Expand volunteer roles to gain experience in your field

For twenty-somethings, volunteering has long been a part of our lives. Our parents made us volunteer as kids, our high schools required it, and we needed it for college admissions and resumes post-undergrad. We built Habitat houses, volunteered in soup kitchens, mentored kids, worked in group homes, and all kinds of things that help our community.

Continuing our volunteer work is important to personal growth, but expanding our roles as volunteers can give us a professional boost. We should considering joining boards and committees for non-profit organizations they believe in — and taking leadership roles in them.

Joining non-profit boards and committees and providing pro-bono services to organizations give great experience and learning opportunities to young professionals. And twenty-somethings can get involved with local organizations who need our knowledge and skills.

My best friend Josh, a 23-year-old construction executive in South Carolina, recently stepped up as a Trustee of his church, which he’s been a member of his entire life. He’s taken on a heavy role with the church’s finances, learning about non-profit accounting and governance.

Because he’s done a great job as a Trustee, he’s been asked to lead the church’s capital campaign to build a new sanctuary. He asked me to volunteer, and I’m trying on a consultant hat for the first time by giving them some fundraising advice as they plan their campaign.

We’ve already prepared a strategy document for the church (attached below), had one excellent meeting with the church’s leadership, and I’ll be working with Josh to train church members, prepare materials, and coach them through the fundraising process.

These experiences will not only accomplish good things for his church, but they’ll give us added experience that will hopefully help us in our careers.

Look at non-profit organizations. At my job, the Ronald McDonald House and Family Room of Durham, volunteers are crucial to our operations and leadership. Volunteers help us provide direct service to the families; advise us on operational, legal, fiscal and strategic moves; and are actively involved in our fundraising and special events. We have several young professionals, including two Duke MBA students, on our Board of Trustees and committees.

Political committees need volunteer leaders. When I worked in politics, volunteers were key to fundraising, get out the vote (GOTV), and events. Political experience is applicable to many careers, especially fundraising.

Also, public boards and commissions are always looking for young people to serve. A college friend of mine with an interest in city planning was the only person under 30 who applied to serve on the Town of Chapel Hill’s Transportation Board, and he had a very successful term.

So get involved! No matter your field, I bet there is an organization in your area who could use your help. You’re doing great work, and it gives you valuable experience that could be helpful in future career endeavors.

April 2, 2008 | Filed Under Blog, Career, Fundraising, Non-Profits

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Beware of workplace bullies, especially if you’re a twenty-something

An article and blog post in yesterday’s NY Times health section brought up a topic that hit close to home: workplace bullying.

Young professionals should be very aware of these workplace problems because our age and eagerness can make us easy targets, and 37 percent of American workers have reported being bullied. I incurred the wrath of a bully for seven months in a previous job, and it took an extreme emotional toll.

Although it was a difficult time for me, I think I handled the situation well, and I’ll offer some tips on dealing with a workplace bully through telling my story. I was hired to work for a large organization, and three other staffers and I were placed under the immediate supervision of a difficult person.

Recognize the early warning signs. On my first day, my supervisor criticized the CEO for hiring me because of my age – “I don’t know why they hired an over-glorified intern who doesn’t know anything,” she said – and made a highly racist remark about me and my family. I knew then that a long battle was ahead. Within the first month, the supervisor demanded total control of my schedule and workload and took credit for all of my work.

Document inappropriate behavior. When I first went to complain to the HR department, it was dismissed as a personality conflict, and as a young professional, I was told that I “had to learn to get along with different people and respect my supervisor.”

Simply put, they didn’t believe me because I was young, and I learned that I had to provide proof of the problem. I began to keep a special “crazy” journal – locked away in a hidden folder on my jump drive – that detailed line-crossing behavior by the bully. It grew to five single-spaced pages.

Stay cool. No matter what my bullying supervisor said, I stayed calm and refused to raise my voice. I would disagree and express my objection to personal and inappropriate attacks, but I almost always did it calmly, regardless of her bellicose nature. I knew that if I stooped to her level, I ran the risk of being protrayed as the young trouble-maker in the office, helping her plan.

