Fundraising Has a System — And You Can Learn It

Rhen is back on the Petrus Development Show with Jenni Reamer, Petrus coursewriter and fundraising educator.  Jenni joins Rhen for a candid, thoughtful conversation about one of the most daunting challenges in the nonprofit world: building a fundraising program from scratch.

Drawing from her firsthand experience launching a fundraising program for a college campus ministry, Jenni gets real about the highs, the lows, and everything in between. What kept her going when things got tough? What surprised her most along the way? She shares it all — and her biggest takeaway might just be the encouragement you need to hear: fundraising has a system. With the right training and processes in place, even first-time fundraisers can find their footing and thrive.

If you want to dive deeper into the building blocks of a successful fundraising program, consider joining the Petrus BOAT Program this summer. As Rhen and Jenni break it down, BOAT is all about understanding how fundraising activities connect — and how smart strategy and intentional planning can make a real difference in your results. Don't miss it!

INTERVIEW TRANSCRIPT

00:53.14
Host
Well, howdy everybody. Welcome back to the Petrus Development Show. I'm Rhen Hoehn from Petrus, and joining me today is Petrus Consultant Jenni Reamer. How's it going, Jenni?

01:06.17
Jenni
Hey, it's great to be here. I'm really excited to be on the show.

01:09.94
Host
Good, good. Welcome. We're going to kind of dive right into it. So today, Jenni, you're here to talk about getting started in fundraising, both as a new fundraiser and as an organization starting out in fundraising. And we'll kind of unpack that as we go. But before we do, do you want to tell us about yourself, Jenni, and your background in fundraising?

01:30.58
Jenni
Sure. So I started working in fundraising unexpectedly in 2009. Of course, I had no idea what that was before I went to my interview, but I heard the priest at my campus ministry say that they were starting up a program to help them reach more people. And I thought, that's awesome. That's what I want to do. I want to help the church reach more people. So I started their development program there under the direction of a Petrus Consultant.

02:00.50
Jenni
And that ended up being, unbeknownst at the time, the first campus ministry development program in the Diocese of Richmond. So to some degree, we were really starting from scratch there.

02:13.18
Jenni
And then after that, I shifted gears and picked up the annual fund manager position at a Catholic high school up in Northern Virginia. And I didn't mention this, but the campus ministry was in the western part of the state, which is a much more rural area. So I went to a very different place and started a focus on the annual fund. And that was a very different experience, but certainly very rewarding and enjoyable.

02:43.51
Jenni
And now I'm here talking with you guys and very happy to share all of my experiences and what I've learned.

02:49.34
Host
Excellent. Can I ask what you studied in college?

02:52.76
Jenni
Yeah, I studied biological anthropology, which you can see obviously has nothing to do with fundraising, except when people mention that, I always like to point out that I was interested in anthropology because I absolutely love people.

02:56.70
Host
Awesome.

03:08.50
Jenni
And fundraising has given me a chance to talk to so many people and learn so much about their own stories. And to me, it feels very much like a progression that makes sense, but it doesn't always on paper.

03:20.76
Host
Excellent. It's one of my favorite games when you go to fundraising conferences — what did you study? What's your background? Because nobody ever studies fundraising, right? It's not something that's taught in undergrad. So everybody kind of comes at it unexpectedly or from out of left field.

03:37.43
Jenni
Yeah, exactly.

03:37.43
Host
So—

03:39.59
Jenni
We're a good bunch of people, many different personalities in this group.

03:44.25
Host
Yeah. Yep. I love it. Excellent. So let's talk a little bit about those experiences. You said you were the first fundraiser at the campus ministry. What was that experience like? What were you walking into? Did they have any fundraising in place already? And then how did that develop for you?

04:04.18
Jenni
So in general, it was extremely challenging, but equally as rewarding. They had one part-time staff person, and they didn't even have a full-time priest up until quite recently.

04:24.09
Jenni
When I started there, Father Jim had been there for a couple of years, but they had no money prepared or anything — no planning whatsoever. He ran into a Petrus rep at a priest convocation, and they shared with him that he could reach so many more students if he started to be proactive about fundraising and about building out the program. And he was sold. And then I was sold, and we got started.

04:54.55
Jenni
And there were a lot of challenges.

04:54.60
Host
Yeah.

