In his new book, Jeremy Beer unpacks the psychology of giving and how nonprofits can tap into donors’ most potent motivators.
Some years ago, I was bouncing my energetic baby in the back of a church in a smallish “cry room” filled with other parents and similarly energetic small children. At some point, I noticed an old plaque on the wall listing names of those who had donated money for stained glass windows, pews, chalices, and so on when the church was originally built. As I idly scanned, I came across my grandparents’ names and was hit with a surprisingly strong rush of emotion.
I knew, of course, that my grandparents had been longtime members of the parish I had recently rejoined after moving back to town. I not infrequently ran into people who reminisced fondly about them. Still, there was something about happening across their names on an ordinary Sunday on that rather unremarkable, tucked-away plaque that underscored my feeling of connection and rootedness in that particular parish.
Successful fundraisers, insists Jeremy Beer, must pay careful attention to these sorts of feelings. In his new book, The Quest for Belonging: How the Most Effective Fundraisers Understand the Psychology of Giving, Beer draws on academic research, real-life stories of fundraising, and the expertise of successful nonprofit leaders to demonstrate that identity and belonging are crucial root motivators of human action, including charitable giving.
In this engaging book, Beer repeatedly debunks the idea that donors give primarily for rational reasons. He acknowledges that donors may say they are giving rationally but demonstrates that the evidence suggests otherwise. For example, in the major 2009–2010 “Money for Good” study of American givers with household incomes of $80,000 or above, the authors concluded that “very few donors actively try to give to high performing charities.” When the giving rubber hits the philanthropic road, the performance and impact of nonprofit organizations do not turn out to be decisive factors.
Instead, what mattered most to the donors studied was whether the organization was local, they knew someone at the organization, or they connected strongly with the organization’s values. Shockingly, the “relative performance” of charities seemed to motivate only about three percent of donors.
Beer, who trained in psychology himself before turning to a career in fundraising, calls on sociologists and psychologists to explain this near-ubiquitous lack of rationality in giving. Sociologist Christian Smith, Beer suggests, can help us understand the reasons donors, such as those in the “Money for Good” study, give. Smith identifies six fundamental goods that motivate us; these include “Identity coherence and affirmation,“ “Moral affirmation,” and “Social belonging and love.”
Likewise, social psychologist Jonathan Haidt’s research can help us see that human beings tend to act intuitively first and rationalize the action later. In a striking analogy that Beer helpfully adopts, Haidt compares emotion to an elephant and reasons to the elephant’s rider. Many fundraisers make the mistake of appealing only or primarily to the rider, not realizing that the elephant has final say in which direction the pair is going.
Having established a solid case for why human beings act and give the way they do, the remainder of The Quest for Belonging expands on the kinds of stories, relationship-building, and experiences fundraisers should offer their donors. Since stories are the key means by which we understand our identity and make meaning, storytelling deserves careful attention. Our first aim, Beer repeatedly reminds us, should be asking for and seeking to understand the donor’s story.
Beer writes, “Even if there is a break in our identity, there remains an overarching narrative that links seemingly disparate but in fact related items. ‘I was an alcoholic. Now I’m in recovery.’ ‘I was raised Baptist. I drifted, searching. I converted to Judaism. I’m a religious person.’” Among many intriguing claims in the book, I find this one especially worth reflecting upon.
I’m reminded of that famous narrative of change and conversion, Augustine’s Confessions. He highlights the consistency working through his years of inconstancy: his mother’s unceasing prayers, the restlessness of his heart, the workings of grace. The Confessions helpfully illustrates, I think, how our urge to create an “overarching narrative” doesn’t necessarily mean seeing an individual’s experience as straightforward or lacking complexity.
I bring this example up in part to point out that most of us, donors included, aren’t nearly as masterful at shaping narratives as Augustine. And even the neatly packaged narratives of self that we offer to others may not reveal our deeper motivations. Consequently, it takes considerable work and relationship-building to recognize the through-lines in a donor’s story. Nonprofits seeking success must put in that work so that they can effectively invite belonging and invite donors to connect their identity and story to the organization’s mission.
In a service to fundraisers everywhere, The Quest for Belonging offers a guidebook for such work. A lively discussion that incorporates the voices of many fundraisers with on-the-ground experience, it offers many practical tips on creating donor communication, relationships, and experiences informed by the psychology of giving.