Key Takeaways:

• Lasting fundraising growth does not come from better tactics alone but from changing the internal narratives that drive behavior. Coaching addresses fear, money stories, and self-doubt that silently undermine even the best strategies.
• Fundraising leaders often carry invisible baggage that affects how they show up with donors and teams. Coaching builds awareness, emotional neutrality, and sovereignty by separating facts from stories and reducing reactive behavior.
• Effective fundraising leaders coach boards and staff through fear, avoidance, and shame rather than simply training them. Through questions, accountability, and normalized discomfort, coaching creates ownership without blame.
• Over-functioning leaders burn out when they carry all the emotional and relational weight alone. Coaching redistributes responsibility, strengthens collaboration, and removes leaders as the bottleneck in fundraising efforts.

“Strategy is great. Training is great. You need both those things, but mostly they do not shift your mindset. They do not shift your thinking.”

“Sovereignty means you own your own thoughts, choices, and actions. You do not outsource your confidence to outcomes, and you do not let no define your worth or competence.”

“At its heart, fundraising is a team sport. When you coach instead of carry, you stop being the bottleneck.” 

- Maryanne Dersch

Let’s Work Together to Amplify Your Leadership + Influence

1. Group Coaching for Nonprofit Leaders

Want to lead with more clarity, confidence, and influence? My group coaching program is designed for nonprofit leaders who are ready to communicate more powerfully, navigate challenges with ease, and move their organizations forward.
 

2. Team Coaching + Training

I work hands-on with nonprofit teams to strengthen leadership, improve communication, and align around a shared vision. Whether you’re growing fast or feeling stuck, we’ll create more clarity, collaboration, and momentum—together.
 

3. Board Retreats + Trainings

Your board has big potential. I’ll help you unlock it. My engaging, no-fluff retreats and trainings are built to energize your board, refocus on what matters, and generate real results.

Get your free starter kit today at www.theinfluentialnonprofit.com

Connect with Maryanne about her coaching programs:

https://www.courageouscommunication.com/connect

Book Maryanne to speak at your conference:

https://www.courageouscommunication.com/nonprofit-keynote-speaker

Key Takeaways:

• Fundraising nos and prolonged indecision often reflect emotional readiness, not the quality of the ask. Letting go of over-attachment to a yes allows fundraisers to listen more clearly.
• The Map of Consciousness offers a practical way to understand donor behavior without ranking people as better or worse. Effective fundraising adapts presence and strategy to a donor’s current emotional state.
• Lower emotional states call for safety and acknowledgment rather than solicitation. Courage is the turning point where donors become open to clear, values-based asks.
• Repeated follow-up does not move donors emotionally; trust and presence do. When a relationship leads, financial support follows.

“The issue isn’t your ask. It isn’t your words. It isn’t your case. It’s that the ask is happening at the wrong level of readiness.”

“You cannot argue your way into a yes.”

“Love doesn’t need a pitch; it needs a pathway.” 

- Maryanne Dersch

Let’s Work Together to Amplify Your Leadership + Influence

1. Group Coaching for Nonprofit Leaders

Want to lead with more clarity, confidence, and influence? My group coaching program is designed for nonprofit leaders who are ready to communicate more powerfully, navigate challenges with ease, and move their organizations forward.
 

2. Team Coaching + Training

I work hands-on with nonprofit teams to strengthen leadership, improve communication, and align around a shared vision. Whether you’re growing fast or feeling stuck, we’ll create more clarity, collaboration, and momentum—together.
 

3. Board Retreats + Trainings

Your board has big potential. I’ll help you unlock it. My engaging, no-fluff retreats and trainings are built to energize your board, refocus on what matters, and generate real results.

