Individual sponsorship is certainly “smart” from a marketing perspective. You may be surprised, but your “sponsor child” may not actually be receiving the funds you donate (or is receiving far less than you suspect), or if they are, they may be harming the child:

http://www.hvk.org/articles/0603/169.html
http://www.aidworkers.net/?q=node/2026
http://www.newint.org/issue194/simply.htm
http://www.newint.org/issue111/keynote.htm

The book I referred to in the post also deals with this issue at length.

Please don’t take this comment as an attack on you for donating to World Vision (I have no idea how well or poorly they are run). I’m sure it comes from a spirit of generosity and wanting to help someone in need. I’m sure you’ll agree that it’s better when it actually *is* helping someone and not just giving the appearance…

I mostly donate to World Vision. When I signed up I asked how much of the money is directed towards actual aid rather than admin/marketing (something like 85% I think?). I was satisfied with that and I believe my money is going to help someone in need. They do occasionally follow up with opportunities to sponsor particular initiatives but it doesn’t really bother me. I think it’s smart of them to work to foster a connection between me and my sponsor child.

I only give to a few organizations, one applies 87% or so of donations to programs. The rest goes to staffing salaries, fundraising, etc. Their CEO earns a lowish 6 figures, but given the size of the organization I think he deserves it.

As for the street stuff, one thing I HATE about working in DC is that I may get accosted 3 times on my way to work. I don’t mind the panhandlers and I like the street musicians and may even give them money. But it’s the people doing fundraising and petitioning for various causes that get my goat. There are so many and you have to plan your route to avoid them if possible. Some almost block the entrance to the metro station! The only such group I’ve seen and liked was one that waited until the light was red and then walked up and down the line of stopped cars (big intersection, long light) with giant signs which had a url for a carpooling site. They didn’t impede traffic and they didn’t personally approach any of the drivers, but they provided potentially useful info. Least invasive.

As for the idea that it is somehow wrong to pay commissions or a healthy salary for fundraising, that’s incredible to me. If you don’t have a professional fundraiser who has the ability to convince major donors to contribute you simply won’t make the money to do what your organization is there to do. Do you think that wings on hospitals magically appear due to $20 contributions from people on the street and $2 donations at the checkout? They don’t. You have a handful of major donors giving $50,000 to $1 million plus for big projects or they would never be able be able to break ground. The $20 donations buy the beds, put up curtains, etc. but the bricks and mortar have to be there first. Without a professional fundraiser you will never see those big donations. (Disclaimer: while I won’t discuss what my own NP does I will say that I don’t work for a hospital foundation. It was just an appropriate example.)

We do one mailing campaign, one telephone campaign and one gala event per year (so I don’t think we harass people, although the folks I have to invoice 3 or 4 times before they actually pay up might differ with me on that). Yes, some other groups do a lot more but you can always ask not to be solicited. You donate when you want to and get your tax receipt but escape the solicitation.

One big problem that NPs have is that we can’t get enough volunteers when we need them or to do what we need them to do. So, sometimes hiring someone on commission makes a lot of sense. If you had 1,000 people to phone in a 2 or 3 week period and you only had enough volunteers to call 300 of them what would you do? Leave the money that those other 600 people would have donated on the table? Or pay somebody (or a few somebodies) 10% commission to call them all? Say even half of those people give you only $10 each. That is $3,000. Subtract the commission and you have $2,700 you would not have had otherwise. That is a good deal.

If you have a concern about how much of your donation actually goes to the projects you should ask, get a copy of the last annual report, look them up online, etc. The generally accepted rule is that you want no more than 20% to go to overhead and administrative costs. That means when you pay 10% commission, you are well within those guidelines, BTW.