What Not To Wear: Petrus Edition - An Episode on Fundraising Attire

Happy New Year!  We're back with our first Petrus Development Show episode of 2025, and we return with a discussion about fundraising attire.  Yep, you read that correctly.  We're talking about clothing.  In this episode, Andrew and Tara share details about how a fundraiser should dress for donor meetings and events.  We find this topic especially important because, as a fundraiser, your clothing should never be a distraction (for you or the donor!) in meetings.  

Show Notes:

Join Rhen as he questions Andrew and Tara about all the clothing basics - from shoes to accessories and everything in between.  Andrew discusses his favorite outfit strategies, and he highlights his appearance pet peeves.  Tara offers tips and tricks for building a closet of foundation pieces that should offer options for any event that comes your way, no matter the season or the location.  As a bonus, Tara even shares her favorite stores for finding affordable clothing basics!

Again, it all comes down to this:  do no harm.  What you wear to donor meetings matters.  Not only do you want to feel comfortable and confident in front of donors, but you also want to appear professional, approachable, and authentic.  

INTERVIEW TRANSCRIPT:

00:55.05
Host
Well, howdy everybody. Happy New Year! Welcome back. This is the Petrus Development Show. My name is Rhen Hoehn from Petrus Development, and joining me today, at least for the first part of this episode, is Mr. Andrew Robison, owner and president of Petrus. Happy New Year, Andrew. How's it going?

01:11.14
AROB
Happy New Year! It's going great. How about yourself?

01:13.80
Host
Living the dream, man. We just spent a few days in Salt Lake City at Seek.

01:18.16
AROB
Yeah, that was good.

01:18.35
Host
Good experience. Lots to get you pumped up and see lots of people. Good time.

01:23.54
AROB
Yeah, it was great.

01:26.61
Host
So, how have you been recovering from the Christmas season here? I know there's been lots of travel, lots of events, kids.

01:32.88
AROB
Yeah, all my kids are back in school, which, you know, at Christmas break is—I love having them home and love having them back in school and back in a routine.

01:41.99 Host Time for some structure.

01:43.61 AROB So it's good.

01:44.87 Host Yeah.

01:46.14 AROB Yeah. You know, as a parent—I don't know if it is at your house—but as a parent, most of the gifts are going to end up in the stockings of the little ones. And so, gifts for me and my wife are usually pretty simple. We do a gift exchange with my family, and then my wife's family—my wife's parents, mom primarily—will buy us some gifts. But, you know, usually for Christmas, I'm happy with a couple of shirts, a pack of socks. You know, I'm at that age where socks and a tie is like an exciting gift for dad.

02:21.31 AROB And so...

02:21.92 Host Good socks are the most underrated Christmas gift, I think.

02:25.94 AROB Yeah. My kids, you know, they open something that's got a sweater or sweatshirt and they're like, "Ah, clothes?" And I'm like, "Whoa, whoa, whoa!"

02:36.58 AROB Hey, I will take some socks. I will take a pullover, like a new belt. Woo! This is living large. Love it. So yeah, things change.

02:47.91 AROB Right. And what's important to you changes over time.

02:49.01 Host Exactly.

02:50.64 AROB So it's fine.

02:52.15 Host Exactly. Well, if you listened to our last couple episodes of the Petrus Development Show in December, we talked about etiquette at dinner, right? How do you present yourself?

03:02.42 Host How do you handle yourself? One thing we didn't talk about in there is how to present yourself in terms of what you wear at a formal dinner, but also just in general.

03:13.35 Host And when you go out and meet a donor face to face, even if it's for coffee or stopping by their house or their office,

03:16.98 AROB Yeah.

03:18.62 Host How do you dress? It's something we get asked about all the time. So let's dig into that today. And you know, you and I are going to talk about how men should dress. And then at the end of the episode, Tara Doyan, our Vice President of Operations at Petrus, who's been on many, many donor meetings herself, is going to join me, and we'll talk about what to look for for women, for how you should dress there.

03:39.88 AROB Perfect. Yeah. I think this is helpful again, you know, and when we were talking about the meal etiquette, it was—if you're new to the workforce, you're new to professional life, right? Like these are learned behaviors: how to eat, how to conduct yourself at a reception,

03:55.86 AROB and how to dress because you're no longer just hanging out with your peers, but you're in situations where you're meeting with company leaders and industry professionals.

04:10.24 AROB So it's important that you dress not so you're trendy with the people that you just graduated with if you're new out of college, but that you're presenting yourself to everybody in a professional way.

04:28.69 Host Great. So where do you want to start? If you're talking to somebody who's just starting out in fundraising, what are your kind of first considerations, first tips for men for dressing to go meet a donor?

04:39.56 AROB Yeah. So you want to start at the feet and work your way up.

04:42.06 Host Yeah, that sounds great.

04:43.01
AROB
Okay, good. So shoes are never something that I've put a lot of time and energy and thought into, but whenever I'm dressing for work, they become a little bit more important. So usually I have two pairs of shoes. I have a more casual shoe that I'll wear around the office.

