Our minds can be darn cruel to us sometimes.

Many of us often get that itch to take on a new, monumental challenge. Usually, it’s inspired by watching someone else accomplish something great and thinking to ourselves “I want to know that feeling!” So, we start climbing the mountain, full of eager energy, ready for anything, and assured of our imminent success.

But then that first hurdle comes along. And even if we overcome that hurdle, it causes us to look up for the first time at the path that lies ahead and suddenly we see just how big that mountain is.

When that happens our mind begins an evolutionary cost/benefit analysis that’s beyond our control. We see how much work is left to do and make the decision that we’re better off not doing anything at all. So that’s exactly what we do – nothing. 

Short spurts of progress are then abandoned, because the task ahead is too great.

This psychological phenomenon is well-known in the fundraising world, particularly in regards to online fundraising. There’s an old trick in the crowdfunding world in which you set “mini-goals” that you promote to your supporters to help you reach your final goal.

Asking people to help you raise 100% of your goal by the weekend might be too much. Asking them to help you reach 60% feels more doable. Our brains’ cost/benefit analysis gives us the thumbs up, and we donate. 

Many nonprofit leaders don’t think about applying this strategy across their organizations.

People go into nonprofit work with a purpose. It’s not often that the field attracts individuals simply there to collect a paycheck or pad a resume. Nonprofit work attracts those with a strong desire to make a difference in the world.

The problem is, the issues nonprofits work to solve are as complex as they are massive in scale. They’re not easy problems. If they were, there wouldn’t need to be a nonprofit dedicated to fixing it.

This combination of a huge task and bright-eyed idealism can be a dangerous recipe for burnout 

Once that worker meets their first challenge, they’ll look ahead at the massive task that lies before them, and the brain negotiation begins and momentum can stall.

So how can nonprofit leaders help prevent this?

Just like a good crowdfunding campaign manager, it helps to think on a micro level.

Setting micro-goals for your team helps make gargantuan tasks manageable. More importantly, they help your team stay focused and engaged, undaunted by the mountain ahead.

Plenty of development workers do this by breaking up annual fundraising goals into quarterly or monthly increments. More polished development departments even set monthly or weekly metric goals for phone calls, visits, or asks made.

It is also important to remember the reason your team members got involved in nonprofit work in the first place: they wanted to make the world a better place to live. Your organization as a whole could be setting micro-goals that relate directly to your mission that the whole team is working towards in their own capacity. Opening three new learning centers in the next year. Providing 1,000 of your neighbours with health services this month. Signing up 50 more families for classes.

Too often, we forget that our nonprofit workers are subject to the same psychological quirks that our donors face. Just because we know all the “tricks” doesn’t mean that we’re not susceptible to them as well.

But by keeping your team on task with micro-goals, the mountain slowly gets smaller and smaller, while the view gets better and better.

Andrew Littlefield is a writer and marketer for WeDidIt, a startup focused on helping nonprofits maximize their fundraising efforts through software solutions. 
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