If you’re one of our 872 UK Agitator readers this is for you.

And also for the other 7,247 Agitators around the globe.  Most likely the  shoe also fits.

Here’s the deal. Over the last few months the UK tabloids busted the fundraising British sector for its overly aggressive tactics in telemarketing and Face –To-Face techniques.  ( See Playing the Blame Game in the UK.)

The media is outraged in their faux sort of way. Same with the politicians. Same with the fundraising trade association.  Donors are mostly silent; their reactions yet to be felt.

  Many fundraisers yelped ‘unfair’. Most were unaffected.   Those most guilty largely  ducked for cover preferring silence or ambiguous promises of solution to forthright explanation.

There will be commissions, blue ribbon panels, lofty rhetoric but little movement.

Frankly, the Brits can handle all this. In fact they’re quite good at it. More endless meetings.

What I don’t think they can handle –and neither can most nonprofits in most countries—is the consequence that comes from denial and obfuscation. If ever there were a time to admit error, focus on the failure of leadership at the Trustee and CEO level the time is now.  Doesn’t anyone care about the donors?

My guess is that’s not gonna happen. Once again, it’s blame the little guy. The agencies who did all this. The ‘cowboys’ who overstepped their brief.

Doesn’t anyone with a brain or a soul bother to ask: Who provided the brief? Who set the standards for performance? Who monitored and approved these tactics and performance? Was anyone watching and listening?  Or did they just check the bank balance?

The little guys – the folks who do the hard and largely thankless duty of asking for money – have been thrown under the bus. Buried under faux scorn, denial and the shifting sands of blame.

Shame on the directors of the charities who signed the purchase orders, employed and encouraged them. Shame on the fundraising directors who set the goals and were happy to deposit the money—until trouble arrived in the form of the tabloid headlines. Shame on the Trustees or Directors who never asked a question nor had a clue.

The UK “scandal” represents nothing more or less than an a abysmal failure of leadership. Period.  It’s a failure that occurs daily all over the world.

On Friday The Agitator received a copy of an announcement from Go Gen, on of the firms that provided the media-maligned services to the sector. It announced their bankruptcy and the loss of jobs for hundreds of folks who worked their hearts out doing work the charities themselves were incapable of:

“It is with great sadness that I can confirm that GoGen has ceased to trade. In the past twenty-four hours, we have had no choice but to make 485 employees redundant across our offices in London, Nottingham, Bedford and Bristol. We are urgently reviewing the options for the future of our business with financial advisors, BDO, but it is likely that GoGen will enter a formal insolvency process early next week. It has been impossible for us to cope with the suspensions in business resulting from recent media coverage.

“It is a tragedy that so many people have lost their jobs, and we have already thanked our team for their talent and commitment. They have helped to raise more than £80m for you all in the past five years alone.

“Please be aware that the ICO have dropped their investigation against us, although we have offered to continue to work with them in their investigations and provide input from the perspective of being a data processor.”

Rather than defend them the UK clients dumped them. Threw them under the bus. Great courage.

Who’s going to hold the nonprofit staffs who managed this firm responsible? Probably no one. In fact my guess is they’re probably on holiday or making plans for one.

Who’s going to hold the fundraising director and CEO and Board responsible? Probably no one. Will they really rely on the defence they’re clueless?

There is so much irony and paradox in all this. Enough to choke a horse.

Look no further than the words vs. action of one of the biggest consumers of these ‘overly aggressive techniques’ Mark Astarita, fundraising director of the British Red Cross. On the one hand he eloquently defended the Face-2-Face practices that the organization so benefited from.   Yet in Agitator interviews with the suppliers they claimed he and his staff  notoriously ‘squeezed “ them to produce more and more at less and less cost.

I’m not singling out Mark.  He’s  not alone. I’m singling out the contempt this approach represents for both donors and for the ‘little guys and gals’ who do the actual and difficult work of asking for money.  The folks who lost their jobs because the Mark’s of the world didn’t pay enough attnetion.

If anyone deserves to be thrown under the bus it’s not the vendor, call center,  nor face-2-face solicitors.  It’s those on top. The ones who set the unrealistic goals, promise the un-promisable and bask in the glorious and smug ignorance of their trustees and directors. Trustees and Directors who set ever greater and even more unrealistic goals unaware of the damage they do to both the ‘little guys and gals’ who ask for money and the donors who are asked to give it.

No regulations, no commissions and no blue ribbon panels will succeed unless they focus on leadership rather than technique. It’s lousy leadership and their hypocrisy that needs to be dealt with.

They can promise all the ‘reforms’ they wish but as Grandma Craver always said “Everyone who talks about heaven ain’t going there.”

Roger