Helping nonprofits scale gen-ops dollars to fund the infrastructure they need to grow. Sherry Quam Taylor, CEO of QuamTaylor.
I love reading my clients’ strategic plans. It’s where I see the mission leap off the page: lives changed, communities strengthened, systems improved. But there’s a pattern that always makes me smile: the last initiative. After pages of bold goals, you’ll find something like “Initiative #7: Raise More Philanthropy Dollars,” followed by vague to-dos such as diversifying revenue, finding more major donors, growing a social media presence and having the board host in-home events.
I am glad fundraising makes the list. Yet, this is exactly where many plans stall. Leaders call me months later and say, “We can’t execute the plan because we don’t have the money.” What they really mean is “We don’t have enough flexible, general operating revenue to hire the people, buy the systems and build the runway the plan requires.”
If “raise more” is on your roadmap, here’s how to translate it from a placeholder into a funded strategy.
Step 1: Define The Money Before You Budget
Every initiative needs a financing plan, not just a revenue target. That starts with a simple question: “What type of money do we need?” If you want to build infrastructure, retain talent and smooth cash flow, the answer is almost never project-restricted grants. You need unrestricted, flexible gifts that you can deploy where the plan demands it most.
Treat this as an operating assumption: Infrastructure is a general-ops problem. That means your plan must explicitly pursue flexible capital at levels that match the scale of your goals. If you need to lift service capacity by 30% and modernize your data stack, put a price on that, quarter by quarter, for the next three years. Then align your fundraising strategy and team to those numbers.
Step 2: Be Honest About The ‘How’
Here’s the hard truth: You won’t raise meaningful, flexible dollars with a calendar built on events, appeals and applications. Those tools have a place, but they produce spikes, not stability, and they are often restricted or smaller in size. Investment-level philanthropy—the kind that funds strategy—comes from 1:1, numbers-literate conversations with donors who can make their best gift every year to your mission.
Ask yourself:
- Do we have an investment brief that pairs mission with math, including outcomes plus unit economics, timing of cash and three-year projections?
- Can the CEO lead growth and finance conversations with top donors, in addition to program updates?
- Does each board member give their best annual gift and share a small portfolio of relationships with staff, advancing one to two prospects each?
If the answer is no, you don’t have a major-gifts problem. You have a model problem.
Step 3: Equip The People Who Will Raise It
Many capable fundraisers have never been trained to translate organizational assets into a donor’s point of view. They’re asked to produce events, manage a database and “keep the content flowing,” leaving little time to open or advance high-value relationships.
Reallocate time and build skills around four capabilities:
- Financial Fluency: Fundraisers must answer numerical questions without phoning a friend: cost to grow by X%, unit costs, risk mitigations, days cash on hand and where flexible dollars unlock the most impact.
- Portfolio Discipline: Protect weekly focus blocks for 1:1 cultivation, prospect research and follow-through. Track introductions, conversations and meaningful exchanges, not just “touches.”
- Board Participation: Replace the “give/get box” with a best-gift ask and a shared-portfolio model. Board hours should align with dollars, not logistics.
- CEO Visibility: Your top donors deserve the CEO’s time. Co-lead the top 10 relationships. In the next 20 to 100, involve the CEO selectively where her presence accelerates belief and decision.
Step 4: Resource The Work (So It Can Happen)
If your fundraisers only involve designing graphics, scrubbing spreadsheets and sending broadcast emails, they are not building the donor pipeline your plan needs. Add or outsource the production tasks that consume the week. Fund the tools that support relationship work: clean data, a simple pipeline dashboard, brief templates and time-saving executive support. Hours must map to dollars.
Step 5: Tie The Plan To A 12-Month Implementation, Not A Quick Fix
You (technically) can create real momentum in 90 days: publish a needs-based budget, build the investment brief, schedule board 1:1s and reassign time from event production to portfolios. But durable change requires dedicated time. Investment-level gifts mature over six to 24 months, board behavior changes with practice and the organization needs to see the model perform through cash-flow troughs and year-end peaks. Quick wins are helpful, true. But a multiyear arc is transformative.
Step 6: Measure What Matters
If your dashboard only tracks activities that occurred in the past, donations and email opens, you will optimize for the wrong outcomes. Add metrics that align hours with dollars and predict flexible revenue and cash health. Create 6- to 24-month plans that lead every donor to their best gift each year.
Turn ‘Initiative #7’ Into The Engine That Funds #1–6
If scaling your mission were as simple as “hire another fundraiser,” more organizations would be crossing the $5 million or $10 million threshold with ease. The reason they aren’t is not a talent shortage; it’s a financing model gap and a skill set issue. Put unrestricted gen-ops gifts at the center of your plan. Equip your CEO, board and development team to lead investment-level conversations. Resource the work so hours align with dollars. Then give the model a full year to take root.
Do that, and “Initiative #7: Raise More Philanthropy Dollars” stops being a wish list item at the back of your strategic plan. It becomes the engine that funds every other initiative on page one.
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