don't do meetings," because I had that warm connection.

So it is the best way to go.

How do you start these off?

stories.

So sharing those personal stories that really create that emotional connection and like share the human element of the impact that your organization has.

And it doesn't have to be a story that is like this organization changed my life forever and now I am successful and I have no problems anymore.

Life is not like that.

Sometimes progress is not linear.

You can have a personal story about an impact that your organization made in one day of a person's life or one aspect or one moment.

I personally used to work in organizations that provided resources for people recovering from addiction.

And Caitlin will share the first one.

So they're giving to get something tangible back.

Yeah, and this is definitely a reason, you know, we try to, in our practice and the work that we do with our clients, we try to have things like this, this kind of getting something in return as like an added benefit.

Like it's an added, it's an extra, but really like you want the donors who give relationally rather than transactionally.

This is very much a kind of, yeah, you get an event ticket, you get recognition, you get something else.

which is not really what fundraising is.

Fundraising is building that relationship.

And then, yeah, it's like an add-on extra.

your beginnings as a humble organization.