Practical Tips for Facilitating a Donor Meeting

Jeff Schreifels 

Everyone wants to have an effective and successful meeting with donors. But that’s a lot easier said than done. I bet that you’ve been in at least one donor meeting where you didn’t have a good plan. The donor said something unexpected, or it was hard to keep things on track. Now, it’s unrealistic to assume that you can make every donor meeting go exactly to plan, but you can prepare yourself for whatever may come up by focusing on the right tools and strategies. That’s why I’m handing off today’s podcast episode to Karen and Matt to share some of our top tips for how to successfully facilitate a donor meeting. Enjoy.

 

Recorded 

Welcome to the Nothing But Major Gifts podcast from Veritus Group featuring Richard Perry and Jeff Schreifels. Twice a month, we bring you the latest and best thinking about major gift fundraising so you can develop authentic relationships with your major donors. Here are your hosts, Richard and Jeff.

 

Karen Kendrick 

Welcome to the podcast today. I’m Karen Kendrick, and I’m with my colleague, Matt. And we’re excited to talk to you today about something that everyone has to do effectively: facilitate donor meetings. If you’ve been around for a little while, then you know that we use a conversational model called permission-based asking where you play two roles, the partner and the facilitator. Today, we’re going to focus on that second role, and share some practical tips you can start using today. So Matt, let’s get started talking a little bit about what are some of the common challenges that we all face related to meeting facilitation?

 

Matt Gill 

Yeah, you know, Karen, a lot of times when we talk about the challenges that we face, they arise from this situation that I’m sure we’re all familiar with this, this pressure we have, to get a certain number of meetings. And to make a certain number of asks. And you’ve got these sort of numbers to hit; you’ve got these metrics around meetings, which ends up pushing that meeting into a transactional space. It makes it challenging to be present with the donor. It’s hard when you’re in that space: it doesn’t allow you to focus on what the relationship needs to move forward.

 

Matt Gill 

It’s focused on, “Alright, so I’m gonna meet, we’re gonna have coffee, we’re gonna… then I’m gonna go on to my next meeting. And we’re gonna have lunch, and then…” You’re like, thinking about your itinerary and hitting your metrics and not necessarily, you know, being present for what the donor needs and what you need out of that meeting. And that’s essentially the challenge. If we go into a meeting, you know, without having a clear goal or a plan, before the meeting, if we haven’t thought through that, then, you know, we’re gonna have a hard time accomplishing our goals, because we don’t know where we’re going.

 

Matt Gill 

Time with your donor isn’t enough of a reason to have a meeting, right? You’ve got to have some kind of desired outcome. And we coach folks on their donor engagement plan to have a non-financial goal for every single one of your donors. Where are they going? What is next in the relationship? And how is this meeting going to get them there? Like, what do you need out of this meeting to achieve your goals with your relationship with this donor?

 

Karen Kendrick 

I have to tell you, I’m getting like flashbacks from when I was a fundraiser, and having some of those meetings that I was just having because I was supposed to have a meeting, and not being very clear on what I was trying to advance in the relationship. And so, we’d be chatting away, and I could tell the donor was kind of like, “Why are we here?” And I’m not stating clearly why we’re there. I don’t have a purpose. And we have a nice conversation. But you can do that like once maybe, but then if you do that again, and then again, donors are like what… they’re not gonna want to meet with you. It’s a real waste of everyone’s time.

 

Karen Kendrick 

And I like how you brought in the fact that if our metrics are pressuring us, meetings, meetings, meetings, and it’s not about advancing the relationship, then no matter how good a facilitator we are, if we’re feeling like we need to meet with someone, we don’t really have a purpose at the moment, or meet to ask them for a gift, if we really don’t have a relationship, then we’re not going to be in our authentic selves, because we don’t feel right about it. So that’s not going to be effective.

 

Matt Gill 

You can’t be present, like, you know, and you just mentioned the donor, how they’re feeling in that meeting too, where they’re like, they’re kind of waiting, like, they know that you’re a fundraiser and that it’s your job to ask for money at some point. And so they’re like “When’s that gonna happen? Is it gonna happen now? Okay, all right, they’re asking me about my kids. Alright, we’ll talk about the kids. Is it gonna happen now? Okay, so they’re talking about something else now.” And it’s, you know, not having that clear, like, not being very clear about where you’re going, or what you’re trying to accomplish in the meeting. It’s not good for you, because you don’t accomplish anything. And it’s not good for the donor, because they’re kind of constantly on edge waiting for that other shoe to drop, right?

