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What's Under the Lidnotes from the back of house
Practical thinking on the systems behind your fundraising. The habits that make a CRM stick, the automations that buy your team time back, and the data that holds the relationships your fundraisers are building. Biweekly, and always free.
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Latest essays
Recent pieces from What's Under the Lid. Each links to the full essay, hosted right here.
Can Your Fundraising Operations Hold a Windfall?
I spent an evening with three Bay Area leaders whose organizations each got a MacKenzie Scott gift. The gift is the part everyone hears about. The quieter question, the one I live in, is whether your operations can actually hold it when the money lands.
Read the full postThe Oscars Just Showed You Four Donors in Your Database
This year's Oscar nominees map to four distinct giving styles already sitting in your database. Here's how I'd steward a Coogler differently than a Del Toro, a Jordan differently than a DiCaprio, right down to the CRM fields.
Read the full postYour Next Generation of Donors Is Already Giving. Are You Meeting Them There?
An entire generation is already giving in real time, through creators they trust. Creator-led campaigns raised over $100 million on Tiltify in 2025. Here's what that world gets right, and how to build a front door that feels made for younger donors.
Read the full postWhat the Winter Olympics Can Teach Your Nonprofit About Playing the Long Game
The athletes we cheer for are supported by systems built years in advance. Here's what the Olympic model gets right about sustaining relationships, plus the welcome sequences and impact reports you can build so the work keeps happening between the big moments.
Read the full postBreaking Down the Super Bowl LX's Fundraising Plays
The NFL doesn't just create visibility, it builds infrastructure to turn attention into connection. Here's the playbook your nonprofit can borrow for your next partnership, whether it's a national sponsor or the local coffee shop down the street.
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