05:31.44
AROB
Okay, so I usually have two pairs of shoes that I—you know, for men, it's pretty simple. I have a pair of more casual shoes that I wear around the office that, if I'm going to walk to coffee or somebody pops in, I'm going to give them a tour.

05:51.13
AROB
They're maybe nice sneakers or loafers, but I'm comfortable with them and they're not basketball shoes. They're not junky sneakers. They would be something that's semi-professional, right?

06:08.11
AROB
And then a pair of dress shoes. In Texas, years ago, I bought a pair of boots, and those are my dress shoes now, and I can get away with that in Texas. That would be weird if I was not a Texan or meeting other people.

06:20.13
AROB
So a nice pair of dress shoes is pretty simple. And then socks—I feel like socks are pretty popular and common with guys these days.

06:32.96
AROB
Not a problem usually, but get yourself a couple of pairs of dress socks. Don't wear white socks with slacks, and you should be fine.

06:43.38
Host
Yeah. One thing I've had to deal with, being up in the far north, we get a lot of snow. We get, you know, 300 inches of snow every year. And I was in Detroit a lot, which would get snow and it would melt and be kind of slushy.

06:54.43
Host
Sometimes your typical dress shoes don't hold up very well to that when you're walking between office buildings or restaurants, whatnot.

06:58.01
AROB
Yeah.

07:00.87
Host
So even a pair of kind of dressy boots—kind of like not quite the same as cowboy boots—you can get kind of laced up boots that look still kind of like dress shoes. They're a little bit more robust. It's probably worthwhile if you're in this type of climate.

07:12.42
Host
Just kind of an anecdote from my experience. Great. So that's choosing socks. How about the pants?

07:19.30
AROB
So slacks are almost always what you're going to be wearing—slacks or if you're wearing a suit, suit pants, but jeans are appropriate for hanging around your house, running errands, not for when you're going out on donor meetings.

07:37.28
AROB
So slacks usually, most folks that I know will have two different pairs of slacks: kind of a darker or a black pair of slacks, and then a khaki pair of slacks. Most donor meetings, you're gonna be wearing the darker slacks. If it's a little bit more casual, you can get away with the khakis.

07:53.91
AROB
I stopped buying khakis years ago. It was just—for me, I could never decide. And then I was trying to match shoes and belt and shirt with khakis or dark slacks. And then I found a pair of dark slacks that I like. And that's literally the only style I have—a couple of pairs of the same slacks. But that's it for me is a pair of charcoal dark slacks that literally go with anything. So no jeans, but dark pants and then khakis and then possibly a suit, but I think we're talking about suit in a minute.

08:28.96
Host
Yeah, well let's talk about the belt first. Do you have any recommendations there?

08:33.43
AROB
So a simple belt, usually it's going to come down to preference about either gold or silver belt buckle. I've always had a silver belt buckle and a brown belt. I know that there's probably some people that feel very strongly about brown and black. I've always found that with charcoal slacks, I can wear brown. My boots are dark brown. I can wear dark boots,

08:57.04
AROB
dark brown boots, and then a brown belt with charcoal slacks, and it looks fine. But if you need two belts, then get a black and a brown belt, and that's pretty simple. I don't think you want, for professional work, a woven belt or a canvas belt or anything like that. You want a simple but nice brown belt and a black belt.

09:19.76
Host
And I think you want to match them to your shoes generally, your belt and your shoes, right?

09:21.97
AROB
Agreed. Yeah.

09:23.53
Host
Yeah.

09:24.11
AROB
Correct. Yeah.

09:24.63
Host
All right. So keep moving up here. How about for shirt? Let's start with a shirt.

09:29.36
AROB
Sure. So generally speaking, which is kind of tough in Texas, but generally speaking, if I'm going out on donor calls, I'm almost always going to be wearing a long-sleeve button-down shirt. So it's very versatile. I've got a couple of shirts that have a simple pattern on there. I know a lot of people like to wear block colors—white or blue or navy, simple colors like that. I've always found that I prefer patterns.

09:58.66
AROB
So I get kind of not obnoxious patterns that match with whatever. But long-sleeve button-down shirt is kind of my go-to. If you are going to a golf tournament, or you're going to a casual dinner or you're around the office and somebody pops in, a polo is fine or a short-sleeve button-down. But if you're going out on donor calls, I'm almost always going to go with long-sleeve button-down shirt.

10:36.87
Host
And then how about on top of that? Should you wear a tie? Should you wear a jacket, full suit? What's the approach there?

10:45.14
AROB
Yeah. So I had a boss years ago and it was funny about it. He didn't like wearing ties, but anytime he was going out to ask for a gift, he wore a tie. And I don't think I noticed it. And then one of our donors pointed out to me one day, he was like, "I always know when Greg's asking me for money. He's wearing that tie." I was like, "Oh man, that's his tell," you know, that's funny.

11:07.56
AROB
But you know, the point being is that he always wore button-down shirts, but he didn't like a tie. For me, almost always, if I'm meeting a donor, I will wear a tie. So I've got a couple of simple ones—I've got a red tie, a black tie, a blue tie—you know, I can mix and match if I'm traveling.