04:57.31
Jenni
I mean, first of all, it's in a pretty low-cost area. The university is the largest white-collar employer out there, and it also had a very young alumni base.

05:08.86
Jenni
So it was a very long-established college, but it had only actually gotten big quite recently. There were a lot of things up against us, but it was incredibly enriching.

05:21.21
Jenni
Getting a chance to talk to so many people who cared so much about the Catholic faith and who loved this university so much — it was really wonderful. And through it all, despite the fact that I had no experience and no understanding at all of even what...

05:37.59
Jenni
...an annual fund was. I remember having to Google that — "what is annual giving?" But we had an incredible coach through Petrus, and he guided us through it. We talked once a week on the phone, and I would give him my action items. The next week, he would help me discern how that went, what progress was going well, and where I was getting stalled.

06:23.38
Host
Good. As you got into fundraising, did it match what you expected coming in, or was it very different from what you expected after taking the job? How did that unfold?

06:36.92
Jenni
I had no expectations. I mean, what I said earlier about my introduction — reaching more students — that was my complete knowledge of what the job was. I mean, even the job description was generic and didn't really tell me much.

06:53.87
Jenni
I didn't even care what it said. I was excited about helping the church and helping the Holy Spirit, and that was all I cared about. In some ways that helped me. But in other ways, because I was all enthusiasm, I was not ready for the day-to-day grind.

07:13.11
Jenni
And because it was all personal investment, when I started to encounter some of those delays — the friction associated with starting these programs — it was easy to fall into the trap of feeling like I wasn't equipped for the job, like I wasn't the right fit.

07:33.14
Jenni
But we worked through that. And a lot of that was because as I went along, I was figuring it out and being guided and trained through it. So I was able to work through that and start to learn the system — that fundraising is a process and a system of activities, and when you do it, you get good results. But that was not something I understood when I started. So that definitely took some time figuring out.

08:05.56
Host
And then you moved to the high school and plugged into an already established program. What was that experience like?

08:12.31
Jenni
Oh, it was night and day. It was a relief in a lot of different ways. I mean, for one thing, they had a team of people. That was different. At the campus ministry, the full-time priest had so many different things to do — the university was at this point a pretty decent size, so he was very busy just being the campus minister. The part-time bookkeeper and I were the ones cooking meals for students at the Sunday supper, and if the toilet broke, that was just us — no one else was going to fix that toilet. So it was such a relief going to an established team with a great program. And not to mention, Northern Virginia is a very high cost-of-living area, so there's a lot more wealth there than out in the mountains in the Shenandoah Valley.

09:06.39
Jenni
But at the same time, the annual giving manager position had been vacant for probably six months. So their annual fund was, to some degree, in crisis mode.

09:21.98
Jenni
I want to say they were around 30% of their goal with 25% of the year left.

09:27.14
Host
Wow.

09:30.95
Jenni
So no one expected me to make that goal, but they were facing a very difficult year.

09:31.22
Host
Yeah.

09:41.27
Jenni
But from my perspective, coming from starting up in campus ministry and dealing with all that — that was the school of hard knocks for a fundraiser. So here I am coming into this established program where I didn't have to clean the toilets. And I was like, no problem. It was easy for me to recognize where they could do more and where we could focus our efforts in the remaining few months of the fiscal year.

10:07.99
Jenni
And that was such a relief — to be able to focus on that. And the results that we received were really incredible. We actually ended up exceeding the goal in the last quarter of the year, which we certainly did not expect. But there was a whole team ready to do the work, and we knew what to do.

10:32.28
Host
Awesome. Yeah, you put it into action and then things take off.

10:35.32
Jenni
Yes. And that's really because the training with the Petrus philosophy was so good at taking the fear away.

10:45.66
Jenni
I remember in my interview with the director at the high school, she presented all these different elements of their annual giving program.

10:46.35
Host
Hmm.

10:54.52
Jenni
And she said, if you took this job, what would you do to try to help us get a little closer to our goal? And it was easy — they really didn't have much in the way of personal solicitations or major gift cultivation going toward their annual fund. And everything I had done with the campus ministry was all about cultivating major gifts. So it was easy to say, well, we've got three months left. You've got this giving day that was started last year.

