By Kat Carson, Manager, Pipeline Development, University of Calgary
Fundraising campaigns are a lot of work. This is obvious to anyone who has ever been involved with one, and it’s becoming apparent to me, a relative newbie on the campaign front. As the University of Calgary (U of C) moves toward launching a campaign, prospect management has been pushed to the frontlines: prospects are assigned and portfolios are built; priorities are decided and pipelines are expanded to include prospects to support top initiatives; goals are set, and the excitement builds.
As I learn what a campaign involves, I’m looking for ways to make sense of it, and three areas are emerging where prospect management can make a difference and set the stage for success.
Prospect-level and Project-level Management
Both prospect-level and project-level management are essential for the long-term planning and organization demanded by an ambitious campaign.
Prospect-level management considers who is managing the overall relationship between the organization and the prospect as a whole. Essential for larger organizations with multiple fundraisers, or for large corporations, or highly philanthropic individuals who have multiple interests, this “air traffic control” involves an in-depth knowledge of the prospect’s history and relationship with the institution, the prospect’s readiness and willingness to support the institution’s priorities, and a knowledge of whether the prospect prefers one point of contact or is open to multiple approaches. The prospect-level management also involves monitoring (if not full coordination) of prospect clearance and, subsequently, current asks, as well as positioning the prospect for future asks. This level of management also ensures that our donors do not disappear from the pipeline after they move into stewardship , and we are ready to bring them back for another ask later in campaign, as appropriate
Project-level management has a different focus. It is concerned with the specific projects or asks under a prospect’s consideration, and seeks to ensure that these are managed with regards to movement through the pipeline. This moves management involves careful tracking of a project through the stages of the pipeline with attention paid to key activity and stage timing. What is tracked and the definitions of the stages in the fundraising cycle differ across institutions. Some institutions track according to ask activity, active versus closed (with a yes or no to the ask. Here, at the University of Calgary, we look at: Qualification (is this prospect a good one?), Early Cultivation (what is the prospect interested in?), Advanced Cultivation (lead up to the ask), Solicitation (from ask to a yes or no), and Gift Received (completing any required paperwork and getting the actual dollars in the door).
Pipeline: Projections Metrics
Prospect management has always played a key role in gathering and verifying data used in generating projections that are critical for guiding the decisions that contribute to successful fundraising. These data points would include: how much we can expect for a given gift, when we can expect receipt of the gift, the likelihood of receiving the gift, among other metrics. This activity, however, is largely after-the-fact, reporting on numbers that are already in the system.
During a campaign, prospect management has to become more proactive, expanding its pipeline projections by reporting beyond active solicitations (gifts expected in the current quarter) to include any prospects in Advanced Cultivation and Solicitation; that is, any prospect whose interests have been confirmed to align with institutional priorities and is being positioned for a major gift solicitation with the next year. Prospect management may need to go back even further to Early Cultivation or Qualification and assess pipelines and the prospect pool, ensuring there are enough prospects to support the campaign’s successful completion of its fundraising goal within its stated timeline.
With regular review of fundraiser prospect pipelines, collecting and confirming data such as dollars asked for, dollars expected in, the expected date of receipt, and the likelihood of a gift projections can be generated to help illustrate where success is anticipated, to identify potential challenges and gaps, to develop future priorities and tee up key resources, and measure distance-to-goal.
Teamwork: Working with Research
In many shops, particularly smaller ones, Prospect Management is part of Prospect Research. However, in larger shops like the University of Calgary they are separate teams. Regardless, these two areas can support each other.
Over the last few months, University of Calgary’s Prospect Management and Prospect Research teams have worked closely together to support the fundraisers. When Prospect Management analyzes the pipeline against gift charts and projections, determining a need for more prospects to qualify, Prospect Research responds by providing lists of prospects for the fundraisers to engage. Prospect Management then ensures that the projects, and all relevant information, including the relationship between UofC and the prospect, are captured in the database (Raiser’s Edge), that the required information is added to the database, and that the relationships between the organization and the prospect are recorded. As the fundraiser moves the prospect through the pipeline, Prospect Research continues to provide the fundraiser with more, in-depth information, and Prospect Management ensures that the activity is captured and reported on. In this complementary way, the Prospect Research and Prospect Management teams work together to support the fundraisers.
Why it’s worth it
Campaigns can often be the catalyst for change and improvement in a fundraising organization. As outlined above, this has certainly been true for the University of Calgary as we continue to improve our processes. This work will not only set the stage for a successful campaign, but will also set the stage for continued success beyond campaign as those improvements are sustained forthe long term.