Eric Streiff Nonprofit Accountability Archives

When should you stop asking for a donation?

April 2, 2017

Is it ever good to stop asking for a donation?

The frequency and intensity of asking for a donation is an ongoing question that surfaces all the time. In my line work helping nonprofit leaders to be effective and to raise as much money as possible I encounter lots of naysayers regarding time-honored strategies and tactics. There is both science and art to nonprofit fundraising. There are tactics that clearly have the metrics behind it to support the effort while others don’t have the science behind it but it just seems right. And often your efforts include a bit of both. Why is this important?

In every part of our life we encounter a series of decisions that rest on past experience and sometimes you need to go with your gut because there is no past experience or it’s not 100% clear what is best. Fundraising is no different.

Nonprofits need to rethink how to measure a charity's success.

The way we think about charity is dead wrong

April 25, 2015

Nonprofits need to rethink how to measure a charity’s success.

Too many nonprofits, he says, are rewarded for how little they spend — not for what they get done. He questions how to measure a charity’s success. Instead of equating frugality with morality, he asks us to start rewarding charities for their big goals and big accomplishments (even if that comes with big expenses). In this bold talk, he says: Let’s change the way we think about changing the world.

You can find the video on YouTube HERE

In this video activist and fundraiser Dan Pallotta calls out the double standard that drives our broken relationship to charities

Impact of Mission

March 29, 2011

This past weekend I was doing a lot of thinking on the long road from Saint Louis to Chicago — a five full hours of blissful thinking time — and I was thinking back to a previous blog post regarding how nonprofits need to focus more on the changed lives and the impact they are making in the world and less on the financials.

People Support Winners

August 28, 2010

The simple fact is that most people tend to support winners. Organizations that handle the funds they receive in the most effective, honest, and efficient way seem to perform better then those that don’t. You can’t overlook this fact.

Should You Conduct A Development Audit?

November 21, 2009

Development Audits (or Development Assessments) are a genuine way to get a clear and objective snapshot of the overall health, effectiveness, and efficiency of a fundraising organization. Depending on the goal of the organization being assessed, the audit can include a review of the overall business operation, including organizational structure, business processes, marketing and communication efforts, positioning in the marketplace, donor surveys, as well as employee and volunteer staffing and so on.

Are We Accountable to Our Mission?

May 21, 2008

There is a great deal of talk about the accountability of nonprofits. Accountability is on the tip of everyone’s tongue and is being discussed at conferences and seminars and in nonprofit board rooms. It has become a punch line of sorts and frankly is in danger of becoming a meaningless word similar to the “all natural” tag lines you see on just about every food product sold, which have lost total credibility in my opinion.

Tag: Nonprofit Accountability