How to get creatively unstuck

If you're a normal human being, you sometimes get stuck while working on projects, especially at the beginning. Here are some good hints from The Nth Factor for ways to get going: Eight Ways to Jump Start Your Fundraising Creative:

1. Go to work -- on the program side -- for your organization for a day.
2. Reverse the way you build your case for support. Start narrow -- tell a single story conveying your impact on an individual level -- and then expand to the larger discussion of what your organization is doing.
3. Check your idea file.
4. Share with and learn from other nonprofits and colleagues.
5. Read up. What's going on in the news about your issues?
6. Remember that donors don't want to hear about your programs; they want to know what you accomplish.
7. Spend an hour with your results. Data is one of the best places to look for messaging and campaign ideas.
8. Take a walk.

I can vouch for these; I do most of them regularly. You'd be amazed at the power of taking a walk.

Comments

[Mazarine]

I definitely agree with #4 the most.

if we can be with nonprofit colleagues, and think of new ways to partner, to hear their struggles as well as their joys, I feel that we can stop being so alone in our development offices.

And of course, they will stop feeling so alone too. It's incredible the rewards that are instant, as soon as we reach out.

Peace,

Mazarine