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November 2020

Nov 30

Stakeholder feedback takes the guess work out of decision making

By Sponsor Insight

by Hannah Gooding, Consultant, Hedges

In our everyday lives, we constantly ask questions and use data to help us make better, smarter decisions. Can we say the same about decision making at our nonprofits? Think about your last staff or board meeting. What information did you have to inform your decisions? Maybe you were considering what expenses to cut due to COVID. What data did you have at your disposal? Budgets alone can’t tell you what programs are the most impactful to those you serve, why your donor retention is going down, or what inefficiencies are causing bottlenecks for your team. To get that information, you need real-time feedback.

Why feedback is a game changer.

According to a survey conducted by Stanford Social Innovation Review in 2019, 88 percent of nonprofit leaders prioritize gathering client feedback while only 13 percent use it as a “top source of insight for continuous improvement.” Two-thirds of organizations not collecting client feedback said their greatest barrier was limited staff time and/or resources, and 20 percent said collecting feedback was “too complicated” or “too expensive.” If these statements resonate with you, consider the following:

  1. Collecting feedback will make your organization more efficient in the long run. Gathering feedback from the people you serve will not only make your programs more impactful, but make your service-delivery more efficient. You might learn families don’t need or want something you’ve been providing for years or would rather participate in your program virtually so you could cut food and transportation expenses while boosting engagement rates. Feedback data might help you recognize how different programs can be combined, pared down, or supported by volunteers. In addition, having satisfaction data direct from your participants will make your grant proposals more appealing and your impact reports more compelling. That’s right, collecting feedback can both lower your administrative expenses and increase your fundability. Win, win.
  • How should you collect participant feedback? To collect in-depth, qualitative feedback about your services, organize a focus group with the individuals who participate in your programs or receive your services. Use a time and space with minimal barriers such as a community center (with social distancing) or video conferencing. Alternatively, if you want to collect high-level, quantitative data, consider surveying your participants. The survey should be brief and easy to access. For both focus group and survey options, consider offering incentives for participation and using third-party facilitator to ensure participants can be fully transparent.
  • What should you ask participants? Ask program participants if and how your services are making a difference for them; what about your services is most meaningful to them; what, if any, barriers complicate receiving your services; and what could improve their overall experience with your organization.
  1. Collecting feedback is great donor stewardship. By the end of the year, your donors are tired of being asked for money. The majority of American donors give to three or more organizations, so their inboxes are inundated with #GivingTuesday emails and asks for support. But remember the saying—”Ask for money, get advice. Ask for advice, get money twice?” December and January are great months for collecting feedback from your donors. Asking your donors to share their input makes them feel valued and engaged in your work. Plus, their feedback should help you determine what information is meaningful to them, why they support you, and how they feel connected to your mission. All of this data will help you build relationships with your donors, keep them engaged, and prepare for larger asks in the future.
  • How should you collect donor feedback? Digital surveys are excellent tools for collecting feedback from your donors. Send out a survey to your general donor list and consider posting the survey on your social media. For your major donors, gathering their feedback should be more personal. Enlist Board members to share the survey with one or two donors using a personalized email or set up a Zoom meeting to go through the questions in an interview style.
  • What should you ask donors? Ask donors if they feel well-connected to your organization, if they can see the impact of their giving, why they choose to give, whether they would recommend your organization to others, and how they prefer to be recognized. If the survey may reach lapsed donors, ask why they don’t currently give and what might inspire them to give in the future. Sound scary? Remember, if lapsed donors take the step to even open your survey (and many do), odds are they’re still interested in supporting you. Asking for their feedback can be the perfect way to reach out without making it awkward.
  1. Collecting feedback could solve your turnover problem. We hear a lot of nonprofits talking about their staff turnover rate and setting aggressive goals to curb turnover. However, not all turnover is bad turnover. What really matters is why staff members feel the need to move on. Is it a culture issue? A salary issue? Perhaps some teams are constantly overwhelmed while others are bored. Collecting staff feedback is an important and effective way to monitor your organizational health and assess what is working and what is not. These insights give you the “why” behind a turnover rate and help you get to solution faster. Feedback can help you get ahead of an issue before it becomes worse, identify blind spots, and even give you statistics to strengthen your staff recruitment.
  • How should you collect staff feedback? Whereas you might collect feedback from your participants and your donors once or maybe twice per year, you should collect staff feedback at least once per quarter. Many organizations use a “pulse survey” to collect essential, real-time feedback on a handful of key indicators. Pulse surveys allow you to identify issues as they occur and take more immediate action. It’s important to use the same questions in each survey so that data can be compared over time. If you don’t have a designated Human Resources professional on staff, consider using a third-party to ensure staff members can be fully transparent.
  • What should you ask staff members? Using the Net Promotor Score is a great place to start. You should also ask staff about their satisfaction with workplace culture, if they can maintain appropriate work/life balance, whether they feel connected with other employees, whether they feel appropriately valued, and if they see opportunities for professional growth. Consider asking about pain points as well — for example, how does your team feel about remote work or coming back to the office?
  1. Collecting feedback can breathe life into your Board. Halloween is behind us, but maybe your Board meetings still feel like a scene out of a zombie movie. You ask a basic question and get a sea of blank stares. It’s painful, we know. But often times, Boards become disengaged and zombie-like when members either don’t understand their role, or there is no clear structure of accountability to ensure everyone is doing their part. Many Board members feel embarrassed to admit what they don’t know so they don’t ask, and then the cycle of uncertainty continues. Gathering Board feedback can be a great way to break that cycle and get an honest sense of what Board members are thinking in real-time. Feedback data might tell you some members are ready to roll off while others are ready to step up into leadership roles. You might learn simple solutions — for example, maybe members would be more engaged if Board meetings were scheduled in the mornings instead of the evenings. Feedback results can give you an objective base to start from so that no one has to feel singled-out and you can address the elephant in the room with a positive, solutions-focused attitude.
  • How should you collect Board feedback? Ideally, the Executive or Governance Committee is accountable for collecting and analyzing feedback. However, the Board Chair may also lead or outsource a confidential feedback collection process. Similar to staff feedback, Board feedback is most effective when it is captured regularly. Consider using the pulse survey format to gather feedback quarterly. At a minimum, all Boards should complete an annual engagement survey.
  • What should you ask Board members? Ask Board members about their satisfaction with the Board’s culture, communication, and effectiveness; what they perceive to be the role of the Board; what they need to be an effective and engaged Board member; whether they feel valued; and what they would change about Board meetings. You can also ask about committee involvement, leadership goals, and satisfaction with their personal giving.