 

Karen Kendrick 

So one tip I would take away from the first part about the pressure is, if I am in a position where I can speak back, I would get clear about, okay, if I’m being asked to ask a certain amount for so many donors, by the end of the year or something, I would look through my my caseload of individual donors and see how many I actually have that are authentic, and are ready for that. And I would sit down with my boss and have a conversation, okay. And this is my plan, but I think it’s going to be more like March, not December. So I’m being proactive and pushing back in a way that explains the story and the reason why, it would be powerful.

 

Karen Kendrick 

And then what I hear you saying is, be really clear before… either before you get the meeting, or in getting the meeting, or at the meeting, the purpose of the meeting. And always tell donors, if I’m going to come ask for a gift, I’m gonna let you know. And get your permission. So you never have to sit there wondering is it now, is it now, is it now? Because then they can relax and actually build a relationship.

 

Matt Gill 

Right, and you can’t do any of that if you haven’t thought through in your own mind. And so, think about that pressure. There are trips that I’ve been on, I’m sure you’ve been on, where you’re trying to pack as much as you can, into the you know… donor dollars paid for that flight, and they’re paying for your rental car, and they’re paying for your hotel. So you want to make sure you are seeing as many donors as possible; doing as much of the work as you can. And you get wrapped up into the, “Alright, if I’m sitting down, I got 45 minutes till this donor. Then I gotta get on the road so that I’m at the next place, by the time that they… and you’re wrapped up in the doing of it and not being present in the relationship piece.

 

Matt Gill 

You know, the reverse can be true. We talked about not having a goal, you know, and kind of having this aimless meeting. Which can be a lot of fun, but ultimately doesn’t accomplish anything. The reverse can be true, right? Where you can be too focused on your goal. You just interrogate the donor, and you’re just… “I’ve got to find out this thing,” or “I’ve got to get to the ask, and I’m gonna ask for $25,000 and then we’re gonna find out,” or “I’m gonna find my opening, and we’re gonna do it.” And so you just kind of hammered the donor with questions or there’s even those moments where you’re like, “Hey, we’re going to come. We’re going to talk about this proposal, I’m really excited to talk about this proposal.” And they show up and they’re like, “I was up all night, because my mom’s staying with us. And she’s old. And she, you know, was getting out of bed and had a really hard time. So I’m just, I’m having a hard time this morning, focusing.” “So let’s talk about your $25,000 gift!”

 

Karen Kendrick 

Talk about a tip for that. Let’s say, if you’re doing it right, then you’re letting them know you’re coming with an ask. So if you do show up, and they’re like, “Yeah, I had a really horrible night, my mom was yada, yada, yada.” First of all, I’d be like, “I’m so sorry you even came today. You really should have canceled.” And they’ll be like, “No, no, I’m fine.” So, you know, “We were going to talk about, you know, a proposal today that, you know, I feel like matches your interests and passions, but this may not be the right time for you. And, you know, do you still want to go ahead and hear about that today and have that discussion and really dialogue about it? Or is it better at another time?” So this permission-based asking model gives us that tool to just ask permission. So we’re wondering in our head, should I, shouldn’t I, should I, shouldn’t I? And the cool thing is we just asked. Like I’m sitting here wondering if I should even have this conversation with you because of what you just went through. What do you need?

 

Matt Gill 

Yeah. And that can be so honoring for the donor to know that you heard them, and that you care, that you are willing to meet them where they are, and that you are perfectly willing to leave today without having made the ask and talked about the proposal. If that’s what the donor needs, that can be such… that posture can be so disarming, and so honoring, that it can go an awful long way.

 

Karen Kendrick 

So what I hear you saying is, be clear about the purpose of the meeting, have spent some time planning and thinking ahead about the relationship you’re building, the asks you have in the future, what you’re doing to really steward and cultivate that donor. And then in the meeting itself, have the emotional intelligence to be present to where they are, what’s coming up, and be able to pivot. And talk a little bit about that pivoting. What are some examples of that, Matt? Or how have you seen some of the folks that you work with and coach every day do that pivot in meetings, when they’re not holding on to their outcome so tightly?