11:27.07
AROB
I don't want to take a whole wardrobe. And so having a couple of ties and shirts that can be mixed and matched, depending on what's going on that day, is helpful. So for me, I don't know if it's a personal preference, but I almost always am going to wear a tie if I'm meeting with donors. It's not a necessity, but generally speaking, that's the case.

11:50.79
Host
Yeah, I think that kind of the principle is you don't want to be underdressed for a donor meeting, right?

11:54.51
AROB
Correct, yeah.

11:54.99
Host
There's nothing worse than coming in underdressed. If you're overdressed, you can make a joke about it and maybe adjust. I know you were with me actually, we went to a donor meeting in the middle of the Upper Peninsula, Michigan out, you know, very rural, small town, a little cafe.

12:09.07
Host
And we walked in, we had our jackets and our ties on. And the first thing the donor said is, "Why are you wearing a tie here?"

12:13.90
AROB
I did.

12:14.82
Host
You got to be kidding. Like, okay, well, for future meetings, maybe I won't wear a tie with this donor, but it's much better to be overdressed than underdressed, right?

12:22.52
AROB
Yeah. I had almost an identical experience a couple of weeks ago. I was meeting—it was me and the executive director of the organization. And we were meeting with a donor in the Dallas area and I wore a tie and the executive director didn't, he's a little more casual. And we walked in and he said, "Who's this guy you brought with him wearing a tie?" And, you know, joking about me. I was like, yeah, it's just...

12:44.29
AROB
What I'm doing, but it was a very subtle thing, but I think the donor perceived me, not that he didn't perceive the director as professional, but he perceived me as like, "All right, Andrew is a professional. He's wearing the tie." And so whenever we were having our meeting,

13:03.42
AROB
and we got to the point where we were talking about the gift and kind of details of it and everything, he knew that I was capable of answering his questions. He was having that conversation with me. Was it just because of the tie?

13:14.03
AROB
But that started our relationship, started our dynamic out on a positive direction where he wasn't making a crack about me not wearing a tie. You know what I mean? And being underdressed and like, "Oh, well, is this a guy that I can trust with a big gift?"

13:25.02
Host
Right.

13:28.45
AROB
It, to your point, I was not going to be underdressed and it just made it simple.

13:33.87
Host
Yeah. Any other kind of parts about what you wear, you probably want to avoid too many accessories. You probably don't need a top hat and cane, right?

13:43.24
AROB
A cowboy hat in Texas sometimes is appropriate. So on the topic of a suit though, I feel like a suit is—for me it's necessary, it's important in certain situations but not in every situation. So a lot of times I'll wear a sports coat. I have a kind of a dark gray sports coat again. I'm like...

14:07.59
AROB
You know, I want things that can go in any direction, right? So a charcoal pair of pants, a gray sports coat, and then simple non-patterned ties work for me, boots, because I do a lot of travel and plane and car and everything else. But it makes my wardrobe kind of versatile, right? I also have one suit, and it's a navy suit. And I gauge my kind of who I'm meeting with, is this a suit donor or is this a,

14:36.30
AROB
You know, slacks, shirt, tie, maybe a sports coat donor. The more you do it, the more you're going to kind of get comfortable making that assessment, making that determination. If you're just starting out, nobody's going to think less of you if you're overdressed. So tend to go on that end. I do know people—our friend Brian and Joe up in North Dakota, they never go out without a suit, right? That's personal preference for them, but they are always viewed as professional because of how they dress. It's never a question in that regard. So, for me, I don't wear a suit to all of my donor meetings. If I'm meeting with the president of a university, if I'm meeting with a CEO of an organization in their office,

15:23.29
AROB
then I'm definitely going to wear that suit. If I'm meeting with some monthly donors and we're in their home or waiting for coffee, then I'm going to go with shirt, tie, slacks.

15:34.11
Host
Excellent. I don't know.

15:35.22
AROB
Yeah.

15:35.62
Host
Is there anything else to hit there?

15:37.16
AROB
I don't think so.

15:42.74
AROB
Do we want to talk about grooming or is that necessary?

15:43.53
Host
Yeah. Uh, there's a little—I think there's too many directions you could go there.

15:49.96
AROB
Okay.

15:51.23
Host
One thing I was thinking about is if you're just starting out...

15:53.97
AROB
Why don't you ask me if I have any pet peeves and then I'll just—we'll kind of talk about that and then not.

16:04.46
Host
If you don't have a lot of money to buy this stuff, like where would you start? You kind of hit on the versatile pieces.

16:11.99
AROB
So once you ask a question like, is there anything—yeah, you know, kind of to wrap up any points that you want to make, that are outside of specific clothes, but just general appearance and things.

16:21.30
Host
Yeah, I think some people, I've heard in multiple occasions of the person being like, "Oh, I just got this job. Why are you making me spend all this money on this stuff?" It's kind of an investment in yourself.

16:33.69
Host
Okay great, so it kind of covers what to wear. Any other thoughts or tips on clothing in general for dressing for these professional meetings?

16:42.62
AROB
Yeah, I've got two. One is a pet peeve of mine with general appearance. As a man, and when I meet other men, trimmed fingernails are very important to me. I don't know what it is.