So many organizations have had to completely reimagine their work this year. Many have had to pause or cut programs, cancel fundraising events, and toss out their strategic plans. Maybe your organization is approaching 2021 with nothing but question marks. No survey or focus group will tell you what the future holds, but feedback can help you make informed decisions. Meet your stakeholders where they are and ask for their input. With their feedback, you can assess where organization is strong and what you need prioritize so that your decisions are made with greater reliability, clarity, and certainty.

Hannah Gooding has been a Consultant with Hedges since 2017. With a background in nonprofit program management, her expertise in research and strategic thinking has supported dozens of nonprofit organizations in Central Indiana.

Nov 30

IndyFringe’s retiring CEO leaves behind a case study on how to put an arts organization on solid ground

By Feature

by Shari Finnell, editor, Not for Profit News

After more than 15 years at the helm of the IndyFringe, Pauline Moffat decided it was time to activate a succession plan — identifying and hiring her replacement as CEO for the annual theater arts festival. While Moffat previously had given some consideration to this phase in IndyFringe’s development, the events of 2020 — a global pandemic and racial injustice protests — triggered a more serious look at the implementation of a succession plan, she recalled. 

“The world is changing,” Moffat said. “It reminded me of my duty. We did not have a succession plan in place to take IndyFringe through the next 10 years. I knew it was time for us to start seriously thinking about it.”

As Moffat spends her final few weeks at IndyFringe — assisting its new CEO, Justin Brady, with strategic planning, she leaves behind a case study of how to transform a fledgling street festival into a vibrant arts organization with two theaters, zero debt, an active army of supporters, committed sponsors and donors, and a strategic plan to ensure its long-term viability. 

When she took on the roles as IndyFringe’s co-founder and leading executive in 2005, Moffat knew little about Indianapolis and the business of running an arts festival. “I didn’t come from an arts background,” said Moffat, a marketing professional who had just moved from Australia at the time. 

