Ep. 171: The Fundraising Busywork Trap
EPISODE 171
The Fundraising Busywork Trap
About the Episode:
If you’re ending your workday exhausted but can’t point to how you actually moved your fundraising forward, you might be caught in the fundraising busywork trap.
In this episode, I’m breaking down why so many nonprofit leaders confuse “activity” with “progress,” and how fear, comfort, and overthinking keep your mission stuck in motion but not momentum. You’ll learn how to identify low-ROI tasks, make courageous decisions that drive funding, and replace cluttered calendars with confident action that actually grows your organization. Because the opposite of busy isn’t lazy, it’s focused.
Here’s what you’ll learn:
The fundraising busywork trap and how to recognize it
Why working harder doesn’t always mean raising more
The difference between “activity” and “aligned action”
Adam Grant’s concept of cognitive comfort and how it stalls growth
Why procrastination often disguises itself as preparation
Real client examples: saying no to low-ROI events and sponsorship decks
The three ingredients of brave leadership: boundaries, focus, and support
Why coaching and systems prevent burnout and build momentum
It’s not your stories—it’s how you’re telling them. If your amazing work isn’t getting the attention (and donations) it deserves, it’s time for a messaging shift. The Brave Fundraiser’s Guide guide gives you 10 done-for-you donor prompts to make your message impossible to ignore. Get it for free here! https://christinaedwards.krtra.com/t/xKuLs6tOiPZa
Christina’s Favorite Takeaways:
“Working harder doesn't mean you're raising more.”
“The opposite of busy work isn't laziness, it's focused, it's a courageous action.”
“Why are we all having meetings? This could have been an email.”
“The real magic happens when you stop managing those appearances and start moving with purpose. It's not about doing more things. It's about doing the right things with the right plan and support.”
“Busy work feels safe. Bravery feels risky. Busy work keeps you stagnant, and bravery - that's what creates the momentum.”
“Clear is kind and unclear is unkind.” - Brené Brown
“Boundaries. Bravery. Support. That's brave leadership.”
“Busyness doesn't make you brave. It's just clutter in your schedule. Bravery is what moves that mission.”
Episode Resources:
FREE Resources from Splendid Consulting:
How to Work with Christina and Splendid Consulting:
Double Your Donations - Raise More From Your Laptop Without Chasing Grants or Galas
Easy Emails For Impact™ - Turn Your Inbox into an Income Stream
Donations on Demand: Build a $5K Email Campaign System in 30 min/week
The SPRINT Method™ - Fundraise Like a Pro, 5 Figures At a Time
Connect with Christina and Splendid Consulting:
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*Links may be affiliate links which means I may earn a commission at no cost to you.
Unknown Speaker 1:02If you've ever ended a work day or work week completely exhausted, but can't really point out how you moved your fundraising forward. You may be caught in the fundraising busy work trap, and it's really common for leaders, fundraisers and even marketers, to be stuck in this cycle of busy you are putting the hours in, but the results aren't matching up to the sweat. Because the truth is that working harder doesn't mean you're raising more putting more time in doesn't always equate more funding or more impact. If it did, the person with the longest hours put in and the biggest to do list would have the best, most, largest funded organization, and that is not how the world works. We know that, right?
Unknown Speaker 1:55
today, we're unpacking why we default to busy work when the brave work feels hard when the real leadership is about being decisive and taking courageous action that moves the mission forward, not just clogging and filling the calendar.
Unknown Speaker 2:12
So you can work an eight hour day, a 10 hour day and feel totally wiped out. There's meetings and check ins and slacks and planning sessions and grant drafts and Canva designs and social media posts and sponsorship decks and all the things and it is work. It feels like work, but it doesn't always mean it's productive. Psychologist Adam Grant calls this cognitive comfort. Cognitive comfort. We gravitate towards what feels manageable and measurable and honestly accessible and doable, things you're familiar with, or maybe even things that feel fun you like to tinker in Canva. Go there. You're used to applying for grants. Go there, right? But that work, that comfort, is actually keeping your funding stuck. That's why you can spend a whole day working and feel like, damn, I didn't move the needle forward at all, and yet you feel depleted, you feel burnt out. That busyness does look like progress, right? It does look like I did stuff. I was in meetings, I took notes, I did all the things, but it's really just like wearing a Fitbit, right? So imagine you're on a track in a Fitbit, right? You're clocking steps in, but you didn't really go anywhere. So you physically worked, right? But you didn't actually go anywhere, versus putting on your Fitbit, leaving your house and walking to your favorite restaurant, right? That walk ends. You're at your favorite restaurant. You're meeting up with friends, right? That has an end game in mind.
