Nonprofits - how should our teams work?

Maybe we’ve been looking at Development wrong. In fact, maybe we’ve been looking at our nonprofit structures wrong. We segmented roles: boards govern and oversee the director; the staff carries out the mission, the administration oversees the staff, and donors supply dollars to fund the mission.

What if we thought of ourselves as one team – working together to do one good – a good we all agree needs doing. Each of us uses our unique talents to further a mission that is itself unique and worthy of support. Our skills may be different, but we are equally important.

If we thought of our nonprofit as one tram, a lot would shift. One important shift would be the way we view donors. They would stop being a faceless ATM and become people, teammates essential to the team.

Then we won’t be “begging them for money,” we will be inviting them to join the team in making the world a better place in a way that matters to them and to us. Then we would listen to their interests, their passions, and their values. We would share our successes. We would recognize we need the whole team to make “good” happen.

As team members, donors care about staff, administrators and board members, and we ALL care about them. We ALL share stories with donors – stories of need, stories of success. We show them appreciation. We hear what they need. We recognize their role.

Maybe Development is less about metrics and more about relationships, and the whole team helps.