The Impact of Program Evaluation

By Gayle Warner, Director of Grants and Program Strategy Why is program evaluation important? My 25-year nonprofit career challenged me to develop programs that would impact a person’s life – whether it was about finishing high school and/or being the first-generation graduate from college. Often, I worked hand in hand with local and national foundations [...]

2017-01-07T18:50:15-07:00April 1st, 2016|Evaluation, Fundraising, Policy and advocacy|1 Comment

How to Ask People for Money: Finding the Right Message

By Janine Vanderburg, CEO and Christy Bergman, Director of Resource Development, Joining Vision and Action  How do I ask people for money? Those of us who have been in fundraising for a long time know intuitively that the messages you use to ask people for money need to appeal to both the left brain, which is [...]

2017-07-21T14:04:56-06:00March 22nd, 2016|Blog, Fundraising, Training|0 Comments

The Blueprints for Donor Retention

Chief Strategy Officer, Christy Bergman, talks donor retention By Chief Strategy Officer, Christy Bergman, and JVA Alumni, Ali Brieske. In advance of this week’s training and next week’s [Development Intensive], Christy and Ali sat down to follow-up on last week’s blog, and answer another question from readers: so after [...]

2018-02-13T12:08:38-07:00March 7th, 2016|2016, Blog, Fundraising, Training, Unconsultants|0 Comments

HOW TO IDENTIFY NEW DONORS

By Christy Bergman, Director of Resource Development, Joining Vision and Action The art (and science) of raising money never fails to be exciting, with new evidence-based practices emerging and new ideas cropping up around every development director’s corner. However, some things never change. Fresh off of two fundraising trainings last week, the number one burning [...]

2017-01-07T18:50:16-07:00March 1st, 2016|Fundraising|0 Comments

Are Nonprofits Obsolete?

By Ali Brieske Joining Vision and Action Marketing and Business Associate  How can you use social enterprise to change the world? Changing the world is hard work. Undoubtedly, your organization faces numerous challenges that affect its sustainability. Funding insecurity, all the requirements needed to demonstrate impact, more work than staff to do it [...]

Why a Give-or-Get Fundraising Policy is a Bad Idea

Is someone recommending that your nonprofit board adopt a give-or-get fundraising policy? Hang around any nonprofit for a while, and you'll hear someone proposing and/or using a give-or-get fundraising policy. Typically found in a board contract or policy, it might say something like: "I agree to personally give $1,000 annually, or to raise that amount from others." Sounds [...]

2017-07-20T12:47:44-06:00September 12th, 2015|Blog, Board of directors, Fundraising|0 Comments

Fundraising Facts BINGO!

by Janine Vanderburg, JVA Consulting Are you up to date on the latest fundraising facts? Is your board? As JVA’s Development Director Intensive is coming up this month, we always like to make sure that we have the latest data on overall fundraising, who is giving, what is effective and other best practices integrated into [...]

2017-01-07T18:50:21-07:00July 7th, 2015|Blog, Fundraising, Training|0 Comments

Six things you will learn at Executive Director Academy

By Amber Alarid, [Joining Vision and Action] Being an executive director of a nonprofit is hard work. It doesn’t matter if the nonprofit has hundreds of employees and a budget in the millions, or if it is a brand new organization relying on volunteers for everything. Sure, the stresses are different, but there are many [...]

The MATCH Game: Screening funders to see if they are a good fit for you

by Janine Vanderburg, Joining Vision and Action A critical part of successful grantwriting is identifying funders that are a good fit for your organization or programs. We've all had the experience of someone saying, "Oh, you should apply to this foundation—we hear that they are funding children, or the environment, etc." While it might be tempting [...]

2019-03-04T13:13:06-07:00September 15th, 2014|2014, Blog, Fundraising, Grantwriting|0 Comments
Go to Top