How to Run a War Chest Campaign. Rochester, N.Y.: Yawman & Erbe Mfg. Co., 1918. http://archive.org/details/howtorunwarchest00yawm.
Broadly a manual on how to do a big community fundraising effort. Emphasis on furniture and filing systems that could be purchased from the publisher of the piece.
One of my favorite rules of thumb is to “Only start projects that are already 80percent done.” That might seem like a paradox, but committing to finishprojects only when I’ve already done most of the work to capture, organize,and distill the relevant material means I never run the risk of startingsomething I can’t finish.
This same sort of principle is seen in philanthropy circles where the group already has commitments for a large proportion of the end goal before they even announce the campaign.
Is there a rule of thumb for this in philanthropy? 50%? What is it called, ie does it have a specific name?
What relation does it have to the Pareto principle, if any?