CCS Fundraising

Type: Article

Independent schools often rely heavily on one, large annual event to meet important fundraising goals. While these large-scale events can play an important role in community building, they are often costly and time-consuming. Moreover, by focusing on one event, schools are missing out on opportunities to interact with donors and prospective donors in meaningful ways. School development offices should consider diversifying their event strategies, particularly during campaigns, so that they are tailored to engage donors wherever they are in their philanthropic journeys. By developing events with specific and actionable goals, schools will drive campaign activity at each level of the moves management process and bolster the overall philanthropic health of the school.

Horace Mann School, a Nursery-12, co-ed day school of 1,800 students in Bronx, NY and CCS Fundraising partner since 2015, has had a great deal of success in leveraging different types of events to elevate the performance of both annual and capital fundraising. The School launched an ambitious $100 million campaign to support campus renovations and expansion, with a commitment to maintaining the success of the annual fund over the campaign’s five-year span.  Horace Mann’s creative and targeted approach to events drove campaign giving, while minimizing impact on the annual fund. The following case study of Horace Mann’s work with CCS provides several useful examples of how to utilize four key elements of strategic event planning: education, cultivation, motivation and appreciation.

1) Educate

At the beginning of each school year, Horace Mann holds a new parent Trustee Reception for each of the School’s four divisions. These receptions, hosted by members of the Board of Trustees, serve as an important opportunity for new parents to not only meet one another, but also to learn about the opportunities for philanthropic involvement at the School. Independent schools often act as a young parent’s introduction to the world of philanthropy; it is at their children’s school that parents learn how their charitable dollars can make an impact on a given organization. Particularly for mid-level donors, an independent school is, in many cases, a family’s first major gift recipient. At Horace Mann, these Trustee Receptions are an important crash course in giving.

Setting the Tone

While there should be some discussion of fundraising at these receptions, philanthropy should certainly not be the primary focus. New parent events should be casual and informative, rather than heavy-handed, so that all families, whether they are $25 or $25,000 donors, feel welcome. These events should embody the “un-ask” ask: making a case for philanthropic giving without making a firm solicitation.

While your development team can be helpful with mailing invitations, managing RSVPs, and staffing the gathering, the events themselves should be parent-focused and parent-driven. A parent making an appeal to a fellow parent can be far more meaningful than one from a member of your development staff.

Follow Up

After these events have taken place, it is important to note that the invitations to these receptions and event follow-ups should appear to come not from the Advancement Office or the Head of School, but from the trustee hosts.

For smaller schools with fewer divisions or fewer admission entry points, Kindergarten Breakfasts can be equally effective. Held on campus at several times throughout the beginning of the school year, these small group breakfasts offer Kindergarten parents an opportunity to meet with Trustees and the Head of School in a casual setting. These gatherings, like the trustee receptions, can lay the groundwork for future fundraising conversations, while providing new parents the opportunity to discuss the transition to a new school.

2) Cultivate

Horace Mann also saw a great deal of success with two types of cultivation events during its capital campaign. The first, small group dinners, were particularly effective during the campaign’s quiet phase. These dinners took two different forms. In the campaign’s first two years, CCS and the Development Office worked closely with the Head of School to develop a curated guest list of high-capacity and high-affinity parents. The Head of School extended an invitation via email asking families to join him for a dinner at his home with a few other parents. Similarly to the Trustee Reception, fundraising—in this case the campaign—was not the singular focus of the evening.

Both the Head of School and the Board Chair conducted follow up to these events, ensuring an extremely personal solicitation process. These dinners were crucial in garnering early support for the campaign and for identifying potential campaign leaders.

Maximizing Small Gatherings

As the campaign progressed from the principal and leadership gifts phase to the major gifts phase, these small group dinners were utilized to cultivate top prospects on a grade by grade basis. Members of the Campaign Cabinet invited families they believed could make meaningful gifts and conducted their own outreach prior to the event, supported by CCS and the Development Office. These dinners were held at the Head of School’s home, private homes, or restaurants across New York City. The volunteer leaders said a few words about their involvement in the campaign, followed by an appeal from the Head of School and dinner. The Head of School then sent a brief thank you email to each attendee within the week, but the real work of soliciting fell on the campaign volunteers who hosted the event.

By holding smaller events and conducting individualized follow up, Horace Mann was able to ensure that families were having meaningful conversations with campaign leaders about making stretch gifts and multi-year pledges, rather than one-time, outright gifts.  These conversations also reinforced the prioritization of the annual fund, allowing the School to receive sizable campaign gifts while growing the annual fund each year.

Sustaining Campaign Momentum

Horace Mann’s second style of cultivation event utilized the facilities made possible by the campaign. In the early stage of the campaign’s community phase, the Development Office held a series of Open Houses in the School’s newly added Campus Center. The parties featured a short cocktail reception, followed by a campaign video, an appeal from the Head of School, and brief, small group tours throughout the newly constructed and renovated spaces. The Development Office distributed all invitations and managed the RSVP list, but members of the Campaign Cabinet were responsible for sending personalized emails to each invitee to encourage attendance. These Cabinet members served as the event’s Host Committee, welcoming guests as they arrived, joining tours to provide a parent perspective, and sending thank you emails after the event.

The Open Houses simultaneously promoted campaign participation, but also reinforced the importance of the annual fund. Only donors who had already committed to the annual fund at a certain level were invited to these Open Houses. By segmenting the invitation lists, Horace Mann was able to engage prospective mid-level campaign donors, who were committed givers to the annual fund, in large groups. Like the small group dinners held during the quiet phase, the school maximized prospective donors’ contact with the Development Office and Campaign Volunteers to promote multi-year pledges.

3) Motivate

Two of Horace Mann’s most successful events celebrated the campaign’s success and the achievement of important milestones. These large-scale, donor-only receptions were held not only to steward important campaign donors, but also to motivate prospective donors to make meaningful commitments prior to the events. By using invitations to these “exclusive” events as incentives to give, Horace Mann saw significant increases in the number of gifts as well as dollars raised in the months leading up to these two parties. Campaign leaders set internal fundraising goals prior to both events, raising the sights of the campaign volunteers and creating a sense of urgency. On both occasions, the campaign exceeded the internal goals by over $1 million.

Heightening the Importance of Events

The first of these events was a Beam Signing Celebration during the campaign’s quiet phase. Guests heard from the Head of School, Chair of the Board of Trustees, and the campaign’s lead donors, after which all campaign donors were invited to leave their mark on one of the beams that would eventually support the new facilities. Though invitations were distributed only to campaign donors, additional excitement about the event was drummed up at the School’s cultivation dinners and in the campaign leadership’s conversations with prospective donors. This push to drive activity prior to the event was so successful that the campaign received 38 gifts totaling $2.5 million in less than a month, a significant increase over the 11 gifts totaling $845,000 received during the previous month.

The second event, a Hard Hat Tour, was equally successful, raising $3.5 million from 28 donors in the four weeks before the event. The Hard Hat Tour, like the Beam Signing Celebration, had an element of exclusivity that encouraged participation at increased levels. While there was no minimum gift amount required to be invited to these events, both CCS and the Development Office at Horace Mann were pleasantly surprised by how eager families were to make personally significant gifts to the Campaign. Moreover, given the parties’ construction-related themes, both events demonstrated the impact of donors’ philanthropic dollars in a tangible way.

4) Appreciate

Finally, each fundraising event at Horace Mann, whether for the capital campaign or annual fund, demonstrated the School’s appreciation for its donors, volunteers, and trustees. The small group dinners held during the quiet and major gifts phases, as well as the Open House events, empowered trustees, campaign volunteers, and donors to further engage in the campaign process by giving them leadership roles. The School’s large-scale celebrations gave leadership donors a moment to shine, while also acknowledging the generosity of each person in the room, regardless of the size of their gifts. Furthermore, each donor was always sent home with several pieces of campaign-themed gear as an additional thank you and a reminder of their participation in the campaign.

