Welcome to the Fit Fundraising Podcast, where we bring you game-changing fundraising topics, direct from our meetings with major donors and non-profits nationwide. We don’t interview “consultants” who haven’t met a donor in decades, Fit Fundraising stays on the front lines with nonprofit donors and leaders. This podcast is a glimpse into our work with non-profits as we get on the field with them and successfully model fundraising. Get ready to get FIT with the hottest show in fund development, Fit Fundraising.
Roy Jones
Hi, I’m Roy Jones and welcome to the Fit Fundraising Podcast. We’re so glad you joined us today. We’re going to have a great time and I have a great guest that you have to meet. I want to introduce you to Carrie Lynn Wright. Carrie has her own agency and again, after you hear her speak today, you’re going to want to call her. She’s voted a silver winner for the best mentor and business coach in 2025. Hospitality and Culture Workshop voted the best development workshop in 2021, 2022, 2024.
She’s a certified Enneagram coach, certified resume writer and interview coach, career coach, young professional Athena award winner in 2020. She’s written more than 100 published articles in numerous publications. She holds a bachelor’s degree in communication and broadcast journalism and a master’s in counseling, both from Liberty University. She is wife to Michael and mom to Eli, and Violet. Carrie uses her experience and education to transform workplace culture, working with individuals and teams through emotional intelligence training, leadership development, and strategic planning. She’s helped us dramatically here at Fit Fundraising. She serves our team as a contractor, as a senior account director, helping us manage accounts. Carrie, thank you so much for joining us today. We’re so honored to have you.
Carrie Wright
Thanks, Roy. I’m excited to actually join the podcast. This is exciting.
Roy Jones
Well, it is long overdue, and we are just glad to have you
Carrie Wright
Well, I enjoy being a part of the Fit Fundraising team. I appreciate the accolades and just awesome to be a part of all of that you’re doing and helping nonprofits.
Roy Jones
Take just a minute and again, I know it’s kind of a little bit of a blended approach, but so much of what you do does help nonprofits with fundraising specifically. Take just a minute and talk a little bit about your company and then how you help us here at Fit Fundraising.
Carrie Wrigh
Yeah, so my agency is Wright Consulting and I consider myself exactly what you said, a workplace performance guru. So I use a lot of the tools that we talked about, Enneagram, personality assessment, emotional intelligence, communication skills to really help teams work better together. I do a lot of that inside of the accounts that we also serve through Fit Fundraising and a lot of that also helps with strategic planning, helping the nonprofits that we serve to really know exactly who they’re reaching, how to reach them, their donors the best, and build those relationships.
Roy Jones
Fantastic. Well, let’s get right into the discussion. We’re eager to spend time today talking about the generational differences that nonprofit leaders face, both in the workplace as well as dealing with staff, clients, and donors in the community. Take just a minute. Of course, I’m one of the old guys in the boomer generation, and you’re one of the newer and I really believe national leaders in workplace culture. Are you a Gen X, a millennial Gen Z? Tell us a little bit about that.
Carrie Wright
I begrudgingly fall right on the line of the Gen X generation at the very top of it, but I am officially Gen X. Yes, that’s true.
Roy Jones
Very good, very good. Well what trends and what do you see as different among the generations? What trends are you seeing in organizations and just how does it help us in fundraising and development?
Carrie Wright
Yeah, let’s give our listeners just a brief overview of even what we’re talking about with different generations in the workplace. So right now we’re seeing as many as four different generations in the workplace. So we have just introduced Gen Z. Obviously they’re coming up and I’ll just kind of give a brief like overview, right? So our boomers, they’re about 61 to 79, sometimes 60 to 79. And they kind of grew up with this mentality. Their parents were probably coming out of the Great Depression. They were coming out of war.
And many of those before them, the builder generation, they were really a scarcity mindset, right? So like when they approached work, they felt like it was you were grateful to have a job. So those children, the boomers that are now kind of semi-retiring or maybe on the verge of retirement, they sort of felt like they deserved more. That was our first generation that both parents started to enter the workplace around in the late 70s and 80s. And so we saw the generation that was coming, my generation, Gen X.
We are about 45 to 60. We thought that we were going to do something better. And so our approach to really workplace was just, want to keep it real. We want you to be honest with us. We want you to just tell us exactly how it is. We’re going to approach work with, we want to own it all, right? Like we saw our parents, both of them working. They got the boats. They also got the divorces. And so we wanted to do it better. Millennials, they are…
overtaking the workplace right now. They are ages 30 to 44. They are our fastest growing in terms of how they’re leading as well as our fastest developing executive suite people, right? So they’re taking over leadership role. And what we saw from them is that they really treated the work as if life is a cafeteria. So, it took them a little bit of time to kind of decide maybe what career path they were on. They tried out maybe four or five different jobs in their 20s and now they’re starting to settle into those leadership roles as they’ve climbed the ladder. So they’re really leading our organizations, including a lot of our nonprofits. We’ve talked a lot about emerging leaders, right? That’s kind of where that’s coming from. Our Gen Zers, 14 to 29. And Millennials and Gen Z sometimes do not like each other being right on that verge, right? So yeah, there’s this definitive line of either I am a millennial or I am not. But Gen Z is one of the fastest growing generations in the workplace, right? So those are, they’re taking a lot of our customer service jobs, age 16, first job. And their generation is kind of looking at things coming out of COVID and saying, hey, we’re just hoping and coping right now. We don’t know what a job looks like. They’re the most stressed out generation. Number one thing they’re stressed out about, money.