11:28.66
Jenni
So we can go out there and talk to all these people and see if they'll give gifts toward this giving day. Essentially, the strategy was: we're going to ask more people for more money, because that's what we had been doing up to that point. And she was a little nervous — well, we don't have a capital campaign, so how are people going to take that? Do people like giving to annual giving if you ask them for a larger gift?

11:52.06
Jenni
And it was easy to say, yes, they're going to love it. If you give them an opportunity to support the regular everyday mission that they already love, they're going to jump at it.

12:02.81
Jenni
And they did.

12:04.34
Host
Definitely, yeah. Having a plan and executing it — that's really what it takes, right? And you've been helping a lot of newer fundraisers develop that plan for their own ministries lately. You came on with Petrus a couple of years ago and helped us start writing courses — a bunch of the courses on there you helped develop. And over the last year or two, you've been taking on our BOAT Program — Basic Online Advancement Training — and leading that, working with a bunch of different organizations and their staff as they get trained up on the process of fundraising, the science and the art of it both. What has that experience been like, and how have you been liking it?

12:48.28
Jenni
It's been incredible. I've absolutely loved it. From starting out in fundraising and Catholic fundraising and recognizing it immediately as a spiritual process — one that united all the different elements of my personality and my faith — that has defined my adult life.

13:13.11
Jenni
Since graduating from college, that's what I've done.

13:13.82
Host
Thank—

13:14.83
Jenni
So being able to take that and apply it to many different organizations, and share what I have learned from my own experience — the mistakes we made, the things I've learned, the successes we've had — plus all the research I've been able to do for Petrus over the last few years, those two sides come together.

13:37.05
Jenni
And I'm able to teach that to people who are starting out and who are in that same sometimes-lost position I was in when I first started, and try to help them let go of that fear and that stress. Because results don't have to be tied to the force of your personality.

13:59.45
Jenni
You can learn the process. And the process is really: if you do all these different steps and implement all these different strategies, you're going to get results. It's not a question — it's going to happen.

14:09.88
Host
Yeah. Excellent. Yeah, excuse me. A hundred percent. And yeah, what I want to do with this episode is take some of the questions and concerns that we get from people who are just starting in fundraising — those we've been working with in BOAT —

14:28.02
Host
— and kind of address some of those for you, the listener, who maybe has some of these fears or misconceptions or questions about fundraising as you get into it or think about developing a fundraising program for your organization. We'll kind of dig into some of these things that come up pretty frequently with the organizations we work with.

14:47.90
Host
So as we get started here, how would you explain fundraising to somebody who's never done it before?

14:56.76
Jenni
I would say that it's the process of finding people who love your mission and sharing ways that they can make that mission possible.

15:09.50
Host
Yeah, and you're connecting them to those opportunities, right? I always tell the story — I'm sure I've told it on the podcast before — of a couple that I went to lunch with early on in my fundraising career. As we sat down to lunch, they said, "Don't ask us for money."

15:14.61
Jenni
Yeah.

15:29.86
Host
That was the first thing they said. Like, we'll visit with you and tell you our story, but don't ask us for money. I said, okay. Then as we were getting up from lunch to leave, I handed them some books that we had been giving out for free to the college students — we had some left over.

15:44.98
Host
And they loved the idea of putting catechetical materials in the hands of young people. And they committed to paying for that program as long as they were alive, every year going forward. So that one lunch went from "don't ask us for money" to "please take our money." They would love to do this with their own two hands, but they're not face to face with college students every day — we are. So they'd pay for us to do that, right? It's connecting them to that opportunity.

16:13.24
Host
And that's really what fundraising is in its essence, when it's done well. In my own experience, when I started out in fundraising, some people I'm close to thought I was going around shaking people upside down, taking whatever money fell out of their pockets.

16:29.32
Jenni
Yeah.

16:29.31
Host
And really, it's not that. That's maybe a misconception of fundraising. It really is connecting people to those opportunities to make a change in the world.

16:38.90
Jenni
Yeah, that's such a good story because it illustrates the fact that you are the tool of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is the one that's doing the heavy lifting.

16:49.37
Jenni
You're just the one that's physically presenting them that opportunity. You don't have to make them love your organization — that's God's job. Your job is to just give them a way to show their love for your mission.

16:58.97
Host
Yeah.

17:05.29
Host
Definitely. Do you think that new fundraisers feel like they're bothering their donors when they're reaching out?