Find mentors in the organization. As Penelope Trunk says, mentors are important. I began to reach out to the CEO, CFO and other senior staffers, asking them to get lunch with me periodically and give me advice on how to be successful in my job. I was never negative about the bullying supervisor, but I shared the progress on my projects and clients. They soon began to understand my workload and contribution to the organization, and we developed relationships and trust.

Stand up for yourself. The attacks from the bully continued. For a while, I internalized it all, taking a toll on my home life. That changed one day when the bully belligerently yelled at me in front of other staffers. It was a deeply personal tirade that included some racist words, fingers in my face, chasing me down a hallway, job threats, and the parting words “you sorry SOB.” The embarrassment of being berated in front of colleagues in such a manner was the last straw.

The next day, I filed a hostile work environment complaint, gave the CEO a copy of my “crazy” journal, and said that I was prepared to leave the organization if the inappropriate behavior continued. The CEO realized that it was a grave situation and the documentation made it real. My job structure was changed so that I reported directly to the CEO and the supervisor was put on probation. The documentation and mentoring paid off because I stood up for myself.

Find allies among your coworkers. I made a point of building relationship with my other coworkers, who defended me against the bully’s gossip and talked favorably about me to the senior staff. Finding allies also uncovered fellow victims. One of the other twenty-somethings who reported to the bully finally confessed that she was the victim of similar attacks.

Do a good job. I knew that professional failures would only give the bully substantive fodder to attack. Once the senior staff knew what I was working on and once I reported directly to the CEO, I began to excel in the job. In fact, one of my clients presented me with an award at their annual gala. Plus, I got a glowing performance review from the senior staff.

The bully didn’t fare as well. The mounting complaints and lack of performance gave the senior staff no choice but to fire her seven months after her start date.

Consider finding a better situation. I outlasted the bully and enjoyed a lot of success after steps were taken to alleviate the situation. However, things don’t change for all people. If you’re stuck in a similar situation and things don’t change after frequent tactics or complaints, you should definitely consider looking for a better opportunity.

There’s plenty of stuff on the net about workplace bullying that can be found by simply using Google, but be sure the check out this report from the State of Washington and another from Pepperdine University.

March 26, 2008 | Filed Under Blog, Career

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Why I moved to Raleigh-Durham instead of New York City

The past two weekends have been really fun for me. I spent the Easter holiday in Columbia, SC, where my best friend Josh lives. The weekend before, four of my friends from college and I had a reunion in Harker’s Island, a small coastal community on the NC coast where one of my buds lives.

Spending time with them on their turf helped me notice that my closest college friends made similar choices for finding a place to start our careers. We moved to small-to-medium cities after college.

Many people in our college cohort, including my girlfriend, had an innate desire to move to the big cities (namely LA, NYC, and DC). But when I had to make that big decision, I turned down a job offer in NYC to work in North Carolina’s Research Triangle (pop. 1.5M).

It’s been one of the best decisions I’ve made, and here’s why:

It’s allowed me to save money. During college, I spent a summer interning in NYC. I spent $1250 for half of a room near Columbia University, which only left me about $800 for living expenses from my non-profit intern stipend. Subtract a few nights out per week — to keep up with my investment banking and law roommates — and I was eating off of the dollar menu at fast food chains to make ends meet.

I didn’t want to be broke like that again, and I didn’t have any parental resources to rely on like many twenty-somethings. My NYC job offer paid only $2,000 more than my Triangle offer, but the cost of living was roughly $13,000 more expensive.

I chose the more affordable option. My rent during my first year out of college in the Triangle was $1500/mo (split among three guys), and with lower entertainment costs, I’ve been able to save an average of 15% of my income.