 

Matt Gill 

Right, and I think, you know, that having thought through the goal, and having thought through a couple of possible outcomes, “I’m going to ask for money, they’re going to say, yes, we’re gonna celebrate, they’re gonna say maybe, they’re gonna say no.” And then knowing that you are going to go and be present with the donor. And that may result in any number of directions that the conversation could go. That’s the preparation piece. And then in the meeting, like, you might, you’ll notice, right, where you’re kind of driving somewhere and they’re kind of going somewhere else, or they’re distracted. Or they’re, you know, they talk about how they gotta jump in like 20 minutes, because they’ve got this other thing that just popped up in there, and they’re really anxious. You can just, I mean, notice that, right? So be present enough to notice, and then name it. You know, “gosh, really sounds like, you know, you’re thinking ahead about this other thing that’s going on, you know, it sounds like that’s really taken a lot of your attention right now. Should we talk about this another time?”

 

Karen Kendrick 

Easy peasy. You just ask.

 

Matt Gill 

Yeah. “Should we continue this conversation? I, you know, we, I’m excited about this opportunity for you? And I know you’re excited about this initiative? Should we have this conversation when you’ve got a little bit more space to be present on the, you know, in the discussion?”

 

Karen Kendrick 

I love it. Yeah. All right. If you’re going one direction, they keep going another.

 

Matt Gill 

Right.

 

Karen Kendrick 

It can be checking in on you know, “When I brought up, you know, the program we’ve been talking about, you mentioned some other pieces. Is that something now that you’re even more interested in?” Versus being like, oh, my gosh, I gotta wrangle them back to this one thing I have a proposal for. If they’re not really excited about that, and something shifted, you want to know in that moment. Because then you can pivot. So let’s say they no longer… they found this new thing they really think is the cat’s meow. And so you’d be like, “Well, you know what, today I came with a proposal for you around this, would you still like to see that? Or would you more be more interested in seeing what the needs are in that other area? Because that would be exciting, too.” So that makes it a lot easier when you can just ask. I think I’ve said that about 10 times, but we don’t do that! I didn’t have that tool before. I was always trying to like, guess and manipulate and figure it out.

 

Matt Gill 

Yeah, I mean, and we say this all the time, right? Like, we tell ourselves a story about the donor. Like we’re thinking about them a lot. And we’re planning and we’re strategizing and we’ve got okay, you know, we’ve talked to our boss, like, “I’m gonna make this ask and the gifts gonna be in by December and we’re gonna be able to account for it and make our budget.” Like we thought about all this stuff. And it’s kind of a lot riding on it, right? People are depending on us to raise this money. And so we tell ourselves a story about the donor. And that can often intrude on the story that the donor is telling us about themselves and where they are and what they’re hoping to, you know, what problems they’re trying to solve, where their passions are, what they’re hoping to get out of all of this. And, you know, we have to have some kind of plan. And there’s this phrase in planning, it’s from the military, you know, no plan survives first contact, right? You’ve got to have, and you’ve also got to be just prepared to think on your feet and adjust based on the realities.

 

Karen Kendrick 

And you don’t have to have all the answers. You can just come back and say, “Well, let’s talk about that as much as I can… I actually have information on it and let’s come back and revisit it.” So. Cool. Anything else on some of the typical challenges and some tips, Matt?

 

Matt Gill 

Yeah. So, you know, some of the things that come up is, even if we’re very good at facilitating a one-on-one meeting with the donor, and we’re very good at… we’ve thought through the goals, we know their passions, we’re able to be present, we’re able to facilitate… Sometimes we go on joint visits with our CEO, or with the head of programming or whatever, you know, a colleague, and we haven’t fully prepared the two of us before we meet with the donor. Or we haven’t established our own roles internally, and the CEO is used to being the CEO, and takes over the meeting, and is talking a lot and is being the, you know, kind of the center of attention, when what we really want out of the meeting is, you know, something else. That can be a challenge. And, you know, I think everyone listening to this has probably been in that situation a little bit. You know, I’d love to talk about some ways that we can get ahead of that. And, you know, and also, if you notice it happening in the moment, like, how do we pivot?