Get your free starter kit today at www.theinfluentialnonprofit.com

Connect with Maryanne about her coaching programs:

https://www.courageouscommunication.com/connect

Book Maryanne to speak at your conference:

https://www.courageouscommunication.com/nonprofit-keynote-speaker

Key Takeaways:

• Centering fundraising on genuine care, honesty, and alignment creates trust and long-term support rather than transactional gains. Actions from authentic relationships feel meaningful, while actions solely for money feel manipulative.
• Loving donor relationships are honest, authentic, and aligned. They are not transactional or performative, and both the donor and organization benefit from shared values and mutual yeses.
• Applying love languages in fundraising—words of affirmation, quality time, acts of service, meaningful gifts, and shared experiences—builds connection without pressure or manipulation. Each interaction should reflect respect, care, and intention.
• Listening, personalization, and alignment are critical. Engaging only with donors who resonate with the organization’s mission fosters sustainable giving, while letting go of misaligned relationships protects energy, trust, and long-term impact.

“If we are doing things for our donors because we genuinely love and care about them… that’s a loving relationship.”

“Love languages don’t replace integrity. They express integrity.”

“Healthy donor relationships don’t come from saying the right thing. They come from being in the right relationship.”

- Maryanne Dersch

Let’s Work Together to Amplify Your Leadership + Influence

1. Group Coaching for Nonprofit Leaders

Want to lead with more clarity, confidence, and influence? My group coaching program is designed for nonprofit leaders who are ready to communicate more powerfully, navigate challenges with ease, and move their organizations forward.
 

2. Team Coaching + Training

I work hands-on with nonprofit teams to strengthen leadership, improve communication, and align around a shared vision. Whether you’re growing fast or feeling stuck, we’ll create more clarity, collaboration, and momentum—together.
 

3. Board Retreats + Trainings

Your board has big potential. I’ll help you unlock it. My engaging, no-fluff retreats and trainings are built to energize your board, refocus on what matters, and generate real results.

Get your free starter kit today at www.theinfluentialnonprofit.com

Connect with Maryanne about her coaching programs:

https://www.courageouscommunication.com/connect

Book Maryanne to speak at your conference:

https://www.courageouscommunication.com/nonprofit-keynote-speaker

Key Takeaways:

• 90 days is long enough to get something done, but short enough that there’s some urgency to it. The 90-day MOST stands for Mission, Objective, Strategy, and Tactics. It accounts for having an overall vision and creating simple strategies to implement each quarter. 
• We need to have a clear vision so that we know what we’re looking for. Before creating a plan, take time to create a vision board. Visualize what you want to create in your life and depict it in your vision board. 
• Once you have a vision, determine an objective. Then, create three strategies that will serve to achieve that objective. Under each strategy, create three simple tactics. Keep it simple. 
   

“90 days has been studied to be very effective. It's long enough to get something done. But it's short enough that you there's some urgency to it.”
 

“We create the vision. And then from that vision, we create the plan. But we don't want to plan while creating the vision, because we wind up talking ourselves out of doing some bold things.”
 

“We're keeping it very, very simple. The more complicated you make this, the less likely it's going to work for you. So you pick what would make this quarter be the win for you.” 

- Maryanne Dersch


 

Let’s Work Together to Amplify Your Leadership + Influence

1. Group Coaching for Nonprofit Leaders

Want to lead with more clarity, confidence, and influence? My group coaching program is designed for nonprofit leaders who are ready to communicate more powerfully, navigate challenges with ease, and move their organizations forward.
 

2. Team Coaching + Training

I work hands-on with nonprofit teams to strengthen leadership, improve communication, and align around a shared vision. Whether you’re growing fast or feeling stuck, we’ll create more clarity, collaboration, and momentum—together.
 

3. Board Retreats + Trainings

Your board has big potential. I’ll help you unlock it. My engaging, no-fluff retreats and trainings are built to energize your board, refocus on what matters, and generate real results.

Get your free starter kit today at www.theinfluentialnonprofit.com

Connect with Maryanne about her coaching programs:

https://www.courageouscommunication.com/connect

Book Maryanne to speak at your conference:

https://www.courageouscommunication.com/nonprofit-keynote-speaker

Key Takeaways:

• Reframe goals as guides, not judgments. Traditional output-focused goals can create pressure and burnout; goals should inform your direction, not define your worth or success.
• Wrap up the year holistically. Reflect on wins, surprises, and growth beyond numeric targets, release what no longer serves you, and recognize internal and relational progress as real achievements.
• Make goals human-centered, not just metric-centered. Reframing SMART goals to be Supportive, Meaningful, Aligned, Relational, and Tension-free ensures they strengthen trust, connection, and values alongside traditional metrics.
• Measure relationships, not just money. Track trust, reciprocity, affinity, consistency, and advocacy to prioritize connection and mission impact, understanding that financial outcomes naturally follow strong relational foundations.