Setting the foundation through a fundraising education

Moffat determined that a formal education in fundraising was a good place to start. She had already heard about the reputation of the Indiana University School of Philanthropy. “One of my major clients told me that the IU Fundraising School is the best in the world,” she recalled. “That piqued my interest because there is nothing like it in Australia.”

The courses didn’t disappoint, said Moffat, who considers them foundational for anyone operating as a leader in the nonprofit industry. Moffat initially took one course and, as she faced new milestones as CEO, she enrolled in additional courses that aligned with the leadership’s goals at the time — from strategic planning to successfully managing capital campaigns.

As part of a fundamental course on fundraising, she gained a critical understanding of the differences in communicating supporters and donors. “It provided the techniques and principles of fundraising, including language, terms and references you need to understand when communicating with constituents and patron. Your conversation must be couched in different terms, depending upon who you’re talking to,” Moffat said.

Moffat also stressed the importance of adopting a “constant learner” mentality when guiding a nonprofit through different stages.

“When we got to the point of doing a more comprehensive plan, I enrolled in that course,” she said. “The IU School of Fundraising provides a wonderful learning opportunity. It’s a great investment.”

Strategic board selection and planning fueled IndyFringe’s growth

Developing a strategic plan for IndyFringe’s growth, including identifying the right board members at every phase, has been critical to the organization’s successes, Moffat said.

“It’s important to come up with a good solid plan that’s achievable, something that everyone can feel good about, like 10 percent growth year over year,” she said. 

The composition of the board was an area that demanded close attention, Moffat said. “For each stage of the organization’s strategic growth, efforts were made to get the right board members,” she said. “At the grassroots stage, it’s important to have board members and volunteers who are willing to work hard, putting in a lot of physical effort and energy.

When the organization set a goal to secure property, Moffat said, they recruited board members with real estate knowledge.

Next, the focus turned to how to become a sustainable organization. “At that point, we needed people who are much more experienced than us, people with experience and wisdom. Educators. We did that and the results were fantastic,” Moffat said. “When we decided to build a second theater, we needed expertise on how to do that while leveraging and protecting what we already had. If we always have to rent, how do we protect the festival? We went to the phase of capital fundraising — how do you build a building and then become debt free?

“I would tell a young executive that those are the key goals — get a great board, don’t carry debt and develop a good plan so that you can achieve results,” Moffat said. “We’ve had challenges, absolutely. But the festival has never suffered. We have always had affordable ticket prices to ensure that people can attend but at the same time asked the question, ‘How do we operate without debt?’”

Navigating uncertain times in 2020

As the spread of COVID-19 forced organizations to cease their operations and programs, IndyFringe was in an enviable position. The theater group did not have to worry about significant bills since it owned its properties. Moffat said that she believes it will be key to IndyFringe being sustainable in the theatrical space in the coming years.

While its debt-free status helped IndyFringe better navigate shutdowns caused by COVID-19, Moffat relied on advice from other international Fringe organizations to help her team determine whether to cancel all programs or move forward with some shows with restrictions in place. The World Fringe association includes more than 250 Fringe festivals from around the world.

“We have the support of all the other Fringes around the world — this huge network of people doing problem solving,” Moffat said. “We could see that COVID was hitting Australia in a big way while it was still just a blip in the United States. In Asia, everybody was prepared for this. We were engaged in a lot of discussions about how they were able to navigate it. As a result, it was pretty easy to make a call to cancel the festival early. Performers didn’t have to wonder what we would be doing.”

As IndyFringe approached the prospect of reopening earlier this summer, it considered a balance of streaming shows and live theater. “We were exploring who’s doing it well and how do you do it better,” Moffat said.

The organization decided to move forward with outdoor performances. “With our second theater, we designed it so that it had a wall that opened to the park,” she said. “The moment they said you could have up to 250 people gathered outdoors, we started working on the logistics of how to host programs, including festivals, music, dance and theatrical performances.”

IndyFringe was able to sell out all but two of its shows, with a maximum of 100 people in attendance. Procedures included temperature checks and social distancing checks. “It was stressful,” Moffat recalled of the experience. “It didn’t get any easier because COVID cases kept going up. Nothing was getting better.

