Fundraising is Organizing

Fundraising Is Organizing

What I Wish More Nonprofits and Funders Understood

As 2025 comes to a close, I find myself returning to a truth I learned not from textbooks or conferences, but from lived experience inside movements and philanthropy alike.

Fundraising is organizing.

Not metaphorically. Not rhetorically. Structurally.

And when we forget that, we create unnecessary harm for ourselves, our organizations, and the communities we claim to serve.

Too often, fundraising is framed as a transactional exercise. Identify a funder. Submit a proposal. Ask for a large grant. Hope for a yes. When the answer is no, move on or try again somewhere else. This approach is understandable in a sector shaped by chronic underfunding, urgency, and survival mode.

But it is also unsustainable, disempowering, and misaligned with the values many of us say we hold.

Organizing teaches us something different.

Organizing begins with relationships. It begins with listening. It requires patience, strategy, and an understanding of power. It is not about making demands before trust exists. It is about building shared analysis and moving people, over time, toward deeper alignment and shared responsibility.

Fundraising works the same way.

Funders are not abstract institutions. They are people operating within institutions. People shaped by incentives, fears, policies, board dynamics, and political realities. Treating funders as faceless gatekeepers or limitless ATMs flattens the relationship and guarantees frustration on both sides.

When organizations skip relationship-building and move straight to large funding demands, the result is often predictable. Rejection. One-time grants with no follow-up. Funders who disappear. Burnout. Cynicism. A sense that the system is rigged and hostile. Sometimes it is. But often, it is simply being approached without strategy.

Fundraising as organizing asks a different set of questions.

• Who are these funders, really?

• What do they care about?

• What constraints are they navigating?

• Where do our values genuinely align, and where do they not?

• What would it take to build trust over time rather than force urgency in a moment?

Organizers understand that relationships have arcs. You do not ask someone to take a risk with you before you have built credibility, consistency, and connection. You do not expect deep commitment without prior engagement. You do not confuse desperation with strategy.

Yet nonprofits are often taught to do exactly that with money.

Trust-Based Philanthropy cannot function in a vacuum. It requires reciprocal effort. Funders must loosen control, reduce harm, and redistribute power. But nonprofits must also show up in relationship, not just in crisis. Trust is not built through proposals alone. It is built through conversations, shared learning, transparency, and time.

This does not mean nonprofits should perform gratitude or soften their politics. Relationship-building is not appeasement. It is not shrinking. It is not pretending power imbalances do not exist.

Organizing never denies power. It works with it honestly.

Fundraising as organizing means understanding where a funder is on the relationship continuum and engaging accordingly. Some funders are in curiosity. Some are in alignment. Some are ready for commitment. Many are not. Treating all of them as if they owe you the same level of support leads to frustration and disappointment.

It also means letting go of the fantasy of the savior grant.

Most durable funding ecosystems are built through layered, repeat support from multiple relationships over time. They are sustained by funders who feel connected to the mission, respected as partners, and accountable to shared outcomes. One dramatic check rarely builds long-term stability. Organizing teaches redundancy for a reason.

Another truth that deserves naming: Funders, too, are being organized.

Every conversation, every briefing, every honest exchange is an opportunity to shift how power is understood and exercised. When nonprofits share their realities without performance, when they articulate their values clearly, when they invite funders into learning rather than just evaluation, something changes. Funders begin to see themselves not as saviors or judges, but as participants in a collective effort.

That shift does not happen overnight. It cannot be rushed. And it cannot be coerced.

This is slow, steady work. Strategic work. Human work.

As a strategist, I often tell clients this plainly. If you believe in shared power, your fundraising practices must reflect that belief. You cannot demand trust without building it. You cannot expect partnership without relationship. You cannot claim organizing values while treating money as separate from people.

Fundraising is not asking for money. Fundraising is inviting people into sustained relationship with your mission.

As we move into a new year, my hope is that more organizations allow themselves to slow down, strategize, and build the kinds of funding relationships that last. Not because urgency disappears, but because dignity demands it.

And my hope for philanthropy is equally clear. Live up to your own missions. Use wealth to support thriving communities and shared power. Not performatively. Not eventually. But in real time.

There are enough resources for all of us. The question has never been whether abundance exists. The question is whether we are willing to organize ourselves and our institutions to move it with care, integrity, and courage.

That work is slow.

It is difficult.

And it is worth it.