“Goals aren't good or bad. They are just what they are. They are information.”

“If we're only measuring our worth by input and output, we're really missing a lot on what we're doing and the progress that we're making.”

"Work can be joyful. Grace, ease, joy is sustainable. Hustle and grind is not.”

- Maryanne Dersch

Let’s Work Together to Amplify Your Leadership + Influence

1. Group Coaching for Nonprofit Leaders

Want to lead with more clarity, confidence, and influence? My group coaching program is designed for nonprofit leaders who are ready to communicate more powerfully, navigate challenges with ease, and move their organizations forward.
 

2. Team Coaching + Training

I work hands-on with nonprofit teams to strengthen leadership, improve communication, and align around a shared vision. Whether you’re growing fast or feeling stuck, we’ll create more clarity, collaboration, and momentum—together.
 

3. Board Retreats + Trainings

Your board has big potential. I’ll help you unlock it. My engaging, no-fluff retreats and trainings are built to energize your board, refocus on what matters, and generate real results.

Get your free starter kit today at www.theinfluentialnonprofit.com

Connect with Maryanne about her coaching programs:

https://www.courageouscommunication.com/connect

Book Maryanne to speak at your conference:

https://www.courageouscommunication.com/nonprofit-keynote-speaker

Key Takeaways:

• Sustainable change begins by raising standards, not just managing expectations. Standards define the floor you will no longer fall below, while expectations shape the ceiling you desire. Boundaries and agreements act as the walls that uphold both.
• Boundaries focus on what you no longer want to tolerate or experience. Agreements clarify what you do want and how it will work in practice. They turn avoidance into intention and make expectations visible to others.
• Agreements reduce resentment by replacing unspoken rules with shared understanding. They teach others how to relate to you personally, professionally, and in leadership spaces. Strong agreements create safety, predictability, and mutual respect.
• Raising standards often invites testing, especially in the early stages. Holding the agreement while releasing the outcome allows relationships to adjust naturally. Over time, people either rise to meet the standard or drift away.

“We can't change behavior unless we change the boundaries and agreements that uphold and support that behavior.”

“We teach people how to treat us.”

“Your internal agreements will determine your external results.” 

- Maryanne Dersch

Let’s Work Together to Amplify Your Leadership + Influence

1. Group Coaching for Nonprofit Leaders

Want to lead with more clarity, confidence, and influence? My group coaching program is designed for nonprofit leaders who are ready to communicate more powerfully, navigate challenges with ease, and move their organizations forward.
 

2. Team Coaching + Training

I work hands-on with nonprofit teams to strengthen leadership, improve communication, and align around a shared vision. Whether you’re growing fast or feeling stuck, we’ll create more clarity, collaboration, and momentum—together.
 

3. Board Retreats + Trainings

Your board has big potential. I’ll help you unlock it. My engaging, no-fluff retreats and trainings are built to energize your board, refocus on what matters, and generate real results.

Get your free starter kit today at www.theinfluentialnonprofit.com

Connect with Maryanne about her coaching programs:

https://www.courageouscommunication.com/connect

Book Maryanne to speak at your conference:

https://www.courageouscommunication.com/nonprofit-keynote-speaker

Key Takeaways:

• Many nonprofit leaders enter the new year already depleted from the holiday rush. Emotional residue from 2025 lingers in the body and shapes early decisions. A reset begins by acknowledging how much energy was carried forward unnoticed.
• Leaders often bring guilt, unfinished conversations, and unresolved pressure into 2026. Closing loops matters more than fixing everything that happened. Release becomes the doorway to entering the new year with clarity and choice.
• Leadership begins with knowing your actual energetic capacity, not the idealized version. From that honesty, you choose what stays, what shifts, and what boundaries support you. Agreements rooted in calm reshape how you lead and how you protect your energy.
• Reclaiming means deciding who you are becoming and leading from that center. Leaders choose identities like calmer, clearer, or more sovereign and act from that energy. This practice restores agency and ensures no circumstance dictates your value.