17:12.34
Jenni
Yes. I mean, I remember feeling that way. I don't know anybody who starts out — or I guess I do. I can think of a couple of people who have a tremendous amount of confidence, but I don't think that's the average person.

17:24.85
Jenni
I think most people do feel that way, but that really comes, in my mind, from a lack of training and a lack of organizational planning. So if you start out feeling like, "It's me, Jenny, calling, and I'm trying to ask you for a meeting so that you will give me money" — if that's where you come from, then you're really not quite begging, but you're something close to that. And it might certainly be a bother.

17:58.58
Jenni
But when you're able to enter that frame of thought where you are the tool of the Holy Spirit and you are working for this greater cause and you are looking for people who already love that — then it's exciting.

18:14.78
Jenni
You are suddenly enabling the work of the Holy Spirit. That's a radically different experience as a fundraiser, and a different experience for the person on the other end of the phone call.

18:27.93
Jenni
If they're talking to you and you're subconsciously feeling like you're bothering them, they're not going to get as much out of it. They're not going to be as inspired as if you're in that other frame of thought.

18:40.06
Host
Yeah, I think there is a difference between interrupting somebody and bothering them, too. I think that's maybe something where wires get crossed — you're always going to be interrupting people when you try to get their attention for a minute or two for a phone call. Even if you email them, text them, whatever it is. And some people are going to be bothered that they were interrupted.

19:00.62
Host
Other people are going to be like, oh, who's this calling me? And when they hear it, they say, "I love what you're doing. I'm so glad you called." Right. So you have to be okay with interrupting people and knowing that some people are looking for a reason to be bothered — in my experience — and there's nothing you can do to make them happy.

19:16.57
Jenni
Yes.

19:18.42
Host
And so you just have to let that go, move on to the next person, and look for the people who are excited to talk to you, to hear from you, and to see what's going on with your organization.

19:29.40
Jenni
Yeah, that's very true. You never know what you're entering into in someone's life — what's going on when you call them. It could be all sorts of things that aren't normal. So you definitely have to try not to take anything personally.

19:44.86
Host
Definitely. Good. Let's see. What are a few — maybe the first — habits that a new fundraiser should build?

19:53.78
Jenni
I would say discipline of routine. Getting into the habit of starting your day with prayer — that's the way you let go of yourself. You connect with the Holy Spirit. You ask the Holy Spirit to take over, take the reins: tell me what you want me to do. Let it be your words and not mine.

20:15.80
Jenni
So start every single day that way. And then after that, look at the calendar, set up your call list for that day, and see what you have going on. When am I going to make calls today, and who am I going to call? Even if your regular phone calls don't happen until five o'clock, you have the call list set up — it's the second or third thing you do, after prayer and reviewing what's going on today. Do I have a meeting starting in 20 minutes?

20:43.64
Jenni
But the third thing you do every single day is set up that call list. Then whenever you make your calls, you've already got it ready, and you have one less excuse to let those phone calls slip away from your day.

20:59.61
Host
I think that point about discipline is super important. I know Jim Collins wrote the book Good to Great in the business world — it's kind of one of the big books out there on how you take something good and make it really, really great. And one of the concepts in there is the flywheel. A lot of people don't understand what that is. I think the easiest way to visualize it is: if you picture yourself getting on a stationary bicycle to exercise...

21:31.13
Host
The first couple of times you pedal, it takes a lot of effort. And you can kind of see that little wheel start to spin in the front. And then as you keep pedaling, keep pedaling, keep pedaling, suddenly that wheel starts spinning faster and faster.

21:44.33
Host
And it takes less and less effort from you to keep it moving, right? So that regular discipline every day of doing those same things that need to be done consistently...

21:48.86
Jenni
Yeah.

21:54.82
Host
It starts building more and more momentum, and things eventually take off. And sometimes in fundraising there's a lag time, right? There's always kind of a few months in between when the work happens and when the results come in.

22:08.01
Host
But that consistency and not giving up on it, I think, is key.