Unknown Speaker 3:40
So this is what I call death by 1000 paper cuts, because every single low, small ROI task that feels productive in isolation together, though compounds and that drains your focus and your energy. It's bringing you from one task to another task. That task switching, of course, has a cost you're running from that one project to another, from meetings, interruptions, emails, drafts, brainstorms, but none of it is actually connected or driving significant revenue. You've built a calendar that's full instead of a strong campaign. So I don't mean this episode to make you feel bad. I mean this episode episode to illuminate and shine a light on what you're doing that isn't actually getting you closer to your goals. And permission to stop doing it, permission to stop doing it, and support to take action another way. So what is the solution here? What do we do instead? Real progress doesn't actually come from activity. It comes from decisive, aligned action.
Unknown Speaker 4:55
You can't spreadsheet your way to courage. Listen, if we could, we would, but We Can't
Unknown Speaker 5:07
you cannot spreadsheet your way, and Canva your way to a fully funded, growing organization. So brave leaders don't wait for the perfect timing, the perfect words or the perfect level of confidence. They move with that aligned clarity, that aligned action, not that like frenzied, frantic task switching and chaos.
Unknown Speaker 5:51
So the opposite of busy work isn't laziness, it's focused. It's courageous action. And the best news I have for you is you're actually going to save a few hours a week when you switch to this instead, you actually get your time back.
Unknown Speaker 6:15
Adam Grant often talks about how procrastination often disguises itself as preparation. It's like the stuck in the pre planning mode, and that's what's happening here. You're preparing instead of deciding. So how do you make that shift? You can ask yourself, What's one brave thing I'm avoiding by staying busy, by searching for new grants, by tinkering with an event idea that really has no proven ROI. We had a client recently in the club who had kind of an event idea plunked on her lap, and she came to coaching, and I'm so glad she did, because where we landed was at best, at best. This this event raises a couple $1,000
Unknown Speaker 6:58
and takes her off of her year end campaign significantly to raise that couple $1,000 costs her her signature fundraiser, taking her away from donor calls, taking her away from really building out the campaign she's been working towards, because then suddenly she's got to plan this brand new event she hadn't planned on, right? And so you really have to go. Does this just sound like a fun idea? Does this sound like something I feel bad saying no to, right? Is this a boundary issue or is this a higher ROI event that I actually want to do? And for her, it was something she needed to say no to so she could double down on multiple five figure gifts, right? And that's the piece. That's the piece. We're like, God, this busy work could have doubled her hours a week, and I'm so glad it didn't. What I told her is, that's a hard 2k that is a hard $2,000 to make. It seems like there's an easier way to net $2,000 you with me? And she was like, Yes, I'm totally with you.
Unknown Speaker 7:57
So the next piece is identifying one thing that will actually move your mission forward and do that first and again, that first thing probably isn't something that feels innately easy. It might require you to pick up a phone. It might require you leave a lapsed owner a message. It might require you to write the appeal letter. You've been kind of like, oh, I don't want to do this right now, right? It might require you to follow up with a board member that said they would help. It's time to get their help. Let the rest fall away, even if it feels uncomfortable, even if you have to tell the person who thought the event was such a great idea, hey, we're not doing it. Love the idea. It's not going to fit in this calendar year. So one of my clients spent weeks she felt like she had to create a sponsorship deck, because that's what that's a great way to bring in five, six figures of revenue, right? Sponsorships, right? So she comes and she's like, I want deck ideas colors, and I want to know what to go with the pitch deck, right? She had, you know, researching ideas for what should go in the sponsorship deck and all the different levels of which we call the levels, guys, let's zoom out for a second. She didn't have one single prospect for sponsorships, right? And so we looked at it, and we're like, there's no there. Who are you reaching out to with this deck? Who are you promoting? Are there? Are there even meetings booked for this? What is the value to the sponsor? We didn't she can have answers to any of those questions. So we stopped,
Unknown Speaker 9:22
we stopped that frenzied, right action, right? And we instead said, Let's reallocate your time. Let's do five outreach calls instead of five deck visions, right? That's how you bring in five figures of funding. Very, very quickly, that brave action moving away from like thinking about a sponsorship deck or a pitch deck, and instead doing the uncomfortable one, produced significant breakthrough, and it brought her time back, right? It brought her time back because that clarity, that courage, will raise more than Canva ever will, and you're talking.
Unknown Speaker 10:00
That I'm throwing can Canva under the bus here, but I like Canva. I like Canva. But again, you know what it's like, choose your choose the thing that you can tinker with. You're like, Oh, I'll try that font. I'll try that color. That is not a good use of your time, right? And so same for you. If you're kind of stuck on the like, let me research another grant. Let me research another funder, right?