16:58.65
AROB
I'm not neurotic but if I was neurotic about one thing, it would be not having long fingernails. I try to keep my fingernails trimmed. I just don't want them to be a distraction—that's really all I'm going for. It goes back to that "do no harm"—if I have long fingernails,

17:13.83
Host
Right.

17:15.02
AROB
then people are going to notice that and that's going to be a distraction. If I have trimmed fingernails, they don't even get noticed and it doesn't even come up as a point. So that's one—just from a general grooming standpoint, if you're a man, make sure your beard is trimmed. If you have a beard, make sure you bathe that day, very simple things, and make sure that your fingernails are trimmed.

17:40.97
AROB
My second point is about, you know, a lot of times, if you're new to development, then you're just starting out, maybe you're not getting paid a whole lot. This is maybe your first or second job out of college. And it's kind of like, "All right, well, I don't have money to go buy a suit. I don't have money to buy nice clothes. How am I going to make this work?" Two points on that. One, it's an investment, right? Nicer clothes are an investment in you and your career. So,

18:08.61
AROB
find a way for you to invest in simple, versatile clothes that you can wear. Again, I literally have one color pair of slacks for me, one sports coat, and that's it. One pair of boots, and that's it for me. I don't have a full wardrobe, but my boots were pretty expensive because I knew that I was gonna wear them, and I have worn them for 10 years, right? So it's an investment, and number two,

18:35.33
AROB
you don't need designer clothes. Joseph A. Bank was where I bought most of my sports coat, my suits, and dress shirts for many, many years. And again, they're not the nicest, but they're affordable.

18:52.36
AROB
They look nice and I'm not a distraction in any situation. So consider it an investment. Look for ways that you can make these purchases affordable.

19:05.33
AROB
And then look for ways to be versatile.

19:09.90
Host
Perfect. I think that sums it up well.

19:11.97
AROB
Perfect.

19:12.44
Host
Well, we'll be back in just a minute with Tara talking about the women.

19:15.28
AROB
Thanks. Sounds good. Thanks a lot, Rhen.

19:16.71
Host
Thank you, Andrew.

02:22.21
Host
All right, welcome back. Now I'm joined with Tara Doyan, the Vice President of Operations at Petrus Development. Tara, you've been on a variety, hundreds and hundreds of donor meetings over the years. So I think you're the best person to address how a lady should dress for success for donor meetings. I guess welcome Tara first here.

02:43.63
Tara
Thanks Rhen for having me. I'm very excited to talk about one of my favorite subjects, clothes. Anyone that knows me knows that I like shopping. I like mixing and matching my wardrobe. My husband would say that I am a professional in many things, but shopping and clothes collecting is probably top of the list. So happy to talk about one of my favorite subjects.

03:10.69
Host
Excellent. Well, let's dive into it. I have very little context for what's the right approach for the ladies. So we're going to let you kind of take it from here. In the first half of the show, Andrew and I talked through how men should dress and we kind of started from bottom from the shoes and worked our way up. So I guess let's start there. I think my impression is there's maybe a wider variety of what's acceptable for the ladies. What would you say about, I guess footwear, socks, anything to that effect? As you prepare to go out on a donor meeting, what should you be wearing?

03:41.70
Tara
Yeah, so first I want to preface this by saying it's always important to understand your donor and the venue that you're going. So men can approach this pretty easily, you know, suit, nice pants, jacket, tie, whatever that looks like. It's pretty standard. There may be some variations. I don't know if Andrew's talked about when he went to a cattle drive or a ranch with someone.

04:07.05
Tara
So you know there are some variations, but I think with women there are a lot more variations and issues that come into play. So one of the things that I love to do is to really look at some good pictures and places of the places that we're going to be going.

04:26.29
Tara
I do a lot of social media stalking.

04:26.76
Host
Okay.

04:29.58
Tara
This has come in handy when I'm looking at my daughter's boyfriends, potential boyfriends or dates. But this also applies to dealing with donors and all those sort of pieces that fall into that. So look on social media. If you're going to a restaurant, pull up the social media, the Instagram, the Facebook, the X, Twitter, whatever it is, to look to see if you have pictures from inside a bar or restaurant.

04:56.32
Tara
Look to see what people are wearing there. That's going to be your first really easy cue to, okay, this is a really casual establishment, so I'm going to be my dressy casual self. Or, oh, everyone's really dressed up. This is cocktail attire. That sets the tone. And that really will help you understand what you're going into. You can also do social media stalking on the person that you're meeting.

05:22.60
Tara
Do they have pictures up on their social media feeds that show them going to gatherings and they have a particular style? It's going to be really important to understand what we want to convey to our benefactor, our donor that we're meeting with, and we want to match their style. And that goes with their personal style and also the location. So do your background homework—look at the places that you're going to be meeting, look at the person that you're going to be meeting and try to get a sense of kind of what that overall vibe is.

05:54.51
Tara
So that's the first thing that we're going to do. But then we're just going to start from the beginning again, bottom up and let's start with shoes.

06:03.36
Tara
And I think it's really important as women that we understand there are a variety of different shoes that we wear. We automatically default to our fancy shoes as our high heels.