Sustaining a Successful Future

These opportunities for stewardship ensure a donor’s continued engagement with the School for years to come and, in fact, can serve as important cultivation opportunities for future fundraising efforts or for existing initiatives. Horace Mann held a Ribbon Cutting Ceremony in October of 2018 to officially commemorate the opening of the School’s new facilities. Donors watched a short video of the impact the building was already having on students, faculty, and staff, and then were allowed to walk through the spaces independently. Ten donors who attended the event were so moved by the program and by the facilities that they increased their campaign pledges, with one family doubling their commitment. No gesture of stewardship is too small.

CCS Fundraising is a strategic consulting firm that partners with nonprofits for transformational change. To access our full suite of perspectives, publications, and reports, visit our insights page.

Since the publication of “Making Big Bets for Social Change” in Stanford Social Innovation Review just over three years ago, the topic of “big bet” philanthropy has been making headlines.

According to The Bridgespan Group, a big bet is an individual or foundation grant of $10 million or more made to a single organization or cause seeking to drive social change. These gifts have an extraordinary effect on organizations’ ability to expand their reach, improve the quality of their impact, strengthen their infrastructure, and deploy more resources in service of their mission.

Historically, most gifts of this magnitude were directed at traditional institutional recipients such as universities, hospitals, and large cultural institutions. With their robust development operations and compelling recognition opportunities such as named physical spaces and endowed chairs, these institutions regularly and effectively cultivate, solicit, and steward 8- and 9-figure gifts.

Yet with the rapid growth in wealth over the last two decades, we have experienced unprecedented levels of giving and a stronger commitment to bettering society, with an increasing number of big bets being made to support human services, environmental, and international development organizations. For example, in 2017, U.S. giving surpassed the $400 billion mark for the first time ever.[1] At the same time, the number of donors who made gifts of $25 million or more to social change organizations grew to 69, a significant jump from just 18 in 2000.[2]

The philanthropic landscape is ripe for big bets. Today, we stand at a pivotal moment in the history of philanthropy, as donors contemplate the impact that large-scale charitable investments can have on solving or dramatically improving persistent social problems.

So, what makes an organization “big bettable,” and how can organizations position themselves to secure significant eight and nine-figure investments in service of their mission?

In “Becoming Big Bettable,” William Foster, Gail Perreault, and Bradley Seaman discuss how a significant infusion of capital can transform an organization’s growth trajectory by dramatically scaling its resources, programs, and services. This positions the organization to take bigger, bolder steps to achieve its vital mission—from improving access to quality water to eradicating world hunger.

The key element of a big bet is an ambitious, measurable goal that demonstrates the specific results that can be achieved—and scaled—and that reflects the demand from communities, partners, policymakers, and other major stakeholders.

While the goal will typically be accomplished over a 5- to 10-year period, it will have enduring impact. Oftentimes, it occupies the “missing middle” that is more concrete than a long-term vision and more ambitious than a short-term goal. [3] Equally as important, the goal should matter not only to your organization, but also to society at large. How will your community, country, or even the world become a more just and inclusive place because of this bold investment?

At CCS, we have partnered with nonprofit leaders to tackle some of society’s greatest challenges. We have seen the extraordinary impact that big bets can have. And we know that accomplishing lofty goals requires allocating commensurate resources.                                                                                                              

By developing a compelling investment concept with a clear and measurable goal, a strategic plan to get there, and a well-articulated role for philanthropy, your organization may be able to increase its opportunities of securing big bets and deploying them with distinctive impact. This, in turn, creates the potential for transformative social change.

Below are three steps your organization can take to position itself as big bet ready:

1) Identify a Societal Challenge that Demands Action and Innovation

“Big bettable” concepts address the core of some of society’s most persistent social challenges and are ripe for immediate action. What is the macro challenge your organization is trying to solve and how will a critical cash infusion scale the solution right now?

Since 1913, the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) has fought to stop the defamation of the Jewish people and to secure justice and fair treatment to all. ADL remains on the frontlines against hate today through its anti-bias education and law enforcement training programs as well as grassroots advocacy to build a more civil society.

Today’s external environment demands a stronger ADL. In 2017, ADL reported a 57% surge in anti-Semitic incidents in the U.S.—the largest single-year increase on record since ADL started tracking such data in 1979.[4] This was compounded by the prolific volume of anti-Semitic and hateful content on social media platforms, where 4.2 million anti-Semitic tweets were shared or reshared in 2017.[5] At the same time, extremist activity made national headlines, from the 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, VA, to the horrific massacre at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh, PA, one year later.

From local schools to the halls of government to C-suites at Fortune 500 companies, society was crying out for a stronger, more innovative and impactful ADL. Yet the demand for ADL’s voice and expertise significantly outpaced its ability to deliver.

In order to best position your organization as big bettable, try to establish the urgent necessity of your mission in addressing specific issues, and the potential consequences of not rising to meet these issues, especially if they are of an escalating nature.

2) Develop an Ambitious, Measurable Goal with Enduring Impact

When donors bet big, it is because they are presented with an opportunity at an order of magnitude different from what they have been offered before—an investment concept that allows them to see the tangible possibility of enduring change in a distinctive way.[6]

Since his appointment as CEO of ADL in July 2015, Jonathan Greenblatt has applied his business acumen and entrepreneurial spirit to transform ADL—a 100+ year old institution—into a more innovative, impactful organization fighting anti-Semitism and all forms of hate on the frontlines.

In just a few years, Jonathan has built a best-in-class executive team with experts from the corporate, government, academic, and nonprofit sectors; revamped the organization’s governance structure from an over 300-member National Commission to a highly curated 16-person Board of Directors; and invested in measurement and evaluation to bolster ADL’s operational effectiveness. He also launched a fresh brand into the marketplace to ensure that ADL resonates not only with the organization’s stalwart supporters, but also with the next generation of leaders, advocates, and social entrepreneurs. And he’s just getting started!

Bold leaders dream big—and they bet big. They take a step back from the immediate organizational needs to consider the entire field they are trying to shift and inspire others to join them. “We stand at a pivotal moment in ADL’s history and a pivotal moment in our country’s history,” Greenblatt says. “We are making critical investments in our future to more effectively combat anti-Semitism and get ahead of the next technological trends to spread hate, including cyberhate.”

Greenblatt seeks to achieve this vision through transformational investments in ADL’s tools, talent, and technology. These growth capital investments will build critically needed capacity to measure and scale ADL’s education and advocacy programs to fight hate on the frontlines, pioneer cutting-edge tools to monitor and expose hate crimes and extremist threats with unrivaled efficiency and magnitude—on the ground and in our 24/7 digital environment, and develop technological and policy interventions to reduce the volume and impact of cyberhate.

ADL is an organization in transformation, and the deliberate steps that Greenblatt and his team have taken have positioned ADL to become “big bettable.” Through significant investments that build on its 100+ year record of success, ADL is poised to make critical strides in the fight against anti-Semitism and hate and create a more just and inclusive society.

When thinking about your organization’s goals, think about a new, lofty opportunity that is larger in scale and scope than what you’ve previously aimed to achieve and that builds on your past success. Be bold in sharing how big bet investments in your vision will dramatically change the status quo.

3) Inspire Donors to Bet Big on Your Vision

When donors consider making an exceptionally large investment, they generally want to do more than fund good work. They want to create change that solves or significantly improves a large-scale problem. The key to securing a big bet will rest on your ability to articulate why philanthropy is the missing ingredient for execution.

Big bets usually build on existing relationships. When Bridgespan analyzed a sample of 165 grants of $10 million or more from its big bets databases (gifts from U.S.-based donors to a social change organization or cause between 2000 and 2012), they found that the big bet recipients received a median of four previous grants from the donor prior to the big bet.