Unknown Speaker 10:27
And you may be thinking, okay, so if I stop doing all this busy stuff, everything will fall apart, right? Everything will fall apart. You're saying I shouldn't research, you're saying I shouldn't tinker. You're saying we don't need sponsors. You're saying we don't need this. And in fact, it won't fall apart. In fact, most of it was never holding things together again. It was holding your calendar together to make your calendar appear very, very full and busy, which it was, right. It's, it's the same thing I see in the corporate world. I'm not in the corporate world, thank God. But I, you know, I can through the window look and I'm like, Oh my gosh. How are you having so many meetings and getting any work done anyone in the corporate world is like, my god, the amount of meetings, right? It's like, why are we all having meetings? This could have been an email, why are we all using eight hours a day? And you know, 80% of those, those hours are just sitting on meetings, not a good use of time. It's okay to have less meetings and to actually get into action mode.
Unknown Speaker 11:30
So the real magic happens when you stop managing those appearances right and start moving with purpose. It's not about doing more things. It's about doing the right things with the right plan and support.
Unknown Speaker 11:52
So what is busyness? I remember listening to, I don't know, it's probably a decade ago, maybe reading a book or listening to something, and it was like this, thing. We all say, how are you What do you been up to? Oh, things are really busy. It's like we say it before we even mean it, right? It's just filler. And in a way, that's what busyness is. It's just filler. Busy work feels safe. Bravery feels risky, okay? It's supposed to be right? It's supposed to feel different, because you're literally expanding. If you want your income, your donations, to expand, you have to expand first. You have to rise to that occasion.
Unknown Speaker 12:37
busy work keeps you stagnant, and the other one bravery, that's what creates the momentum. Brene Brown's research on leadership shows that clear is kind and unclear is unkind, right? So being very clear on what your deliverables are, what you expect your team to do, what their deliverables are,
Unknown Speaker 13:14
So when she's managing her team, she has this prompt, what does done look like? So instead of having a vague deliverable. They know to ask her, okay, Brene, what is done look like? And vice versa, when she's coaching people, what does done look like? So people are very clear. What is the deliverable here? And that applies how you lead your time, your energy and your decisions. Because when you lack that clarity, and again, you're just kind of just jumping, task hopping, you default too busy, and that busy has a low bottom line, a low ROI, and it leaves you burnt out, right? Because your brain is tired at the end of the day because you weren't like, I got this shit done instead, you're like, I jumped around everywhere and I feel exhausted, right? So you can be well funded and work fewer hours, but it does require boundaries. I'm gonna say no to this event. I'm going to say no to this well meaning board member. I'm going to say no to this meeting. I cannot attend this meeting, right? I'm going to say no because I have donor calls. I need to make boundaries bravery and support. That's brave leadership. And I think the bravery and the boundaries are very hard to do by yourself. That's why I love the support piece. That's why I love coaching so much. Because when you're in a group of other, of people who are like minded, who are doing this work too, you feel supported, you feel understood, you feel known, right? I've had those seasons too, where my day was full but my results were flat. I get it. I work with organizations who come to me in the same place, right? They check all the boxes. Nothing new is happening, but we're busy, right? So once I learned to trade busy for brave, everything changed. That's what I help my clients do inside my programs. You learn how to make decisions quickly. You're decisive, you're brave, you're making.
Unknown Speaker 15:00
Those brave moves that create real momentum, not just action for action sake. Because when the brave world feels hard, you will default to busy work. You will like catapult your way back to let me just search for some more grants. We haven't gotten any grants in the last six months, but I'll just keep searching right. Let me apply for 12 more grants. But you know, these are all restricted and for low dollars and don't actually meet the criteria, right that type of work. So unless you have the coaching, the structure, the tools, the system, it's really hard to do this alone.
Unknown Speaker 15:54
So remember, busyness doesn't make you brave. It's just busyness. It's just clutter in your schedule. It might make you feel safe, but that safety is a lie, because it's getting you further away from your goal. You're in that Fitbit, just circling the track versus going to where you want to go, right going to a specific destination. Bravery is what moves that mission. Bravery is what moves the mission. This is your invitation to step out of busy and too brave to stop filling your days just to fill them, to go, you know, jumping around and task copying and stop, start funding your dreams if you want to do that with guidance and inside a system that helps you focus on what to do, which gives you the system, the tools, the templates and group coaching support, I highly recommend joining one of my programs. We have The SPRINT Method™ that is designed for solo shop EDS and founders who are learning how to raise their first 100k and 200k and beyond, right? And then we have The Purpose & Profit Club that is for scaling teams, marketers and fundraisers and leaders to sync up, to stop spinning their wheels and to start scaling, you can go to the show notes to reach out for more information. I'll see you in the next one. Go do that brave thing today.