Search for the Next Great Fundraising Event

Anthony Williams' keynote at the Association Technology Conference inspired me to order the book, Wikinomics, that he co-authored with Don Tapscott.  It is a fascinating book that provides insight into the potential power of mass collaboration and how it is already changing our world and its business models significantly.

So I started to think how this mass collaboration concept might apply to charitable organizations.  So many of these charities seem to be in a rut when it comes to fundraising events.  Most are realizing only modest if any real growth.  How many walks can one community actually support?  We have walked, run, skiied, golfed, sailed, bicycled, etc. all over the world.  Where will the next new fundraising event appear?

If pharmaceutical companies can collaborate on R&D to find the next great drug, why can't like-minded charities collaborate to invent the next great fundraising event?  Personally, I would love to see several environmental groups come up with an event or activity to raise millions to save our planet.  Or, perhaps several health organizations can work together to raise the dollars to find a cure.

How would this work?  It could start with an open community discussion to learn what motivates people to raise money and participate in these events.  What are the essential elements for a successful fundraising event?  Then, this "open source" community of fund raising professionals and past event participants could work on identifying a brand new concept (or a significant twist on an old one).  The goal would be to create an event or activity that would capture the imaginiation of a mass audience and inspire them to support a cause greater than any one organization and raise more money than all of the organizations could raise independently.

Of course, there would be some natural barriers to success.  Organizations would need to take more risk than they would normally find acceptable and new governance structures would need to be created.  But where there's a will...

If anyone is interested in this idea, let's explore further.  I would be happy to create a wiki to get the discussion started.

Tagged: fundraising new event mass collaboration Wikinomics
 

Comments

[Kare Anderson]

PBWikis makes it super easy to start a wiki and -no I have no business connection to the group. They are used to working with non-profits, schools as well as firms