Thanks to the FIA for alerting us to the long awaited Government Productivity Commission report into the charity sector.
I haven't read it yet, but am trying to bribe a keen Pareto person with a gift to write a summary for us. I'll read it later too!
Australian charity people, check it out here.
Sean
Showing posts with label FIA. Show all posts
Showing posts with label FIA. Show all posts
Saturday, February 13, 2010
Tuesday, November 18, 2008
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
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
Monday, October 13, 2008
The Field of Scoring
This (Northern) summer I attended the DMAW / AFP Bridge Conference in Washington DC, following the IoF National Convention and via a week ‘off’ in France.
I say a week ‘off’ because, whilst in France, I stayed with a friend, Ken Burnett. You may have heard of Ken from his work and books on fundraising including the essential Relationship Fundraising, which I reckon first came out in about 1893. Over a century later, it is still very relevant and promotes a donor-centred approach to maximising lifetime value; i.e. be nice to your donors and they will give you more money in the long term.
Ken actually has a life beyond fundraising. At his place we spent some time walking around his field. But this time the field is a star of his new book, The Field by the River. This is his first non-fundraising published book—a sort of cross between A Year in Provence and Jed Bartlett’s love for trivia. If you haven’t seen The West Wing don’t worry about that reference. If you did see it, liked Jed and you like nature, you will love ‘The Field’.
During my visit, Ken was obsessed with his ‘score’ or rank on Amazon.co.uk. He was checking it pretty much every hour—as I’m sure you and I would be if we had just had a book published—and it was the main topic of all conversations.
Actually, not all, I exaggerate—just breakfast, morning tea, lunch, dinner, after dinner and a quick check of Amazon before going to bed. To be fair, it was the very first week of sales, I am sure he is not checking every hour this week …
So, what has this got to do with fundraising? And how does it bring in British fundraising stalwarts, Tony Elischer (of Think!) and Tim Hunter (of NSPCC)? Well you didn’t know it was going to bring in Tony and Tim but now you do. They only get tiny cameos though.
At the IoF Convention in the bar (of course) with Tony and Tim talking shop (that’s it for Tim, told you it was a little cameo). Tony brought up the ‘scores’ of my speaking sessions at the Resource Alliance’s shockingly named International Workshop for Resource Mobilisation—IWRM—a couple of months previous, in Malaysia.
I had presented a few sessions in Malaysia that had gone down very well, according to the scores, and Tony ‘ranked’ me—i.e. ‘You came in above blah blah’. Mind you, he did leave himself out of the list—I am sure he did very well too.
And this week I got my ‘scores’ from IoF too. As an egotistical, needy, must-be-loved, ‘please like me’ person this is really important to me, and I hope my mum finds out without me having to tell her. But really, the whole scoring system is seriously flawed.
When Tony first told me about the ‘scores’, I accidentally forgot about my ego and instead got on a soapbox about scoring. (OK, it was still ego—just manifesting itself differently). And here it is.
Conference organisers need an objective way of measuring their speakers’ performances. They really need to be able to get the best speakers back and establish a system of good speakers to build their reputation. Seems obvious.
The problem comes from a conflict between the only real purpose of a fundraising conference—empowering individuals to make more money for their organisations—and the fact that people want to enjoy themselves, be entertained, laugh and learn. If you ask, we will always say learning is our priority. But this is not reflected in the scores.
Basically, most people score emotionally. They will score a speaker higher if they like her or him, they will score higher if they have fun. But worst of all they will score them lower if they disagree with the speaker. The last point presents a huge challenge for any speaker trying to challenge the prevailing paradigm, which of course we need to do if we are to create change.
Now bear in mind a few things:
The best learning comes from highly skilled teachers or trainers who really know their stuff, give direct practical information, are willing to adequately prepare before the conference and are engaging and fun. The problem is they are very rare—hence the international conference ‘circuit’ has the same old names cropping up.
So what can we do about it?
Well, we need a paradigm shift about how we ‘score’ at conferences and the decision-making process about how we invite people back.
The organisers of the key fundraising conferences should come together to develop effective and standardised conference evaluation policies and procedures. This includes organisations such as the Institute of Fundraising (UK), Resource Alliance, Association of Fundraising Professionals, Fundraising Institute of Australia, CAF and Fundraising and Philanthropy magazine. Leave egos behind and do what’s right for the fundraising community. They should develop:
Those are some of my ideas—but I know you have lots of experience as a conference attendee or speaker, so I would very much welcome your views and ideas.
Anyway, when I wrote this, The Field by the River is ‘scoring’: ‘Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 3,486 in Books’, the highest I have seen. Oh, Year in Provence is 3,883 and #1 at Amazon was‘Chinese Food made easy’.