“If you don't pause or reset, you're going to step into the new year carrying the energy of the old one.”

“Every boundary, every decision, every conversation, every interaction is going to come from that survival mode place - that's the lens through which you're going to view the world.”

“Reclaiming your energy means consciously choosing the leadership identity you want to embody this year.” 

- Maryanne Dersch

Let’s Work Together to Amplify Your Leadership + Influence

1. Group Coaching for Nonprofit Leaders

Want to lead with more clarity, confidence, and influence? My group coaching program is designed for nonprofit leaders who are ready to communicate more powerfully, navigate challenges with ease, and move their organizations forward.
 

2. Team Coaching + Training

I work hands-on with nonprofit teams to strengthen leadership, improve communication, and align around a shared vision. Whether you’re growing fast or feeling stuck, we’ll create more clarity, collaboration, and momentum—together.
 

3. Board Retreats + Trainings

Your board has big potential. I’ll help you unlock it. My engaging, no-fluff retreats and trainings are built to energize your board, refocus on what matters, and generate real results.

Get your free starter kit today at www.theinfluentialnonprofit.com

Connect with Maryanne about her coaching programs:

https://www.courageouscommunication.com/connect

Book Maryanne to speak at your conference:

https://www.courageouscommunication.com/nonprofit-keynote-speaker

Key Takeaways:

• Influence is the art of getting people you have no authority over to do what you want them to do, not just because they have to do it, but because they choose to. Your ability to influence others is critical to your success. 
• The first step in mastering the art of influence and showing up as an influential leader is knowing yourself. It’s not about anybody else. Train yourself first before anybody else in the organization, because you are the trailblazer who sets the limit for others. If you raise your game, they will rise with you. 
• Discover and honor the things that make each person in your team unique. Acknowledge those things so that they will light up and they will join you in your vision. 
• Look within yourself for credibility rather than relying on others to recognize your worth. This is the key to becoming a sovereign, influential leader. If you want them to recognize something in you, you have to recognize it in yourself first. 

“An influential leader shifts that narrative from going to somebody who needs other people to feel good. Instead, we know ourselves, and we cultivate our own energy ourselves so that we stay sovereign.”

“If you can feel anything, you can do anything, and influential leaders understand how their thoughts and feelings play into their everyday decision-making, and they know how to navigate in a way that feels really good, really easy, and really aligned. ”

“Showing up as an influential leader means having deep trust in yourself and others, that everything is working out as it should, that there is nothing to fear. ” 

- Maryanne Dersch

Let’s Work Together to Amplify Your Leadership + Influence

1. Group Coaching for Nonprofit Leaders

Want to lead with more clarity, confidence, and influence? My group coaching program is designed for nonprofit leaders who are ready to communicate more powerfully, navigate challenges with ease, and move their organizations forward.
 

2. Team Coaching + Training

I work hands-on with nonprofit teams to strengthen leadership, improve communication, and align around a shared vision. Whether you’re growing fast or feeling stuck, we’ll create more clarity, collaboration, and momentum—together.
 

3. Board Retreats + Trainings

Your board has big potential. I’ll help you unlock it. My engaging, no-fluff retreats and trainings are built to energize your board, refocus on what matters, and generate real results.

Get your free starter kit today at www.theinfluentialnonprofit.com

Connect with Maryanne about her coaching programs:

https://www.courageouscommunication.com/connect

Book Maryanne to speak at your conference:

https://www.courageouscommunication.com/nonprofit-keynote-speaker

Key Takeaways:

• Understanding how thoughts and feelings contribute to decision-making is key to influential leadership. Influential leadership creates sustainable workforces with less turnover and more productivity.
• The first step towards becoming an influential leader is to go inward. Be willing to understand how the thoughts, beliefs, and experiences that you had when you were young impact the decisions that you make today.
• Guilt is when we feel bad for what we do, and shame is when we feel bad about who we are. Most things that upset us originate from deeply rooted feelings of guilt and shame. When navigating conflicts of others or your own, pay attention to what’s making you and others feel uncomfortable.
• An influential leader’s job is to create more good leaders. When you practice influential leadership, not only are you creating a more influential and conscious leadership for yourself, but you're also teaching others how their thoughts and feelings contribute to their everyday decision-making, which helps them resolve things internally.