“It probably was the hardest four months in my life,” she added. “You’re fraught with anxiety about whether you’re doing the right thing.”

Maintaining personal connections with donors, volunteers

During the pandemic, Moffat said, the IndyFringe team also committed to keeping personal connections with their donors, volunteers and other supporters. Without the ability to engage with them frequently during in-person events, Moffat and the team focused on reaching out, including with telephone calls.

“You need to know your donors. It was important to keep the conversations going,” she said. “It was time to be personal, starting with the top people you know, those who understand your organization and mission, and are connected to it. It’s also a great time to get to know your volunteers by picking up the phone.”

The feedback was overwhelmingly positive. “They appreciated it. If they couldn’t be close to people, it was great to have that personal connection,” Moffit said. “It gave me just as much pleasure.”

Choosing the right successor at the right time

With the reduction in programming created by the pandemic, Moffat said the timing was right for a succession plan. “The more I thought about it, the more I realized that now is a good time. It would give them (the successor) the freedom to create their festival and build their own team because it would be such a long time between festivals.” 

As the leadership team worked on identifying a replacement, they were committed to finding someone who had close ties to Indianapolis. “They also needed to understand that Fringe is not a 9-to-5 job,” Moffat said. “It’s a way of life and it demands a world connection. We’re a community … we share everything. It’s an open book. We’re very noncompetitive.”

Justin Brady clearly fit those requirements, she said. Brady, a graduate of Butler University and Indiana University, had worked in theater in New York City. He also was intimately familiar with IndyFringe, having been a part of the organization’s growth in its early stages.  

Moffat will work with Brady throughout December, focusing on strategic planning with assistance from an award by Lilly Endowment. “That was very important to get the strategic plan done, and it does require both of us,” she said. “The future and the past have to come together to determine what does 2021-22 look like?”

Nov 23

Expressing Gratitude for Those Who Have Invested in Others

By Sponsor Insight

by Kevin Kidwell, vice president, tax-exempt sales, OneAmerica®

“Gratitude turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos into order, confusion into clarity… it makes sense of our past, brings peace for today and creates a vision for tomorrow’s future.” ─ Melody Beattie

I recently participated on a virtual panel on behalf of retirement plan advisors across the country. It was largely a nuts-and-bolts conversation, discussing the disruptive past eight months and talking about how to best serve employers and employees with tax-exempt plans in an environment where there’s so much up in the air. What was most impressive was how my colleagues opened the session with gratitude. They began by thanking all the financial professionals on the call who had gone above and beyond, despite the societal upheaval and its impact to their businesses. In short, they reacted by simply being there for one another.

Because it’s Thanksgiving week, and your family table likely will look a lot different than it has in years past, I wanted to focus on expressing gratitude to the community for all you have done, including even the smallest gestures. It’s also important to be grateful — acknowledging all that we have going for us.

Here are some of those reasons to be thankful:

Gratitude for your innovation
Think about all those organizations that rely upon outsiders to thrive. That might be the youngsters who come to nursing homes to read to seniors. Or Girl Scouts who stack shelves at a food pantry. Or parishioners who used to sing in the Sunday church choir. The pandemic has made the mixing of old and young populations impractical due to social distancing requirements. Volunteers and visitors comprise much of the ‘free labor’ that is so vital to a tax-exempt organization’s operations running smoothly — labor that is now curtailed or upended for the foreseeable future. Yet, you have managed to do more with less, bringing in creative solutions to deliver on your mission.

You also stayed sharp. The Society for Human Resources Management (SHRM) recommends that leaders hone their coaching skills and re-establish discussions with employees about achievements, areas for professional development, educational opportunities and the like. You lived out that recommendation. Despite being apart and shorthanded, employers encouraged empowerment of their staff and challenged themselves to do something differently or more efficiently, entering new territory to help raise the bar for the organization and expand their skill sets and capabilities. (OneAmerica’s Retirement Service division upped the ante ourselves after the pandemic by going beyond traditional retirement plan guidance and providing a holistic overview to our clients).

