Al Gore's Commanders Intent

Jonathon Grapsas, our regional director in North America sent me a link to Al Gore's latest video about climate change. Click here to see the video.

Even though it is very US-focused and many of my readers are not in the US, it’s worth watching for two reasons:
1) It is appropriate for pretty much every country
2) They way he delivers his speech.

In the speech he calls for America to “commit to producing 100% of our electricity from renewable energy and truly clean carbon free sources within ten years.” Wow. (If you are short on time, fast forward the video to about 1:50).

It is a very clear call to action with targets, timeframe and it’s supported by his reasoning.

At first it is incredibly unbelievable – America leading the way in cutting carbon emissions and saving our planet? Bear in mind the USA is still the world’s biggest culprit when it comes to carbon emissions, and shows its leadership by not signing up to Kyoto and hiding behind the fact that the emerging economies have not signed up.

But then again, Al Gore’s speech is comparable (and directly inspired) by the equally unbelievable speech by JFK’s in 1961.

Back then, in the midst of the cold war with USSR, JFK called upon America to put a man on the moon – and bring him back safely – within a decade. For people back then, that would have been as unbelievable as Al Gore’s speech. There is of course, one key difference between Gore and JFK – which I will come back to later.

So, what has this to do with you? Well, climate change has a lot to do with all of us.

While I am sure millions of PowerPoint presentations have been improved by Gore’s movie “The Inconvenient Truth” , heads of charities (and companies like Pareto Fundraising) can take inspiration from the clear big picture goal – such clarity gives people clear guidelines for all of the actions and little decisions they have to make on a day to day basis.

And to top it off, at about the 4:50 mark, Gore begins a very well delivered call to action. The sort of call to action that we often wish our CEOs and Chairs would make when delivering speeches to potential and actual donors!

In a rather brilliant and easy to read book, “Made to Stick” Chip and Dan Heath talk about the ‘Commanders Intent’. Gore is using this same technique, articulating an incredibly clear and easy to understand vision in a directly practical way. (
Anyone wanting to help achieve the vision has enough information to help them with all decisions they make on the way.

I work on a daily basis with lots of charities, and most of them don’t really have a plan for next year, never mind a long term vision. Jonathon wrote about this in a recent blog entry : “[I often ask]... why do you need more money? Secondly, what are the organizations growth plans? Invariably I get blank stares to both questions – and often not for lack of asking on the fundraisers part.”

This is not to be taken as too harsh a criticism of course – please remember that most charities exist hand to mouth, are understaffed and have boards made up of brilliant, caring people who are rarely business leaders. In fact, boards are more often experts in the cause (health care, development, human rights etc) or they are motivated, well-intentioned people with a connection to the cause.

If you don’t know what your charity (or business, or even personal) vision is, then have a crack at your commander’s intent.

Oh, the key difference in the speeches? JFK was President after being fairly elected. Just imagine if Al Gore had been President for the past eight years.

Comedy and learning

I do a lot or presenting at conferences and the like. Of course much of this is about ego, being centre of attention, narcissism etc but I really genuinely want to give away my secrets. However, I do know that telling people stuff is not the right way to train or coach them - you need to engage them too.

In recent years, I have been trying to improve Pareto masterclasses and presentations by introducing 'Made to Stick' techniques into training. Lots of exercises, getting people to write stuff down etc.

However, in Washington this (northern) summer I did a presentation called 'Mythbusters' about fundraising myths with a new spin, I deliberately tried to make it funny. It seemed to work; got great 'marks'*, but also people I spoke to seemed to really take on some of the key points.

The highlight for me was seeing guru and friend Mal Warwick bent over double from laughing.

It got me thinking though, so I went on a stand up comedy course to try and improve engagement and learning. Graduation from the course, was a short stand up show at a comedy club, which you can watch if you want.

I can tell you though, if you do do any public speaking this course will help you. Not just for how to contruct funny stories or jokes but also the whole nerves / preparation / bright lights thing. Go on, give it a go.

So, the comedy course graduation was at a comedy club. I was one of five students and there were three 'real' comedians along, and my colleague Justine recorded a video of it.

You can see it here on You Tube if you like and if you do, I hope you enjoy the video. But, please DO NOT WATCH IT if you don't like swearwords - it is classic stand up and has nothing to do with fundraising, charities or social justice and is pretty rude.

(TIP: Press play, then pause and wait two or three minutes for the whole video to 'buffer' before pressing play again).

* For some thoughts about conference scoring, check out this blog.

(c) Pareto Fundraising 2008, All Rights Reserved

OMG Older People are on Social Media - Drop the Direct Mail Program!

Do you really KNOW who is on social media?

A recent blog by guest blogger George Crankovic on Future Fundraising Now (best fundraising blog in the world) brought to my attention a report from Pew Research about who is on social media. 

Titled Do you think you know who's on social media? the blog pointed out that older people who are online are on social media more than you may imagine.

I quote from George’s blog:

“But now for the unexpected findings:

• 52% of Internet users between 50 to 64 are on social media.
• 32% of Internet users age 65 and up are on social media."

Check this out (from Pew's excellently constructed and helpful website)

This use of social media by older people may well be unexpected, but what does it mean?

A couple of problems with this kind of research –

1. It is opinion and not transactional.  Looking at the scale of the research, and Pew’s credentials it is almost certainly statistically accurate in reflecting what people SAY but it is still not based on actual usage data; it is just what people said they did.  This is inherently flawed.

2. What is ‘on social media’?

They decided someone was ‘on social media’ if they answered affirmatively to a question like “Do you ever...use a social networking site like Facebook, LinkedIn or Google Plus?”

There were six questions like that.  Answering that you ever use is a reasonable definition of being 'on social media' but it gives no indication of their involvement.  This will vary enormously by age, gender, education, job, real world social network and more.

My friend John Lepp in Canada accounts for perhaps as many updates from friends as all my other friends added together but he and my someone like my mum are both defined as the being ‘on social media’.

Mum may use Facebook for looking at photos of grand kids once a year, and nothing else.

Everyone is different, but you can rest assured that the average older social media user (mum) has a different level of engagement from the average younger user (John).

If the Pareto principle holds true, then 80% of social media activity will involve just 20% of people ‘on social media’.  In fact, I would bet that >64% of activity is conducted by perhaps <4 areto="" font="" of="" squared="" users.="">

Even if the numbers are not an exact 80/20 split, there is no doubt that the majority of activity will be conducted by a minority of registered users.  After all, 50% of my activity seems to be just one friend, John, and I doubt that is unique to me!

Generally speaking, charities have failed to achieve expectations from fundraising on social media.  

I think that there are four reasons for this:

1.     Charity expectations are huge because big stats like these released by Pew are exciting and overwhelming

2.     I believe younger people are much more involved in social media that older people (OK, belief is worse research method than even opinion surveys but come on, what do you think?)

3.     In all metrics on giving, older people in any 'type' of fundraising are better givers - better average donations and retention rates etc.

4.     Charities think it is free or cheap to fundraise on social media, when in fact it needs a program in place like any other advertising media

If you ever see mind blowing data like this, be really careful with how you interpret it. Ask the questions – ‘what does that actually mean?’ ‘How was this research conducted?’ and ‘What about my donors?’.

You are not going to be revolutionising your fundraising by using social media with your older donors for another ten years or so.  Don't get distracted by amazing 'data' about social media... yet.  Stick to what you know works, and look out for case studies of how people have made social media make more money for their cause.

Sean