 

Karen Kendrick 

Yeah, I love that. Because in the Permission-Based Asking model, which I think is in your information, there’ll be how to look at the model and get more information and white papers and that kind of thing on how it works. Yeah, you know, there is a whole process. And so you can sit down, like, if you and I were going to work together. You’re the head of program, and I know that you’re chatty, then I just want to… You know, the other day I learned that Matt can talk so fast if he wants to. I was so amazed. Let’s say that you are a fast talker, a chatty guy who’s head of program. So I’m gonna sit down with you. I’m gonna talk through the model and explain how it works. And that, what we’re doing in each section of the model and how there’s transition questions, and that my role is to facilitate the meeting. So, “I’m going to keep us moving throughout the meeting. And, you know, this is the part that I would love you to come in on this piece, the curious part where we’re going to really break down the programming and how it works. And what I’ve been learning from Veritus and permission-based asking…” (use us as your reason) “…is that it’s important not to do a presentation, but really do more of a discussion back and forth. So, you know, we’re going to ask the donor, what kind of questions have come up from them around this programming. Kind of start there and see what kicks off. And then you could present some answers and some ideas for a few minutes, and then see what questions they have. So it’s, so instead of doing a 5- or 10-minute monologue, it’s a back and forth.”

 

Karen Kendrick 

And then, “Because you know, we work together, and we know each other, and I know you can talk fast and a lot, you know, let’s come up with a little fun way for me to give you a clue that you need to slow down, you’re talking and you know, take a breath because you get so excited and passionate about it. Take a breath and ask the donor where they are in their thoughts.” So you and I would come up with whatever that little cue needs to be. Or we would just tell the donor at the beginning of the meeting, “Matt is so passionate about all of this and starts talking so much, I’m probably going to interrupt him and redirect at times and ask you questions, because he just has so much to share. And it’s really exciting.” I would probably do something like that just so it’s just a natural thing. Versus I’m like doing some kind of weird signal that the person’s like, “What are they doing?” Like scratching my left ear.

 

Matt Gill 

“Did you take care of that ear problem, Karen?”

 

Karen Kendrick 

Yeah, and if it’s a CEO that likes to chat a lot, like talk through… Like, let’s say they usually have a shtik they give. It takes 15 minutes or 10 minutes. It can be like, you know, how can we get that down to 8 minutes or 5 minutes. And sometimes they’re just going to do their 10 minute spiel. So what can you do around that to create… maybe you can say to the CEO, “If you don’t mind in the middle there, I’m going to jump in a few times to ask some questions.”

 

Matt Gill 

And what’s a natural pause? Like let’s pause. Like that’s a lot. Can we just like, “What’s coming up for you, donor, as we’re, you know, as you’re hearing this? You can tell you know, we’re very passionate about this. We can’t stop talking about this.” This is how fast I can talk. It’s Minnesota, Karen. We can get cold up here, so we got to talk fast.

 

Karen Kendrick 

Yeah, you’re warming up your body. Like creating a little warming machine.

 

Matt Gill 

That’s right. Yeah. We can’t keep our mouths open for a long time. A little cold air gets in and freezes our lungs. That’s how it works. It’s just science. It’s just…

 

Karen Kendrick 

Totally, totally scientific. Okay, so anything else?

 

Matt Gill 

So we’ve talked a little bit about, like what has to happen before the meeting, right? So there’s that preparation you do with your partners. There’s the preparation you do as you’re thinking about the purpose of the meeting, the goals, what do you need out of it. There’s, in the meeting, we talked about where you know, how you are, how you’re able to be present, how you can pivot. Some facilitation questions that can help you move forward or even just name when there’s a mismatch, or interrupting your CEO. Not always an easy thing to do.

 

Matt Gill 

I think it’s worth mentioning, Karen, post-meeting, especially if you’re on that hamster wheel, and you’re like, “Sweet, I got the meeting. I did, you know, we made the ask, or I got permission to submit a proposal or whatever, you know, I accomplished my goals. Great. Now I’m on to the next thing, I’m go to the thing, and gotta get on the road, get to the airport to get to the, you know…” Like, the follow up, and the notes and what we learned and what the next steps are, and who’s doing what. And all of the stuff that needs to get entered in the database. All of that is part of the meeting. Right? We’re naming like, these are not your donors. They’re the organization’s donors. They had a meeting with you, but they had a meeting with your organization. And so the organization needs to know, should something happen to you, it needs to get entered, your plans need to get adjusted, based on what happened in the meeting. And that all needs to be captured. And the follow up needs to happen after the meeting. The meeting is not over when the meeting is over. Right? You’ve got to do that post-meeting work.