Gratitude for continuing to prioritize your employees’ financial security
Thank you to the employers who provided (and keep providing) their employees with a way to save for the future by maintaining a retirement plan, which has proved invaluable as a fallback. And kudos to those of you who bought into the idea of regular education to motivate workers. We’ve been astounded at those who continued to prioritize savings. In a world where many people live paycheck to paycheck, that’s really saying something.

Retirement plans provided a short-term crutch during the recent economic downturn. We’re grateful that the public and private sectors worked together in a bipartisan way to allow those accounts to be accessed with few or no penalties for those who needed the money most. We’re also grateful for employers who educated their employees about trimming household spending or modifying their budgets. Of course, we’re looking forward, in the near future, to when employees can get back to thinking long term regarding savings.

Gratitude for leaders who collaborated, connected and listened
According to a recent report from Upwork, production increased during the past eight months, despite team members having to collaborate from non-office locations.

Additionally, engagement scores went through the roof in many corporations as workers used technology to remain connected. This increased productivity occurred even though workers were simultaneously juggling homeschooling, caretaking and other stressors. Why was that? Great leaders who communicated, collaborated and connected with the workforce. They led by listening, understanding their employees’ unique needs and perspectives through a global pandemic and economic uncertainty. These leaders engaged with them on important dialogues about racial injustice and the need for positive change.

Gratitude for running a tight ship and being good stewards
Recognition should be given to employers who were consistent in their commitment to being good stewards of the organization’s resources and mission during an incredibly challenging time. We know that many of our clients have been with us for over 50 years and have experienced ups and downs that are part of the retirement journey.

Gratitude to work at a company that practices what it preaches
I am personally grateful for those organizations that live out their mission. We’ve had the same conversation internally. Our philosophy has been about being resilient, stable and putting Americans on the path to a secure retirement. That would not be possible without our own company being built to last and mutually strong by delivering on this five-part pledge:

  • The American retirement dream should be accessible to every American, regardless of race, ethnicity, religion, national origin, gender or sexual orientation.
  • Each plan, and every employee participant in the plan, is unique.
  • Meaningful, individualized education is the key to empowerment; new solutions can be simple, approachable and help employee participants to plot a course to achieve their goals.
  • Customization is necessary to address individuals’ varying perspectives, situations and challenges.
  • Thoughtful plan design leads to better outcomes for plan sponsors and participants.

We are proud to be financial first responders, in a sense, to support leaders and their critical not-for-profit teams continue to prosper, adapt and look toward the future as they maintain their essential roles in support of our communities.

Thank you for your leadership and may you, your colleagues and all families enjoy warmest wishes during upcoming holiday seasons.

In Kevin Kidwell’s role as vice president of national tax-exempt sales, he works to provide ideas, knowledge, information – both technical and practical – in an effort to facilitate improved plan and participant outcomes. Kidwell has held various positions within the Retirement Services division since 1988. Beginning in 2000, his exclusive focus has been on health care and tax-exempt organizations.

Nov 09

Nonprofit tech leader and executive Jay Love outlines 7 trends and lessons to embrace in 2021

By Feature

Bloomerang CRO and co-founder encourages nonprofits to engage in out-of-the-box thinking to prepare for the coming year

With 2021 quickly approaching, there’s little doubt that nonprofits will continue to navigate the challenges caused by the unprecedented combination of a pandemic, social unrest, food insecurity and high unemployment rates. Yet, the year can represent a period of significant and, in some cases, much needed growth for small- to medium-sized nonprofits, according to Jay B. Love, Bloomerang’s Chief Relationship Officer and co-founder.

In sharing his insights on the best path forward in 2021, Love highlighted ways for nonprofits to better engage with corporate partners, supporters and volunteers, and explore more effective and cost-efficient ways to leverage technology. He also predicted that nonprofits will increasingly use artificial intelligence to develop meaningful relationships with supporters, and that two-factor authentication to enhance data security will become commonplace.

Here are Love’s insights:

1. Lean into the virtual lessons taught by COVID-19. “2021 is a time for thinking outside the box, as the old saying goes,” Love said. “We can still fulfill our mission without doing things the old-fashioned way.”

While the shift to a virtual work setting may have been initially painful for some nonprofits, the benefits of doing so can be long lasting, according to Love. “Every nonprofit has had to learn how to embrace technology in a greater fashion because of the need for so many of them to work from home,” Love said. “It caused a lot of systems to be revolutionized.”