22:13.72
Jenni
Yeah, absolutely. And I think even if you're just looking at the process of something so small, like making phone calls — and we know what a building block that is — that process starts out very difficult. But the more you do it, it's like any activity, anything that a kid learns to do: riding a bike, reading, whatever. The more you do it, the more it becomes a natural process. And you have to expect to work through those first couple turns of the wheel — it's going to be kind of rough, it's going to be difficult. But it's not always going to be so difficult. You're going to figure it out. And some of those things you learn by being taught and by learning the science of it, and some of them you just have to push through, and then you figure it out as you go along.

23:59.90
Jenni
Okay, so the four items are: database, number one; institutional plans — case for support, fundraising plan, communications plan — number two; mailings, number three; and then the fourth thing is getting your meetings set up.

24:04.06
Host
Oh, yeah.

24:15.90
Host
Yeah, I would just add in other annual fund items on top of mailings after that, just because that's kind of how the structure of BOAT goes, right?

24:27.33
Jenni
Okay, yeah.

24:28.18
Host
We do the case the first two weeks, then the communications, then the annual fund, then the major gifts. I laid it out that way just because that's how we talk about it.

24:33.32
Jenni
Yep.

24:35.00
Host
I would lay those out at a high level, but I don't really want to go into the details of how to do any of those here, if that makes sense.

24:41.96
Jenni
Okay.

24:43.48
Host
OK. Yeah, so we want to send them to BOAT for the "how."

24:48.28
Jenni
Yeah, that's right. You've got to buy the package. Okay.

24:51.83
Host
So that was my intent there. I think this has all been really good so far. Let me just scan through to see if there's anything else — if Eddie's going to have to cut this out. Any other sidebar notes?

25:09.62
Host
Okay, and the next question I'll go to after this is: if there's no fundraising infrastructure in place, what do you need? And then you can really lean into the database.

25:27.11
Host
Okay, yeah — the database. What role do the executive director, pastor, or president play in fundraising efforts early on?

25:38.94
Host
And what does a simple fundraising plan look like? I might skip that one actually — leave that for BOAT.

25:46.90
Jenni
Is that getting too detailed? Okay.

25:48.22
Host
I think so.

25:54.10
Host
Okay, then that'll kind of transition us into BOAT itself.

25:57.99
Jenni
Okay.

25:58.41
Host
We're at about 25 minutes. So yeah, that'll be good. Okay. Now we're going to come back. Sorry, Eddie.

26:13.19
Host
What did I just ask you? First new habits. Okay, sorry. There we go. Great. So how about at an organizational level — if your nonprofit doesn't really have any fundraising infrastructure or process in place, what are the first building blocks you need to get in place?

26:34.31
Jenni
I would say that the first thing that is essential is getting the right database.

26:39.97
Host
Hmm.

26:40.15
Jenni
Having that set up — you really can't do anything well if you don't have the system in place to track what you're doing.

26:48.78
Host
100%.

26:48.92
Jenni
And then after that — immediately after that, slash at the same time — working on those institutional planning documents.

26:48.94
Host
Hmm.

26:56.57
Jenni
So things like your case for support, your fundraising plan, your communications plan. That's the step that so many people skip. They get the database and then they're doing stuff right away — getting mailings out, having meetings. And it's possible to do it that way, but you will not receive the same results in the long run if you skip that planning step.

27:20.82
Jenni
So figuring out what are the elements of your mission that are the most inspirational, and how are we going to articulate that across all of our fundraising strategies?

27:21.01
Host
Mmm.

27:31.19
Jenni
Those plans are really key.

27:31.29
Host
Yeah.

27:34.04
Host
Yeah, I think when we talk to students about this within the BOAT program, we kind of layer them, right? You start with that case for support, and that informs all of your fundraising efforts at every level. And then the next layer is communicating — sending, getting that word out to the people who are connected to you: what are we doing and why, and here's how you can give. And communications is kind of like that flywheel — you need that consistent communication effort over time to really see the results come in. And then you start adding other fundraising activities on top of that, and as your ability grows you add more, right? As your staff grows, as you master some things, you don't need to spend as much time on them the following year to keep them going. Then you add in more and more, and things can grow from there. I think that makes a lot of sense.

28:25.18
Jenni
And when you approach it in that way, your activities are not isolated — they are all integrated and they work cohesively together, so that each mailing, each meeting, they are all reinforcing your most inspirational messages. If you just reactively send this letter out, set up these meetings, with no big-picture plan, then every single element is less effective because of it.

