Transcending Transactions: Human-Centred Fundraising in a Digital Age (with Adrian Bartha & Aaron Sanderson)

A donor becomes a row in a database. A gift becomes a number on a dashboard. A person in need becomes a story deployed to move that number. Somewhere along the way, fundraising can start to feel less like an invitation and more like an extraction - even though the whole thing only works because of something deeply human: the personal decision to give.

And that decision is getting rarer. Over the past decade, the share of Canadians who donate has fallen from 82% to 54%, according to Statistics Canada’s Survey on Giving, Volunteering and Participating - roughly three million fewer donors since 2018 alone. So is generosity itself shifting?

As Canadians head into the season of giving, host Bruce MacDonald is joined by two leaders who see the question from opposite ends of the gift. Adrian Bartha, CEO of raisin software - the Toronto-based fundraising platform that 1.5 million people give through each year; and Aaron Sanderson, President and CEO of Kids Help Phone Foundation - where phone, text, and chat open the door for young people, but there’s always a real person on the other side.

Together, they unpack why people actually give (including what the sector tends to get wrong), how to meet people where they are, whether that’s a phone call, a text, or a click, and adopt new technology without losing what matters most, and where they draw the line as AI reshapes both fundraising and care. They also share practical advice for small and mid-sized organizations doing this work with limited time and tools - and what gives them hope for the year ahead. It’s a conversation about treating every gift not as the finish line, but as the start of a relationship.

Make sure to check out our full episode list. This episode is also available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and YouTube.

This podcast was made possible thanks to generous support from our sponsors.

SUPPORTING PARTNERS