 

Karen Kendrick 

Yeah, I love that. That’s still part of the meeting. Because I’m always… I remember thinking, “Oh, I remember that.” And like, by the end of the day, it is totally gone. Like, I have no idea what happened in that meeting. And so I know, some fundraisers sit in their car with their laptop, and just quickly have like three things, any notes that they want to highlight, any next steps. And if you’re lucky enough to have an assistant, they could send that right away and have other folks enter it. If not, then you can enter them altogether at some point. That’s really valuable.

 

Matt Gill 

Yeah, I definitely tried to always plan in my itineraries, you know, a few minutes in the parking lot afterwards, where I’m sitting in the car, and I’m just jamming notes down. So I’ve got the highlights. And then as I’m putting those notes later in the database, or typing them up, or whatever, some other stuff will come back, and I’ll remember it and adjust. But just building that into your plan, so you’re not so squeezed. Or if you are squeezed because you’re on the road and that’s the way it works and you’re double lunching and you got to get from one to the next quick, you know, building into your day when you do those notes, whether it’s at night at the hotel or whatever.

 

Karen Kendrick 

Cool.

 

Matt Gill 

So Karen, we’ve thrown a lot of tips out there already. And we’ve talked through some elements from the Permission-Based Asking model. Can we just kind of dive in a little bit more into that? We don’t have our graphic that we can show and if we did people who are driving or jogging or working in the yard, you shouldn’t be looking at the graphic anyways. But it’s you know, it’s available. But so can we talk through some of that and how that model helps us in our facilitator role?

 

Karen Kendrick 

Yes. So the model is cool. It starts with connect and ends with celebrate. So connect is that you know, the chit chat. And the chit chat is good because it’s kind of… it’s not just to be friendly and be social. It also helps people mentally get in the room. You don’t know what they were just doing beforehand. You kind of need to settle into a new space. Of course you do that according to that person’s personality and it may be longer or shorter depending on the person. Some folks just want to get right down to business after saying, “Good to see you.”

 

Karen Kendrick 

And then you always end in celebrate, which is telling a little story of impact that the donor has made because of their giving through the years. And I heard one fundraiser talk about a donor they were going to ask them for an increase. And the donor came in, and in that meeting shared that their business is struggling and they weren’t able to give. I think they gave $10,000 every year for multiple years. And so they were going to ask for an increase which is logical and so that donor felt so badly. They had to say they’re going to give less. But the fundraiser was ready with that celebrate. “Oh, you know, not a problem. Thank you for letting me know. You’re my partner.” That’s the other thing we talk about in PBA. Donors are your partner in the sense that you’re having authentic conversations about where they are, what they know, and don’t know, what their concerns are. And you’re teaching them about systems and structures and how things work as well. So you’re a true partner. So they shared with that donor, the impact of their giving with a great story. And the donor came back the next day and just said, “Well, as soon as I have my revenue going, again, you’re going to be my number one organization, because I felt so seen, heard, respected, cared about.”

 

Karen Kendrick 

So. And then there’s a circle in the middle, where you align on why you’re there and the roles and the timing. You go to that be curious, that asking questions, learning more about their interests and passions, or what they pulled out of the proposal you sent that stood out to them, or the questions that… Whatever the be curious needs to be, where you’re really having dialogue back and forth. And they’re sharing things. And you’re listening for little key elements that you can then bring back. And, the cool thing is, the next thing is the ask. Whatever that might be: asking them to come to an event, join a board, give a gift, their communication preference. Whatever the ask might be, and then you go back to align, check in on okay, next steps, and then you end with that celebrate.

 

Karen Kendrick 

And I like that it’s circular, because many of the models are linear thinking that, you know, meetings always sort of go in this order. And the circle helps you go back around when things go sideways. Like you said earlier, donor doesn’t seem that interested in the thing that you think they want to talk about, and then you can go back to be curious and be like, “Okay, so it seems like maybe there’s something else that’s interesting you.” And you can go back around the circle. Come up with the ask, might be the next step on what information they’re interested in, and then the align would be how you’re going to do that and the timing. So it’s a very helpful tool.

 

Karen Kendrick  

The beautiful thing, too, is every arrow in this tool is a yes/no question that helps you in your facilitation. So not everybody is trained to be a facilitator. A facilitator’s jobs are to be present, listen to where people are, but have an agenda and a process; they are trying to move people through. So, it’s this interesting dance between where people are, where the energy is, and where you’re trying to go. So, you’re doing both things at once. And the arrows help you do that.

