Fundraisers Find Painless Ways for Nonprofit Leaders to Raise Money

If someone had told Dr. Edward Miller early in his career that he would eventually have to raise money for his employer, his first reaction would have been one of horror.

“I would have said, ‘I’m a doctor; I don’t want to do that.’ ”

After a 46-year career in medicine, including 16 years as chief executive of Johns Hopkins Medicine, his reaction is quite different.

“I gotta tell you, I think it’s fun; I loved doing it,” he says. “You meet some very interesting people.”

Like many nonprofit leaders who never expected that their careers would include fundraising, Dr. Miller nevertheless found himself deeply involved at times in raising money. He and other nonprofit leaders interviewed for this story say they found the role surprisingly rewarding.

Now retired, Dr. Miller helped raise $2.2-billion during his time at Johns Hopkins Medicine. He says nonprofit leaders should view relationship-building with donors as one of the perks of the job.

But many leaders are uncomfortable, at least initially, with the process or have time constraints that make it difficult. So it can take a while to develop an affinity for building relationships with prospective donors.

A good chief development officer plays a critical role in helping a leader feel comfortable working with donors. That partnership must be one of mutual respect and trust, say fundraising experts.

“The relationships will vary massively,” says Andrew Watt, president of the Association of Fundraising Professionals. “But you’ll never find a successful fundraising operation where the two lead individuals aren’t able to play off each other really effectively.”

Also crucial for success: a highly organized development office that understands the many competing demands on a nonprofit leader’s time.

Overworked Executives

Steve Rum, who leads Johns Hopkins Medicine’s development office, says an organization’s top fundraiser must know which interactions are going to try a busy executive’s patience or take up too much time.

“I would never have put Ed Miller in a position where he had to go play golf with a donor,” says Mr. Rum. “Even if that’s the donor’s preference, that’s not Ed’s comfort zone, and it’s a waste of his three hours.”

Instead, Mr. Rum made sure Dr. Miller was prepared with information on what was most important to the donor and what to focus on in conversations.

“If we had a donor meeting in two weeks, we weren’t going to give Ed 40 pages to read an hour before he’s scheduled to go into a meeting” says Mr. Rum. “So he’s got a period of weeks to read it at his leisure, to go back to it when he has time, and zero in on it a day or two before, ask me questions, and know exactly what his role would be and what my role would be.”

This worked well for the busy physician. “I wasn’t caught off guard by anything,” says Dr. Miller.

After meeting with a prospect, the two men would quickly debrief and decide what steps to take next. That could be anything from sending a handwritten thank-you note to the philanthropist, following up with program information, to providing a full-blown gift proposal if the donor asked for it.

Regardless, says Mr. Rum, the development office would handle that part of the process and involve Dr. Miller only when it came time to remind him to call the donor, sometimes suggesting what priorities he should zero in on.

That kind of internal support was key to Shirley Raines’s success during her 12-year tenure as president of the University of Memphis, where she helped raise $256-million. A specialist in early-childhood education, she, too, initially viewed fundraising with trepidation, especially since she often had to ask donors directly for gifts.

“I’ve always been comfortable with the social aspect, so cultivating donors was not difficult for me,” says Ms. Raines. “The ask was more difficult.”

To overcome her discomfort, she made sure she met regularly with development officers to learn everything she could about a potential donor’s interests and what other causes he or she supported. She also worked closely with her campaign chairman, with trustees, and with faculty to understand every aspect of each university program or building project and why a potential donor would be interested in supporting it.

“One of the things you have to get over is, you’re not asking for yourself, you’re asking for your university,” she says. “If you can believe in your cause—and for us, it was often scholarships, buildings, support for faculty—then seizing that opportunity is easier.”

Styles Vary

Fundraising styles for executives vary depending on the type of institution.

At symphony orchestras, for example, the music director (a conductor and musician by training) is the public face of the organization and may find it especially awkward to cultivate donors.

The most important way to deal with this, say conductors, is to remember that a music director’s role is the same on the podium as it is off: always focusing on the music and how the orchestra serves its community.

“When you start in a music-director post, you know you’re going to have to cultivate donors, so you have to accept that. But you can’t go out there with the attitude that you’re raising money. You’re not,” says Delta David Gier, music director of the South Dakota Symphony Orchestra. “You’re building relationships and talking about the orchestra’s relation to the community.”

Mr. Gier says he almost never asks donors directly for money. Like Dr. Miller, he leaves that task to others.

“The only time I would allow myself to ask for money is if I really know the person well and I know we’re on the same page,” says Mr. Gier. “Otherwise, I think a music director has the potential to really screw things up.”

His approach is working. The organization has raised at least $7-million since Mr. Gier joined in 2004, and with the exception of when the financial crisis hit, each year’s fundraising total has been higher than in the previous year.

Sharing a Passion

Carolyn Kuan, music director of the Hartford Symphony since 2011, agrees with Mr. Gier and says that while she enjoys interacting with donors, the best way she can help with fundraising is indirectly, primarily by evangelizing for the music.

“As leader of an orchestra and in the community,” says Ms. Kuan, “my job is to infect everyone with my passion for this amazing experience.” The support will follow, she says.

There are multiple ways that a music director can contribute to the work of fundraising without ever approaching the topic of money, says Jesse Rosen, president of the League of American Orchestras.

One way is learning how to articulate for potential donors a vision for the orchestra’s future. Another is understanding how to work with a board to help carry out that vision.

The league has held training sessions to teach music directors, board leaders, and administrative staff how to work together effectively.

“One of the big pieces we work on is their nonmusical roles,” says Mr. Rosen, “because that’s a role that doesn’t get taught when you go to the conservatory.”