Beyond Donor-Centered: Change Your Mission!

You know that mission statement that either is on your wall in your organization's office or in some dusty handbook on the bottom of your desk drawer? Yeah, that one.

Is there anything about your donors in that mission statement? Probably not. It's a pretty rare occurrence if there was.

I'm going to go out on a limb here, but at Veritus Group we believe nonprofits need to change their mission statements to not just include donors but to make them half of the mission.

There, I said it. Now, let me have it. Come on; don't hold back ...

Tell me all the reasons why that is just a crazy idea. Now, for all the reasons you come up with I have two on why your nonprofit needs to change it's paradigm about how it views donors.

What I'm talking about goes way beyond being donor-centered. I'm talking about changing your organization's mind-set and culture. In short, the way it does business.

For too long we in the nonprofit world have looked at our donors as a means to and end. You need their money to get the real work done, right? But, what if your real work was not only what your current mission statement says, but also to care, challenge and change your donors, so they too can be transformed by their giving and involvement in your work?

That's pretty radical. But also I believe it will change lives and help your organization be successful.

So what does this new paradigm look like?

Well, what if your organization actually had folks whose job it is to evaluate the programs you have and report on the impact to your donors? I mean, that's it, that's all they did. Or, what if your program people took a day out of their week to call or visit with donors and update them on what is happening with the investment they made? What if you invited donors to sit with your executive team in your yearly planning meetings? Or you invited them to your annual retreat.