I also agree fully with Jim McLachlan’s comments about the importance of underscoring synchronized values (case articulation), while cultivating, building and sustaining solid and positive relationships. These are the foundation of productive advancement efforts.

What I also ponder in this discussion is the fact that we can build our strategies, plans and initiatives on facts and assumptions that might not work out in the ways we predict.

What was projected and assumed about the philanthropic behavior of the “boomers” over the past 20 years or so might be quite different from what we will see transpiring as real time goes on from here.

Life in the larger world and society will always be affected by a huge array of factors and realities that can alter human behavior in the heat of the moment. Economic conditions, political upheaval, cultural shifts and societal crises all can undermine the earlier predictions of a group’s evolving behavior.

Maybe, in the final analysis, the boomers might not be the vaunted champions of philanthropy that many have expected them to be. If not, the lesson to be learned is that we in the nonprofit advancement profession must remain vigilant about changes in the larger scheme of things, attuned to the current mindset of a specific population group, and ready to adapt, at every turn, to the changing environment in which we operate.