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Memories (Digital and Otherwise)

I visited with a new client this morning and met with about a dozen people around a conference table, talking with them about work I'm going to be doing with their data.  Throughout the meeting, I stressed (as I so often do) the importance of understanding that your fundraising management software really needs to be considered your organization's institutional memory.  Everything your organization has learned, every interaction your organization has had, every gift your organization has received -- every everything -- should be recorded in your database, so that anyone looking at information about any person or organization can rely on the data to preserve the organization's memories.

I have been helping nonprofits make effective use of their software resources for over 25 years (let's be charitable and say that I was six when I started doing this work, okay?)  When I started, and for many years thereafter, I thought of the work as a way to marry the very personal work of fundraising with the very impersonal functionality of computers and software.  It wasn't until a few years ago that I had that lightbulb moment and realized that my work is about preserving memories.

More and more recently, I find myself realizing that my commitment to memory is not just connected to my work.  While I don't feel that I live in the past, I do like to recall it and keep it alive.  I happen to have a very good (perhaps near photographic) memory, so I have the blessing/curse of being able to remember a lot of things as though they just happened.

I'm telling you all of this so that it will make perfect sense to you when I tell that I've just published a book, called An Ordinary Man, and it's a memoir about my friendship with Edward Mellish and the many gifts I received as a result of that friendship.  I started writing this book about 14 years ago, jotting down memories in a Word document.  Some recent events caused me to pull back from my business a little and focus on finishing the book and getting it published.  I wanted to honor Edward, I wanted to give something to his two daughters, who were not quite two years old when he died in 1996, and I wanted to do it for Edward's wife Rosalie, who is my dearest friend and has been for nearly as long as I have been working with nonprofits.

But mostly, I want to remember.  I know that one day the memories will not be so readily available in my brain, and I don't want them lost forever.

Memories can be so many different things, can't they?  Digital memories can be knowledge and understanding, history and recognition.  Printed memories can be literal reminders to help us prevent bad things from happening again, or to help us understand how to repeat good thoughts or deeds.  Visual and other sensory memories can shock our systems and bring back feelings we thought overcome or forgotten.

There is no future without the past.  Memories preserve our past and allow us to grow and move forward.  Hearing or reading other people's memories, or protecting an organization's institutional memory -- these are building blocks for the future, and they connect us to one another.  They are part of our common humanity.

We cannot forget.


If you are interested in "An Ordinary Man" it is available at Amazon.com -- search for Cheryl J. Weissman and you will see the book along with (and I have no idea how this found its way to Amazon) an article a wrote in 1991 for a now-defunct fundraising magazine.

Help Us Help You

If you are reading this, there's a decent chance that you were routed to it via an email we sent you, letting you know that there's a new blog entry.

CJW has been serving the nonprofit community for nearly 18 years. Through all of that time, we have remained a very small company, dedicated to keeping our costs and therefore the cost of our services as low as possible.

One of the tradeoffs that we've made to keep our costs down is that we don't do a lot of marketing. Recently we have ventured more into low- or no-cost marketing options such as social networking (CJW has a presence on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Plaxo and a few other sites). We've made some calls to nonprofits requesting permission to add contacts to our mailing list. However, we have relied primarly on word of mouth to keep CJW the successful firm it has been since 1993.

Today, I'm asking for your help, to better enable CJW to help you when you need us. If you've attended one of our webinars, online or on-site trainings; if a CJW staff person has provided consulting or data cleanup or other services for your organization; if you believe that CJW offers high-quality services at reasonable rates, please let someone know.

You can do this is a number of ways. You can post a comment below this blog entry; forward one of our emails to a colleague at another nonprofit organization; go to our website and complete a referral form for an organization that might be in need of our services, or you can give me a call at 866/598-0430 if you think a colleague needs to hear from us.

I'm happy to be able to say that CJW is healthy and I'm optimistic that we will remain healthy as we all navigate the current economy. We are proud to be able to serve nonprofits and hope to continue to do so. I'm committed to continuing to keep our rates as low as possible. Anything you can do to spread the word about CJW will be greatly appreciated.