06:14.24
Tara
It's just kind of across the board, women think that. And yes, when we are trying to dress up an outfit, we will go to heels.

06:21.76
Tara
I always go to heels when I'm trying to be my dressiest. But let me just tell you that if you are not comfortable dressing in high heels and walking in high heels, or if it is an environment such as where you live, Ryan, in the Upper Peninsula that may have 10 feet of snow on the ground, you are going to look like a fool in high heels.

06:42.90
Tara
If you come walking down the street, if you're not comfortable, if you're wobbly, if they hurt your feet, if you're not feeling good in that, do not, do not wear that, even if that's going to be your fanciest, because that is going to make you feel insecure from the very moment you step into your location.

07:00.58
Tara
You're going to feel nervous about that. You could potentially be in pain and you can embarrass yourself if you're falling. So we don't automatically have to go to the high heels, even if that's kind of where we think of, but

07:12.74
Tara
Again, high heels or flats are always good. I'm gonna talk about some closet staples that you should have at the end of this episode. But high heels or flats are always really good. Now, for warmer climates or more casual settings,

07:31.76
Tara
we want to look at what sort of dressier type sandals we have. We're going to stay away from flip-flops, so anything that's beach-ready—unless you're actually going to a picnic on the beach, we probably want to stay away from those kinds of shoes, those sort of flip-flops or sandals. But a woman can wear a nicer sandal, a sandal with a strap, something that has some embellishment on it. And that really takes it up and sets the tone that this is the nicer sandal, the nicer casual option. So those are usually always acceptable.

08:12.52
Tara
Now, we also then go back to, okay, what about hosiery? What about socks?

08:18.86
Tara
I, my mentor, God rest her, Helen Gibbons. And if you've ever heard me talk about any of my mentors on any other podcasts, I had a lady—she died several years ago, but she was one of my mentors and she was the first business professor at the Kelly School of Business at Indiana University. And she was a real stickler for,

08:43.76
Tara
dressing appropriately, dressing professionally, and she would not have been caught dead without a pair of pantyhose on. And I remember going to an event with her and it was an outdoor event and it was probably 80 degrees. It was late spring into summer and I didn't wear pantyhose and she about had a heart attack. And I never heard the end of it why I was not wearing stockings.

09:12.50
Tara
I would think if you are of a certain generation, that's going to be very normal for you to wear pantyhose. But younger people today, especially a lot of our younger development directors, they may have never worn a pair of pantyhose or stockings before, and that's very foreign to them. They may not even know where to get them.

09:31.41
Tara
But if you are meeting with someone older and it's a colder time of year, it's probably important for you to wear pantyhose. It shows a level of respect. It elevates the look. My gauge is if it's 50 degrees or colder,

09:49.41
Tara
I always wear pantyhose. I just think that also is just sensible. It gives us a little more warmth. But if it's 50 degrees or warmer, it's a little more casual. I think you're okay to go without the pantyhose or stockings. But that's just my personal opinion. But it goes back to understanding the person that you're meeting with and if they're going to think it's important that you show up with pantyhose on.

10:14.12
Host
All right. Great.

10:16.07
Tara
You probably didn't know so much about tights or pantyhose, did you?

10:20.41
Host
No, I have nothing educated to add to this part of the conversation. Let's go up to I guess the next layer. That'd be pants or dress skirt. What are the considerations there?

10:28.33
Tara
Yeah. So we also think when we're going out with donors that we need to wear a business suit. And there are great options for women with business suits. We can wear pantsuits, we can wear skirts with a suit jacket or a blazer, with pants with a blazer. There are so many different options, but we don't necessarily have to default to the suit. So with a guy, you have one option. Women, we have many, many options.

10:53.71
Tara
I think it's really important for anyone to feel really comfortable with what you're wearing and that allows you to feel comfortable in any sort of conversation. We know that when we go in to talk to a donor and talk about money, we're going to probably feel uncomfortable because we're always nervous about those conversations.

11:12.78
Tara
If you add the layer of feeling really uncomfortable in your clothing to that, it's going to be like double jeopardy. Like you're going to feel even worse about it. We want to be professional and be appropriate, but feel comfortable.

11:29.08
Tara
And so that means if you're never going to be comfortable in a suit, a suit blazer, if you feel really stuffy, if it's not fitting very well, if you don't feel good about that, don't wear that suit. Wear a nice dress. Add a cardigan to it.

11:44.17
Tara
Put a dress if you have a blazer over it. We want to make sure that we feel comfortable and you can do that. So if you're a person that feels more comfortable in pants, wear pants. If you're more comfortable in a dress, do so. Now, one of the things that I would caution us is to be a little conservative in our coloring and our patterns.

12:05.32
Tara
Less is more. It's always important that we are not the star of the show necessarily. We don't want to come in wearing neon green with purple polka dots. That really detracts from the conversation. It usually detracts from the environment. And so nice neutral colors are always appropriate.

12:23.86
Tara
I wear pattern dresses, so don't get me wrong. I'm not saying don't ever wear anything that's patterned, but you can think like, would this be appropriate at a more solemn event? I don't want to say appropriate for a funeral because we're going into these donor meetings hopefully really cheerful and celebratory, not necessarily in a situation where we're sad. But think about the conservativeness that we might want to convey with those sort of situations. But again, we want to be comfortable. So if you're comfortable in a dress, you can wear a dress. If you're comfortable in pants, wear pants.