What does this mean for your organization? If a donor has given many times and at significant levels, chances are strong that he or she believes deeply in your mission and the people involved and may be poised to make a big bet. While it may not be a requirement to have a long relationship involving multiple gifts with every big bet donor, it is important to be patient and to play the long-game.

As fundraisers, we know that at the heart of any meaningful investment is a donor’s steadfast belief in the mission of the organization and trust in the CEO and his or her vision. To inspire donors to make the leap from a major gift to a big bet, organizations must emphasize the specific outcomes the donor’s investment will have, and how these outcomes will catapult the organization to a higher level of impact—but for this big bet, we would not have the resources or capabilities to achieve XYZ. It takes time and discipline, but the results are worth it!

For many donors, a big bet investment may be the single most consequential philanthropic commitment they make in their lifetime. Be bold and think big about the innovative and scalable solutions you seek to address society’s toughest challenges together.

CCS Fundraising is a strategic consulting firm that partners with nonprofits for transformational change. To access our full suite of perspectives, publications, and reports, visit our insights page.

[1] Snapshot of Today’s Philanthropic Landscape, 2018

[2] Unleashing Philanthropy’s Big Bets for Social Change, Introduction, 2019

[3] Unleashing Philanthropy’s Big Bets for Social Change, Becoming Big Bettable, 2019

[4] ADL Audit of Anti-Semitic Incidents, 2017

[5] Quantifying Hate: A Year of Anti-Semitism on Twitter, ADL, 2018

[6] Unleashing Philanthropy’s Big Bets for Social Change, Becoming Big Bettable, 2019

So often, organizations face pipeline challenges because of difficulty re-engaging lapsed donors or difficulty gaining access to new prospects. Relationship mapping can help resolve these challenges by matching your organization’s prospects with the personal and professional networks of your organization’s board leadership. As a result, your board can become instrumental in facilitating introductions, cultivating prospects, and, ultimately, moving prospects towards the ask.

Relationship Mapping in 6 Steps

The “Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon” game was invented as a play on the concept of six degrees of separation—the idea that any two people can be connected in a maximum of six steps. Fun and addictive, the game demonstrates just how small the world of Hollywood really is by drawing connections between Kevin Bacon and any other actor. In fundraising, the world of qualified prospects and your organization’s connections to them is even smaller.

To achieve success with relationship mapping, follow these simple, yet strategic, steps:

  1. Research your prospects
  2. Engage a task force/ad-hoc committee
  3. Map your relationships
  4. Select viable connections
  5. Make connections
  6. Build relationships

Step 1: Research Your Prospects

To ensure your list of prospects is well-qualified, it’s important to do your research. Gather information on both new prospects and lapsed donors, including giving capacity, giving history to your organization (if any), and area of interest/alignment. Completing this research in advance will ensure that the prospects you map are qualified and will increase the likelihood of a successful introduction.

Step 2: Engage a Task Force

Recruit a handful of well-connected board members to assist you with your prospect pipeline project by serving as a member of an ad hoc committee or task force. Five to seven members will keep the group manageable. An ideal task force member is one who is connected in multiple sectors (casting the widest net of connections), serves in an executive role (providing access to the most influential people), and is not overcommitted (ensuring they have the time and interest to help). Select a member to chair the task force – someone who will lead by example and serve as an encouraging and motivational peer. As with all initiatives, be sure to inform your committee of the scope of assistance needed for the project upfront. Schedule monthly calls with the committee to check in on progress and provide updates.

Step 3: Map Your Relationships

Relationship mapping, or, identifying likely connections between two people, takes the guess work out of list vetting. Instead of asking board members, “Do you know anyone on this list?” mapping relationships allows you to say, “We think you know this prospect. Can you confirm?” Tools like Muckety and Relationship Science are invaluable for identifying not just who your board members may know on your prospect list, but specifically how they know them.

Step 4: Select Viable Connections

After mapping all possible connections between your committee and your prospects, review the individualized list of potential connections with each committee member and identify, first, connections that are viable, and, second, prospects that the committee member is willing to engage to make an introduction. A viable connection is one in which the committee member confirms they do, in fact, know the prospect. Since you have already done the research to qualify the prospect as having both affinity for your cause and capacity to give (Step 1), there is a strong likelihood the prospect will be open to an introduction, particularly from a familiar face.

Step 5: Make Introductions

Provide each committee member with a call strategy sheet for each prospect they agree to connect with. Conduct a briefing call with each committee member to reiterate that the purpose of their outreach to the prospect is to simply facilitate an introduction to your organization’s internal leadership, not to pitch a project or campaign. Provide each committee member with a timeframe to complete the calls and ask them to take notes on their calls so that they can report back to the committee during the next scheduled group call.

Step 6: Build Relationships

Once the introductions to your internal leadership have been made, follow up with your prospects promptly to schedule your first introductory meeting so you can begin the cultivation process.

Follow these simple, yet strategic steps and your organization is sure to reap the benefits of engaged board members, a qualified prospect pipeline, and the new gifts that will follow from a successful game of “Six Degrees of Cultivation.”

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Big gifts – the kind of transformative philanthropic commitments that can positively redirect the trajectory of a program, project, or even an entire organization – are the types of gifts that many development professionals don’t just dream about but strategize for months or years to secure. Enormous amounts of discovery, cultivation, and solicitation go into inviting and – if everything goes right – ultimately formalizing these major gifts. While the time, human capital, and other resources needed to arrive at the pivotal point of receiving a transformative gift are of course necessary, what happens after the gift is in the door is just as, or even more critical to ensuring continued fundraising success and meaningful donor partnerships.

Game-changing gifts mean something different for every organization and vary depending on a nonprofit’s annual budget and fundraising goals. Regardless of whether an organization considers a cornerstone commitment $25,000 or $25 million, the core fundamentals of properly stewarding the gift and leveraging its impact remain the same. When leadership fully realizes and embraces the extraordinary opportunity that significant philanthropic commitments yield, they can then use the momentum from the gift to heighten their overall fundraising performance while simultaneously deepening their partnership with the donor. Failure to maximize this opportunity can result in a poorly executed stewardship plan and a missed shot to take the organization’s culture of philanthropy to an entirely new level.

If your organization is privileged to be the recipient of a significant philanthropic investment, consider keeping the following tips top of mind for effectively managing transformative gifts.

Build a Comprehensive and Timely Stewardship Plan

Too often, stewardship is an afterthought – something that is only given attention after a donor has signed a check. Waiting until the last minute to develop a stewardship plan runs the risk of lacking meaning, customization, and alignment to your donor’s investment as well as his/her preferences for engagement and receiving information post-commitment.

It is worth noting here that while development staff should not delay the crafting of a stewardship plan, it is also important to not jump the gun either, especially if the latter leans on false assumptions that a donor’s gift is a given before a request for support has been extended. In addition to the potentially inaccurate presumptions that a premature stewardship plan might depend on, it is a mistake to rush into a solicitation and hurriedly move into the stewardship stage without sound strategy, adequate timing and, most critical, a robust understanding of what is important to your donor. Moving ahead without these elements goes against a key principle of the donor engagement process – developing a tailored stewardship plan that is equally thoughtful and effective.

Instead, throughout the Moves Management process, development staff should continuously gather information from early discovery and cultivation stages to inform customized stewardship touchpoints when appropriate. Relying on this information underscores the importance of maintaining detailed contact reports that can be easily referenced as needed. As the prospective donor continues to grow his/her affinity for and connection to your organization, and a gift decision appears to be on the horizon, outlining a proposed stewardship roadmap that can be adjusted as applicable will help you and your team stay one step ahead.

When developing a stewardship plan, keep in mind basic elements, including how your donor prefers to receive impact updates and reports, and how frequently. Is your donor’s gift helping to launch a new initiative that will require an advisory council or some other leadership body? If so, know how to properly engage your donor in that manner. Recognize that personalized stewardship opportunities can also double as cultivation toward continued and/or increased future support from the donor. With that said, it is imperative to adequately thank your donor and show substantive impact before asking for another gift too soon.

