For many, the month of December is a time to decompress and relax with family and friends. But mention “end of year” to any advancement professional and you’ll likely be met with some combination of wide eyes, deep breaths, and a reassuring mantra such as, “We’ve got this!”

As someone who has worked in fundraising, I understand that reaction since over 30% of all giving to nonprofit organizations occurs during the month of December, making it one of the busiest times of the year for schools and universities. But why is this month so busy? And how can you turn a stressful month into a streamlined, stress-free operation? Read on for three quick tips you can apply to streamline your end of year advancement efforts.

In the past, the climate crisis was mainly the concern of environment and conservation organisations. Today, largely thanks to the work of Greenpeace, WWF, and others, it is recognised as the defining challenge of the century.

We all have a responsibility to solve it, and civil society organisations play a critical role. As not all organisations have climate action integrated into their strategy yet, let’s have a look at five key ways the nonprofit sector can help to solve the climate crisis — and concrete examples of intersectional initiatives that are already happening.

Apply Pressure to Limit Global Warming to 1.5 Degrees

As we know, world leaders didn’t quite get to 1.5 at COP 26, so pressure from both civil society and the private sector will … Read more

A new survey by McKinsey confirms that 9 out of 10 employers surveyed include behavioral health among their top workforce health concerns, noting that COVID-19 is affecting productivity.

In fact, the National Alliance on Mental Illness reveals that depression and anxiety cost the world $1 trillion each year in lost productivity. Clearly, it’s our responsibility as corporate citizens to address mental health in the workplace.

At Salesforce, we have found some creative ways to bring mental health conversations into the workplace. For many years, we have incorporated meditation, monks, and moments of joy in our workplace culture and our company events. As the pandemic hit and remote work became a reality, we found new ways to add to these resources

As one example, our Chief People Officer, Brent Hyder, hosted a virtual Mental Health Town Hall … Read more

“There’s nothing about learning and creativity that requires spontaneity. You just need informal interaction time. And you can actually structure that unstructured time.“

That’s organizational psychologist and bestselling author Adam Grant, who studies how people find motivation and meaning in the workplace. Adam has found that the same skills that make us good at thinking and learning can make us worse at rethinking and unlearning — and the ability to do the latter has become much more important in light of the groundbreaking changes to the workplace wrought by the pandemic.

Salesforce.org invited Adam to speak with a group of higher education CMOs about ways they can update their own opinions and strategies, open people’s minds, and build teams in which people are eager to improve on the status quo rather than enforce it. I was thrilled to moderate that highly engaged discussion, which focused mainly on concerns about how … Read more