Research underway to find what makes a successful fundraiser
Howard Lake | 30 April 2014 | News
Do successful fundraisers share similar social skills and personality traits? What personal skills combine to make a successful fundraiser? Dr Beth Breeze from the Centre for Charitable Giving and Philanthropy at the University of Kent is undertaking research to find out.
Academic research on the charitable sector has so far focused a great deal on donors, their views and attitudes on different types of fundraising, how much they give, and their expectations of future charitable giving. It has also focused on the strategies and technical skills involved in fundraising.
But very little research has focused on the qualities of fundraisers themselves. Dr Breeze’s research is therefore investigating their behaviours, characteristics and attitudes – the ‘soft’ rather than technical skills.
The Formation of Fundraisers
Her three-year research project has now developed to include launching a survey of 1,000 UK fundraisers. It also involves interviewing professional fundraisers and volunteers who have raised significant sums, together with major donors who have given £100,000 or more.
The research, The Formation of Fundraisers: the role of personal skills in asking for money, is funded by a Leverhulme Trust Early Career Fellowship.
Dr Breeze estimates that there are about 31,000 paid fundraisers in the UK, who together help raise about £10 billion for charities.
Why no previous research?
Dr Breeze attributes the lack of research into fundraisers themselves to charities lack the resources and a preference to fund ‘applied’ research, such as testing direct mail for the benefit of their own organisation.
Such research is important, in her view, because “it is not possible to understand the economics of charitable giving without accounting for the role of fundraising”. She cites the example of dire predictions of dips in voluntary income during recessions which fail to materialise. This could well be the result of “the energy and drive of fundraisers”.
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Theoretical basis
In her research bid summary, Dr Breeze points to “studies of workplaces in which employees’ personalities are integral to their performance, a phenomena that has grown with the decline of manufacturing and the rise of jobs involving contact with the public”. Referring to Arlie Hochschild’s concept of ‘the managed heart’ concerning the strains involved in doing ‘people work’, Breeze suggests that her argument that” personalities are commoditised in the service of capitalism does not translate easily to situations where people are pursuing a nonprofit motive or working as volunteers”.
Yet fundraisers do of course undertake ’emotional labour’. So Breeze is looking to develop existing these and other theoretical ideas in a new realm.
[message_box title=”Take part in the survey” color=”blue”]To take part in the survey visit Dr Beth Breeze’s online questionnaire.[/message_box]
About Howard Lake
Howard Lake is consultant editor of UK Fundraising. He founded the site in 1994 and successfully sold it in 2022. As director of Giving X Ltd he is exploring growing giving on a massive scale.
He is the founder of Fundraising Camp and co-founder of GoodJobs.