While these stewardship tips have applications to gifts of all sizes, they carry significant weight when a transformative gift is at play. Donors of transformative gifts are becoming increasingly savvy and sophisticated, and failing to effectively engage them in how their gift is being put to work severely diminishes their gift experience. At its core, sound stewardship is the hallmark of a high-performing, donor-centered fundraising operation.

Consider Your Donor a Partner

Expanding on the importance of tailored and purposeful stewardship, it is critical to acknowledge and celebrate the donor-organization relationship for what it is – a partnership. High-level donors are not merely check signatories nor should their connection to a nonprofit be viewed as transactional; rather, it should be considered nothing less than relational.

There are numerous ways to keep your donor close post-gift that can lead to an enhanced experience for them to enjoy as well as greater opportunities to amplify the gift’s ripple effect throughout your organization. As you report impact to your donor, ask questions, invite feedback, and do so with sincerity, rather than asking for input to simply check a box on your stewardship to-do list. Your donor has good ideas and a valuable perspective to offer; lean into these opportunities to meaningfully engage your donor and amplify the gift’s impact on a specific project or program.

Asking for feedback can be as simple as getting their thoughts on the color scheme for a new program brochure or the cover page of your quarterly newsletter. In addition, your donor’s feedback does not need to be asked for in a vacuum. For example, although they directed their gift toward your new after-school creative arts program, think about whether they have also demonstrated interest in other programs that might have overlap. With respect to their expressed interest areas and the amount of time you are asking of them, think about whether there is a reasonable opportunity to engage them in feedback sessions related to complimentary initiatives. Could their participation in this type of conversation generate impact beyond where their gift was originally allocated?

Further, take stock of how you can leverage your relationship with your donor to create new ones. Inviting your donor to open doors to his/her network can inspire new philanthropy from peers who otherwise may not have been connected to your organization’s important work. Sharing stories of personal giving is a surefire way to, at the very least, get other prospective high-level donors thinking about how they can be a part of your organization’s legacy. Tactfully tapping into your donor’s network can yield many additional returns, including a more robust roster of leadership candidates who can offer sound advice, a deeper prospective donor pipeline, and increased meaningful contact activity for your development staff.

Think of your big donors as insiders, keep them close, and maximize all opportunities to expand their impact beyond the dollar signs.

Explore Opportunities for Organization-Wide Impact

Big gifts have big impact, and oftentimes that impact is confined to a specific initiative within an organization – naming a new wellness center or endowing a scholarship fund for first-generation students, for example. But the impact of a big gift does not need to be limited in scope. If leveraged effectively, the impact of a big gift can reverberate beyond its designation while keeping the donor’s intentions front and center.

Maybe there is a smaller-scale program that has been sustaining thanks to annual operational support but would have the opportunity to thrive if wrapped into the larger initiative your donor is helping to fund. Brainstorm how other programs not directly supported by the gift can indirectly benefit from the momentum the philanthropic investment creates.

Particularly in situations where the big gift is truly a transformational catalyst, it is wise to inventory how the organization on a broad scale can be leveraged as a result. Perhaps this once-in-a-generation commitment can serve as the anchor gift to a larger fundraising endeavor such as a campaign where other organizational initiatives would also stand to benefit. As the Chronicle of Philanthropy recently pointed out, single big gifts tend to not only inspire others to raise their own philanthropic sights, but can also result in positive trends related to long-term increased annual and major gift support overall.

In summary, big gifts are called transformative for a reason. They ignite the opportunity for significant impact and change that can only be achieved through the power of philanthropy. The transformative gift is the seat of the stool, but without an effective stewardship plan, thoughtful follow-up strategies, and smart program design serving as the legs, the gift’s potential for impact is minimized. As fundraisers, we must remember to adequately and thoughtfully facilitate the positive influence that transformative gifts can have for our emerging program initiatives, our organization’s operations, and our overall culture of philanthropy.

CCS is a strategic fundraising consulting firm that partners with nonprofits for transformational change. To access our full suite of perspectives, publications, and reports, visit our insights page.

When it comes to the responsibilities of independent and private school board members, there is often uncertainty about what is expected of them beyond a financial contribution to the campaign. James Greenfield, long-time fundraising executive, addresses this in his book, Fundraising Responsibilities of Nonprofit Boards: “Board members are the primary stewards of the nonprofit organization, ultimately responsible for securing adequate resources and overseeing the disposition of those resources. For this reason, a commitment to fundraising must begin with the Board.”

These words by Greenfield are likely to be well understood by most nonprofit board members, but what may not be as readily understood is what that “commitment to fundraising” looks like, and what is entailed when “securing adequate resources.” For independent schools, that commitment often means defining and participating in a capital campaign. For capital campaigns to be successful, the board’s involvement must include achieving a clear understanding of the campaign goal and the case for support, establishing well-defined and articulated roles for the board and school leadership, and owning the campaign plan and timeline. Each piece is essential for a board if it hopes to support an effective campaign.

The Value of a Planning Study

It is no secret that board generosity is critical to the success of a school’s capital campaign, but all too often, campaigns struggle to get off the ground or stall because board members don’t understand or embrace the important aspects of a campaign beyond their own financial commitment. There is often uncertainty surrounding how best to support the Head of School and the advancement team. Of course, for any campaign to be truly successful, one hundred percent commitment from the board and a willingness to consider stretch gifts are vital, but there are other elements that are equally important in ensuring a campaign’s success over time.

No matter what your campaign is aiming to accomplish, it is critically important that a board engages with school leadership in a planning or feasibility study. Nothing will derail a campaign faster than if there’s a lack of understanding, trust, or confidence in the campaign goal and the underlying composition of the gift pyramid. While the goal can (and should) be bold and aspirational, the board needs to understand and participate in a comprehensive, thoughtful process of determining the goal and the structure of the gift pyramid that will define the effort to achieve the goal.

Each board member should participate in the feasibility study or in a conversation that offers feedback on the case elements, as well as some indication of the level of support for the campaign. A study helps the board understand the donor base—both its capacity and inclination—and aims to instill confidence in a campaign goal that is realistic and attainable. Without this confidence, committing to the work involved in cultivating, soliciting, and closing gifts will be more difficult and will run the risk of a campaign that will stall or, even worse, fail.

One element of the planning study that can be especially informative for board members in structuring the gift pyramid is predictive modeling. Specifically, understanding the implications of an RFM (Recency, Frequency, Monetary) analysis of a donor base that segments the base into categories that give a clear sense of capacity to give and affinity toward the institution. This type of analysis and the information it yields can be invaluable to board members because it can help them understand how an attainable campaign goal is established and, perhaps more importantly, the path to reaching that goal.

Understanding the Mission’s Narrative

One of the most important aspects of involving board members in a planning study is familiarizing them with the campaign’s case elements. Campaigns are often bogged down when there is a lack of clarity or shared understanding of the important case elements. The board’s understanding needs to move beyond a mere description of the various elements. For example, it is not enough to simply know that endowment for financial aid is part of the campaign; board members should have anecdotal examples of the power of the financial aid program in supporting the mission of the school.

The board should be able to offer compelling, mission-appropriate examples of students who have enriched the life of the school because of the opportunity created by financial aid. It is more effective to share a specific vision for how growing this endowment will enhance the school and support the mission going forward. While this may seem daunting, the commitment to learning these stories and sharing them with the donor community is incredibly powerful. While it’s wonderful to host or to attend an event, it is much more compelling if board members can speak with enthusiasm, specificity, and conviction about the impact of the gifts on the various case elements.