As a result of the increasing reliance on web applications, nonprofits are now able to realize some of the advantages they bring, including streamlined processes, and more frequent touchpoints with supporters, volunteers and the community.

Now that a significant portion of the population has become accustomed to functioning in a virtual world, Love said, there will be an increasing acceptance of virtual connections. “I don’t think business travel is ever coming back,” he said. “People have realized that you can do business remotely and easily talk to people this way. For a lot of nonprofits, 50 percent or more of their workforce will continue to work from home. It’s not just the future. We all have lived with this pandemic and realized it works very, very well.”

For nonprofits, virtual connections can represent a bonus. It allows them to broaden their reach, as well as hire talent anywhere in the country. “You can live in Florida and work for a nonprofit in Indianapolis and do it very, very well.”

Meeting with a supporter or a board member can be as simple as finding a 30-minute slot on your calendars, without the need for travel.

2. Recruit tech-savvy board members. In 2021, as nonprofits increasingly leverage technology, some nonprofit teams may feel at a disadvantage because they don’t have the funds to hire a full- or part-time digital marketing professional. Love recommended analyzing your board composition to determine if there’s room for growth. “It’s very important to have board members who not only have the capability to help you embrace technology but who fully enjoy doing it,” Love said. “If every small nonprofit had one or two board members with those capabilities, it would help them bridge the gap.”

3. Seek partnerships with local tech companies. In addition to recruiting assistance from board members, Love recommended developing partnerships with local tech companies to recruit tech-savvy volunteers. “There are about 150 tech companies in Indianapolis. If someone were to contact them, they would love to do volunteer work in some way, even if it is remotely,” Love said. “It would make employees feel better about their employer as well the nonprofit. You probably will end up having lifelong volunteers and donors.”

4. Be more strategic about using volunteers. Love also pointed out that many nonprofits appear to be missing out on critical opportunities to use volunteers in more effective ways. Every quarter, Bloomerang’s team offers one of its nonprofit clients the opportunity to use as many as 50 of its employees to help with volunteer work. In one instance, a nonprofit responded that they had no idea how they would use the volunteers. In other cases, the Bloomerang volunteers have been assigned to tasks like yard work, Love observed.

“I’ve got network geniuses … people who know everything about technology and they have them moving mulch and painting walls,” Love said. “Those young men and women would love to go there and help them set up apps and would enjoy it more than moving mulch around.”

During one of their volunteer projects, Bloomerang employees were unable to complete their outdoor project because of inclement weather. “It was storming so we had 25 people who went inside the building and, during the course of the morning. All they did was enjoy doughnuts and coffee, and write handwritten thank you notes,” Love recalled. “They came back and said it was the most rewarding volunteer experience they ever had. However, if we hadn’t raised our hand and said, ‘Hey, why don’t we help you do this?’ they would have never thought of it.”

5. Embrace relationship building via artificial intelligence and other technology. Instead of waiting for things to get back to “normal,” strategically create a new normal when it comes to relationship building virtually, Love recommended. “COVID is not going away in 2021. It’s going to be here,” he said. “Nonprofits that are embracing web-based technology to build relationships with their supporters, volunteers and vendors are seeing unbelievable results.”

Love said that artificial intelligence (AI is continually evolving, opening the door to more personalized connections with supporters. “We are already seeing that artificial intelligence can take a look at what’s in a database and create a rough draft of an email or letter, never missing anything that needs to be communicated with a volunteer or a supporter,” he said. “It will issue prompts of when you’re supposed to be communicating with donors, supporters and volunteers. If it’s buried deep in your database that my anniversary of supporting your organization is coming up or that my dog’s birthday is coming up, it will issue a prompt for the ideal time to send a message.” Love said that it’s the equivalent of being a best friend to your supporters. “You may be able to do that with four or five of your friends, but if you have a database of 1,000, 5,000 or 20,000 constituents, you need AI to issue those prompts.”

Bloomerang’s platform already is operating with a significant amount of AI to help clients build relationships with their constituents, Love noted. “If you have a first-time donor, for instance, we will prompt you three or four times in the first several months on how to follow up with that person,” he said. “When someone is about ready to lapse and not being retained, without donating again, we also set up a series of prompts.”

