Last week, Henry Timms and Asha Curran of New York’s 92Y and global GivingTuesday movement co-founders came north of the border to speak at several events across Canada. Staff from the two Canadian co-founding organizations, CanadaHelps and the Giv3 Foundation, were with them for a fascinating few days of conversations about this now five-year-old movement, its impact, and its future.
Our Canadian teams have joined hundreds of volunteers and sector peers in living the GivingTuesday movement these past few years, but listening to these global founders brought new insight and perspective. They’ve travelled the world from South America to Africa to visit teams from some of the almost 40 countries that now celebrate GivingTuesday. Here are five things about GivingTuesday you may not know.
1. It’s been a rare, sector-wide test. The charity and non-profit sector can be conservative when it comes to innovation. A communal mindset of scarcity has left us in a very risk-averse space. But GivingTuesday was something that was going to happen whether we liked it or not, and as much as many campaigns look like the ineffective “It’s GivingTuesday! Please give us money!”, the movement has given thousands permission to test and experiment. Surf the #GivingTuesdayCA hashtag and you’ll see the level of creativity displayed last year by small charities, large nonprofits, and even some of the sector’s oldest brands. Visiting hundreds of charities myself, I often hear, “We tried something, we got nothing, so we’ll never do it again.” But when it comes to GivingTuesday, civic teams are meeting in cities across Canada (have you found one in your city?) and there is a new culture of test, try, fail, and try again that has led to amazing gifts, programs and volunteer engagement. Goat selfies, Dress for Success’, #GivingShoesday, and music charities’ using #GivingBluesday are just a few examples. Heck, I’m going to be leading a movement myself this year called “Naps for Good, #GivingSnoozeday”.
2. It was an intern revolution. When the Canadian movement started in 2012 and many organizations heard that the first year in the USA was driven strongly by social media, the often overworked communications managers looked at their doe-eyed, iPhone-holding interns to take the lead; young people around the world suddenly got their shot to shine. Big, established charity brands turned over their social media for a day to creative, young professionals who stepped up and engaged the public, excited donors, and brought in big gifts. Five years later, many of those interns have been hired and promoted, and are considered leaders in social-engagement in their communities. Our own team at CanadaHelps recruited two civic leaders from different provinces to our own staff, and they have become active, creative, and valuable members of our team. Charities across Canada tell us they have recruited thousands of new volunteers and staff through GIvingTuesday. As people publicly disclose their purpose and step up to leadership on GivingTuesday, both charities and professionals have come together in new ways because of this global day of philanthropic engagement.
3. This BIG movement started surprisingly small. I had assumed the American founders had gone big to create momentum for this movement in such a huge USA market. As co-founders in Canada, our teams at CanadaHelps and the Giv3 Foundation felt so proud that other founding partners like the Association of Fundraising Professionals, Canadian Association of Gift Planners, Community Foundations of Canada and many more sector champions saw the value of the movement and got on board early. I was shocked to hear from Asha Curran that, just like us in Canada, their first few years involved crossing the country, hosting meetups in libraries, boardrooms, back rooms, church basements and pubs, to build the movement. It was a campfire vs. bonfire momentum. Now that the movement is responsible for hundreds of millions in new donations, millions of new donors, and dozens of countries all celebrating this one day together, it’s kind of heart-warming to know that small groups can still do big things in a hyper-digital world.
4. It is creating more deep donor connections. Many charity teams tell us they don’t like how one big day feels very transactional when it comes to fundraising. We were in Calgary on an AFP panel hosted by our peer from the local United Way, and we all nodded our heads when Asha Curran exclaimed, “You want transactional? What is December 31? It’s not an inspired day of donor engagement! It’s millions of people giving out of care, but also urgency to ensure they get a tax receipt. That’s transactional.” Wow. It was a big point for many of us in fundraising in the room. Often we frame GivingTuesday as the “start of the giving season,” but really it is a day to go deep with donors before that deadline arrives. When we see the most engaged campaigns, they are telling stories, not transacting.
5. It’s a day to engage beyond your borders. Many of us who are part of movements in our charities were originally threatened by the advent of crowdfunding and “cause marketing.” GivingTuesday is a day when millions of donors across Canada stand up, stand out, and shout out who they give to, why they give, what they believe in, and who they want to help. The biggest mistake charities often make in fundraising is looking inward. GivingTuesday is an opportunity to engage non-donors – the people who may not even know about your cause. We have heard from thousands of individuals who don’t normally interact with charities but who decided to volunteer, ask questions, give money, and meet new charities because of this day.
The volume is raised, and the country is listening. Every news station, radio station and newspaper is looking for a local story, so let this be the year that you and your charity stick your hand up and say with pride, “What we do is important and everyone who doesn’t know about us deserves the joy we have to engage our mission.”
A big thanks to Asha Curran and Henry Timms of the 92nd Street Y for travelling with us to Calgary, across Ontario, and around Toronto (in just 72 hours) to inspire all of us and keep the GivingTuesday spirit growing!
Paul Nazareth is VP Community Engagement with CanadaHelps.org, Canada’s leading charity that brings together charities and donors as they give online. He speaks to nonprofit groups all across Canada, visits hundreds of charities, and meets thousands of fundraisers each year. Paul teaches the planned giving course with the Georgian College postgraduate fundraising program, is an instructor with the Canadian Association of Gift Planners, is Chair of the Humber College Postgraduate Fundraising Program Advisory Committee and is a passionate advocate of ‘the power of networking in our work and lives. Find him on Linkedin https://www.linkedin.com/in/paulnazareth/ or @UinvitedU https://twitter.com/UinvitedU on Twitter.