Seeing the Road Ahead

Understanding both the planning and case elements of the campaign will also help provide a clear roadmap for reaching the campaign goal. Not having a clear, collectively understood plan to raise the money can be problematic. The board plays a critical role in helping to shape this plan by establishing leadership roles and assigning specific trustees to play those roles. It is important to choose campaign chairs who will be comfortable soliciting gifts and who will be able to devote time to spend with potential donors. Each board member needs to attend or host events and cultivate and steward donors. Additionally, it is always a good idea for board members to pay attention to how campaign plans are designed or carried out by peer or aspirant peer schools.

The board needs to work alongside the Head of School and advancement staff to establish and, ultimately, approve the campaign plan. But, more importantly, the entire board needs to understand the plan and have the leadership in place to adhere to the plan. Given the demands on the Head and the unforeseen issues that may consume his or her time, the board needs to support the Head by working closely with the advancement team to ensure that the plan is carefully created, communicated, and executed by each member. When boards commit to knowing the plan and having the discipline to follow it, they greatly increase the likelihood that the campaign will be a success. Additionally, when board members are deeply familiar with the institution’s plan, it not only improves their ability to ask but can also inspire them when it comes to their own gift.

Part of this plan is also developing a clear, intentional timeline. All campaigns go through peaks and valleys— times of great momentum and lulls—so understanding the campaign timeline, particularly when asking for leadership gifts, will mean that the campaign stays on course. Board members need to be active partners in building the donor pipeline by opening doors and cultivating potential donors, but it is a willingness to ask those donors to join them in support of the campaign that will ensure steady progress and ultimate success.

Campaigns can be intimidating in both scale and scope, but success is attainable when a board understands its role beyond its own financial generosity. Being well-organized, committed to the goal, well-versed in the case elements, and disciplined in following a plan will go a long way in keeping a board unified and cohesive as it fulfills its responsibility “to secure adequate resources” and realize campaign success.

CCS Fundraising is a strategic consulting firm that partners with nonprofits for transformational change. To access our full suite of perspectives, publications, and reports, visit our insights page.

We all know that large, transformational gifts can positively impact a parish’s mission and its community for generations to come, sparking a fundraising campaign to new heights and building momentum to achieve aspirational goals. But how do you go about attracting such gifts?

The answer requires a few more questions.

Do you know who in your parish has the most giving potential? Do you know families who could be major givers but are not currently donating at that level? These donors have the means to make transformational gifts to your parish, but they need to be cultivated and invited to do so. Understanding how to identify and grow your relationships with these donors is the most important key to success, and it may take shifting the way you approach fundraising strategy altogether.

First, it is crucial to not overlook the importance of major donors whether you are in a campaign, in between, or just getting started. Consider the fact that in America, 91 percent [1] of high net worth individuals—those who have investable assets of $1 million or more—donate to charity, compared to 56 percent [2] of the general population. More importantly, high net worth households give the most to religion over any other philanthropic sector. The most recent data shows that over 36 percent [3] of these households give to religious causes.

Overcoming Common Challenges

While the numbers show that these types of donors may consider supporting your mission, parish leaders can often feel apprehensive about how to approach these relationships. Developing a positive mindset about why you are undertaking this aspect of ministry can seem challenging, but it’s important to understand how philanthropy and the message of the Catholic Church are related. Father Henri Nouwen, a Dutch Catholic priest, wrote astutely about the spiritual dimension of fundraising for the church:

“Fundraising is proclaiming what we believe in such a way that we offer other people an opportunity to participate with us in our vision and mission. Fundraising is precisely the opposite of begging. When we seek to raise funds we are not saying, ‘Please, could you help us out because lately it’s been hard.’ Rather, we are declaring, ‘We have a vision that is amazing and exciting. We are inviting you to invest yourself through the resources that God has given you—your energy, your prayers, and your money—in this work to which God has called us.’ Our invitation is clear and confident because we trust that our vision and mission are like ‘trees planted by streams of water, which yield their fruit in its season, and their leaves do not wither’ (Ps. 1:3).”

In addition to understanding the role that fundraising plays, simply becoming more informed about who your donors are and how they may want to contribute in the future will ease any discomfort about discussing their potential contributions with them.

A few years ago, at the beginning stage of a major diocesan fundraising campaign in the Midwest, CCS Fundraising recommended to the presbyterate that each parish should identify those families who could be asked to consider leadership gifts of six figures or more for their parish campaigns. A senior priest raised his hand and declared that he had never once looked at what people gave and would not start now for this campaign.

The Bishop provided an immediate and effective response. He replied that if you don’t know where a person is regarding their relationship with the church, how can you minister to them? This sparked a great discussion about what each parish knew about their parishioners. It was discovered in the process that followed that there were several high net worth individuals who gave often to the church but at levels well below their means. The reason was two-fold: no one had done the research to know their potential to make a transformational gift, and they weren’t asked.

Chances are, through open and honest conversations with these donors, your goals to help others in your community will be aligned. They will also understand the role they can play in making these goals a reality.

Taking a Closer Look

Understanding who your potentially impactful parishioners are is an important first step. One way to begin is to conduct a review of the past three years of individual offertory contributions from your parish. Then, make a list of your top 10 or 20 financial supporters during this time period. Once your list is complete, make note of your current relationships with these donors. Ask yourself, how well do we know these families? Are they also engaged in other parish ministries or on the financial council or pastoral council? Making note of these criteria will help you identify who is already heavily involved and who could benefit from further outreach.

The next step is to identify other families who you may perceive to have significant financial resources but whose offertory support may not reflect their potential capacity. This may take further work. While it is a significant challenge to know with specificity any family’s financial circumstances, some indicators of strong financial potential can be estimated from occupations.

Many of the largest donors to churches and other nonprofit organizations are individuals who own businesses, are senior executives at larger companies, or work in highly-compensated professions such as medicine, banking, finance, or the law.

Another way to gain a better understanding is to perform what’s called a wealth screening analysis to help identify families who have outsized capacity that may not arise from looking only at their offertory or occupation. Even if you are not planning a major campaign, such an exercise can help you identify families flying below the radar and allow you to engage them more deeply in the work of the parish.

Once you have compiled a list of families that are either currently giving large amounts or, based on perceived capacity, might be amenable to increasing their support, rank them by whether you know them well, know them in passing, or have not met them at all.

Developing Strategies

Families You Know Well

Look to how engaged they are in the parish’s life. Are they on councils, engaged in ministries, or involved in other parish-based groups such as the Knights of Columbus? If not, consider meeting with them to explore other ways their gifts could be used to help the parish. This is an opportunity to share your vision for the parish and learn their own thoughts and vision for where the parish is headed.

Families You Know in Passing

Seek ways to get to know them better. Consider inviting them out to a meal or for coffee. This will give you an opportunity to come to know them better and to understand how they view the parish. Can they be invited to join a ministry or a council? Are there ways they can become more engaged in the parish? Do they have suggestions or feedback for your vision that you hadn’t considered? It will also be helpful to find out where they are in regard to their faith journey. If they are interested, see if there might be a ministry or service role that would appeal to them.

Potentially Impactful Families You Don’t Know

Consider asking other families in the parish with whom you have established a good relationship if they know them and can facilitate an introduction. From there, you can apply the same conversation as you did for those you know in passing.

The Importance of Stewardship

Remember that successful philanthropy is a relationship, not a transaction. Just as you do with other families you get to know, learn details about them and show you appreciate them. Send a birthday card or anniversary card. Recognize a child’s accomplishments. Greet them by name after Mass. Additionally, thank them. Not everyone is looking to have their name on a wall or to be publicly acknowledged, but everyone likes to be thanked. Even a simple phone call or note of appreciation can make a huge difference.

Once you have identified families with extraordinary financial resources and started taking the first steps to implement a strategy, you can begin inviting them on the journey of fulfilling the parish and church’s vision.

[1] Bank of America: U.S. Trust Study of High Net Worth Philanthropy, 2016

[2] IUPUI Lilly Family School of Philanthropy: Philanthropy Panel Study, 2017

[3] Bank of America: U.S. Trust Study of High Net Worth Philanthropy, 2016

CCS Fundraising is a strategic consulting firm that partners with nonprofits for transformational change. To access our full suite of perspectives, publications, and reports, visit our insights page.

