You’ve heard me and several others talking about what’s happening on the UK fundraising/prospect research scene right now. Two charities have already been assessed hefty fines, and 11 other UK charities are currently under investigation for their fundraising activities including their prospect research/wealth screening activities.
It’s the wealth screenings that are the big deal part of it for us. [Read more…]
Town Hall Albert Square Manchester. Photo by Stacey MacNaught: http://blogsession.co.uk/
Twenty years ago this coming June, a nightclub called The Haçienda closed in Manchester, England. For nearly 15 years, but mostly in the mid-to-late ‘80s, the Haçienda was the place to see, be seen, and dance to great music. Madonna took the crowd on holiday and The Smiths showed what a difference it did make in music history. Income from record sales from co-owners New Order helped keep the club afloat during the recessionary years. [Read more…]
As Americans, we’re acculturated to believe – deep down in our cell structure – that no matter how dire the situation, the cavalry will always come at the last minute to save the day.
The cavalry can be a heroine, a hero, a bunch of dusty dudes on horses, or a squad of geeky introverts, but you only have to look at every movie ever made in Hollywood to know that when help is needed, it will come. [Read more…]
Abbaye de la Sauve Majeure – Ulysses, by Ophelia2 (Own work) [GFDL (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html) or CC BY-SA 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons
Earlier this week, I was looking at my phone – and at all the apps I have and don’t use – and started thinking about how every person’s app collection looks different based on their individual needs and interests. I wondered how different my screen would look if I were a billionaire. (Hey, a girl can daydream). And so my journey of discovery began.
As I researched, I realized that many of the sites I was idly finding were actually useful for prospect research purposes. Which led me to abandoning my original mild curiosity and heading toward useful employment of my time, which is a good lesson in the power of daydreaming! [Read more…]
(Fairly appropriate fortune for a fundraising researcher, eh?)
Something must be in the air because I’ve had three calls in the last two weeks about training new researchers.
Fundraising intelligence (or prospect development, whatever you want to call it) is one of those professions that you can’t go to college for. There are degree programs in nonprofit management and, frequently, fundraising intelligence is part of the coursework, but there’s not yet a higher ed degree in prospect research, prospect management and data analytics.
So mostly it’s taught by the experienced to the newcomers, and you learn – and get better – by doing. [Read more…]
Quite. Well, in May 2015, the UK elected a Government with the manifesto pledge to hold a referendum with a simple question: should the UK remain in or leave the European Union? That referendum took place on 23 June 2016, and 51.9% of those who voted, voted to leave the EU. [Read more…]
While uncertainty rules the day on Brexit’s effect on philanthropy, four things seem reasonable to expect in the wake of the British public’s vote on June 23rd to leave the European Union.
First, Brexit is likely to be bad news for the British macroeconomy. A weaker sterling (the British pound is so far the worst performing currency in the world in 2016), continuing low productivity (see chart below from the Resolution Foundation) and lower profits (the FTSE 250, consisting of mainly British companies, lost £38bn from June 24th-July 8th) are all notable trends.
There is a risk that Britain (or, in the event of a breakup of the UK, perhaps only England) will become a sort of ‘Greater Guernsey’. [Read more…]
Front Cover – CAF Charity Street II Report 2016
This month, the UK-based Charities Aid Foundation (CAF) released their report Charity Street II: The value of charity to British households. Over 2,000 households responded to the survey this past February which was aimed at discovering [Read more…]
It’s here! The 20th anniversary Capgemini World Wealth Report is now available to be downloaded and discussed.
As in previous years, the Report’s high-beam focus has been on global high net worth individuals (HNWIs); their distribution geographically as well as the distribution of their assets, the world markets and how performance has affected portfolios in the past year, and what HNWIs need from their investment managers. [Read more…]