It’s allowed me to buy a house. The housing crisis has created a buyer’s market in the Triangle, and there are plenty of affordable housing options that don’t exist in the larger cities. I left the apartment life last June and bought a townhome in downtown Durham. My mortgage for a 3BR townhome is the same as my DC friends’ rent for half of a room, the tax benefits of home ownership are incredible, and I have an appreciable asset at an early age.

I won’t stay in this area forever — probably for only 3-4 more years — but when I leave, I’ll hopefully be able to get a great return from selling my house to support a move elsewhere.

There are also state and federal programs that reward young professionals to buy (more details on those in a later post).

It allowed me to have excellent work experience. I’ve been fortunate enough to work in smaller shops that have allowed me to get a lot of experience I wouldn’t have gotten in the big firm I would have worked for in NYC. In the small offices, I have served as a catch-all and have learned about things outside of my area of specialty. Also, because of the smaller flood of twenty-somethings, the demand for young non-profit professionals is high in the area as well, so finding a job is a bit easier.

Living in smaller city isn’t perfect, though. There’s a lot of entertainment here but nothing compared to the bigger cities, though, and I don’t have a large concentration of college friends in the area, like my DC and NYC folks. Having a long-distance relationship is tough, too. I’m on the road a lot to visit people, especially in DC, and I have to make the effort to meet new people in the Triangle.

However, moving to a small-to-medium city is something I’d recommend to twenty-somethings, especially those in the non-profit community or those who don’t have parental support and need to build financial stability. It’s worked well for me and my friends.

Check out Kiplinger’s Seven Cool Cities, which include Raleigh, as places to start building.

March 24, 2008 | Filed Under Blog, Career

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Don’t use grad school to break into fundraising

In the last post, I suggested several professional development programs that young professionals should look at in order to build their credentials for a career in fundraising. In response, a friend of mine shot me an email this morning, questioning if grad school was an option to break into fundraising or get high-paying jobs in non-profits. This is definitely not the case. Grad school is not a smart option for millennials trying to break into the field.

There are a few professional degree programs in fundraising out there — Columbia and NYU to name a few. However, these programs don’t seem to provide anything that good work experience in fundraising and some professional development couldn’t — at a fraction of the cost.

As Penelope Trunk has pointed out several times, grad school isn’t something 20-somethings should rush into.

I would recommend that people wanting to break into the field pursue the professional development programs I listed in the last post and spend years working in the non-profit or political sphere to gain work experience and perspective on the fundraising world.

Now, some of us millennials are Covey-esque in our “begin with the end in mind” thoughts — we might not go to grad school now, but we like to think about what programs we should be applying to in the years to come. Heck, I have GMAT, LSAT and GRE books on my bookshelf, just so I’m prepared for whatever program I decide to apply for in the future.

If after working in the field for five years you are truly interested in making fundraising your career, a graduate degree is required to get top, senior-level jobs — senior consulting for big firms, CEO gigs for large foundations, and serving as vice president for development or advancement at universities. There is no set degree path to getting senior-level jobs, though, and that’s pretty frustrating to a lot of folks.

Many people would recommend versatile degrees such as MBAs or JDs for seasoned professionals looking to get top fundraising jobs. One of my former bosses, NYC Education Chancellor Joel Klein, said that getting a professional degree in an uber-specific field limits you in the long run and highly recommended a law or B-school for both the non-profit and for-profit worlds.

But it’s a matter of choice. In an old Chronicle of Higher Ed article, Mark Drozdowski, a fundraising administrator at Pierce College in NJ, outlines the many degree paths you could choose (degrees in law, business, higher ed, public policy, and philanthropic studies) to enhance a fundraising career and get to that senior level, but his final recommendation is the same as mine– professional development.

March 20, 2008 | Filed Under Blog, Career, Education, Fundraising, Non-Profits

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Build your fundraising credentials through professional development

One of the most frustrating parts about a career in development is that there is no set path into the field. Most of the people I encounter come from seemingly random backgrounds and degree paths and connected to fundraising during parts of their careers. My mentors in development have been journalists, pharmacists, and even sociologists before becoming fundraisers, and I got into the field after a degree in history — North Carolina history, to be exact.