A focused feasibility and planning study is an essential early step in campaign planning for higher education institutions. Rather than providing a simple “yes or no” answer about whether or not to move forward with a campaign, a truly valuable study serves several purposes: it provides early feedback on the case for support and campaign goal, identifies potential volunteer leaders and financial prospects, and serves as early cultivation of an organization’s top stakeholders. For colleges and universities, which tend to have broad campaign priorities and many prospect constituencies, a strong planning study is a first step in bringing your community together to support what will be a transformational initiative. However, without thoroughly planning the study, there is the potential to waste time and resources, and miss opportunities to strengthen your campaign in the long run.

Start with a Strategic Plan

While the study provides an opportunity to test a very early version of case elements and uncover the areas your donors find most attractive, the strongest case for support will align with your institution’s strategic plan, even at this early stage.

The strategic plan – typically designed over time by a group of stakeholders including administrative leaders, board members, key faculty and staff, alumni, parents, and sometimes even students – outlines the institutional priorities of the school. The campaign is the vehicle that will fund that plan and make those priorities a reality.

Knowing that your case is built on a strategic plan gives your study participants the confidence that the initial step of determining priorities has already been accomplished and that the school’s leaders are behind it. It also helps ensure that no matter how much your college or university is transformed by the campaign, it will still adhere to its mission and goals.

Think Outside the Box

A planning study will include personal discussions, or interviews, with key stakeholders. While you want to include many opinions, and meet with your most valuable stakeholders, the goal should not be to interview as many people as possible. Instead, prioritize finding the right people. Focus on who is best-suited to discuss the school’s strengths and challenges and who will have important insights into the school’s ability to embark on such a major initiative.

While your discussion subjects should include board members, top donor prospects, and close friends of the institution, there is opportunity to think more creatively as well. Consider including up-and-coming potential board members, active alumni, or others who know your school well even if they aren’t (yet) significant donors. Also make sure to meet with anyone whose financial participation could greatly sway the campaign goal amount or initiatives.

Additionally, don’t be afraid to include people who have expressed frustrations in the past. Often, providing the opportunity for a one-on-one discussion is a valuable way to allow that person to vent his or her frustrations and provide honest feedback. Rather than closing the door on these prospects, this enables school leaders and the development team to keep the conversation going.

Remember: This is Cultivation

Don’t think of the planning study as a precursor to campaign planning, but rather as an important component of campaign planning. The cultivation aspect sometimes gets lost, but it is a critical piece of setting the school up for success. There are a few things you can do to help turn a study interview into a cultivation opportunity.

For starters, be sure to find out from those conducting the study if the participant has any immediate concerns or complaints that need to be addressed. If so, forward them on to the appropriate person. If the participant has questions that can be answered now, such as requesting more information about a current program, be timely in your follow up.

Finally, don’t forget to say thank you! Although most of the study discussion content will likely be kept private, a member of the school’s development or administrative team should follow up to thank each participant as soon as their discussion is complete. Thank them again once the study is over and be sure to keep them informed of any major decisions along the way.

Preparation is Key

A feasibility and planning study is the first step to setting your college or university on the path to a campaign. Go into the study with your homework done. Identify your main priorities and goals, keep an open mind to engaging participants, and have a cultivation mindset throughout. The advice you receive from the study may contain surprises and your case may shift based on the study results, but thoughtful preparation will ensure a solid start to your campaign.

CCS Fundraising is a strategic consulting firm that partners with nonprofits for transformational change. To access our full suite of perspectives, publications, and reports, visit our insights page.

An effective case can excite, compel, and inspire your donors to raise their philanthropic sights. It is the guiding document upon which the entire narrative of your campaign is built. However, writing this impactful story can be a daunting task, below are 5 tips to keep in mind.

  1. Confirm your strategic priorities
  • Before you put pen to paper ensure that all internal stakeholders are in agreement regarding the funding focus for your organisation.
  • Include programmes that have a strong rationale for support and will deliver impact which can be shared with donors.
  • Plan out the financial requirements that you will include in your case document in order to demonstrate the strong need for philanthropic support.
  1. Consider how your case document will be used
  • The case should not be a stand-alone document but rather designed with the intention of being accompanied by a personal visit/conversation from someone in your organisation.
  • Content should be able to be re-purposed later for proposal documents and supporting materials for cultivation activity, therefore, the language, tone, and design should be carefully developed.
  • Think about how you will share the document; will you use hard copies, send it electronically or both? Knowing this at the beginning may impact design decisions.
  1. Think about the audience
  • The strongest case documents are written with real donors in mind and aim to give them a first-hand insight into the organisation.
  • Your case should include an emotional appeal for why the programmes included matter and convey the difference a prospective donor can make through participation. Using testimonials from your beneficiaries allows them to hear directly about the impact they could have.
  • At its core, your case should show how the donor can play a transformational role by making a philanthropic investment.
  1. Give time to design
  • A visually attractive and compelling document will instantly engage a reader and portray your organisation in the strongest light.
  • Try to access good quality images which reflect your priorities and think about how you can tell your story with visuals and infographics to break up text and convey important messages.
  • Be consistent with font size, colour palette and layout to ensure a coherent look overall.
  1. Finalising your case document
  • Check and check again to make sure that you are utilising the most compelling language and importantly that there are no spelling or grammar errors.
  • If you have time, it can be beneficial to take a few days away from the document before reviewing again with a fresh perspective, similarly asking members of your team or colleagues to review can also be very helpful.
  • Once you have completed a high-quality case, consider ‘testing’ it with people close to your organisation to gain initial feedback before finalising your document.

Culture: It’s complicated.

“Culture” is ubiquitous, although that does not mean it is easy to define. Instead, “culture” presents a challenge when we try to change it without buy-in from essential stakeholders. Understanding that every organization has a particular culture, whether or not stakeholders acknowledge it, is crucial in formulating a fundraising strategy. Before describing an ideal “culture of philanthropy,” it may be helpful to refer to a few underlying assumptions about culture:

  • All organizations have it
  • It’s a powerful source of communication inside and outside of the organization
  • It can be detrimental if not aligned with the well-being of the institution
  • It can – and should – be measured [1]

It should be no surprise, then, that the first step towards developing a dynamic and successful advancement office is to articulate how philanthropy allows institutions to realize key tenets of culture that they bring into reality every day.

Developing a culture around philanthropy within an independent school, especially, is a little more complicated than merely speaking it into reality. Schools increasingly rely on the generosity of current and former students as well as their families, and can be especially at-risk for missed opportunities if they do not appeal to the collective values of these stakeholders. Advancement offices have also seen improvements in external fundraising when internal stakeholders, like faculty and staff, choose to participate.

Models for Understanding Philanthropy’s Role in Culture

Independent schools operate as complex, adaptive systems, and they must if they hope to respond to the critical needs of the communities they serve. [2] Culture and philanthropy’s role in these institutions can be equally as complicated, and the consequences of inconsonance can alienate and drive away existing and prospective supporters.

Thankfully, systems thinking approaches like the Vision, Mission, Capacity, and Learning (VMCL) model, championed by Drs. Derek and Laura Cabrera of the Cabrera Research Lab at Cornell University, make it easier to analyze, understand, and implement a culture of philanthropy.

The VMCL model suggests that culture is derived from these four functions:

  • Vision: The vision is short, simple, inspiring, and measurable. It is a desired future state for your organization.
  • Mission: The mission describes actions done repeatedly to realize the vision. Mission statements clearly state who does what for whom, and are clear, concise, measurable, and easily understood.
  • Capacity: Capacity describes the critical systems essential to realizing vision and should be easily understood and measured.
  • Learning: Learning is the continuous process that enhances an organization’s collective ability to accept, make sense of, and respond to internal and external change. [3]

Where VMCL helps us understand philanthropic culture, Cultural Moves Management [4] helps us change it. Shifting the way stakeholders perceive philanthropy and their role in it encourages detractors to become supporters.