“Every minute we spend in clean-up conversations that could have been avoided with better communication and leadership - we're moving away from the work we were called to do.”

“You have to be willing to go inside, and understand what thoughts and beliefs were implanted in you when you were young, and how those can be affecting the decision-making that you make today.”

“When you find yourself in a conflict or navigating somebody else's conflict, first you have to pay attention to what's happening in your body, what am I feeling? And then seeing other people - there’s something inside of them that’s uncomfortable with this, what can we do?” 

“Good leaders create more good leaders and influential leaders; their job is to create more good leaders.”

- Maryanne Dersch

Let’s Work Together to Amplify Your Leadership + Influence

1. Group Coaching for Nonprofit Leaders

Want to lead with more clarity, confidence, and influence? My group coaching program is designed for nonprofit leaders who are ready to communicate more powerfully, navigate challenges with ease, and move their organizations forward.
 

2. Team Coaching + Training

I work hands-on with nonprofit teams to strengthen leadership, improve communication, and align around a shared vision. Whether you’re growing fast or feeling stuck, we’ll create more clarity, collaboration, and momentum—together.
 

3. Board Retreats + Trainings

Your board has big potential. I’ll help you unlock it. My engaging, no-fluff retreats and trainings are built to energize your board, refocus on what matters, and generate real results.

Get your free starter kit today at www.theinfluentialnonprofit.com

Connect with Maryanne about her coaching programs:

https://www.courageouscommunication.com/connect

Book Maryanne to speak at your conference:

https://www.courageouscommunication.com/nonprofit-keynote-speaker

Key Takeaways:

• Supporters engage for a reason, a season, or a lifetime, each bringing unique value. Instead of expecting long-term loyalty from everyone, recognize the natural ebb and flow. Gratitude for every contribution keeps the relationship healthy and grounded.
• Tourists, seasonal residents, and townies each play a meaningful role in the ecosystem. One-time donors bring energy, visibility, and new connections when they matter most. Long-term supporters reveal themselves through aligned values and deeper engagement.
• Lasting relationships grow through purpose, connection, and involvement beyond giving. Inviting donors into stories, conversations, or behind-the-scenes roles builds ownership. When people feel seen and included, loyalty naturally strengthens and expands.
• Not every donor will stay forever, and that is part of a healthy pipeline. Letting go with appreciation frees energy to invest in aligned relationships. Focusing on shared values ensures every interaction remains meaningful and mutual.

“Our job is to give them meaningful experience while they're with us and release them with gratitude when they're ready to go.”

“Every donor plays a role in your ecosystem. You know, tourists bring energy and visibility, townies bring depth and sustainability, and there's space in between them, where just the relationships involved.”

“Relationship first, money will follow that. Build belonging, not just giving.” 

- Maryanne Dersch

Let’s Work Together to Amplify Your Leadership + Influence

1. Group Coaching for Nonprofit Leaders

Want to lead with more clarity, confidence, and influence? My group coaching program is designed for nonprofit leaders who are ready to communicate more powerfully, navigate challenges with ease, and move their organizations forward.
 

2. Team Coaching + Training

I work hands-on with nonprofit teams to strengthen leadership, improve communication, and align around a shared vision. Whether you’re growing fast or feeling stuck, we’ll create more clarity, collaboration, and momentum—together.
 

3. Board Retreats + Trainings

Your board has big potential. I’ll help you unlock it. My engaging, no-fluff retreats and trainings are built to energize your board, refocus on what matters, and generate real results.

Get your free starter kit today at www.theinfluentialnonprofit.com

Connect with Maryanne about her coaching programs:

https://www.courageouscommunication.com/connect

Book Maryanne to speak at your conference:

https://www.courageouscommunication.com/nonprofit-keynote-speaker