13:02.45
Tara
If you are going to the rodeo—and I have actually gone to a rodeo on one of my donor visits—I'm not going to show up in a dress or even a pantsuit. I want to make sure I wear my dressy jeans or have a more casual pant that I can pair with the boot. So again, understanding where you're going and dressing the part is really important.

13:25.64
Tara: When you have an opportunity such as a rodeo or something that's very casual to wear jeans or a different type of trouser pants, we want to make sure those are free from holes. Even though there may be distressing or different colors that are trendy and that we might wear casually in our regular life, that's probably not a good idea for donor visits.

13:50.98
Tara: Make sure you have a nice pair of blue jeans that are a dark wash. Dark washes always look a little more tailored, more professional. They're free of holes. We want to make sure that they fit really well and we want to make sure we have a belt. This maybe just goes back to my kids in Catholic school and just generally growing up with a mom that was a real stickler for clothing.

14:15.42
Tara: If pants have belt loops on them, you have to be worried about this. It's just a general rule. If it has the loops, you need to have a belt. If it doesn't have the loops, you're good to go. But if it has loops and they are visible, you need to make sure you have the belt. And so I'll talk about that when I talk about my closet staples a little more. But that's really important, even if we're going to be wearing a nice pair of jeans to something a little more casual.

14:44.11
Tara: As for the top, whether it's a dress or a blouse, we want to make sure that we have an appropriate cut. We want to make sure it fits us well and we feel good in it without being too revealing. We want to be really careful. There are certain outfits or dresses that I own that if I'm going out for a date night with friends or my husband, they have an open collar and look a certain way that may not be appropriate to wear to a donor meeting. Anytime that you can add a tank top or another shirt underneath to bring up your neckline is probably always a little more appropriate when we're meeting with donors.

15:34.87
Tara: If we're ever going to a donor meeting at a church, we want to be cognizant of people's preferences for church wear. I go to a Newman Center parish and I would say our normal Mass attire is probably pretty casual overall.

15:52.88
Host: You.

15:57.41
Tara: So in the summer, I might wear a dress that has a different neckline and my shoulders might be exposed, modestly and appropriately, but that's very common for where I live and the standard of dress.

16:13.40
Tara: Other more formal parishes and different people may not think exposing shoulders is appropriate at any sort of religious event. So I think it's always better to err on the side of caution, probably not show your shoulders, not have an open back. Those things, in appropriate settings, are fine, but with our donors and not necessarily knowing what their preferences are, I would steer away from anything that could show a little more skin than would probably make people feel comfortable.

16:50.24
Host: That makes sense. Anything - there are probably a thousand considerations when it comes to hair, earrings, accessories - anything you want to mention there?

16:59.57
Tara: Again, be comfortable. I have naturally curly hair. If I want it to be straight, I have to straighten it and it becomes problematic and takes forever. When I'm in a humid environment - I'm going to go work in South Carolina next week - I don't even try to straighten it because it is curly and it's crazy all the time. If I was there and I was trying to straighten it, I would constantly be worried about: Is it straight enough? Is it curling up?

17:31.41
Tara: I'm going to be fixated thinking externally about what my hair looks like. So if you have a particular hairstyle that's natural to you, and you are in an environment that you are unsure of, or again, a little nervous about,

17:48.88
Tara: Don't do your hair a totally different way that you're going to be constantly worrying about. Is this piece sticking up? Or does this look OK? Or is this straight? Or am I starting to curl? Because you're going to detract from that conversation. You're going to be distracted. You're not going to feel comfortable. I always think it's important that we have our face visible. So again, you can have your hair down. I have my hair down today, and by no means am I an expert in hairstyle or anyone's personal style of how they should do their hair.

18:24.13
Tara: But nothing is worse than when you're talking to someone and their hair is kind of in their face, especially if they have bangs and you can't see their eyes.

18:31.22
Host: Mm.

18:31.08
Tara: So if you do have a hairstyle that naturally falls that way or is cut that way, you want to make sure that you're just putting it back, so it's behind your shoulders, tucked behind an ear.

18:43.34
Tara: If you have glasses, anything to tuck up behind - just out of your way so it's not falling in your face so you're not likely to pick at it. Sometimes when we get nervous - and I notice this when I drive sometimes - I twirl my hair and I don't even realize it. I'll just be sitting here kind of twirling my hair around and it's just a way that I'm processing things.

19:08.37
Tara: I don't even realize I'm doing that. So if you're in a situation where you're uncomfortable and you know that you are a hair twirler or you tend to need that tactile sensation and something, get your hair out of your face.

19:20.77
Tara: Because the last thing you want to do is be talking to a donor, twirling your hair, asking for a million-dollar gift. So know these little things that are going to make you feel

19:27.04
Host: Right.

19:32.12
Tara: more likely to be uncomfortable or pick up weird habits that you wouldn't want to do if you were going to be on camera in the middle of Times Square for everyone.