So it’s really important that we know that about them because as we’re hiring them to work in our nonprofits or as we are reaching them as potential donors, we sort of need to know like what it is that they’re stressed out about. So that’s just a little bit about those generations.
Roy Jones
Wow, of course. You know, my biggest problem being a boomer is we think we know it all. Well. And we have to get over this propensity to lecture. And I know the younger generations don’t like that type of communication per se. Now, of course, we’re doing all types of marketing to acquire donors. Yes. And it’s really interesting. I’d love to hear your thoughts about how these different thought processes and how the different communication styles. come into how we’re acquiring donors in each of these generations.
Carrie Wright
Absolutely. We have to understand that different generations are going to be reached different ways, right? So you just talked about, you might know it all. Well, there is experience that comes with age and repetition, right? And what we’re seeing is such a pivot when it comes to technology. And that’s hard for some of us older people. I’ll put myself in that same category.
We really have to work to bridge the gap. So what we’re gonna probably have to do, especially from a nonprofit standpoint, is we’re gonna have to use multiple different mediums across varying different platforms. I also really strongly encourage reverse mentoring. So you’re talking about how you have a lot to share and there is wisdom in the age and the years and the experience that you have. And some of our Gen Zers, some of our millennials, they’re probably gonna be a little bit more up to date on.
What’s the newest, latest, greatest technology? How do we reach their generations? That’s this idea of we both have something to share and we should both be willing to come to the table and sit down and listen.
Roy Jones
Very good. You know, that kind of brings up this shift in the way we think and a shift in strategies, the in the way we reach people. Yes. You know, I mean, I grew up boomers, you we like to talk, we like to read. And I grew up, you know, we were reading old fashioned paper letters. And of course, a lot of boomers still support a lot of organizations and need that type of.. communication, but what are you seeing about the different communication techniques with each of the generations?
Carrie Wright
Yeah, and there’s something to be said for boomers still want that piece of mail, right? Like Direct Mail has a place for a nonprofit to be able to understand, hey, if you’re still trying to reach that generation, and remember, those are the ones that are retiring, they’re probably accessing their investments and all of their 401Ks, they’ve got money to give. And that they’re a generous generation still, but they still want that piece of mail. However, if you want to reach a millennial or a Gen Z-er, you’re going to have to speak their language. What does that mean? You’re sending text messages.
You might be using online funding platforms. There have been things that have kind of overtaken some of their generation, but here’s the key. they are of a mentality of one and done. So they can either “fix it and forget it”, like, hey, I’ll give online, I’ll set my credit card, I don’t want to have to worry about it and come back to it, or they’re going to only give one time and never think about it again and think that they’ve done their part. So really, that’s where a lot of fit fundraising strategies come into place, right? So the friend raising that we talk a lot about and building those relationships, you’ve got to know how to effectively reach Gen Z and millennials to build a relationship so that they’ll keep coming back.
And really it’s about finding their passion, which we talk a lot about when it comes to fit fundraising strategies.
Roy Jones
Wow, Carrie, this has just been a wonderful conversation. I so appreciate it. Time just flew by and you know, we’re going to have you back and talk some more on these topics. But thank you again for joining us. And if our listeners wanted to learn more about how to connect with you directly, what’s the best way for them to do that?
Carrie Wright
Yeah, absolutely. They can go to my website at C-Wright, my last name, W-R-I-G-H-T, consulting.com, C-Wrightconsulting.com. They can check me out there, sign up for the newsletter, or even book a call with me if they’re interested anymore. Workplace culture norms or even generations in the workplace. I have a whole workshop that I do to teach different generations how to work better together. Communication is a gift. And that’s the final thing that I’ll say, is that we show each other that we care by being able to clearly communicate and doing that as a kindness to those that you both work with, as well as those donors that you’re trying to communicate with, build relationships with, and hopefully reach for the long term for your organization.
Roy Jones
Thank you again. I so appreciate it. And of course, the other thing you can do is you can go to fitfundraising.com. You can click on the your team page and you’ll see Carrie’s photo and a link to her website right there. But please, please, please, I want to encourage you to go to fitfundraising.com. My wife does not like me to introduce this. OK, so make Melinda mad. One thing we do is offer free fundraising counsel to nonprofits. Did hear that? Free, free. free. Now I have to admit, we’ve had more than 15 of our clients that we offered free fundraising counsel come back and actually have retained us month to month because the ROI we provide. But please, please click on that button and just let us reach out to us because we want to help you. That’s why we’re here and we really believe that we can make a difference in your mission and your ministry and help you make the world a better place.
fitfundraising.com. Thanks for joining us today on a podcast. We’ll see you soon.
Outro
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