Most of your organization’s supporters are considered cultural “adopters” and tend to be the largest sub-group of supporters. They are passionate, reliable, and motivated by external and internal factors. [5] A smaller group of your supporters are cultural “leaders,” who serve as visionaries and should be enlisted as cultural ambassadors. To continue their work in advocating the culture, cultural leaders in the organization should receive ongoing stewardship for their support. Adopters, alternatively, can be transitioned into cultural leaders through ongoing investment and incentives.

Detractors of your organization’s culture are most often “fence-sitters” – they tend to be passive, undecided, and skeptical. [6] Fence-sitters are waiting to see what’s going to happen, so you want to avoid rewarding this behavior. Instead, show them the benefits of joining and adopting the culture. Use assorted communications that demonstrate for fence-sitters that on the side of corporate culture is the right place to be. They will get rewards, have fun, gain a sense of purpose and belonging, and ultimately love what they’re doing.

A smaller group are “naysayers,” who are oppositional, misinformed, or combative. [7] Because they may have legitimate complaints, naysayers should have an opportunity to share grievances. Sometimes naysayers can even become cultural proponents, but other times, leaders may confront staunch opposition to change. In this instance, they should redirect the naysayers’ energy and avoid letting them set the agenda with their opposition.

Regardless of where your stakeholders fall in cultural moves management, it’s critical to give them each the time and support needed to legitimize their experience and foster a sense of buy-in for your institution’s success.

Cultural Moves Management and Avoiding Obstacles

The case of a 100-year-old military school serves as an example to better understand potential obstacles when creating a culture of philanthropy. One particular pitfall of the advancement team at this school was not spending enough energy engaging alumni, students, and families through social media. Cabrera and Cabrera say that the most successful organizations are the ones that can easily communicate their vision, internally and externally. Independent schools can facilitate organizational learning by exposing stakeholders to a diverse array of resources like social media and online videos. Twitter and Instagram helped the school create the capacity for cultural formulation by instantly sharing essential information and updates. Once senior leadership at the military school embraced the use of these mediums and conveyed a sense of urgency around their fundraising initiatives, they actively engaged more alumni to participate in their annual Day of Giving. Cultural inculcation occurred organically, as retweets, reposts, and likes were continuously monitored and measured for their impact.

The military school was also able to mitigate the mistake of developing an overly complicated mission statement that would only confuse its stakeholders. The goal of any mission statement should be to clearly and concisely explain the actions required to bring about the change action that the school is working towards. Verbose mission statements often have the opposite effect intended. If they are too long and unfocused, the reader will have difficulty walking away with a clear sense of the school’s most pressing needs. Instead, this school simply stated its most important mandates and quickly explained why they required immediate attention and resources. Simple. Clear. Concise.

Finally, a renewed commitment from the military school to celebrate every volunteer leader went a long way toward developing a compassionate culture of philanthropy. These cultural champions were lauded and served as examples for other alumni, parents, teachers, and community members as people willing to go the extra mile to ensure that all of the school’s fundraising initiatives were successful. Creating compelling incentives such as a “Joint Chief’s Circle” or asking an alumnus to consider moving from the “Captain’s Circle” to join the “Major’s Circle” was a creative way to showcase the school’s corps of donors. When these organizational leaders were properly recognized and heralded as visionaries, they were more likely to demonstrate repeated buy-in and open new doors to engage the community in every philanthropic endeavor.

Changing Culture: The Value of Buy-In

Another example is a small independent school in Virginia where kids with ADD, ADHD, dyslexia, dysgraphia, dyscalculia, and other differences have discovered a love for learning since the early 1970s. The vision of the school is to build a community where all students, regardless of learning differences, can realize their full potential, and their mission to provide multisensory education for each individual’s academic and social achievement is nurtured by faculty and staff every day.

Philanthropy, however, was not as easily adopted. Giving to previous annual fund campaigns fell flat, with only 20% of faculty and staff giving at any point in the school’s history. While teaching methodologies and technologies employed at the school have changed, the home that they have built in a re-purposed church has remained the same for several decades. Many of the school’s faculty and staff would be classified as “fence-sitters” when it came to a culture of philanthropy: teaching in outdated classrooms with noisy air-conditioning equipment, they were skeptical and didn’t see the value of their gift.

With new leadership and a five-year-old development department, the school decided to embark on its first-ever capital campaign to enhance and expand the campus. While philanthropic outreach is blossoming among a variety of stakeholders, faculty and staff participation presented a unique challenge for the school.

Knowing how valuable faculty and staff participation is to a capital campaign, development leaders set out to change the perspectives of their colleagues. They started by renovating two model classrooms to serve as examples for the future and then organized cultural “leaders” from the faculty to serve as volunteers for the campaign.

Most importantly, the campaign was about meeting a participation goal, not a dollar amount. This aligned with the school’s collaborative values, and the campaign’s elements spoke to the needs of faculty and staff and their students.

Early “adopters” of the capital campaign were rewarded with fun incentives for participating: the Head of School hand-delivered morning beverages, participants enjoyed a special adult-only lunch, and teachers were given a flexible hour for joining the effort. “Fence-sitters” – and possibly a few quiet “naysayers” – witnessed the shift happening among their colleagues and began to reconsider their own attitude towards philanthropy.

By the end of the campaign period, 100% of staff participated, demonstrating unprecedented endorsement towards the capital campaign.

Key Takeaways

The objective of cultural moves management is to encourage detractors to become supporters. From the real-world successes and challenges of these two independent schools, we identify important takeaways to align primary and secondary academic culture with philanthropy:

  1. Philanthropy must be rooted in the organizational culture to resonate with donors.
  2. Leadership sets the foundation for a positive overall and philanthropic culture.
  3. Values must be communicated early and often to students, parents, and members of faculty, administration, staff, and teachers.
  4. Measuring desired outcomes, like participation or elevated giving, will strengthen perceptions of culture.

So, how strong is your culture?

One simple test is to ask your essential stakeholders what your mission statement is. If they cannot recall, then it might be time to revisit how your school communicates its strategic vision. When your stakeholders can recite your mission without hesitation, that is a good indication that your organization is well on its way toward developing a culture of philanthropy, thus empowering your school to mold the leaders of tomorrow.

CCS Fundraising is a strategic consulting firm that partners with nonprofits for transformational change. To access our full suite of perspectives, publications, and reports, visit our insights page.

[1] Cabrera, Derek, and Laura Cabrera. Flock Not Clock: Design, Align, and Lead to Achieve Your Vision, Plectica LLC, May 29, 2018. Print.

[2] Ibid.

[3] Ibid.

[4] Think Water. (2015). VMCL: Build an Adaptive Organization. Retrieved from: https://fyi.uwex.edu/programdevelopment/files/2016/03/VMCL-Guide.pdf

[5] Cabrera, Derek, and Laura Cabrera. Flock Not Clock: Design, Align, and Lead to Achieve Your Vision, Plectica LLC, May 29, 2018. Print.

[6] Ibid

[7] Ibid

When working with a 2,000-year-old institution, there is a tendency to think that there is nothing new under the sun. This way of thinking is often magnified in a parish setting where staff and volunteers have served for many years and are accustomed to working with limited and often antiquated resources. Many parishes still rely exclusively on bulletin and pulpit announcements to communicate with parishioners, but there are a variety of newer technologies available at relatively low cost that can dramatically enhance the effectiveness of parish communications, particularly during a fundraising campaign. 

Some of these tools include email systems that can send thousands of personalized messages in a few seconds, electronic survey forms, recorded phone messages, and mass text message services. These resources allow a pastor who might have hundreds or even thousands of families in his parish to engage every parishioner dynamically.