The platform also scans communications, such as emails, to ensure that there is more focus on talking about the person instead of the organization.

Love also said that nonprofits can encourage their supporters to use technology as part of their digital outreach. “Volunteers and supporters are able to reach out to their own personal network on behalf of your organization,” he said. “Now it’s not uncommon for an avid supporter of your organization to open up their email address book on #GivingTuesday and help you get an additional 10 to 20 donors very easily.” He also said that supporters are increasingly asking Facebook friends to support their favorite charity on their birthdays.

He predicted that more apps, similar to Twitter and Facebook, will become more commonplace to elevate communications on behalf of nonprofits.

6. Enhance your messaging to reflect current events. Love also recommended nonprofits revisit their messaging to ensure that they are elevating their mission during this time of crisis. For example, he said, an organization that must move job training online can highlight the increased need for those type of services and the expenses required to deliver them.  He also said that it’s important to include details about the anticipated results. “Any time you’re reaching out to gain support for your mission, you should talk about the results you’re achieving,” he said.

7. Anticipate stricter data security measures becoming the norm. Lastly, the population will start embracing stricter security measures that are tied to their financial records. “It used to be that people would complain about having to enter a password,” he said. “In the near future, they’re going to embrace a deeper level of authentication, including two-factor authentication, to make donations or to access information.”

Nov 09

Donate Safely This #GivingTuesday

By Sponsor Insight

Best Practices for Charities and Individual Donors

By Cody Lents, Partner and Change Manager at COVI, Inc.

Since it was first founded in 2012, #GivingTuesday has become known as a charitable movement built around a simple idea: Set aside a day that encourages people to do good. Over the past seven years, #Giving Tuesday has transformed into a global day of unity that has inspired hundreds of millions of individuals to give, collaborate and celebrate generosity in their communities.

GivingTuesday’s data reported $1.97 million was raised for reputable charities around the globe in 2019. But could the number have been even higher? A few months prior, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) kicked off “International Charity Fraud Awareness Week,” a coordinated effort to help charities and donors avoid a growing number of scam groups masquerading as charitable organizations. Using tax deduction as bait, fake charities have often lured unsuspecting victims into making ineligible donations.

With the next #GivingTuesday quickly approaching on Dec. 1, 2020, what can you do to ensure your donation ends up in the right hands this holiday season? And, as a charity, how can you ensure prospective donors feel comfortable about allocating funds to your cause?

Best Practices for Individual Donors

  1. Give to established, trusted organizations.
    The easiest way to immediately confirm the legitimacy of a charitable organization is through the IRS’ “Tax Exempt Organization Search”, which allows donors to search for qualified charities in which donations may be tax-deductible. Legitimate charities will provide their Employee Identification Number (EIN) upon request.
  2. Use credit cards or checks.
    If a charity is attempting to solicit a donation through cash, gift cards, virtual currency, or wire transfer, it is most likely a scam. For security and tax record purposes, it is safest to contribute by check or credit card.
  3. Be skeptical of copycats and disaster relief.
    Exercise caution when examining charities with names that are similar to nationally known organizations. Scammers may use names, domains, etc. that sound or look like those of respected, legitimate organizations.

Following natural disasters, it’s common for scammers to impersonate charities to solicit personal financial information from victims and those looking to donate–don’t give out personal financial information, such as Social Security numbers or passwords to anyone who solicits a contribution.

Still unsure? Run the organization’s name through Charity Watch or Charity Navigator to browse reviews, ratings and reports from other donors.

Best Practices for Charities & Nonprofits

  1. Educate your donors.
    Whether on your website, social media or mailings, share information that instills confidence in those who want to contribute to your cause. Use the above best practices for individual donors as a guide.
  2. Implement a payment processor on your site.
    This allows your organization’s website to accept all online payments directly through the website, as opposed to sending donors off-site to a third-party platform. When your donor enters their payment information on your site, their card information is sent through a payment gateway to be validated. If the card’s information is legitimate, the transaction will be processed by your payment provider.

This process provides donors a more streamlined and credible experience and keeps them on your website for longer. Here is a comparison of eight trusted payment processors.