Thank you!

Happy Holidays

Today I prepared what should be my final global email for 2009. As such, I took the opportunity to wish my readers Happy Holidays.

I do this every year, in one form or another. I have always been carefully non-sectarian, not wishing to offend anyone. However, as I was searching for images to include in the email, I found one showing a dreidel and some "gelt". These are representations of the Jewish Hannukkah holiday, which begins at sundown on December 11th this year, and ends on December 19th.

Initially I bypassed the image and went on looking for something with snowflakes or trees or a globe or just the words "Happy Holidays". But I ended up returning to the Hannukkah image and including it in the email, along with one that says Happy Holidays but also shows a decorated Christmas tree. I love Christmas trees!

I included the Hannukkah image because of the meaning of the dreidel and the "gelt." A dreidel is a 4-sided spinning top. Each of the 4 sides has a Hebrew letter on it, and the 4 letters represent the words "nes gadol haya sham" -- "A great miracle happened there." The miracle involved an oil lamp with enough oil to burn for one day that actually burned for 8 days and allowed the Jewish people to cleanse and rededicate the temple in Jerusalem in the 2nd century BCE after its desecration by the forces of Antiochus IV.

"Gelt" is a Yiddish word that means money. It's been a tradition since the 17th century to give children small sums of money (coins) during Hannukkah. Apparently this started in Poland and was approved by the rabbis because it publicized the story of the oil.

So one reason I included the Hannukkah image is that these are uncertain times, so the reminder that miracles happen every day somewhere seems important to remember. And as all of our work is with nonprofits -- well, who could not use more money to advance their mission and achieve their goals? Perhaps my gelt can bring you some of your own in 2010!

The other reason is purely personal. CJW is my company -- I created it and it literally has my name attached to it. The more time goes by, the harder it becomes for me to separate who I am from what CJW is. I'm a Jewish woman. Judiasm is part of who I am and by extension, it's part of CJW as well.

Someone once told me that to them, a Jewish person is someone who tries to do good; tries to be the best person they can be; treats people as they would be treated; and respects others as they would be respected by others. While I know well that these attributes are not limited to the Jewish people, I do strive to live by them.

I've lived with these precepts all my life. I manage CJW based on the principles I learned growing up in a Jewish family.

This is the foundation for CJW. I have enormous respect and admiration for the nonprofit community. For over 16 years now, I've striven to show this by providing affordable, high-quality services. For as long as CJW exists, this will not change, nor will my commitment to nonprofits and their work.

For everyone reading this, let me wish you happy holidays, whether you will be celebrating St. Nicholas Day, the Fiesta of Our Lady of Guadalupe, St. Lucia Day, Hannukkah, Christmas, Boxing Day, Kwanzaa or Omisoka; or you have recently observed Ramadan, Eid al-Fitr or Eid'ul-Adha.

And my very best wishes for a happy, healthy 2010!

Please Shine A Light on CJW Consulting!

CJW Consulting & Services has been nominated in the Shine A Light contest from American Express and NBC Universal. In order to be considered for an award, we need a minimum of 50 endorsements.

Please go to:

http://www.ivillage.com/shinealight?ice=iv:mini:amex:emailpromo

and read our story. If you feel that you can, please take a few moments to endorse CJW -- should we be fortunate enough to win, we will receive funding for marketing and business development that will make an enormous difference to us.

If you can, please also forward this to anyone that knows of CJW and can offer an endorsement.

And please let me know if you do find yourself able to endorse us, so I can thank you!

I've Got Wiki Fever

And the only prescription is... More cowbell!

I've been looking for a way to bring "more cowbell" into the blog for a long time, so thank you for letting me get that out of my system (and apologies to those unfamiliar with the SNL sketch in which Christopher Walken plays a music producer demanding that Blue Oyster Cult record "Don't Fear The Reaper" with more cowbell.)

And now to our business for the day, which is the answer the question "What the heck is a wiki?"