So how can someone get training in fundraising or make themselves marketable to development employers? The key is professional development.

There are many part-time or seminar-based programs in fundraising that not only give you great skills but can enhance your resume significantly. If you’re looking to break into the field, or if you’re a non-profit professional, you should check out these programs:

Duke University Certificate in Non-Profit Management: I’m partial to this program because I’m in it, but it offers workshop courses all over NC on all aspects of non-profits, but with the option to concentrate on fundraising courses. Most of the workshops last one day at a time — so you can take a day off or ask your employer for a professional day — and it’s quite affordable. More important, it’s taught by NC fundraising consultants and professionals, and gives a lot of options for networking.

The Fundraising School at IUPUI: The premiere place for development training, the Indiana University-Perdue University Indianapolis offers an excellent training program on all aspects of fundraising. It’s a bit expensive, but it’s definitely worth looking into if you can afford it. My boss is pursuing training there.

Association of Fundraising Professionals: The “trade organization” for fundraisers is an excellent place to get great training. Their website lists a host of information, including job listings, that is free, but membership gets you access their listserv (which is invaluable) and great trainings that are free to members or reduced in price. The biggest perk is that there are local chapters nation-wide, cutting down your travel that could be a problem for the other two programs.

There are also affordable programs in the political fundraising arena. Even if you aren’t interested in working in politics, the lessons of political fundraising can help you immensely in the non-profit world.

EMILY’s List has quite possibly the best political fundraising training there is. The organization specializes in getting Democratic, pro-choice women elected to office up and down the ballot, but their training is open to all genders. They take the show on the road, so check and see if they’re near you.

Camp Wellstone is the best thing I did during my career in politics. The training teaches people how to run campaigns like Sen. Paul Wellstone, UNC alum and all-around great guy who was tragically killed in a plane crash. The fundraising portion of the program is phenomenal, and they travel more than EMILY’s list does. They’re all over the US and on college campuses.

March 18, 2008 | Filed Under Blog, Career, Education, Fundraising

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Young professionals should consider fundraising

Like many millenials who are exploring careers, I have been caught between two seemingly conflicting desires: one to have business-like, upwardly mobile work that is project based and competitive and another to do work that is personally fulfilling and positively impacts society.

Fundraising for non-profit institutions and organizations has been a great balance of both desires for me, and I recommend the field to young professionals especially.

Here’s why:

Competitive pay. Development jobs are competitive in salary. According to the most recent salary survey by the Association of Fundraising Professionals, the average salary for a development professional under age 34 was $45,501, and non-profits are increasingly employing private-sector strategies, including competitve pay, to increase their impact and lure top talent.

Performance-based evaluation. One of the fears I’ve had about non-profit work is potentially being evaluated on intangible, feel-good goals. However, I’ve been pleasantly surprised. In development, goals are geared toward your organization’s revenue performance and your role within it.

Professional development. I have had the opportunity to work for non-profits that invest significat resources on training their staffs to become better leaders. My organization is helping me complete Duke University’s Certificate in Non-Profit Management, be a member of the Association of Fundraising Professionals (our trade organization) and get leadership training from Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Management.

Relationship building and mentoring. Anyone who says that development work is simply asking for money is mistaken. The key to fundraising is building strong relationships with donors, volunteers, and community leaders, and good relationships yield good donors. Young professionals have the unique opportunity to build donor relationships that could become sources for recommendations and career advice.

Personally fulfilling work. Working in development has allowed me to have a direct connection to what I consider to be God’s work. My office is next door to family rooms for the Ronald McDonald House. When I get frustrated in the office, I go play with the children in our playroom or drink coffee with one of the mothers while they’re not in the hospital. When I go home, I know that every dollar my team raises goes to the support these familes.

It’s been a perfect balance of my career goals, and I encourage folks to check out career opportunities in development in ours and other organizations.

March 16, 2008 | Filed Under Blog, Career, Fundraising

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