Attendance at Nonprofit Fundraising Development Conference Up 3 Times Over Last Year

Booz Allen sponsors a groundbreaking opportunity for any charity—large or small—to gain critical insights from leading area nonprofit development officers, foundations, and corporate grant makers.

“Fundraisers have many training opportunities available from higher education institutions, management trainers, and others, but investing the time and resources in a conference so that industry leaders can share their best practices is practically unprecedented,” says Booz Allen Hamilton consultant Eileen Miller.

But on March 6, 2008, Booz Allen did exactly that when it partnered with Volunteer Fairfax to hold its second Nonprofit Conference on Fundraising Development in Fairfax, Virginia. The event drew 300 attendees from 180 nonprofit organizations—three times the attendance of the first conference in 2007.

The conference is the brainchild of principal Joe Suarez. “Nonprofits face common challenges in raising funds to support their missions. As a funder of many local charities, Booz Allen sees the same challenges affecting these organizations, regardless of whether their mission involves health, education, arts, environment, or another cause.

“By providing this opportunity to share organizational fundraising best practices, Booz Allen offers participants lessons learned and tools to maximize their success and improve the well-being of our community.”

Panelists from Washington, D.C. metro-area corporate grant makers and foundations provided an overview of current giving programs and addressed crucial questions such as, how do they decide which nonprofit organizations to support? How does the economic climate impact corporate giving? What can nonprofits do with a minimum of time and money to attract individual donors or qualify for a grant?

Attendees were looking for more efficient ways raise funds, new ideas for existing programs, and insight into the fundraising techniques of other professionals, such as major gifts and planned giving. “They wanted to gain knowledge that will help them further their organizations’ missions,” Miller says.

Speakers included such recognized names as:

Tobi Printz-Platnick, program officer at the Morris and Gwendolyn Cafritz Foundation
Paulette Maehara, president and CEO of the Association of Fundraising Professionals
Barbara Harman of the Harman Family Foundation
Kathy Ward, senior vice president of the American Institute for Cancer Research
Kelly Mansfield Brown, assistant dean at the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business
Richard Moyers, director of the Meyer Foundation’s Nonprofit Sector Fund

“The conference is part of the firm’s commitment to corporate social responsibility,” Suarez says. “It dovetails with our value proposition. Booz Allen makes a difference by using our intellectual capital to take best practices to clients to help them become more successful. It’s easy to write a check—much harder, but often more effective, to develop an educational platform and teach techniques.”

Sara Gibson is director of development at the nonprofit Miriam’s Kitchen. “Smaller charities like Miriam’s Kitchen usually can’t catch the attention of the industry leaders,” she says. “But just one well-trained person at a small nonprofit can make a big difference to that organization—and Booz Allen recognizes that.”

Suarez adds, “This conference is important because smaller nonprofits often live on the edge financially and can be most susceptible to going under. But they fill an important void in the community, and the individuals they serve may not find similar help elsewhere if these nonprofits no longer existed.”

Smart New Approaches to Revitalize Fundraising Efforts

Building the capacity of an organization means strengthening its capabilities for expanding existing programs, adopting more efficient approaches, and developing ideas for new programs. To help nonprofits build capacity, the Conference on Fundraising Development covered a wide range of topics, including:

Event Planning A to Z: Bold approaches in reevaluating, reinventing, and reinvigorating nonprofit events
Planned Giving 101: How to start a new planned giving effort or enhance an established program
Resource Development on a Shoestring: How to carry out professional programs with limited time and a small budget
The Board’s Role in Fundraising: Identifying the role board members should play and how they can best support initiatives such as capital campaigns
Practical Tips on Grant Writing: How to research funding sources, create a grant timeline, and improve writing to increase grant awards

The ServiceSource Network provides job training and support to more than 10,000 people with disabilities in 10 states. “The Nonprofit Conference on Fundraising was one of the most well-organized conferences I’ve attended in quite some time,” says Lisa Ward, vice president of communications and community development. “A wealth of very practical, hands-on experience and insight was shared with us. The conference definitely helped me improve upon our existing fundraising activities.”

Gibson called Rick Moyers and Jocelyn Harmon’s presentation on “Technology and the Future of Giving” the best technology session she ever attended. It outlined how to raise funds and awareness with donors through efficient technology use. “They presented cutting-edge tools and simplified the discussion so all attendees, regardless of technical ability, could understand it. I especially liked their ideas on using social networking and the Internet for fundraising.”

Miriam’s Kitchen provides free breakfasts and social services for those in need; in 2007, 1,200 volunteers served almost 53,000 meals from the nonprofit’s Washington, D.C. facility. Although the suburban conference location was initially daunting for a city dweller like Gibson, Booz Allen arranged for her to share a cab with another attendee. She says it provided her with another opportunity to network with industry colleagues.

“The differing viewpoints of the presenting organizations was also interesting, as some were facing budget cuts while others were not,” she says. Foundations with limited dollars were adhering even more closely to their missions when determining which organization received funding. Gibson also found the quantitative data presented by keynote speaker Paulette Maehara helpful and has already used it in her job.

“We know we’ve succeeded when the nonprofits have an opportunity to quickly use the knowledge gained at the conference to strengthen their organization, and then see the benefits that accrue from those efforts,” says Miller.

“I wanted to attend the conference to educate myself on best practices and see where other nonprofits were having success so that we can elevate ServiceSource’s fundraising activities,” says Ward. “The greatest form of flattery is replication. I learned a great deal from what my colleagues in other nonprofits are doing and how they organize their fundraising activities. We plan to expand our online efforts and take greater advantage of using the Internet as both a broader marketing tool and specifically for fundraising.”

“We appreciated the small things, too, like the nice breakfast and giveaways,” says Gibson. “We received a CD with slides on the topics, which was easy to share with my colleagues. And the conference fee was so affordable, anyone could attend.”

Feedback from participants is the primary way the success of this conference is measured, and this year, Suarez says, it was phenomenal, especially from those who had also attended in 2007. “Many said they learned something they can apply immediately at their organizations,” he says.

Next year, he hopes to boost attendance to 500, and ultimately wants to expand the program into the firm’s key regions, such as San Diego and Colorado Springs.

story posted April 15, 2008