Story

EVERYTHING is a story. It’s up to you to LEAD the story for the organization, for your team, and for your prospects.

Story

Change the Way You Think Overview

Our For Impact Point of View is meant to do one of two things for everyone who reads it – confirm a gut feeling/intuition or give permission to completely change the way we think!

With the latter, we want to challenge old thinking around:

  • Our story. Our message. And the words we use.

    Everyone needs resources, but the story shouldn’t be about ‘fundraising’, or the fact that we’re a ‘not-for-profit’ (or even ‘social enterprise’). Instead, we must articulate a story about the impact, the vision, and how the world will be better because of us. We have an entire section of the Learning Library devoted to a Change in Vocabulary!

    Changing our vocabulary is more than just ‘semantic gymnastics’ – MORE than wordsmithing a message – because WE BECOME WHAT WE THINK ABOUT.  

    Nota bene: Increasingly we’re hearing from philanthropists and foundations that say, “The WORDS you use. The WAY you talk. That’s HOW we think!”
  • ‘Conventional Non-profit fundraising’

    We have an entire section of ‘NO MORES’ – devoted to helping you transform from high energy/low return activity to high energy/high return productivity!

    No More Strategic Plans. No More Feasibility Studies. No More Special Events. And on and on. These ‘challenges-to-the-norm’ all flow from Impact Drives Income and are meant to SIMPLIFY everything!
  • SACRED COWS

    Sacred cows: ideas or customs so widely regarded that they are above critique or criticism – even if they’re unreasonable! The social sector is full of sacred cows (although we’re seeing a chorus of critical inquiry growing!!)In addition to coaching hundreds of ‘nonprofit leaders’, we work with dozens of social entrepreneurs (both for profit and not-for-profit). One of our first message to them: THERE ARE NO RULES (aside from moral and legal).

What we mean by this is: There is not some mystical fundraising process that YOU do not know. We’re here to empower your intuition and remind you that sales is the forging of the human connection.