 

Karen Kendrick 

So, let’s say you’ve been, like even just chatting away at the beginning, you got a really chatty donor. They had a great time at some, they were in Turks and Caicos, yatta, yatta yatta. And it feels weird to say, “Okay, so you’re ready to talk about XYZ.” So a simple thing like, “Are you ready to get started,” is a great way to be like, “Oh, yeah, let’s get into the meeting. That’s why we’re here anyway.” Right? Instead of just feeling like I don’t know when to jump in and do it.

 

Karen Kendrick 

Other parts of the arrow might be, once you sort of talk about the meeting and why you’re there, you start by saying, “Do you mind if I ask some questions about the proposal I just sent or ask some questions about… I would like to learn more about your interests and passions.” You’re asking permission to jump into a Q&A and a real discussion time. So the donor is queued into what’s coming next and they feel… and you’re able to then keep moving the process forward.

 

Karen Kendrick 

So let’s say you’re in that be curious, you’re really diving into a donor’s interests and passions. You’re finding out they really love a certain program. And so you’re seeing that there’s like, you know, 8 minutes left to the meeting. You want to bring it all the way back around. So you can say, “Do you mind if I ask you a few questions about next steps?” And so that just gets you… Okay, now we’re out of discussion. We’re into the next phase. And so the arrows give you those yes/no questions to keep it moving.

 

Karen Kendrick 

And then because it’s permission-based, let’s say, you’re really talking about a program that that person is really interested in and you only have 5 minutes left, you can say things like, “Hey, I’d love to close this out and make sure I’m coming back with the right next steps for you. Seems like you got a lot of energy and a lot more you want to learn. I’ve got a few ideas about how we might do that. Would you like to hear those?” So you make sure you end with clarity and permission from them for the next step. Then because I know I’ve ended meetings where, “Oh, yeah, we could do this next.” And then I’m chasing them down via email, via phone, trying to get them to say yes to the next step, where if they say yes to the next step in the meeting, it’s much easier to get that next step to happen.

 

Matt Gill 

And all you’re doing is just following, because each each step of the way, each one of these arrows, like you said, each moving from connect to align, align to be curious, curious to ask, ask to align again, and then to celebrate… each of those arrows is an opportunity for them to say no. And they don’t say no. Right? They said yes, every single time and they’re with you. You guys are partners, and you are talking about something you both care about. And that’s what’s so powerful about this.

 

Karen Kendrick 

The other thing, in the initial time you meet, you’re setting, you’re sort of retraining your donors on what meetings are going to be like with you. Because donors have probably had a lot of meetings where they didn’t know what it was about. Right? So in that initial meeting, you’re talking about your role as facilitator and asking permission. So, you know, “What I’d like to do in meetings when we meet is, is I’ll facilitate and keep us moving, you know, we’re gonna agree on the objective, but I’ll keep us moving. Is that okay with you?” That really helps you with that chatty donor or really helps you with the donor that you’re not sure is aligned with where you are. Because then you’ve gotten permission to be the guide. And then you also talk about how you’re the partner and so anytime during the meeting you want to hear back what they’re not understanding, what they’re not getting, that this is a journey together of learning and exploring. And so that gives them like permission to be like “No, I really don’t feel like I know enough yet to be asked about, you know, about giving to this. So I feel like there’s some things that I have some questions around.” So that is really helpful in empowering them in the process.

 

Matt Gill 

I love it, I love it. So again, you’re going for a walk, you are driving in your car, you are not looking at this Permission-Based Asking model.

 

Karen Kendrick 

We’re tempting you to look at it. And to come into the PBA world.

 

Matt Gill 

We want you to come back and look at it at a time when it would be safe for you to do so without endangering yourself and others. You can find that all over our website, and our content has this permission-based asking model all over the place. It’s easy to find. It should not take much for you to do it. But do look at it and do use that as a tool as you think about planning out your meetings. Okay, so what, what is my ask for this meeting? If I’m not asking for money, am I asking for… what am I asking for? You know, you’re asking for something in every meeting. But it’s usually not money. It can be. It’s not always. So what’s your ask? You know, what do you need to know to get to that ask, to be curious, you know. What do you want to connect over? What do you remember about your donor that you’re going to ask about as part of that connection piece? You know, what’s the story, what’s the anecdote you’re gonna bring for celebrate? You know, so use this model to prepare for your meetings. And we’ll go from there.

