ClearView Fundraising Solutions Blog

February 2026

Have you ever noticed that it's the things that go unsaid that often speak the loudest? 

My latest LinkedIn article considers this phenomenon in the context of fundraising, organizational culture, and onboarding a new nonprofit executive. What should be a moment of positive energy and momentum can turn south quickly with the realization that fundraising and financial health aren’t what they seemed. 

A recent blog by Dr. Michiko Kimura Bruno in Psychology Today explores the reasons for, and long-term ramifications of, silence in social and workplace settings. Not surprisingly, risk, safety, and survival top the list.

Among the chief outcomes she identifies are disengagement, automatic behavior, and unexamined thinking—all leading to poor choices.

December 2025

'Tis the season! With year-end giving in full swing, now is the time not only to monitor results, but also to plan actively for the year ahead.

Below are 31 ideas to consider in December, as we close out one calendar year and prepare for the next. 

The list offers a mix of quick tips for now and tasks that belong high on your "to do" list for 2026—all designed to improve your fundraising success.

November 2025

Pop quiz. Three questions. Two possible answers: a) partnership, or b) governance.

1. What motivates individuals to join nonprofit boards?
2. What's the most impactful role nonprofit boards can play?
3. What's the most holistic way to advance a nonprofit's mission?

Most nonprofit leaders, and I suspect most board members, would instinctively choose a) for all three.

So, why do nonprofit leaders struggle with "board engagement?" Why do boards fixate on governance? Why is it so hard for nonprofits and boards to collaborate in positive ways?

October 2025

We're all feeling it—the weight of uncertainty with little relief in sight. It's hard to know where to focus.

For nonprofits, the list of challenges keeps growing: a volatile economy, federal funding cuts, canceled grants, staff burnout, donor fatigue, even natural disasters—and now, major tax changes on the horizon. 

And yet, one challenge consistently rises to the top: board engagement. Depending on the study, anywhere from 60% to 75% of nonprofits report engaging their boards as a chronic problem, especially when it comes to fundraising.

How can you activate your board when traditional strategies aren't working? When what you need from board members is real-world insights and fundraising support, but what you get feels like avoidance or detachment?

October 2025

Performance evaluations are dead?

Corporate thought leaders have been heralding their demise for years—long before Daniel Walker, Apple's chief talent officer, dubbed them "the stupidest thing American companies do" back in 2023. A pre-pandemic Gallup poll showed that only 14% of employees agreed their performance review inspired them to improve.

Many today's corporations consider performance evaluations a relic of the 20th century.

What does this mean for nonprofits? And how does all of this impact your fundraising?

September 2025

Reliable Revenue. Fundraising strategies that work. Teams in sync.

If you're leading a nonprofit today, that's the dream.

But here's the part that no one says out loud: It all comes down to your business model.

And just like that...silence.

"Business Model." Two words that can make any nonprofit heart run cold.

A textbook abstraction disconnected from the urgency of the everyday. Less relevant than strategic planning. An idea tucked away at the back of your business office.

The term itself sits in the mouth like bad medicine.

September 2025

Question: What could today's best fundraisers possibly share in common with a medieval French composer and a modernist Anglo-American writer?

Answer: They all know the secret to the statement, "my end is my beginning." 

This idea, the basis of celebrated works by artists who lived worlds apart ("Mon fin est mon commencement" by Guillaume de Machaut and "East Coker" from T.S. Eliot's Four Quartets), holds the key to fundraising success.

Because stewardship isn't the end of the fundraising process, it marks a new beginning.

August 2025

Today's workforce is on the move.

Economic headwinds, shifting federal priorities, residual impacts from the COVID-19 pandemic, and the explosion of generative artificial intelligence are all shaping how we think about work and careers.

They're also revolutionizing how we acquire and retain top talent.

A May 2025 report from McKinsey & Company lends the credence of hard evidence to what we intuitively already know. Americans are not only changing jobs in record numbers, they’re also changing occupations. According to data sampled in August 2024, 17% of employed U.S. respondents...

August 2025

When it comes to fundraising, all nonprofit boards are "works in progress." The literature on the subject is vast. So, too, are the thought leadership and range of opinions you'll encounter.

But I was troubled recently when I heard a consultant say the following: "If your board isn't full of active, enthusiastic fundraisers, clean house and find new members who will solicit gifts for you."

The starkness of this advice is concerning.

June 2025

A common response from most nonprofit leaders, even in the best of times: "challenging." (In today's world, many of us would probably choose a much stronger term!)

I recently heard opinion columnist Catherine Rampell say that "budgets are a statement of values."

Her remark, made almost casually, gave me pause.

May 2025

Just when we thought the chaos of the pandemic was behind us, in come new economic headwinds.

Decision  scientist Cheryl Strauss Einhorn has even suggested that we've entered a "perma-crisis world," where "waiting for stability is like waiting for a train that's not coming."

March 2025

Local, artisanal flower farmers are a ruthless bunch! Sure, they’re passionate about beautiful blooms. But they’re even more savvy scientists and businesspeople. 

The most successful ones have homed in on their consumer market and environmental conditions, so they know what to grow and why in order to turn a profit.

February 2025

Uncertainty is the new normal.

The idea of a VUCA world (the acronym stands for volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous) holds even more true today than it did back in the 1980s when the acronym was first coined.