OPTIMISM: The Essential Ingredient in Desperate Times

by Eddie Thompson | Apr 29, 2020 | Development Management, Donor Communications

Over the last few weeks, I’ve presented a dozen or more webinars for our clients and other organizations on fundraising in a pandemic. Make-A-Wish Foundation, Adventist West, and Texas Community College Foundations were among the participating organizations the last...

THE FLYWHEEL EFFECT: Organizational Branding at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital

by Eddie Thompson | Oct 9, 2019 | Development Management, Donor Communications

Over the last few months I’ve posted several articles on Jim Collins’ follow-up supplement to his best-seller—the 35-page booklet entitled Good to Great and the Social Sectors. Collins introduces the fifth Good-to-Great principle for nonprofits with this proposition:...

FORWARD-THINKING PHILANTHROPY: Focusing on Outputs Over Inputs

by Eddie Thompson | Aug 26, 2019 | Development Management, Donor Communications

Over the last few months (March & April) I posted a couple of articles on Jim Collins’ follow-up supplement to his best-seller—the 35-page booklet entitled Good to Great and the Social Sectors. In those previous posts (GETTING THE RIGHT PEOPLE ON THE BUS and LEVEL...

IN THE MIDST OF A STORM: How Nonprofits Can Survive and Excel in Hard Times 

by Eddie Thompson | Jul 29, 2019 | Development Management, Donor Communications

My previous post, “Weathering the Storms,” covered practice-management strategies to employ during good times that tend to harden nonprofits against three types of hard times: 1) economic recessions that universally impact all donors and their giving capacities; 2)...

WEATHERING THE STORMS: Practice-management Strategies That Ready Your Organization

by Eddie Thompson | Jun 3, 2019 | Development Management

Hard times at nonprofit institutions generally come in three forms: 1) Economic recessions universally impact all donors and their giving capacity, as well as their “giving confidence.”  In the years between 1854 and 2009, there were 33 economic cycles, averaging...

LEVEL 5 LEADERSHIP: Getting Things Done Within a Diffused Power Structure

by Eddie Thompson | Apr 22, 2019 | Development Management

This is the second in a series of several posts on Jim Collins’s booklet entitled, Good to Great and the Social Sectors. In this 35-page supplement to his bestseller, Good to Great, the author identifies and comments on five challenges that are unique to nonprofits...