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Common Work Supplemental information--April 2002 edition of Common Work |
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Philanthropy is a journey. Let JGA be your guide.
Johnson, Grossnickle and Associates Inc.
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THE
VALUE OF PEER SCREENING As fundraisers, we are
always searching for information about prospects.
Volunteers can and should play an important role in this process.
Peer screening is an opportunity for volunteers to assist in
identifying those individuals who are most likely to support your
institution. Peer
screening is an outstanding means to gather information, but also to
involve volunteers in the fundraising process. Typically, volunteers
have helped to rate prospective donors by sitting around a table and
verbally sharing information. This
process generally produces excellent results.
However, for some volunteers this can be an uncomfortable
process. Likewise, some
development professionals feel that on occasion, such interactive peer
screening may lead to both inappropriate sharing of information and a
reluctance on the part of some volunteers to share helpful facts about a
potential donor. If you have any qualms
about the traditional method of peer screening, it may be worthwhile to
try a silent peer screening session.
The process for running a silent session can go something like
this: Give each participant a
personalized booklet that included the names and rating information of
several hundred prospects—individuals you believe they might know from
business, social and/or personal contexts.
Ask participants to rate only those prospects they knew and who
they think are capable of making a major gift to the organization.
You can start things out by giving participants the following
directions: 1. Are you willing facilitate an introduction? 2. How well do you know the person (by reputation, acquainted, socially or well)? 3. What is the person’s giving capacity? 4. Is the person’s inclination to give to our organization low, medium or high? 5.
Please comments related to the person’s interests, sources of
wealth, community philanthropy and timing of a gift. Following the session,
gather the information and prioritize potential donors by both capacity
and inclination. What might typical
results of such a session look like?
Peer screening—as part of one organization’s prospect management program—can result in your learning more about the prospects than ever before and perhaps more importantly, has engaged volunteers in a new and positive way. THE
BASICS OF MOVES MANAGEMENT
It is not enough for an
organization to have donors and prospects.
What is also needed is prospect management—a systematic
way of organizing the identification, cultivation, solicitation, and
stewardship of donors. Moves management
is one of the vital components of prospect management.
A “move” is a planned prospect contact with a fixed action
and objective; moves management is the strategic sequencing of
moves to develop the prospect’s relationship with your organization
and ultimately achieve a gift. Generally speaking, one
“move” per month per prospect is considered ideal; of those, four or
five yearly should be personal visits.
Individual “moves” help assess the prospect relationship, who
else is to be involved, ways of evaluating past moves, and appropriate
next steps. A moves
management report provides a summary of individual “moves” completed
within a selected timeframe and is a key management tool for assessing
the progress or lack thereof in cultivating and soliciting prospects. In short, effective moves management builds relationships with prospects by systematically guaranteeing they are receiving the right cultivational move at the right time. And because of the benefits of strategic and regularly scheduled prospect contact, your organization will reap the benefits in achieving gifts in a timely fashion. NOTES
ON PERFORMANCE ACCOUNTABILITY
One of the most
controversial subjects in fundraising is how we measure the
effectiveness of our staff and volunteers in cultivating and soliciting
major gifts. We all
know how important it is that we are successful in our major gifts work,
but for some reason we find many nonprofit organizations unwilling to
take the important step of building a culture of accountability for
staff and volunteers. JGA finds that a good
prospect management program naturally supports various means of
measuring prospect activity—counting the number of visits, tracking
the progress of prospect donors on some sort of continuum of
relationship status, monitoring “moves” in a moves management
system, analyzing the ratios between gift solicitations and gifts
actually received, and so forth. And
when these measurement activities are integrated into the work of
prospect management, you will find that your staff and volunteers begin
to see how their efforts relate to the overall success of your campaign. JGA doesn’t think
there is a “cookie-cutter” approach to performance management that
works equally well for all organizations.
We do believe, however, that the best performance management plan
for your organization will first ask the question: Based on your
experience, analysis of trends, and institutional priorities, what are
the most important activities that your staff and volunteers should be
pursuing in your major gifts efforts? Your answers to that
question provide a profile of successful staff and volunteer work that
can be translated into a performance management program. For example, one of
JGA’s clients developed a portfolio approach for its major gifts
staff. Each staff member
was assigned certain general administrative duties, along with some
specific management responsibilities related to the fundraising office.
It was determined that these various duties accounted for about
35% of each staff member’s monthly work.
The remaining 65% was devoted to prospect activity—and this
prospect activity also had priorities.
For example, based on campaign trends, it was determined that it
was important that more prospects who had high capacity to give (but
perhaps not as high an inclination) be visited in the next few months.
As staff members made their plans for prospect visits, an
emphasis was placed on visiting these high capacity/lower inclination
prospects—and in their monthly evaluative sessions, major gifts staff
members were asked to account for their efforts with this particular
prospect group. JGA’s conclusion:
Good and effective prospect management plans ensure that your staff and
volunteers are focused on the most important prospect activities—and
hold staff and volunteers accountable for your organization’s efforts
to cultivate, solicit, and steward philanthropic support for the
important work of your organizations. Perhaps we might join together in the common work of rethinking how prospect management programs, devised and implemented well, are at the core of our philanthropic leadership and management. Prospect management powerfully illustrates the privileges and obligations we enjoy as we help build philanthropic relationships in support of our missions. |
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