Back in April, as the coronavirus pandemic was heating up,  we raised some questions posed by many nonprofit board and fundraisers. Put bluntly the question, in its basest form was, “Should we be asking for legacy gifts right now, before the virus gets our donors?”

We noted that a solid set of answers could be found in a note-worthy white paper, Legacy Fundraising:  The Best of Times or the Worst of Times? The work of legacy giving experts Dr. Russell James, III and Michael Rosen provide helpful insights into how people view death, the authors give a useful summary of how people react to reminders of death. Download the white paper here.

Of course, one white paper, no matter how thoughtful, does not an end make to the endless handwringing and dithering deliberations of boards, CEOs and colleagues when it comes to debating the “should we or shouldn’t we?” be asking for legacy gifts in this emergency.

Fortunately, the Agitator can now recommend another worthy arrow for the fundraiser’s legacy quiver.  It’s the just released report from Rogare, the fundraising think tank, titled Ethics of legacy fundraising during emergencies.  You can download the full report here.

I’ve taken the liberty of placing both the recent James-Rosen White Paper and this new Rogare report in The Agitator’s Board Meeting Swipe File so you can quickly provide ocular proof to those doubting board members who forever hide behind what I call the “artificial barriers of ‘good taste’ and ‘dignity’ and simply can’t imagine that anything passing for careful and serious thought goes into any fundraising initiative.

Should We or Shouldn’t We?

In an earlier report —Advocating for fundraising during emergencies Rogare defined what I consider the bottom line answer to the “should we or shouldn’t we?” question:

“Fundraisers learn from the outset that giving is voluntary: the decision to give always rests with the donor. If a charity declares that its needs are not as great as others during the pandemic and chooses not to fundraise, it is taking that right to choose away from the donor. This is not donor- centred fundraising.”

And now in their just-published Ethics of legacy fundraising during emergencies Rogare carries the question to the field of legacy giving.  Of course, the issue of legacy giving is magnified in an emergency situation. As the authors’ note: “During the best of times, there is tension in the donor’s mind between a desire to avoid thoughts of death and a desire to secure symbolic immortality. This tension becomes more pronounced during a crisis. So, while sensitivity to this phenomenon is always important for fundraisers to have, it is especially important during a time of crisis to consider and how they might begin to be addressed.”

Before spotlighting some of their insights it’s worth recognizing the team that put his gem together. It included fundraisers from the UK, the US, Canada and Australia, and represented a range of different (although largely English-speaking) markets.

Headed by Dr. Claire Routley, a veteran fundraiser specializing in legacy fundraising research, the team includes Heather Hill of LAPA Fundraising (US), Cherian Koshy of Des Moines Performing Arts (US), Lucy Lowthian of Sue Ryder (UK), Meredith Niles of Marie Curie Cancer Care ˜(UK), Ligia Peña, Greenpeace International (Canada), Michael Rosen, of ML Innovations (US), Andrew Watt, of Accordant Philanthropy (UK) and Roewen Wishart, of the Xponential Group (Australia)

SOME KEY QUESTIONS

Here’s a short list of questions that are raised and discussed in the report. Just a few.  For the full deal I recommend you read the whole report –and share it.

• Where is the line (or how do we decide where the line is) on when it is appropriate/inappropriate to ask for a legacy gift?
• Does the risk of death or physical/economic disability change whether marketing is ethical or just how and to whom we market?
• Whose urgency matters most? The donor, the beneficiary, or the organization, or perhaps something else and why?
• In short, does it matter that certain organizations may be seen as more worthy in an emotionally heightened situation. Alternatively, will seeking a legacy gift take away form current giving?
• How does an environmental factor (pandemics, war, famine, etc.) change the ethical rules that are followed and why would certain environmental factors matter more than others, such as lack of access to healthcare, economic inequality, etc.?

SOME KEY DISCUSSION POINTS

Many of the ethical scenarios covered in the Rogare report are the same as would apply to day-to-day legacy fundraising – for example, discussing death is an issue which affects legacy fundraising practice on an ongoing basis.  Here are some additional goodies from the Report:

• Legacy fundraising always poses a challenge for fundraisers as they try to discern how to balance the needs of current beneficiaries as it relates to future gifts with legacies.
• Legacy fundraising can often be perceived as reducing income today in order to obtain future gifts, thereby straining the divisions between current beneficiaries and future beneficiaries.
• Amid a crisis such as the Coronavirus pandemic, these concerns are heightened as immediate
  needs are perceived to be more pressing.
• Given the choice between current cash flow and a bequest gift, it can seem that the balance may be skewed to the current need.
• From conversations in the sector, many legacy fundraisers seemed to be struggling with what might be appropriate and what might not be during the Coronavirus outbreak
• ‘In the early days of the Coronavirus outbreak, charities seemed to be waiting on each other to make decisions, and/or looking to ‘gurus’ for advice on what was and wasn’t appropriate, rather than having a firm ethical foundation on which to base their decision making.’
• Ideally, legacy fundraisers and the charities they serve shouldn’t change their ethics just because of the situation they find themselves in. It could be helpful, therefore, as part of this process of ethics consideration, for fundraisers to create an ethical values statement, which is regularly reviewed, and which guides day-to-day practice. Whenan emergency strikes, it could be deliberatively reviewed, considering whether any of the thinking that went into creating it has changed.
• Legacy fundraising always poses a challenge for fundraisers as they try to discern how to balance the needs of current beneficiaries as it relates to future gifts with legacies. Legacy fundraising can often be perceived as reducing income today in order to obtain future gifts, thereby straining the divisions between current beneficiaries and future beneficiaries.
• Amid a crisis such as the Coronavirus pandemic, these concerns are heightened as immediate
  needs are perceived to be more pressing. Given
  the choice between current cash flow and a bequest gift, it can seem that the balance may be skewed to the current need.

THERE’S MORE

Rogare has also launched three other projects to look at how the Coronavirus pandemic might affect fundraising.  They are:

• Responding to arguments that fundraising during the pandemic is inappropriate.
• Fundraising during economic emergencies—collating and assessing existing research and evidence.
• Critical reflections on how the pandemic might change fundraising.

Details of all these projects—and all of Rogare’s outputs—can be found on the Rogare Website.

An Agitator Raise for Rogare and the teams of fundraisers who contributed their time and talent to bring us these reports.

Roger