28:59.80
Jenni
Whereas if you take the time in the beginning to think about the big picture and to shape that long-term plan — your language and how you're going to get there — then your results will be much higher because of it.

29:12.44
Host
Yeah. Let's go back to that database point that you made. We talk about it pretty frequently on this podcast, but I think it needs to be said frequently as well.

29:23.16
Host
A spreadsheet is not a database, right? You need to have a good, solid fundraising database. Do you want to talk a little more about why that is and what that gives you compared to something like a spreadsheet?

29:37.48
Jenni
There's no shortcut around it. And I know that a database is expensive — it requires an investment — and you get what you pay for. So the more you invest in your database, the more you're going to get from it. And I know a lot of people feel like, well, we don't really need that. And certainly it depends on what size your organization is — you don't have to get the biggest one. But there's no way that you can get to operating at a major gift level, which is the transformational level—

30:11.00
Host
Mm. Mm.

30:11.35
Jenni
—for your mission, without having that structure in place. And I'm a big gardener, so that's always where I go in my fundraising analogies: if your fundraising plan is your whole garden, then...

30:26.49
Jenni
The plants are your activities, and the fruit that they bear is the money that comes in. But your database is the soil. That's where the plants take root. That's where the programs and the relationships are able to grow. If you don't have that... actually...

30:47.32
Jenni
I'm now reminded of the parable of the sower in the Gospels. Jesus presents the different types of ground, and those different types of ground are your different database solutions.

31:05.02
Jenni
So you would say the path would be like a spreadsheet — it's basically nothing. There's nothing there that you're able to track or to build on long-term. And then the rocky ground would be using a program that's not really designed to be a nonprofit database. There are a lot of those out there where people feel like, well, we can kind of just jury-rig this — it's what we've been using, so we're just going to keep it going. And it's going to work for a little while, but you're not going to get those programs and those relationships developed to the point where they're going to bear good fruit.

31:35.16
Host
Yeah.

31:35.26
Jenni
And then the thorny ground would be like a poorly managed database — something that has bad data in it, outdated information, no good addresses, not the right people that you're trying to reach.

31:46.23
Jenni
And then, of course, your fertile ground is a database that is well suited for your organization, that you are actively working with, and where you are writing notes on your meetings within 24 hours of when the meeting happens. You can't have that fruit without having a consistent, holistic plan that includes having a database.

32:11.37
Host
Definitely. Good. One more topic I wanted to touch on: when you're starting out in fundraising, especially if you're an organization just getting your fundraising off the ground—

32:22.52
Host
—what role should the executive director, pastor, or president play in fundraising? Let's say they started fundraising and brought in a development director as the first staff member.

32:39.16
Host
What does that role look like for the director at that point?

32:45.75
Jenni
They really become the ultimate servant leaders. They're really there to support that main actor — to listen to the plan, to brainstorm the different elements of the plan, to bounce ideas off of, to give direction, and also to take direction. If your development director says they need a leadership person at a meeting or to make a call, it's very important to do those things.

33:23.94
Host
Definitely. It's not hands-off when you hire a development staff member, right? The director still has to be involved, especially with some of the major donors.

33:33.05
Jenni
Yeah, absolutely.

33:35.22
Host
And developing the messaging, and lots of pieces there. Maybe they can step back a little bit, but not completely — that's a common thing that comes up.

33:41.46
Jenni
Yeah, very true.

33:43.48
Host
Yeah. Awesome. So just a few weeks from now, the summer session of BOAT is starting up — Basic Online Advancement Training. Like we've mentioned a few times over the course of this conversation, can you give us just a real short synopsis of what BOAT is and who it's for?

34:01.37
Jenni
So it's for anybody who needs to add fuel to their fundraising fire. It teaches the big picture. It's a grounding experience and an enriching experience. I talked about this — that there's a system and a process. That's what BOAT teaches. It's a proven approach that can be applied to any type of organization with any size of development program.

34:29.72
Jenni
So whether you are new to the field, starting a new program, or you just feel like you've lost your mojo and need to be rejuvenated, BOAT teaches the big picture of how everything is connected.

34:44.54
Jenni
Or I should say, how it can be connected. As I mentioned earlier, you can do all of these different fundraising activities in isolation from each other, and you're going to get some results — but it's not going to work very effectively in the long run.

