[NPFX Ep. 84] Ethical AI for Fundraisers: Best Practices That Safeguard Donor Trust (with Josh Gryniewicz)
When resource‑strapped nonprofits lean too heavily on AI to generate appeals and donor communications, they risk trading away long‑term donor trust for short‑term efficiency. In today's episode, Russ Phaneuf and narrative strategist Josh Gryniewicz explore best practices for using AI in fundraising while avoiding ethical pitfalls. Tune in to learn how to set practical guardrails around AI use, update storytelling practices to respect your constituents, avoid “AI sameness” that weakens your messaging, and operationalize "the human touch" so your fundraising remains both effective and trustworthy.
Episode highlights include:
Why AI-generated content tends to be predictable and lacks the distinctive human voice essential for effective nonprofit storytelling
Ethical uses of AI to support strategy, synthesis, and audience segmentation
Why fundraisers should plan to spend as much time refining and editing AI outputs as they do when writing outside of AI
How strong, confident human writers and storytellers become a nonprofit’s key differentiator in an AI-saturated landscape
Why feeding real client, beneficiary, or donor stories into AI can be both disrespectful and potentially harmful
How AI hallucinations (fabricated quotes, composite clients, or invented anecdotes) can damage credibility and trust
How to operationalize “people first” storytelling practices
Why nonprofits should revisit and update consent practices to address AI use and the repurposing of constituents’ stories
Engaging AI with follow-up questions and challenging its choices can lead to more nuanced and ethical outputs
How small, resource-strapped nonprofits can use AI to save time without crossing ethical lines in their messaging
Listen here:
Additional Resources
[NPFX] How a $10M Mindset Can Break the "Who You Know" Funding Barrier
[NPFX] Leveraging AI as Your Nonprofit Thought Partner
[NPFX] AI Tools for Grant Writing, Prospecting, and More
Guest
Josh Gryniewicz is the founder and Chief Narrative Strategist at Odd Duck, a storytelling-for-social-change creative consultancy focused on impact-driven organizations. Josh is the co-author of the award-winning national bestseller, Interrupting Violence. For over a decade, he has worked in nonprofit communication. In 2018, he founded Odd Duck to combine his passions for storytelling and social change. The agency’s Navigating Misinformation for Community Health framework has been shared with over a thousand community health organizations. Odd Duck has worked with nearly a hundred change-making organizations and advised hundreds more, including the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention, the Harvard School of Public Health, and the White House.
Host
Russ Phaneuf, a co-founder of IPM Advancement, has a background in higher education development, with positions at the University of Hartford, Northern Arizona University, and Thunderbird School of Global Management. As IPM's managing director & chief strategist, Russ serves as lead fundraising strategist, award-winning content creator, and program analyst specializing in applied system dynamics.
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