Six Fundraising Lessons for Leaders Who Hate Asking
October 10, 2026
Read Time - 5 minutes
“Fundraising is proclaiming what we believe in in such a way that we offer other people an opportunity to participate with us in our vision and mission.”
~Henri Nouwen, A Spirituality of Fundraising
"I know I'm supposed to do this…but I didn't become a scholar so I could debase myself by begging in the streets!"
A department chair said that at a workshop David Perlmutter ran for chairs new to fundraising. Writing in the Chronicle of Philanthropy, Perlmutter, a longtime dean, admitted that he, like most professors who lead academic units, started the job with no fundraising training.
That gap matters more every year. State support for higher education rose just 1.0% in FY2026, below the rate of inflation, while giving to colleges and universities climbed to $78.8 billion in FY2025. More of what our units need, from scholarships to faculty salaries, now depends on philanthropy.
Yet many of us are strangers in the fundraising world. We were trained to teach and to do research. Often fundraising isn't an expectation at all, and when it is, no one says how much time to give it. Without a development officer to guide us, it becomes one more “nice to have” we don’t have time for. And if we’re honest, a few familiar thoughts keep it off our to-do list:
I'm not a salesperson.
Asking for money feels slimy.
I'd be bothering them.
I don't know where to start.
I'll get to it when things calm down.
I talked with Anna Schlia about these thoughts. Anna spent years as a major gift officer, including as senior director of advancement at the University of Rochester's famed Eastman School of Music, and has worked on higher education campaigns as both a frontline fundraiser and a consultant. She now runs Brightside Philanthropy, where she trains fundraisers and campus leaders across the country and researches donor behavior.
I'm grateful to Anna for her time and candor. Here are her answers, in six lessons we can all benefit from:
1. You already have the trait that matters
Let's start with the thought that fundraising takes a salesperson. We tend to picture the best fundraisers as extroverts, cheerleaders, and party planners, the people who work a room and befriend everyone in it. Anna calls that a bias. In her experience, fundraising is a learnable skill, and the trait that matters most is legitimacy, meaning whether a donor trusts the person in front of them to speak for the work. A review of 1,337 studies by Cassandra Chapman and her colleagues agrees: fundraisers who are perceived as legitimate usually raise more money.
You already have that legitimacy. "[Campus leaders] are really bringing that credibility to the table, which is why it's so great to partner with them," Anna said. We're the ones who can speak to the academic priorities, the outcomes, the faculty expertise, and the student stories. In her words, "Just represent your [unit] the way that you already know how."
2. The ask is about 4% of the work
The feeling that fundraising is slimy usually comes from picturing the actual ask for money. Anna puts the ask at about 4% of the work. The other 96% is getting to know a donor well enough to shape a gift that fits what they care about.
So the first conversations are full of questions. What's happening in higher ed that interests you? What have you been reading about the university? Edgar Schein called this Humble Inquiry, "the fine art of drawing someone out, of asking questions to which you do not know the answer." We ask questions like these every time we interview a faculty or staff candidate. Donor conversations call for the same skill. If you want a head start, Anna’s free guide, What Do I Ask a Donor?, has 20 questions that open up good donor conversations.
3. Open with thank you
Even when we know whom to contact, the first message can stall us. What do we say to someone we've barely talked to? Anna's answer is to open with gratitude and make it specific to that person. Her example: "I was reviewing a list of everyone who attended this symposium and I saw your name on there. Sorry we didn't get a chance to connect at that time. I'd love a chance to meet with you on campus or for coffee." She spends no more than ten minutes looking someone up.
Saying thank you can feel awkward, but Anna has seen both sides: the person receiving it is glad to hear it. And if we worry we'd be bothering donors, here's another perspective she shares: A conversation with a campus leader becomes "a brag-worthy story for them to share with their network."
4. Connect the dollars to a story
Anna mentions money in some way in every donor conversation, long before any ask. That doesn't mean requesting a gift. It means letting donors see that the important work we do on campus runs on funding. She might share inside news like this: "We just enrolled an incredible new international student, and it looks like they’ll start in the fall thanks to the gift that we've received from the Smith family." Each mention is a quiet reminder, in her words, that "this work is possible because of dollars."
Then make it real. Name a student, a faculty member, or a project, and tell what changed. Anna likes the small, human stories best. "The more real and human, the better. Your donor is not Reviewer #2," she said. Her example was a group of University of Rochester freshmen who arrived for their first day of school without coats. If she's the donor, she wants to hear how the university solved that problem.
5. Never leave without the next date
"I'll get to it when things calm down" is how donor relationships go cold. Anna's rule is to never end a conversation without knowing when we'll see each other next, whether that's a dinner, a concert, or a lab tour. When a donor gets excited about the work, she said, "the stopwatch starts." If we promise to send a student's video, we send it that week.
That means donor work moves to the front of the to-do list. As Anna likes to say, "The change you want to see in the world has a price tag." If we want our research funded and our most deserving students able to say yes to an offer of admission, someone has to make the case to the people who can make that funding possible. That someone is us.
6. Treat advancement as your partner
I've watched faculty treat development officers like bank tellers: “We need $10,000, have you found it yet?” Anna pointed to the opposite mistake, too, which is leaders assuming they can fundraise alone.
When new academic leaders I coach panic over a personnel issue, I remind them they have an HR office full of professionals who handle these issues every day. The same is true here. Find the person in advancement who covers your area and ask how they would approach a donor and what questions they would ask. Anna would make one study required reading for every new leader: Genevieve Shaker and Sarah Nathan's research on higher education fundraisers.
Try This Before Friday
If you know philanthropy could transform your program but don't know where to start, start here: Get a sticky note and write five names. Anna's order starts with current donors, because "there's no stronger predictor of giving than having already given." Next come current and past advisory board members, consistent annual donors, and alumni who keep showing up. Skip the famous couple or well-known foundation who just made headlines giving to another university.
If your program is starting from scratch, list the faculty and staff who built it and the people who engaged with your last research brief or post. Then ask each of them, "Who else do you know who cares about this?"
Pick one name and send a thank-you email this week. Anna's challenge is to have a visit with that person on the calendar in the next six weeks.
The Bottom Line
Anna shared a well-known line fundraisers pass around that sums up everything above: Ask for money and you'll get advice. Ask for advice and you'll get money.
"We're not selling anyone anything," she told me. "You are inviting someone to be a part of the university."
A new scholarship fund, Anna said, means "your fall next year looks different. And for the student who gets to come to your university because you made that phone call, everything changes."
The chair in Perlmutter's workshop pictured fundraising as begging. Anna pictures it as an invitation for generous people to support what they value, live out their aspirations, and be a part of something they care about. A sticky note and a thank-you email are a good place to start.
Which of these six lessons would be hardest to put into practice on your campus? Hit reply. I love getting your emails, and I respond to every message.
Every donor conversation in this issue starts with an idea worth funding. If your team is writing a strategic plan or launching something new this year, I'm running a free live session on how to draw out its best ideas. Bring a real campus challenge when you register, and we may work on it live.
Join me Tuesday, October 27, at 12:00 PM CT: The Best Ideas in the Room
Thanks for reading today. I'll see you next week.
Put this to work on your campus.
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