Fundraisers Hold the Key to Diversifying the CEO Ranks at Nonprofits (Letter to the Editor)

To the Editor:

The Chronicle’s study analyzing the race and gender of chief executives at big charities (“Nearly Two-Thirds of America’s 100 Biggest Charities Are Led by White Men,” August 13) made clear that as an industry we have relied on white guilt as a method of change. That’s been the sole approach to asking: demanding America’s nonprofits face their chronic lack of diversity.

Somehow, we think that if we shame and guilt white boards of directors, enough change will happen. This report and a long line of others over 25 years have said the same thing. Somehow the futility of this approach isn’t apparent.

Too often we practice tokenism and hire any people of color we can recruit. White leaders, many liberal and progressive, don’t exactly know what to do about diversity. It’s like demanding that someone fix a transmission in your car. If they don’t know how to do it, then what’s the point?

Here’s one way I know that white people are avoiding the topic. I write and post a lot of articles on LinkedIn. Most are read by a thousand people give or take, according to my LinkedIn data. If I publish a piece on diversity and inclusion, I can guarantee you that fewer than 300 people will read it and 90 percent of those who do will be people of color. So white, liberal leaders see that article and scroll past it. Why? Because they are tired of hearing about the problem without talking about solutions.

But the solution to diversity and inclusion is right in front of us.

It’s fundraising, especially major-gifts fundraising. The fundraising office is typically the least understood and least financed part of nonprofits. And in the fundraising office, the least understand specialty is major giving and prospect research. Yet these two areas unlock powerful tools for diversity and equity.

Through an effective major-gifts prospecting system, you uncover diverse major-donor prospects. Not tokens. Especially if you check for implicit bias among members of your fundraising team, you can identify and engage diverse major-donor prospects. Through this method, you can also find great board candidates who are diverse.

If you have a board that includes connected, philanthropic, big donors who are people of color, then it’s a different dynamic altogether. You will choose and interview different candidates for the CEO jobs. We all know money is power. The current dynamic is having a few people of color on board with wealthy, powerful white people. The people of color are usually community leaders, foundation program officers, or corporate foundation leaders. Just imagine a board where you have more equity. When you have a more balanced board that truly looks like your community, you can do a lot more internal work on diversity and inclusion.

The historical lack of diversity in nonprofits, including leadership, is a completely solvable problem. Sadly, many nonprofits have never tried to implement a major-giving program.

Let’s hope the pandemic will help more leaders realize they need to invest in major-giving programs and not rely so heavily on transactional fundraising such as events.

Building major-giving programs for all sizes of nonprofits is smart strategic planning, smart program development, and the path to true diversity and equity at almost any nonprofit.

Armando Zumaya
Fundraising Consultant
Alameda, Calif.