In honor of Halloween, welcome to the fourth not-quite annual edition of Scary Nonprofit Quotes
Past editions can be found for:
- 2025 Scary Nonprofit Quotes
- 2024 Scary Nonprofit Quotes
- 2022 Scary Nonprofit Quotes
- 2021 Scary Nonprofit Quotes
Each edition represents my best attempt to reproduce direct quotes either told directly to me or passed onto me by others that are about nonprofits and that I consider scary.
Imagine reading the following with some spooky sound effects in the background.
“Our donors are anti-social and don’t like to meet people” – said by a Development Director who’s made very little effort to try to meet with donors.
“We need to do a big awareness campaign so more people in the community know about us before we start asking people to donate.” – said by a board member who has no experience fundraising.
“I’m just too busy to plan.” – said by an Executive Director who always appears scattered.
“We’re a 501c3 so we can’t lobby.” – said by a board member. [Yes, this is a repeat from the 2022 list, but I heard it again recently and it’s just as scarily misinformed].
“My predecessors stopped filing our 990 tax return a decade ago” – Sadly, passed on by a board treasurer who is trying to deal with the aftermath of losing their nonprofit status.
“We don’t need to pay mileage to our staff heading to our state capitol to lobby. They can get a ride from an allied organization.” – This one is hearsay, not heard by me directly. Said by the Executive Director of an organization with a known problem of high staff turnover.
“Our approach is to hire young people fresh out of college knowing they’ll move on after a couple of years. It’s cheaper that way.” Said by the leader of an organization where the jobs in question are relationship-focused. [Not the same organization as the prior quote].
“I’m not sure.” Said by an Executive Director talking to me because they wanted their organization to raise substantially more money, and then being asked by me: “how would you use the extra money?”
“I’m going to start using AI to write my grant proposals. I’ll be able to submit 4 or 5 times as many and some are bound to succeed.”
“We’re going to move away from the model of having a Development Director and to one where our two most senior executives lead the fundraising, while hiring a more junior Development Coordinator.” — said by the Executive Director of a group where the two top executives do not come from a fundraising background.
Leave a comment and tell me which one of the quotes is your favorite? Or please share your own!
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