What a Move Actually Is
Most major gift officers are busy. Fewer are progressing donors. This lesson
draws a hard line between activity — calls, coffees, site visits, emails — and a true
move: an intentional action with a specific purpose, designed to produce a piece of
evidence that advances the donor’s readiness to commit. Until a fundraiser understands
this distinction, everything else in moves management builds on sand.
The busyness problem in major giving
Australian nonprofits employ major gift officers to raise significant money from a small number of relationships. The Productivity Commission (2024) estimates over $13 billion was donated to Australian charities in 2021, yet donations represent only about 7% of total charity-sector revenue — the gap between what exists and what is being raised is real, and it is not closed by contact volume.
The failure mode is not laziness. It is misdirected effort. A fundraiser can hold twelve donor meetings in a month, send thoughtful follow-up notes, attend three events and still have no donor closer to a meaningful commitment than they were in January. Every interaction was pleasant. Nothing moved.
This happens because activity and movement are not the same thing, and most organisations never teach the difference.
The word “moves” comes from the idea that a fundraiser should be able to move a donor — their clarity about the cause, their confidence in the organisation, their sense of readiness or urgency — from one position to a more committed one. If nothing has moved after an interaction, it was not a move. It was contact.
This distinction matters because it changes how a fundraiser thinks before a meeting, not just how they debrief one. An officer who asks “What am I trying to move?” before sitting down with a donor is doing different work from one who asks “What should we talk about?”
The definition of a move
A move is an intentional action with a specific purpose — to produce a
piece of evidence or a shift that advances the donor’s readiness to commit. If
you cannot state what a move was designed to produce before you take it, it is
not a move.
What “advancing readiness” actually means
A donor’s readiness to make a major gift is not a single dial that turns from cold to ready. It is a cluster of specific conditions. At any point a qualified donor may have:
- Genuine interest in the cause but incomplete understanding of how this organisation is addressing it
- Some trust in the fundraiser but unresolved scepticism about the organisation’s governance or effectiveness
- Personal wealth and giving history, but real anxiety about their financial security that is not being heard
- A relationship with the fundraiser but no peer or senior figure from the organisation in their frame of reference
- A general sense of willingness but no connection between their values and a specific gift opportunity
A move advances one or more of these conditions. It produces evidence — something the fundraiser now knows, or the donor now believes or feels — that did not exist before the interaction.
The Research for the Giving Experience and Giving Australia studies identifies trust as conditional rather than assumed: doubt grows when donors’ questions are not answered, while transparency and evidence of impact sustain the relationship. This means a move is not just about increasing warmth. It is about reducing specific gaps — in knowledge, trust, connection, or clarity — that are currently standing between the donor and a commitment.
Only 55% of Australians with taxable income over $1 million make any tax-deductible donation (Centre for Social Impact, 2022). The donors most worth cultivating already have the capacity. What they do not yet have — in the cases where they are not giving — is sufficient clarity, trust or urgency to act. Moves exist to build those things deliberately.
The Four-Test Framework — Is this a move?
Before or after any donor interaction, apply these four tests. A true move passes all four. Failing any one means the action was activity, stewardship, admin or maintenance contact — all of which have their place, but none of which should be mistaken for progression.
TEST 1: Did it have a declared purpose before it happened?
What it means: The fundraiser, before the interaction, could state specifically what they were trying to achieve — not “build the relationship” or “stay in touch”, but a concrete advance.
What it looks like (pass): Before a lunch, the fundraiser notes: “I want to understand whether David’s interest is in the research program or the community outreach work, because that will determine which program leader I introduce him to next.”
What it looks like (fail): “I’m having lunch with David to keep the relationship warm.”
Why it matters: Purpose is the difference between a professional managing a relationship and a professional socialising at a donor’s expense. Neither the fundraiser nor the donor is well served by undefined contact at this level of cultivation.
TEST 2: Did it produce evidence?
What it means: After the interaction, the fundraiser knows something they did not know before — about the donor’s motivation, hesitation, competing priorities, values, network, timeline, financial thinking, or connection to mission.
What it looks like (pass): After the meeting, the fundraiser records: “David said he’s thinking about what he wants his legacy to look like now that his youngest has finished university. He mentioned the word ‘legacy’ twice without prompting.”
What it looks like (fail): “Good meeting. David seemed positive and engaged. Will follow up.”
Why it matters: Evidence is the raw material of the next decision. Without it, the fundraiser cannot choose the right next move — they are guessing. Research from Giving Australia confirms that involvement and growing familiarity tend to precede major commitment; the fundraiser’s job is to use each interaction to understand what kind of involvement will deepen this donor’s connection, not simply to maintain goodwill.
TEST 3: Did it change something?
What it means: The donor’s position — their clarity, confidence, trust, urgency, sense of fit, or understanding of what their gift could achieve — is different after the interaction than before it.
What it looks like (pass): A donor who had never met the CEO now has a direct relationship and has asked to be kept informed about the capital campaign timeline. Something has changed.
What it looks like (fail): A donor who has been receiving impact newsletters for six months continues to receive impact newsletters. Their position is identical.
Why it matters: Stewardship maintains a relationship; cultivation advances it. Both are legitimate. They are not the same thing, and treating stewardship as a move inflates the apparent activity in a portfolio without producing progression.
TEST 4: Does it connect to a sequence?
What it means: The move has a place in a logical progression. It is not a random act of relationship maintenance — it follows from something and leads to something.
