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Fundraising for the Long Haul
By Kim Klein
Oakland, CA: Chardon Press, 2000
161 pp., $20.00, paper
ISBN 1-890759-06-6
Order from Amazon

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Kim Klein has been a fundraising guru for nonprofit organiza-tions for more than 20 years. She's worked with thousands of groups through workshops and consulting, as well as hav-ing been a staff and board member for several groups and written books and articles (among many other things).

As she puts it, her new book is for a type of group:

Its name is "People" (or some subset: i.e., Women, Youth, Eastside, Seniors, etc.) For or Against some type of thing, such as Rent Control, Domestic Violence, Rape, Nuclear War, Pesticides, Free Speech, Forests, Racism, Policy Brutality, Independent Giving, Theater Arts. It was formed anywhere from 5 to 50 years ago, but has most likely been around for between 10 and 20 years. Its budget is anywhere from $100,000 to $750,000 a year; maybe $1 million if it has large project grants .... It has a variety of funding sources, but is probably still too dependent on a handful of individual donors or foundation grants.

Indeed, this readable book will be useful to thousands of groups and millions of individuals involved in those organizations with a strong purpose to work on issues important to people and their communities. As Klein says: "Raising money is hard work to be sure, but not having money is even harder. Those are your choices."

The book is useful because the author describes both failures and successes. The first section is ""You Can Learn from My Mistakes." The six lessons are: the importance of prospect research, the importance of being straightforward, practice asking for money, pitfalls of projecting your insecurities onto others, haste makes waste (or concentrate on doing things right), and the importance of process - if the people working on something don't like it, they won't do it, so it's not a good idea.

Section two is how to have a healthy fundraising program. The paradigm is one supported: "by a broad base of individual donors, giving varying amounts, and using a wide variety of strategies to solicit those gifts, with a large number of volunteers involved in fundraising, and fundraising integrally involved in program." The organization's mission is central, not the wishes of a few donors or staff. The section also includes chapters on a healthy development office and characteristics of a healthy person coordinating fundraising.

Section three covers common obstacles to a healthy fundraising program. She targets five problems: founder's syndrome, veering away from the mission, boards ("generally boards don't work"), wearing out fundraising strategies, and taking donors for granted.

Section four is about using strategies effectively over the long haul. Four specific areas are emphasized: strategic planning; savings accounts, reserve funds, and endowments; getting comfortable with making money; and collaborative fundraising.

The book is useful because it uses real examples (although names have been changed), describes the principles underlying why things work, and offers alternative ideas. For example, regarding boards, she has spent a lot of time helping boards work better, but thinks that better structures than those developed decades ago could work. She stresses that clearly stating what the board's jobs are is one key element, but strongly encourages groups to think about what structures could work bettersmall boards that are representative and turn over; staff on boards (something she strongly opposed for many years), and ad hoc committees that do the work.

Most board members and staff' (and many donors) will see themselves - and can laugh at themselves - several times while reading the book. And we can agree with her premise: "The ways we think about money, raise it, spend it, save it, invest it, and plan for it are some of the most basic elements for modeling the world we want to create."

- Don Hancock

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