As parish leaders take the first steps to implementing these programs, they should bear in mind that technology is not meant to supplant personal encounters; it is meant to facilitate them. By incorporating new tools into a parish’s communications and fundraising plans, pastors and volunteers can reach out to a large audience of parishioners in ways that are both faster and more personal than previously imagined.

The Challenge

When parish leaders consider the possibility of adopting new tools to engage parishioners, they generally focus on three challenges:

  1. How will we implement something new with our limited technological background?
  2. Once we do set something up, who will manage the system?
  3. Will the results be worth the investment of time and money?

The first step to overcoming these challenges is very often simply being open to trying something new. The second step is sitting down with someone with deep knowledge of these tools and best practices to gain an understanding of how to move forward. From there, the technology is actually simpler than one might think. If someone can use a smartphone, type into a Word document, and make a list in Excel, he or she can likely manage one of these resources.

Case Study: Saint Rose of Lima in Newtown, CT

During a recent parish capital campaign at Saint Rose of Lima Church in Newtown, Connecticut, CCS worked with the pastor, parish staff, and campaign volunteers to design a plan that introduced new communications tools to a traditional parish fundraising model. This plan enabled the campaign, We Stand With Christ: An Invitation to Faith & Fellowship, to engage over a third of Saint Rose’s 3,600 families in a personal and dynamic way in less than five months’ time.

Getting Started

At first, the pastor, Msgr. Robert Weiss, was reluctant to try these new tools in large part because he was unfamiliar with them. However, Msgr. Weiss quickly recognized that to engage such a large parish in a short period of time would require some new ideas. Saint Rose had some experience with Constant Contact, an email automation platform, but they used Constant Contact almost exclusively to communicate with religious education and youth group families and not to communicate with the parish at large.

During a campaign feasibility study, the Saint Rose staff collected more than 2,500 parish email addresses and 4,195 phone numbers (including 1,358 cell phone numbers) from the parish database and through an in-pew update of contact information.

“The online feasibility study enabled us to receive responses from over 900 parishioner families, the results of which gave us a clear direction for the campaign,” said Msgr. Weiss. “Tracking requests, pledges, gifts, and even those not able to participate in the campaign helped move the campaign forward in a very orderly fashion.”

With this list, the parish was well-prepared to implement some new communications vehicles.

E-Survey

During Saint Rose’s feasibility study, in addition to 76 one-on-one meetings, nearly 900 parishioners were able to offer their feedback on the parish’s campaign plans through an electronic survey. Msgr. Weiss sent a personal invitation to every parishioner for whom the parish had an email address, and about 35% of those invited participated in the e-survey.

Personalized Emails

Following the feasibility study, Saint Rose launched its capital campaign with a working goal of $5 million. From the early stages of the campaign, the parish made good use of its Constant Contact account to engage volunteers, initiate personal visits, and communicate with the broader parish community. Msgr. Weiss emailed parishioners who had indicated that they would be willing to serve as campaign volunteers to invite them to an orientation, and he sent a preparatory email to each family who would receive a call from a volunteer about a personal visit.

“Emails were sent as a way to educate and engage parishioners throughout the campaign. To have access to lists of donors, pledge and gift information, and to be able to track payments has made the project move forward in a very positive way,” said Msgr. Weiss.

Using email during the quiet phase of the campaign dramatically improved the speed of communications. Rather than waiting for letters to arrive by mail and then hoping they had been read, campaign leadership knew immediately when an email had been read, and a volunteer could follow up with that parishioner within hours, not days. This strategy allowed Msgr. Weiss and campaign volunteers to have a personal visit with over 330 parishioners before announcing the campaign.

During the public phase, Msgr. Weiss sent regular updates on campaign progress, and he used targeted email messages to encourage those who had not yet replied to make their pledge. He was even able to include a direct link in the email to pledge online.

Voice Broadcasts

Twice during the public phase of the campaign, Msgr. Weiss recorded a message that was broadcast to every parishioner’s phone number. Recording the message itself was as simple as dialing a phone number and leaving a voicemail, and the broadcasts proved extremely effective at encouraging parishioners to return their pledge cards. About 30 percent of parishioners who were called answered live (the others received voicemail messages), and many commented on how much they appreciated the personal touch of hearing Msgr. Weiss’s voice.

Announcement Weekend Check-In

On the weekend, Msgr. Weiss announced the campaign publicly, Saint Rose organized the distribution of personalized campaign materials after every Mass. This “old school” approach was enlivened with a “new school” twist: Saint Rose rented iPads for its volunteers to use an app called Zkipster to check in those parishioners who picked up their materials. Once checked in, parishioners automatically received an email thanking them for picking up their packets and encouraging them to return their pledge cards by a certain date.

The tech resources for the weekend cost about $1,200, and by Sunday evening, Saint Rose had distributed personalized campaign materials to 626 parishioners. Of that group, 70% made a gift to the campaign, totaling $3.4 million. In fact, in just the 10 days following the announcement weekend, Saint Rose raised about $1.5 million. Furthermore, those parishioners who received materials after Mass were 10 times more likely to make a gift to the campaign than those who received material through the mail.

Text Message Reminders

In the final days leading up to the parish’s in-pew commitment weekend, Msgr. Weiss sent a brief text message to every parishioner who had not yet made a pledge with a reminder to bring his or her pledge card to Mass that weekend. The ease and instantaneousness of text messaging allowed this message to be sent a few hours before the weekend’s first Mass. Over the course of commitment weekend, the text message reminder proved very effective: nearly four times as many parishioners brought their pledge card from home as those who filled out a generic card in the pew.

The Results

The use of new technologies during Saint Rose’s campaign enabled Msgr. Weiss and parish volunteers communicated personally with the vast majority of Saint Rose’s 3,600 parish families. Because the tools Saint Rose used could track in real time who had received a message or made a pledge, communications could be further personalized based on whether a parishioner had already made a gift or was still considering a commitment.

These new tools enabled the campaign to proceed with speed and precision, and they helped to keep excitement high during the public phase of the campaign. Ultimately, Saint Rose exceeded its initial campaign goal by over $1 million, raising about $6.1 million on their $5 million working goal.

Moreover, by the close of Saint Rose’s campaign, both Msgr. Weiss and two parish staff members were exceedingly more familiar with the technological resources available to them. This experience enabled them to engage more effectively a small committee of parishioners who had formed to focus on enhancing the parish’s overall communications strategy. Partially inspired by the success of the campaign, Saint Rose is now working to develop a new parish website and to expand its social media presence.

Three First Steps for Any Parish

While the case study of Saint Rose’s campaign demonstrates how a parish can implement a comprehensive communications strategy to enhance its fundraising efforts, parishes can begin taking advantage of these new tools for a variety of purposes. Even if a parish is not preparing to launch a fundraising campaign, implementing these tools can facilitate broader parishioner engagement and potentially lay the groundwork for more personalized campaign communications down the road.

Here are three strategies that any parish with a list of phone numbers and email addresses can begin to implement immediately:

  1. Send a personalized email from the pastor or other parish leaders to all parishioners on a regular basis (weekly, biweekly, or monthly). Depending upon the frequency, the email might contain a spiritual reflection, a Q&A, an update on parish activities, or a witness from a parishioner.
  2. Record a message of gratitude from the pastor around Thanksgiving or the parish’s patronal feast and broadcast it to all parishioners’ phone numbers. Pastors who have tried this strategy have been overwhelmed by the positive response from their parishioners.
  3. Send a text message announcement before a special event to parishioners’ cell phone numbers. It might contain a reminder of the Christmas or Holy Week Mass schedule or encourage parishioners to attend a parish festival.

In a world where parishioners of every age are increasingly tech-savvy, parishes can gain much by implementing new communication tools.

CCS Fundraising is a strategic consulting firm that partners with nonprofits for transformational change. To access our full suite of perspectives, publications, and reports, visit our insights page.

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