Fund and Friend Raising after the Pandemic: Is Your Healthcare Organization Poised for Action? By Howard L Smith, PhD, Professor, Milgard School of Business, University of Washington Tacoma Sally E. Deck, PhC, Doctoral Candidate, School of Leadership Studies, Gonzaga University
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hanks to the Covid-19 pandemic, healthcare organizations have adjusted their fundraising efforts to align with a strange world of the new normal. Advancement teams turned to virtual fund- and friend-raising strategies as means to make progress toward their philanthropic goals. From this perspective, Covid-19 has helped to nurture widespread innovation in prospect and donor cultivation. Skeptical healthcare executives, clinicians, and ancillary staff might question the assertion that anything good could arise from this contagion. But, inarguably, Covid-19 has stimulated new discoveries for imaginatively reaching advancement goals.
Before becoming over-confident about meeting the virtual reality challenges driven by the ever-evolving pandemic, it is appropriate to ask a pertinent question: Is your healthcare organization poised for action in the postpandemic future? The purpose of this paper is to guide development executives and healthcare leaders toward an affirmative answer. This question should send a little shiver down the spine of development officers or advancement executives worth their salt. Pandemic-induced ambiguity is likely to haunt healthcare philanthropy long after herd immunity is reached. Thus, savvy advancement
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