When it was about 4,000 I asked Ken what that means in book sales. ‘I have no idea, but it was 7,433 yesterday …’
Bloody typical, no one seems to measure the right thing.
Sean
I say a week ‘off’ because, whilst in France, I stayed with a friend, Ken Burnett. You may have heard of Ken from his work and books on fundraising including the essential Relationship Fundraising, which I reckon first came out in about 1893. Over a century later, it is still very relevant and promotes a donor-centred approach to maximising lifetime value; i.e. be nice to your donors and they will give you more money in the long term.
Ken actually has a life beyond fundraising. At his place we spent some time walking around his field. But this time the field is a star of his new book, The Field by the River. This is his first non-fundraising published book—a sort of cross between A Year in Provence and Jed Bartlett’s love for trivia. If you haven’t seen The West Wing don’t worry about that reference. If you did see it, liked Jed and you like nature, you will love ‘The Field’.
During my visit, Ken was obsessed with his ‘score’ or rank on Amazon.co.uk. He was checking it pretty much every hour—as I’m sure you and I would be if we had just had a book published—and it was the main topic of all conversations.
Actually, not all, I exaggerate—just breakfast, morning tea, lunch, dinner, after dinner and a quick check of Amazon before going to bed. To be fair, it was the very first week of sales, I am sure he is not checking every hour this week …
So, what has this got to do with fundraising? And how does it bring in British fundraising stalwarts, Tony Elischer (of Think!) and Tim Hunter (of NSPCC)? Well you didn’t know it was going to bring in Tony and Tim but now you do. They only get tiny cameos though.
At the IoF Convention in the bar (of course) with Tony and Tim talking shop (that’s it for Tim, told you it was a little cameo). Tony brought up the ‘scores’ of my speaking sessions at the Resource Alliance’s shockingly named International Workshop for Resource Mobilisation—IWRM—a couple of months previous, in Malaysia.
I had presented a few sessions in Malaysia that had gone down very well, according to the scores, and Tony ‘ranked’ me—i.e. ‘You came in above blah blah’. Mind you, he did leave himself out of the list—I am sure he did very well too.
And this week I got my ‘scores’ from IoF too. As an egotistical, needy, must-be-loved, ‘please like me’ person this is really important to me, and I hope my mum finds out without me having to tell her. But really, the whole scoring system is seriously flawed.
When Tony first told me about the ‘scores’, I accidentally forgot about my ego and instead got on a soapbox about scoring. (OK, it was still ego—just manifesting itself differently). And here it is.
Conference organisers need an objective way of measuring their speakers’ performances. They really need to be able to get the best speakers back and establish a system of good speakers to build their reputation. Seems obvious.
The problem comes from a conflict between the only real purpose of a fundraising conference—empowering individuals to make more money for their organisations—and the fact that people want to enjoy themselves, be entertained, laugh and learn. If you ask, we will always say learning is our priority. But this is not reflected in the scores.
Basically, most people score emotionally. They will score a speaker higher if they like her or him, they will score higher if they have fun. But worst of all they will score them lower if they disagree with the speaker. The last point presents a huge challenge for any speaker trying to challenge the prevailing paradigm, which of course we need to do if we are to create change.
Now bear in mind a few things:
- Most fundraising conference speakers are not paid and are not professional speakers.
- A large proportion of conference attendees are usually first-timers and people new to fundraising.
- Scores are usually very generous—speakers rarely get the worst possible ranking.
- Session attendance can vary from a dozen to hundreds, so a couple of out-lying scores can have a dramatic impact for some people.
The best learning comes from highly skilled teachers or trainers who really know their stuff, give direct practical information, are willing to adequately prepare before the conference and are engaging and fun. The problem is they are very rare—hence the international conference ‘circuit’ has the same old names cropping up.
So what can we do about it?
Well, we need a paradigm shift about how we ‘score’ at conferences and the decision-making process about how we invite people back.
The organisers of the key fundraising conferences should come together to develop effective and standardised conference evaluation policies and procedures. This includes organisations such as the Institute of Fundraising (UK), Resource Alliance, Association of Fundraising Professionals, Fundraising Institute of Australia, CAF and Fundraising and Philanthropy magazine. Leave egos behind and do what’s right for the fundraising community. They should develop:
- A much more thorough and data-driven approach to the conference and speaker evaluations. The attendees are customers and should be analysed like a charity would analyse its donors.
- A way to gather more data on attendees—before the conference—to find out about their years of experience, area of work, etc. and then analyse it to see who goes to which sessions.
- A process whereby conference organisers can log who came to what session to put post conference feedback in context.
- An evaluation system that has more emphasis on learning outcomes. This means scoring sessions on more than just content and presentation.