35:00.09
Jenni
The word "synergy" has become kind of empty corporate jargon, but it's really hard to find a better word to describe that big picture of fundraising, where the different parts of the plan are strengthening each other. They're creating that momentum that becomes a force of its own — one that doesn't rely on one person's personality or one person's spirit. That's not sustainable or healthy, and it will lead to burnout for the fundraiser and burnout for the donors.

35:34.97
Jenni
So in BOAT, we work to teach that process. And it's a cohort-based program, which I think is a really defining element of it — we're going to be going through it together. We're going to be learning with each other and from each other. We're going to be working out concepts together. It is an interactive experience.

35:55.16
Jenni
So really, anybody — if you feel like you don't know what you're doing, or what you are doing isn't working anymore, or you don't feel like doing it anymore but you still need to — I would love for you to join us this summer.

36:10.52
Host
Yeah. BOAT has both an on-demand element — there are more than 50 lessons within the online modules of the program — but also five 90-minute live cohort sessions with Jenni and the other members of the cohort. And people really seem to love that part.

36:28.15
Host
I would say connecting with the other fundraisers is actually the most valued part. We've had, I think, 116 people complete BOAT over the last several years. And that's pretty consistently the feedback we get — that chance to both learn and connect with others. The program does have a Catholic flavor to it, but we've had non-Catholics and a variety of people go through it and still get a great fundraising education out of it. It's a good time. And like I said, the summer session is starting up at the beginning of June.

37:09.27
Host
The program is 10 weeks and includes five live cohorts, like I said, that meet every other week. The summer session is going to start the first week of June and will meet every other Tuesday from noon to 1:30 Eastern, starting on June 2nd and running through the end of July.

37:29.50
Host
And that was in case we switch to Wednesday.

37:32.73
Jenni
I guess so.

37:35.03
Host
And like I said, the cohort will meet every other week starting on Wednesday, June 3rd, from noon to 1:30 Eastern on Wednesdays, from June 3rd through the end of July.

37:48.95
Host
Good. And registration is open until about May 29th, but prices actually go up next Tuesday. If you're listening to this right away on May 12th, the price is going up from the current advanced rate of $799 to $999. You can also pay as four monthly payments of $200, or a one-time payment of $799 if you register right now. Registering also allows you to add a second member from your organization for free — so kind of two of you for the price of one — plus some other benefits and tools available within the program.

38:30.26
Host
More details are available at PetrusDevelopment.com/boat. And if you're a listener of this podcast, you can get an extra special deal — use the coupon code MAY200 to take $200 off if you pay all upfront. Anything else you'd like to add about BOAT, Jenni, and your experience having led it?

38:55.83
Jenni
I just love it. It is an incredible program. Petrus has been working on it for a few years now, and it has progressed over the years based on feedback from people who have gone through it and said, this was all great—

39:04.92
Host
Yeah.

39:11.48
Jenni
—but I could have used a little bit extra in this area or that area. So it's really had this beautiful, organic evolution to be exactly what people need to be able to continue this incredible vocation that we have been called to.

39:26.82
Host
Thank you.

39:29.91
Jenni
I hope that if anybody is thinking about it, to just try it out — especially having another person from your organization be able to do it with you. It's very helpful to go through it together, and then there's so much fruitful conversation that can happen from there.

39:45.78
Jenni
And in making it, it comes from outside of just what's in your own heart and your own head.

39:51.11
Host
Definitely. That's one of the key moments. We always do this — and maybe this is a bit of a spoiler alert — one of the exercises we always do in the first cohort session is: if a donor walked in and said, "I want to give you a million dollars right now, but only if you can tell me the three things you would do with it and how those are going to make an impact" — could you answer that? And two, if they then walked down to the next office and asked your coworker the same question, would they answer it the same way?

40:09.78
Host
And that's when people's eyes go wide. Like, I don't think they would. Right. And so getting everybody on the same page — getting the messaging, the goals, and the values all aligned — actually makes a really big difference for fundraising and for the organization as a whole.

40:38.58
Jenni
Yeah, I agree completely.

40:41.34
Host
Excellent. Great. Well, we are out of time, but thank you, Jenni, for joining us and giving people — especially those just starting out in fundraising — a little bit to chew on as they go forward in their fundraising career.

40:53.17
Jenni
Thanks, Rhen. It was wonderful to be here today.