The right mentality

Photos: Matthias Zomer and (insert) Lisa Fotios on Pexels

This area of the site was written for very experienced trust fundraisers.

Target drive? Sales drive?

I once had an informal chat to Mark Astarita, about a post I was thinking of applying for. He went on to become one of the big names as a Director of Fundraising. He said the thing he looked for most in a trust fundraiser was that they were target driven. He said that could come and go – people were good at one point, then they weren’t then they’d get it back.

I think it’s both important that people aren’t too stressed about being under target but that they also genuinely care about the numbers, or they won’t push much for solutions. It’s not an easy balance to achieve. Things that help me are:

• Whatever reduces actual stress, as long as it doesn’t involve me abdicating responsibility for achieving.
• Reflecting regularly on what I’m learning, with some focus on learning how to meet targets. When I feel I’m learning, I feel empowered and targets become stressful (instead of a useful goal) when you feel disempowered.
• Celebrating and remembering successes. If you look at professional football teams – which are hyper-achievement-orientated – they celebrate like there’s no tomorrow when they achieve something important. It helps them care, as well as encouraging them. I usually have a nice meal out with my partner when I’ve had a big result – it helps make it a special moment.

Best selling sales author Jeb Blount says in Sales EQ that a good salesperson has to have plenty of “sales drive”. He says this has three components:

1. Optimism – that they can overcome the many obstacles a salesperson has to face.
2. Competitiveness
3. A deep need to achieve

Of these three, I’m a little uncomfortable about competitiveness – mainly that it could leak out in conversations or meetings. I’ve two closely related reasons. Firstly, to quote another sales guru, Art Sobczak, everyone loves to buy but no one likes to be sold to. As an assessor, I want to know that this is all about the end user, not about someone doing something for institutional reasons or who’s on an ego trip. Secondly, occasionally we can be in the position that major donors guru Rob Woods recommends we try and achieve: that we can create a wonderful experience for the donor. Having some trying to put one over on you for the wrong reasons is hardly giving them memories they’ll want to treasure. Going a step further: Barclays’ research into High Nett Worth Individual philanthropists found they were pretty idealistic about charities. Having an ego-driven salesman isn’t going to fit with that.

That said, if competitiveness helps you – and it’s easy to see how it really could – it’s probably a matter of reigning in the excesses. If you want to see me get really competitive, put me in a team where we’re presenting the needs and benefits of something, up against other groups. Maybe it ends up in your DNA after enough time fundraising.