Questions?
If you need assistance vetting a charity or setting up a payment strategy for your nonprofit/charitable organization, you can reach out to COVI at cody@gocovi.com for help. COVI is an Information Technology (IT) service provider specializing in productivity, security, support and strategy services, located in Indianapolis, Indiana.

Nov 02

Decision to leave Fed Funds Rate unchanged until 2023 indicates Fed’s accommodating position for economic recovery

By Sponsor Insight

by Horizon Bank

At its September meeting, the Federal Reserve (Fed) left the Fed Funds Rate unchanged between a range of 0-.25%. More importantly, the Fed indicated its intention to hold the rate there until at least 2023. The Fed stated its expectation to maintain this target range until labor market conditions reached levels consistent with the policymaking committee’s assessments of maximum employment.

In its statement, the Fed also shared its intention to maintain an accommodative stance until the U.S. economy achieves inflation averaging 2% over time and longer-term inflation expectations remain anchored at 2%. The statement reflected the central bank’s new policy framework in which it will allow inflation to overshoot its 2% target after periods of lower inflation. Simply put, the Fed appears positioned to remain extremely accommodative for some time to come.

The Fed’s commitment to obtaining a 2% average inflation rate demonstrated its intent to not enact yield curve control, but instead to continue to foster liquidity where needed. Ultimately, the Fed appears to be signaling that it will allow longer-term yields to rise while holding short-term rates down. This strategy seems necessary to obtain the Fed’s goal of full employment and 2% average inflation. Holding short-term rates low is focused on encouraging full employment while providing room for intermediate and long rates to drift up, which should assist with the goal of achieving higher inflation.

Assuming the Fed is successful, its strategy should result in a widening of the yield curve where investors are paid more yield for taking on longer maturities. One of the goals of such a policy is to encourage financial institutions to make more loans. The idea being that a steeper curve provides more attractive profit margins on the loans. A loan’s rate is typically based on intermediate and long-term interest rates where the money used for the loan typically comes from bank deposits whose rates are typically tied to the shorter end of the yield curve. The difference between what a financial institution pays for deposits and what they charge for a loan is how they make money on lending. As a result, the wider the spread between the two, the more opportunity for profit.

Ultimately, the Fed plans to keep short-term interest rates low while allowing intermediate and long-term rates to drift higher. It appears it is their intention to stick with this strategy unless inflation rises above their 2% average target on a sustainable basis. Inflation, generally speaking, is a function of:

  • Expectations (consumers expect prices to go up or down)
  • Demand (increases drive prices up while decreases drive prices down) and
  • Supply (increases drive prices down while decreases drive prices up). At the present time, none of these factors are indicating that higher inflation is on the horizon.

It is important to note that monetary policy is meant to smooth out economic growth and it is not intended to change an economy’s long-term trend growth rate. Simply put, monetary policy is intended to shift growth around in time. In other words, it is focused on avoiding the high peaks and the low valleys. If growth is slow, monetary policy is implemented to ease or lower interest rates. On the other hand, if growth is moving too quickly, monetary policy is implemented to slow things down by raising interest rates. With that said, inflation or deflation should not be an issue if the central bank gets it right. Dealing with inflation or deflation longer-term typically indicates some sort of monetary policy mistake.

If there is a longer-term inflation story to eventually tell, odds are the Fed remained accommodative too long. There has been significant conversation on this front given the Fed’s extremely accommodative monetary policy. While policy easing has been aggressive, such action seems appropriate in an emergency situation. A pandemic with an associated economic shutdown seems to qualify as an emergency situation. With that said, accommodative policy should always be accompanied by an exit strategy. The risk is that the Fed waits too long and prices overinflate. While at some point, the Fed will be faced with the decision to change policy, we believe, considering the present situation, that point may be several years away. As a result, we expect the Fed to be able to hold course with their present strategy for quite some time to come.

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Dave Voris is a vice president in the Indianapolis market for Horizon Bank. As a senior treasury management officer, he works closely with middle market, nonprofits and small business companies in a broad span of industries. His 25 years of business experience have included treasury management, merchant services, and international banking including sales management, client service and implementation management, product management and electronic payment operations.

We also provide longer-term loans for asset purchases such as vehicles or equipment.  Visit one of our Commercial Banking Advisors at 317-608-2085 or dvoris@horizonbank.com