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Overview

Meet Woodrow. He’s the Chief Data Officer at GivingTuesday, where he has been instrumental in shaping the global generosity movement and has led ground-breaking research and analysis of individual giving behaviors📊🔍 He spearheads the GivingTuesday Data Commons, an international collaboration involving over 100 partners in 50 countries🤝 On the podcast, he’s sharing his insights into the power of data-driven decision-making, dispelling myths about competition and highlighting the nuances of using AI in our current giving landscape. Don’t miss this timely conversation!

💡Learn

About the current state of generosity
The intersection of personalization and AI in fundraising
How nonprofit leaders can make data-driven decisions

Today’s Guest

Woodrow Rosenbaum, Chief Data Officer, GivingTuesday

“Question your assumptions. We see a lot of received wisdom in the sector that it just not borne out by the data.”

— Woodrow Rosenbaum, Chief Data Officer, GivingTuesday

Episode Transcript

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Episode Highlights

Woodrow’s story and journey to where he is today (4:20)
Generosity, giving, and fundraising trends (5:45)
Data from COVID-19 and how it can be applied to other challenging times (10:20)
Responsible use of AI in fundraising (15:20)
Using data to inform fundraising decisions (22:45)
Giving Tuesday strategies and inclusive philanthropy (24:00)
A powerful moment of philanthropy in Woodrow’s life (26:40)
Woodrow’s One Good Thing: My hope is we come together as a sector. (30:10)
How to connect with Woodrow (30:55)

POWERFUL QUOTES

“We're seeing broadly, generosity is common, diverse and robust. We are not seeing that people are becoming less generous, in fact that generosity is a lot more prolific than we thought when we were only measuring one thing, which was donations to nonprofits. “ -Woodrow

“We've been talking for a long time about the need for the sector to just segment more, which ultimately comes down to the right message for the right person, it's about personalization. AI holds the promise of being able to navigate that better, the AI is only going to be as good as the people who are deploying it.” -Woodrow

“Question your assumptions. We see a lot of received wisdom in the sector that it just not borne out by the data.” -Woodrow

“We can use AI as a much more sophisticated way of identifying our different types of supporters. But we have to back this up with an understanding that we need to give people a genuine connection to our mission and more ways of getting involved and that's not something AI can solve for you. But it can definitely leverage that.” -Woodrow

“A lot of fundraisers, they'll read a report or some data or findings or recommendations, and they'll believe that it's true, but they'll think that somehow they're the exception.” -Woodrow

“My hope is we come together as a sector, that we see the current trends as a call to action.“ -Woodrow

“This is our moment to shift. It's not optional anymore.” -Woodrow

“We can't over-index on large donor stewardship. Uh oh, what does that mean? It means that we get to do something a lot more fun, a lot more true to our missions, a lot more inclusive. and that’s the key to success.” -Woodrow

“We can launch that right now. And I think if we do, we're gonna see not just a turnaround, but a much more resilient sector moving forward.” -Woodrow