 

Matt Gill 

One thing to think about is, it can be very… if you’re looking at that Permission-Based Asking model and you connect to align, align to be curious, curious to ask, ask to align and then celebrate. It can be really comfortable going from connect to align and align to be curious. That often happens in natural conversation. You’re connecting. You’re hearing things and you’re like, “Yeah let’s talk about, hey, let’s talk about the organization we both love. And, boy, you know, tell me more about what got you started here. You’ve been on the board for 8 years. That’s amazing. I’ve only been here for 18 months, but boy, you’ve really put in a lot of time, talent, and treasure with this organization. And tell me more about what keeps you coming back. What gives you all this energy?” And you can you can live in that space for a long time. Often we don’t move from that be curious into the ask either because we don’t know where we’re going with a meeting or because for some other reason: we’re afraid it doesn’t feel right, it feels awkward to kind of nudge things along when you feel so connected to the donor in the pleasant conversation of connecting and being curious. But, you know, I would encourage you to know where you’re going into and to have the confidence and the strength to go there.

 

Karen Kendrick 

I love that example. So let’s say you really want to ask that board member to be a volunteer solicitor. So you’re having all that chat chat chat, you’re learning about them and ahead of time you would want to let them know that you’re interested in talking to them about their engagement with fundraising, so that they have a heads up that that’s what it’s about. And so then you can say, “It’s been wonderful getting to know you and hear more about the history of the organization. You have so much knowledge and wisdom. Are you open to hearing some ideas and questions I have for your involvement in fundraising?” And then you come with, you know, “Would you be open to being a volunteer solicitor with us, and this is what it would look like or sound like,” and then have that discussion. And so to me, especially with someone that’s been there a long time, you’re in a different power position, all that… it can feel awkward. And this gives you a way to do it. That’s so respectful.

 

Matt Gill 

I love it. I love it. Well, Karen, can we think of anything else that we need… any tips or other things we want to talk about to help folks facilitate meetings?

 

Karen Kendrick 

Just remember that you personally have your own system to manage and all of this, and so does the donor. So it’s very easy to go into fight and flight, get nervous. Start going into a space where it is harder to be present and really creative and empathetic, because you’re worried about performing and doing it perfectly, right? Or making a mistake. And so we go into fight or flight. Our whole physiology is preparing to run from the big lizard, which is not the warm present fundraiser you want to be.

 

Karen Kendrick 

So you want to work on some tools to prepare beforehand and during. There’s a lot of breathing tools and centering tools that help you prepare and get yourself back to the present. Something as simple as during the meeting if you start feeling nervous, wiggle your toes. You want to get back into your body and back present. Breathing in your nose and out of your mouth slowly. We have a centering practice where you, I’ll just run through it really quickly. This will bring you back into a present space. You want to uncross your arms and legs. You want to, instead of breathing in and out, breathe up and down. So you want to breathe up in your nose and down out of your mouth. And you want to think of something that makes you smile and actually let yourself smile a little bit. Of course, you have to be subtle doing this in your donor meeting. (Laughter.)

 

Matt Gill 

“What are you smiling about over there?” (Laughter.) Yeah.

 

Karen Kendrick 

And you want to imagine there’s a nice bubble around you and include your donor in your bubble. And what this does is, with the breath and the smile and the bubble, it brings in oxytocin, which is sort of that warmth. The warmth chemical substance that makes… how we feel when we give our kids a hug. That’s oxytocin. So it brings your body back into that space versus the you know, I want to run out of here space. So that helps you when you’re wanting to close up the meeting fast because it’s feeling uncomfortable or you’re not sure what to do and you’re feeling lost… to kind of get yourself back to present. All I have to do is be present, ask questions about where they are and what they need. And that will bring you… it’ll just help you bring all the resourcefulness that we know you have within you.

 

Karen Kendrick 

So I hope these tips are helpful to you and gave you some new strategies for approaching your next donor meeting. And thank you Matt for joining me today. To learn more about how to properly facilitate a donor meeting and have permission-based conversations with your donors, check out our online course on making effective donor asks. You can sign up for this course whenever it works for your schedule, and learn the core principles of this model that you can use to have transformational conversations. If you want to learn more, head to the show notes or to our website. Take care and see you next time.

 

Matt Gill 

Bye.

 

Karen Kendrick 

Bye bye.

 

Recorded 

Thank you for joining us for the Nothing But Major Gifts podcast from Veritus Group. Richard and Jeff also write an ongoing blog that you can subscribe to for free at veritusgroup.net. Please join us again next time.