November 27, 1997 | Read Time: 1 minute
The American Association of Fund-Raising Counsel has opened its membership to consultants who help charities in many ways besides fund raising, such as refining their missions, strengthening their boards, managing their grants, and publicizing their achievements.
In addition, the A.A.F.R.C. has stiffened requirements for current members. They now must agree not only to renew their commitments to the association’s ethical standards annually but also to repeat every three years the full application process, which involves a survey of all clients that each organization has served during the interim.
The standards require association members to charge fixed fees based on the extent of service provided, not on the amount of money raised. They also prohibit members from keeping a client organization’s money in their custody.
“We want to get as many firms as possible signed on to our standards of professional conduct,” says Diane M. Carlson, who chairs the association’s Board of Directors. “The more firms who operate by those rules, the better donors and beneficiaries of philanthropy are served.”
Membership in the association is now open to firms whose primary business involves fund raising, campaign management, telemarketing, strategic planning, prospect research, training, direct mail, executive searches, planned giving, or public relations for non-profit institutions.
The organization currently has 25 member firms and three associate member firms, but now expects those numbers to grow substantially.
