Charity Requests, Part II

If you haven't read the post entitled Grouchy, read that first. I shared that I was out of sorts because of the way I had been solicited by a charity. Now I want to tell you about an charity event that made me smile.

First you need to know that in the Northwest Ohio are, there are almost 300 people who have taken the Certified Networker course. This community of grads is very supportive. They each realize that if they help each other to be more successful, that it will come back full circle. One benefit is that when someone in the community has a need, they can email it to me and I then forward it out to the whole community.

Kym Sloan, Boy Scouts of America, Erie Shores Council, did just that for an event the Boy Scouts had this week. I attended to be supportive of Kym, and was nicely surprised to find at least six or seven other CN grads there too. This was a direct response to Kym's call for help. I think the reason this solicitation didn't bother me, was because Kym didn't hide behind anonymity and had already developed relationships within the community to give her the right to ask for help. She had given to others before she asked for something in return.

As I continue to think about this whole issue of charitable giving, I am beginning to form opinions that my be somewhat controversial. I think that many people who work in development for non-profits just see their job as getting as much money as possible from the general public. Some don't seem understand the part about relationship development; the part about giving to others first, the part about being visible in the community. Now I know that many charity's operations give back to the community in their mission, but I am talking about the people here. How do they individually link and freely help others in the community?

What is your opinion about this?