"Wiki" is a Hawaiian word for fast, and it is an apt name, because a wiki is "a website that uses wiki software, allowing the easy creation and editing of any number of interlinked Web pages, using a simplified markup language or a WYSIWYG text editor, within the browser. Wikis are often used to create collaborative websites, to power community websites, and for note taking." (definition from wikipedia.org)

Wiki software is defined as "a type of collaborative software program that typically allows web pages to be created and collaboratively edited using a common web browser." (definition from wikipedia.org)

In simpler terms, a wiki is an easy-to-create web space where you can share information with others, whether they be classmates, business associates, co-workers, friends, etc.

There are of dozens of wiki-creation sites available (there are over 60 included in a comparison at Wikipedia.org.) I chose www.wikispaces.com, as it was recommended to me by an associate. I think it was a great choice. In less than 10 minutes, I had created an account and created a short page to introduce you to the wiki page.

The CJW wiki page will be collaborative in that you can enter comments and create discussion topics. Other wikis are collaborative in different ways. For example, if you are preparing a proposal or grant request and need input from other staff members or board members, you can post the document on the wiki page and anyone with access to that page would be able to view the document and edit it.

Wikipedia itself is a wiki, and probably the ultimate collaborative website. As you may be aware, Wikipedia allows readers to update, edit and add content -- that's the whole point on Wikipedia.

You might be curious about the cost -- wikispaces.com has several options available, one of which is free. For a basic (free) account, you can have one wiki with an unlimited number of pages, users and messages. You can store content up to 2 GB, with each individual file restricted to a maximum of 10 MB. Basic accounts will see advertising on their wiki -- paid accounts do not use ads.

Paid accounts start at $5 a month or $50 for a year. You can check all this out at www.wikispaces.com. And please check out our wiki (and leave a comment!) at http://cjwconsulting.wikispaces.com/.

Tweeting on Twitter

Twitter is my most recent venture into the online world of social networking. I avoided Twitter assiduously for many months, because the idea of stopping in my tracks to tell the online world what I'm doing (in 140 letters or less) seemed... I don't know -- wacky, maybe?

In case you think I'm kidding, here is what you are greeted with when you go to www.twitter.com:

Twitter is a service for friends, family, and co–workers to communicate and stay connected through the exchange of quick, frequent answers to one simple question: What are you doing?

But I forged ahead, because more and more people are asking questions about Twitter and whether or not it can help them with fundraising and donor management. In fact, I set up two accounts, one a personal one and one for CJW Consulting. And here's what I am finding:

Twitter is a great way to stay in touch.

I work a lot, so I don't think that my personal posts (referred to as "tweets") are that interesting. However, Twitter keeps my husband and me in much closer touch with very dear friends that live in Florida. We rarely see them and as we are four extremely busy people, it's not easy to be in touch by phone or even email -- but Twitter keeps us up to date with their daily lives.

After a few weeks of personal Twittering, I set up a new Twitter account for CJW Consulting (the account name is cjwconsult, if you're already Twittering and would like to follow us). I wanted to get a feel for how I might use the (free) service to let nonprofits know about our services. Once the account was set up, I searched on various keywords (nonprofit, non-profit, fundraising, etc.) to find existing Twitter accounts that belonged to people connected to the nonprofit community.

I located about 50 accounts and opted to "follow" them. This means that I get sent copies of all of their posts. Many Twitter users, when you choose to follow them, will then begin to follow you in return. The cjwconsult account currently has 21 users following it, with one or two more signing on every day.

To date, we are using the Twitter account to make available discounts on web services to people who see our tweets and sign up for a webinar or web training. We can also, if we choose, use Twitter to advertise our presence at conferences, participation in seminars or webinars (we've been asked to serve on a panel at the Chicago Fundraising Summit later this month, although the timing may not work out for that.)

I can see Twitter being a great tool for nonprofits. In a few seconds, you can send information about an event or a special need. You can drive traffic to your website by including a URL in a Twitter post. You can reinforce your message on a regular basis.

We've really just scratched the surface of what Twitter can do and how it works. If you are interested in more information, perhaps even a webinar about getting started and learning some of the tricks of the Twitter trade, please click on "comments" below and let me know.