Time for Spring Cleaning
Spring cleaning is that time of year to repurpose, donate, or throw out things you no longer need. Here are four things you should spring clean at your United Way:
BOARD
No, I am not suggesting you throw out your entire board, but you need to get rid of your inactive or disengaged board members. If you have board members who miss more meetings than they attend, rarely participate in any activities outside of board meetings, and would be considered board members in “name” only – you need to do a thorough spring cleaning of your board. This might sound like a painful thing to do, but United Way presidents/CEOs/executive directors tell me that the board members that need to go are often glad to be relieved of their duties. Once you have recruited new board members to fill your spring cleaning vacancies, be sure to schedule our New Directions Board and Staff Retreat to get your new board moving in the right direction.
FUNDRAISING GIMMICKS
Before campaign time rolls around again, sweep any fundraising gimmicks you may have out of your United Way. Two gimmicks to say good-bye to are recognizing 100% workplace campaign participation and campaign-related raffles. We have found from our research with local United Way donors that some companies wanting to achieve 100% workplace campaign participation have forced employees to contribute. Unless you have found a way to absolutely guarantee that no company will ever use coercive tactics to achieve 100% workplace campaign participation, then you should not be recognizing 100% workplace campaign participation.
Raffles have their place in fundraising, but encouraging someone to give because they have a chance to win a prize glorifies fundraising and makes giving dependent on the possibility of winning a prize. Our research with local United Way donors has found that donors are concerned that their contributions are being used to purchase raffle prizes, even when United Way states the raffle prizes are donated.
ADMINISTRATIVE COSTS
Another thing to clean out of your United Way is “bragging” about your administrative costs. Replace all the bragging about administrative costs with a clear explanation of how your donors change lives with their contribution to your United Way. When your United Way makes a point of promoting your administrative costs, you are focusing attention on an issue that most donors do not think is a problem. Based on our research with local United Way donors, only 4% of donors checked out your administrative costs before giving to United Way – that means administrative costs were not an issue for 96% of your donors.
LAST YEAR’S MESSAGE
Finally, one thing you should not throw out when you do your spring cleaning is last year’s message. Often, United Ways feel a self-imposed pressure to come up with a new message or slogan every year, when your current message or slogan is probably just fine. If you are concerned that no one understands what your United Way does, using the same message or slogan for several years in a row will build and grow understanding among your donors and community. The most effective messages are familiar messages, not new messages.