- A process that measures ‘scores’ in grades of ten rather than four. Marks out of ten (rather than ‘poor, ok, good, excellent’) create more significant gaps on measures and also make it easier to provide feedback to speakers and conference organisers.
- Evaluation forms that collect more useful written feedback and send this to speakers.
- A process that takes into account attendance numbers when looking at average scores.
- A process for following up all attendees using something like Survey Monkey to ask people what they have done with the learning.
Those are some of my ideas—but I know you have lots of experience as a conference attendee or speaker, so I would very much welcome your views and ideas.
Anyway, when I wrote this, The Field by the River is ‘scoring’: ‘Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 3,486 in Books’, the highest I have seen. Oh, Year in Provence is 3,883 and #1 at Amazon was‘Chinese Food made easy’.
When it was about 4,000 I asked Ken what that means in book sales. ‘I have no idea, but it was 7,433 yesterday …’
Bloody typical, no one seems to measure the right thing.
Sean
Wednesday, September 3, 2008
Learning fundraising - fundraising conferences and more
It is an interesting business this fundraising for good causes. We all love it, most people I know are in it because they want to 'make a difference' and we all do our best for our charities. But it still isn't a profession. So where do we get our training?
There are qualifications - the CFRE is the one that I most familiar with, but I am sure there are more. (Please share them by commenting on this blog).
I am lucky that my job allows me to visit loads of conferences, where I learn more and also get to present a bit. But sometimes I find out about a new conference I have never heard of, so I thought it useful to publish a list of conferences I know... Please add more by commenting.
I really don't care if the title is conference/forum/workshop or whatever, I am just looking for learning opportunities for fundraisers - and the relevant website, and when it is please!
As well as conferences, Pareto Fundraising offers tons of training too. Mostly in Canada, Hong Kong and Australia more information can be obtained here.
Links are usually to the parent body, since actual conference sites often change.
Australia - FIA Conference. Annual, next February '09
Australia - Australasian Fundraising Forum. Annual, most recent August '08
New Zealand - FINZ Conference, Biannual, most recent May '08
India - SAFRG. Annual, most recent Aug '08
UK - IOF Convention, Annual, next 6-8 July 2009
Netherlands - IFC, annual, next 14-17 Oct 2008
USA - AFP, annual, next 29 Mar - 1 Apr 2009
USA - DMA/AFP 'Bridge' Conference. Annual, most recent July '08
Brasil - Brazilian Fundraising Conference, Annual, next 5-7 Nov '08 (NB the website was not working for me when I put this up, and my Portuguese is not good enough to search in the right lanuage).
International - IWRM. Maybe annual now? Most recent was Malaysia, May '08
Oh, and if anyone knows of a list somewhere else, I would rather point to that and save me some time! The closest I ever got was to follow guru and Resource Alliance chair, Mal Warwick.
I will get the list up in a friendlier format on our revamped website in the new year.
Sean Triner, Pareto Fundraising
There are qualifications - the CFRE is the one that I most familiar with, but I am sure there are more. (Please share them by commenting on this blog).
I am lucky that my job allows me to visit loads of conferences, where I learn more and also get to present a bit. But sometimes I find out about a new conference I have never heard of, so I thought it useful to publish a list of conferences I know... Please add more by commenting.
I really don't care if the title is conference/forum/workshop or whatever, I am just looking for learning opportunities for fundraisers - and the relevant website, and when it is please!
As well as conferences, Pareto Fundraising offers tons of training too. Mostly in Canada, Hong Kong and Australia more information can be obtained here.
Links are usually to the parent body, since actual conference sites often change.
Australia - FIA Conference. Annual, next February '09
Australia - Australasian Fundraising Forum. Annual, most recent August '08
New Zealand - FINZ Conference, Biannual, most recent May '08
India - SAFRG. Annual, most recent Aug '08
UK - IOF Convention, Annual, next 6-8 July 2009
Netherlands - IFC, annual, next 14-17 Oct 2008
USA - AFP, annual, next 29 Mar - 1 Apr 2009
USA - DMA/AFP 'Bridge' Conference. Annual, most recent July '08
Brasil - Brazilian Fundraising Conference, Annual, next 5-7 Nov '08 (NB the website was not working for me when I put this up, and my Portuguese is not good enough to search in the right lanuage).
International - IWRM. Maybe annual now? Most recent was Malaysia, May '08
Oh, and if anyone knows of a list somewhere else, I would rather point to that and save me some time! The closest I ever got was to follow guru and Resource Alliance chair, Mal Warwick.
I will get the list up in a friendlier format on our revamped website in the new year.
Sean Triner, Pareto Fundraising
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