19:42.85
Host: Got it. All right. So you mentioned earlier, maybe you can give us some closet staples. Say somebody's just getting started, they need to kind of build up a professional wardrobe. Where do they start? What are the most important pieces to get right away?

19:58.63
Tara: I think every female should have different shoes. We talked about heels or flats. And I think a really good standard would be to have a black, nude, and navy pair of either flats or heels.

20:15.91
Tara: And then when we go to sandals, we want a nicer pair of either brown or black sandals. If you had those five styles of shoes - any sort of the sandals or the heels and the flats mixed interchangeably - you're going to be able to pair those with any sort of outfit. You don't have to spend a lot of money on these. You can look for different sales from different stores. But the most important thing out of all of these is to make sure they feel good on your feet. And you want to break them in before you wear them to any sort of event or out to any meeting because the last thing that you want to do is show up hobbling because you have blisters on your feet.

20:59.82
Tara: That also kind of goes back to always having a stash of Band-Aids in your bag, especially if you're going to a nicer event where you're wearing a fancier shoe than you're maybe used to wearing. Just always have the Band-Aids with you. We want to make sure our shoes look good. We want to make sure that they're free from scuffs, they're not torn. If it's a casual event and we're wearing boots or sneakers, we want to make sure those are clean.

21:25.20
Tara: A permanent marker of the color of your shoes can go a long way. I don't know how many black shoes I have taken a permanent marker, a Sharpie, to, to get any of the scuffs out. So have some of these sort of pieces ready to go in your bag and be prepared to make everything look nice and shiny, at least on the surface, with your shoes. So that's where I would start with your shoes. As far as clothing, again, a black dress, like a sheath dress - and it can have sleeves or be sleeveless because you could always put a cardigan or a blazer over it - is a really good staple. It can be worn in the summer months, it can be worn in the winter months as well, and I say that's pretty standard across the board. You could really dress it up with some nice jewelry for some sort of fancier event or dress it down with a denim jacket or a more casual cardigan to make it look appropriate for whatever sort of event.

22:39.23
Tara: Any sort of capsule wardrobe idea - you can go look on Pinterest, you can do Google searches and look for professional capsule wardrobes. That's the term that you want to look for. And a capsule wardrobe is basically just some standard pieces that you should have in your wardrobe that you can mix and match. So a nice pair of pants - and I love to make sure that we're not going with 100% cotton pants. A 100% cotton pair of pants is going to wrinkle if you are traveling anywhere.

23:04.91
Tara: You're going to have to put them in your suitcase. Nothing's worse than being in a hotel room, getting out the iron and the ironing board because those are always terrible pieces. But just make sure that you have the blend of material and that will help you not to wrinkle. It'll also help you look unwrinkled when you're sitting down or standing up.

23:26.03
Tara: A nice pair of black pants - you can put them on with a pair of heels and a nice sweater, but you could also put on a nicer blouse, a silk blouse, or something of a different material that can mix things up. In summer months, I would go with a lighter pair of pants, I would say.

23:43.40
Tara: 1998 Tara would say you always have to have a pair of khaki pants, and I don't think I've worn a pair of khaki pants for years and years. But I remember at a time in my early professional career that khakis and a sweater or khakis on top was like the standard operating uniform for any professional event. I would say women today generally don't default to that, but still a lighter pair of pants, something that looks appropriate for the season, are really important to have. I think some standard cardigans - a black cardigan, a blue cardigan, a white cardigan that looks nice, that looks professional - those are always good staple pieces to have. And if we're going to have these as professional staple pieces in our wardrobe, we want to make sure that we're not wearing them in our day-to-day life.

24:36.97
Tara: So I have pieces that I set aside for special events, even if it's just a cardigan or something as simple as that, that I'm not wearing regularly because then it doesn't look worn all the time. Sometimes cardigans or sweater materials get pilling on them. Every time you wash it, it breaks down the fabric, the material a little more. It just looks a little more used. We want to really look put together.

25:02.33
Tara: Our color for the company is green. And so when I am out representing our company, lots of times I will wear that color. That color looks good on me. I like it. It represents us as a brand. I think it's really important. So if you are a representative from Indiana University,

25:22.14
Tara: Go Hoosiers, and I am if you know me. When I go to talk to a Hoosier alum, I'm going to wear my Hoosier colors. I'm not going to wear Purdue Boilermaker gold and black because that sends a different message. We want to remember that we're representing our brand. So I think if you're from a university, especially a Newman Center,

25:44.99
Tara: We want to have some of those university colors as staple pieces. And it doesn't mean if your university color is red, you need to have red dresses that you wear constantly. But do you have a scarf or do you have an accent piece? Do you have a jacket?

26:00.01
Tara: Just something that brings in the color for your university. It just represents who you are. It keeps you on brand and it reminds the person that you're talking to of the connection of where you potentially meet or where you're coming from with that home base of your university or Newman Center or wherever you might be representing.

26:22.62
Host: Fantastic. That was very thorough.

26:26.44
Tara: No, and I always think about jewelry as an accessory.

26:26.81
Host: Good.

