709. Working Session: Fundraising as a Team of One: What to Do When You Don’t Have Time for Everything - Christina Martin Kenny

Innovation
Written By Jon McCoy

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Today’s Guest

Christina Martin Kenny | Founder, Guava Tree Strategies

About This Episode

You are not failing. You are overwhelmed. Christina Martin Kenny is a career fundraiser, the founder of Guava Tree Strategies, and she has been a fundraising team of one more times than she can count. In this Working Session, she brings the full playbook: what to prioritize, what to let go of, how to manage your time proportionally to where your money actually comes from, and the three weekly priorities that will bring your to-do list down to something survivable. This one is for every fundraiser, executive director, or board member who has ever felt like the weight of fundraising is entirely on their shoulders.

What You'll Learn in This Working Session

  • Why the biggest mistake is not yours: organizations that assume one person can do everything are the problem, not the solo fundraiser doing their best

  • How to use your revenue pie chart to manage your time: your hours should be proportional to where your money comes from, and everything that falls off is the noise

  • The Good Enough Checklist: not a to-do list, but a map of everything that needs to function in your organization so you can focus on what actually matters

  • Why donor retention hovers around 40%, and how an automated plain-text thank you letter, not a beautifully branded one, is the thing that changes it

  • The three weekly priorities that replace the mile-long to-do list: one revenue-driving task, one relationship-building task, one system-strengthening task

  • The Tiny Tasks Before 10 method: every morning, do everything on your list that takes less than 10 minutes before opening your inbox

The Three Weekly Priorities

When you are a team of one, your only job every week is three things.

  • One thing that drives revenue. Submit a grant. Schedule a call with a prospect. Send a major donor an update. Just one.

  • One thing that builds a relationship. Write a handwritten note to a donor. Send a plain-text email. Meet a board member for coffee. Just one.

  • One thing that strengthens your systems. Update your automated acknowledgement email. Build a donor welcome series. Run a deduplication report in your CRM. Just one.

Over time, those three things compound. The effects are cumulative. And when you factor in all the meetings you sit in every week, those three things are probably all you were going to have time for anyway.

Powerful Quotes

"Burnout is not a personal failure. It is a signal. It is your body and brain saying that something needs to change. Listen to that. Honor that." -Christina

"It is not that solo fundraisers are making a mistake. It is that organizations are making the mistake in thinking that one person can do all of the things." -Christina

"Protecting your time is not a lack of effort. It is a strategic decision." -Christina

"When you are doing everything, nothing is a priority at all. You can't do everything, and every yes is a no to something else." -Christina

"Stewardship is always, always, always the first thing that falls off the radar. This is why donor retention in our industry hovers around 40%." -Christina

"Just write email. Just write like you're writing to your best friend." -Christina

"We are not failing right now. We are overwhelmed and burnt out right now." -Becky

Episode Chapters

  • Outsourcing doesn't have to cost money (5:00)

  • It's okay to do less: the diverse revenue myth (6:05)

  • Revenue matches time: the core framework (8:00)

  • Time tracking exercise: where are your hours actually going? (8:30)

  • The Good Enough Checklist (11:10)

  • Good bones: your donation processing platform (11:30)

  • CRM basics and the three metrics that matter (12:30)

  • Automated acknowledgement letters: plain text beats branded (15:00)

  • From overwhelm to activated: the three weekly priorities (17:00)

  • Revenue driving, relationship building, system strengthening (19:00)

  • Tiny Tasks Before 10 (20:00)

  • One Good Thing: protecting your time is a strategic decision (21:00)

Resources and Next Steps

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Jon McCoy

Founder + CEO, We Are For Good

http://www.weareforgood.com
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708. Working Session: How to Build a Story Engine for Your Nonprofit - Amanda Green