What it looks like (pass): The fundraiser has introduced the program director because they identified in an earlier meeting that the donor’s primary interest was in frontline delivery. The purpose of this move is to deepen mission connection at a more specific level, preparing the ground for a conversation about impact at scale. The next move will be a targeted site visit to the program the donor has now heard about directly.
What it looks like (fail): A fundraiser sends a handwritten note, then invites the donor to the annual dinner, then schedules a site visit, then sends another note — each interaction pleasant and well-executed, with no coherent thread connecting them or pointing toward a destination.
Why it matters: Donors do not always know they are being cultivated. But fundraisers should. A sequence has direction. A collection of warm contacts does not.
Calling stewardship a move
The mistake: A fundraiser records every touchpoint — newsletters sent, event invitations, Christmas cards, impact reports, anniversary acknowledgements — as moves in the CRM. The portfolio looks active. Donor advancement is minimal.
Why it happens: Stewardship actions are real work and they require effort. It is natural to want them to count. Organisations often reward visible activity without auditing whether donors are progressing, which means there is no cost to conflating the two. The fundraiser is also frequently uncertain about when to move harder, and maintaining pleasant stewardship feels safer than deliberately trying to shift a donor’s position.
What better practice looks like: Stewardship and moves are recorded separately and treated as distinct disciplines. Stewardship maintains trust and connection; it is essential and should be done well. But when a fundraiser reviews their active portfolio, the question they ask is not “Am I in regular contact?” — they ask “Am I producing evidence? Am I changing anything? Do I know what this donor’s next position needs to be and am I working toward it?” Stewardship sustains the conditions for a move. It is not a substitute for one.
Three interactions — one move, one stewardship action, one lost afternoon
Marcus manages a portfolio of 28 qualified donors for a Melbourne-based health research foundation. His manager has asked him to review the last quarter’s activity for three donors and assess whether any real progression has occurred.
Donor A — Priya: Marcus sent a personalised impact report in July, followed by a handwritten note referencing a research milestone Priya had mentioned caring about. In August he held a lunch where he specifically asked Priya what she understood about the foundation’s five-year research strategy and, based on her answer, identified a clear gap: Priya was not aware that the foundation’s work had expanded into paediatric research, which is where her professional background lies. He arranged for the head of the paediatric program to call Priya the following week. After that call, Priya asked Marcus whether there was a way to direct a future gift specifically to the paediatric program.
Donor B — Glenn: Marcus had coffee with Glenn in July, then again in August, then again in September. Each meeting lasted about 90 minutes and covered Glenn’s business, the foundation’s work, and current events. Glenn is warm, enjoys the meetings, and has given $10,000 annually for five years. Marcus describes Glenn as “a strong relationship.” He has no new information about Glenn’s giving intentions, values priorities or capacity trajectory, and no agreed next step.
Donor C — Tran: Marcus spent two hours in August preparing a detailed briefing note for a meeting that was cancelled the day before. He rescheduled for September. That meeting was also cancelled. He has not yet followed up to propose a third date.
The question is not which donor is the nicest or which relationship is oldest. The question is which of these interactions represent genuine moves.
Coaching notes
Priya: Marcus’s work here contains at least two genuine moves. The August lunch had a declared purpose — he was testing Priya’s understanding of the strategy — and it produced specific evidence: a knowledge gap. The introduction of the program head was a purposeful next action designed to close that gap. After it, Priya’s position changed: she moved from general supporter to someone who now has a specific program in mind and is asking a gift-direction question. That question is itself a signal. Marcus should record it precisely and use it to determine the next move. The stewardship in July was real and appropriate — but the momentum came from the moves.
Glenn: This is the hardest case for fundraisers to name, because the relationship genuinely is warm. But by the Four-Test Framework, none of the three coffees qualify as moves. No declared purpose, no new evidence produced, no change in Glenn’s position, no connection to a sequence. Glenn’s annual $10,000 is a baseline, not a progression. The risk here is not that the relationship will collapse — it is that it will stay exactly here for another three years while Marcus privately hopes Glenn will self-escalate. He will not. Financial anxiety is real even among comfortable donors (The Giving Experience), and without a deliberate move that surfaces Glenn’s thinking about his philanthropic future, there is no basis for advancement. The next interaction with Glenn needs a purpose.
Tran: Two cancelled meetings and no rescheduling follow-up. This is not a stall in the relationship — it is an absence of action. The two hours spent preparing were administration. The lost afternoon matters less than what it signals: if Marcus does not prioritise the reschedule, Tran is effectively inactive in the portfolio despite being formally listed as under active cultivation. The discipline of follow-through is part of what distinguishes moves management from wishful thinking.
Summary
A move is not a meeting. It is not a coffee, a newsletter, a call, or a site visit. Those are formats. A move is defined by its purpose, the evidence it produces, the change it creates in the donor’s position, and its place in a coherent sequence leading somewhere.
Most portfolio activity fails at least one of these four tests. That is not a character flaw in the fundraiser — it is the predictable result of never having been taught the distinction.
From here, the course builds on this foundation. The next lesson asks the more exacting question: given what you know about a specific donor, how do you choose the right next move? That question only makes sense once you understand what a move is.
What you can now do: before any donor interaction, state — in one sentence — what you are trying to produce. Not the topic. Not the occasion. The intended evidence or shift. If you cannot write that sentence, you are not yet ready to take the action.