26:36.97
Tara: It's something that makes us look fancier. It can dress up an outfit. And again, I think it always goes back to what sort of pieces do you have? Are we adding something to our outfit to denote if it's a fancier event, or it's a nicer place that we're going to, or are we more casual? But I think standard pieces, like cross jewelry, non-blingy flashy pieces are really important. Always less is more, I think, when we're talking to a donor.

27:12.98
Tara: We don't want to come across as walking billboards for jewelry companies or costume companies. That just sets the wrong tone. If you are familiar with fashion, you probably have heard of the legendary designer Coco Chanel, and she always said this. And I think this is a quote that I actually go by regularly when I leave the house. And her quote is, "Before you leave the house, look in the mirror and take one thing off." Now she's not saying take off your sweater, take off your pants, but if you're wearing big matching bracelet, necklace and earrings and a ring, take one thing off.

00:28.58
Tara: And that I think goes back to the subtlety of sometimes less is more, and it's really important to remember that. So if you're wearing a matching necklace and matching earrings and bracelet and fancy ring, take one piece off. We want to convey a message that we're coming into this conversation with humility and respect. When we're all blinged out or really loud and crazy, it sometimes sends the wrong message, and I think understated is always a better look in my opinion. So if you can kind of think about that every time you go and look in the mirror - and maybe you're not wearing tons of jewelry or other accessories, but then maybe that means you tone down your lipstick or we don't have the crazy eye makeup, or whatever that looks like - those sorts of things are always going to be important. We want to come across as

01:19.72
Tara: humble, we want to come across as authentic, and we want to come across as approachable. And so that means we look natural and we look comfortable as well. So be comfortable in your clothing, be comfortable with your hair and your makeup. Don't go over the top with your perfume and your accessories, and do your research beforehand of where you're going to go and make sure you can piece some things together and

01:49.79
Tara: you're going to be great.

01:53.03
Host: Excellent, I love it. I think you covered all the bases there and if you're just getting started in fundraising, you're going to have a good sense of how you can approach dressing to go meet with your donors for the first time.

02:03.44
Tara: Yeah, also, I should give this shout out to some of my favorite stores. Are we allowed to do that?

02:08.28
Host: Oh, why not?

02:09.15
Tara: Okay, so if you are new to fundraising and you're trying to build your wardrobe, and presumably you don't have - we encounter a lot of young people that are just graduates that maybe don't have the budget to go out and build this really professional wardrobe, and I talked a little bit about building a capsule wardrobe. But some of the great stores I like to go to are H&M and Zara. Those usually have really good pieces that you can mix and match with other staple pieces. They're usually really well-priced. People in the industry would say that's fast fashion, and we should steer away from that for the long run. And I do agree sometimes it is

02:53.10
Tara: a good idea to spend a little more money on some pieces that are going to last forever. But the reality of the situation is when we're starting out, lots of times you just don't even have the funds to do that. So Zara, H&M, those are really good places. Old Navy actually has some good professional pieces. I would say they're on the more casual side, but you can definitely find some great professional pieces from them.

03:17.06
Tara: And then just Target. I mean, I don't know about you, Ren, but I love Target. Do you have Target up there in the great north where you live?

03:25.54
Host: I think the closest one is about 100 miles away, so don't make it there very often.

03:29.26
Tara: Well, my husband would be very happy if the one that I had was 100 miles away. Again, you can get some really good pieces for affordable prices. So again, going for some of those staple pieces, you don't have to spend an arm and a leg, mix and match, put it together, go to thrift stores, Goodwill, all those sorts of places. You really can get some good staples to make you feel your best, look your best and go out to secure those great gifts.

03:57.37
Host: Excellent. Love it. I think this has been very helpful. Thank you, Tara.

04:01.44
Tara: Yeah, no problem.

04:03.29
Host: Great. And just to wrap us up here, a quick announcement for listeners. Next Friday, January 17th, the winter session of BOAT, Basic Online Advancement Training, registration closes on the 17th.

04:17.30
Host: So if you're a brand new fundraiser and you kind of need help getting started fundraising, a little bit of onboarding to know how all the pieces of fundraising fit together, help you get a plan in place. Or if you are an organization who's just kind of starting out with fundraising overall, BOAT is designed to help you get all of those foundational pieces in place: a communications plan, a vision, a case for support database, an annual fund plan. Get all those pieces set for you for the coming year.

04:43.75
Host: And as of right now, while we're recording this, there are some spots open in the winter session, but it's filling fast. So you can go to petrusdevelopment.com/boat to see if we have any spots still open if you're interested in that course. And something new this session: when you register, you get a complimentary second seat in the BOAT for somebody else at your organization. So you can get two people signed up from your organization for the price of one. They can go through all of the - there's about 50 online lessons covering all the different aspects of fundraising. And then we do five 90-minute live cohort sessions with a fundraising coach to help you implement all those pieces. And you'll walk away 10 weeks in, and by the middle of March, having a plan for your fundraising for the coming year. So go check that out at petrusdevelopment.com/boat.

05:34.88
Tara: Wonderful.

05:36.63
Host: Great, well thank you again for joining us, Tara, and we'll see you again soon.

05:38.87
Tara: Absolutely. Thanks, friend.