Helping Fundraisers Help Themselves

A Case Study on Contact Report Automation

Gretchen Dwyer: Executive Director of Leadership Giving, Amherst College

Elisabeth Parker: Senior Research and Prospect Management Analyst, Amherst College

Joshua Wallace, PMP: Senior Database Programmer, Amherst College

Agenda• Overview of Amherst College Advancement • Visit Reports - Before• Visit Report Form Development Process and Technical Information• Visit Reports - After• Other Ideas• Questions?

Amherst College• Founded in 1821• Small liberal arts college in Western Massachusetts• Student body of 1,800• Under 25,000 alumni of record

• Includes Alumni and Parent Programs, Foundation and Corporate Relations, Advancement Communications, Career Center, Development, and Operations• Recently finished Lives of Consequence campaign which raised over $500M• Primarily work with alumni and parents of current students• Advancement office uses Colleague Advancement• When fully staffed, Amherst has eight frontline fundraisers including Gift

Planning, Parent, Leadership, and Principal officers

Amherst College Advancement

Former Visit Report Form required the input of the following:• Donor name, giving history, progress

level, next steps• Donor dog name, donor grandchildren

name, donor grandchildren dog name • Home suitable for event, possible

trustee candidate, good speaker for event, questions for research

• Color shirt donor wearing during visit, color chair sat in during visit, color drink drank during visit

• Donor strategy, cultivation notes, next steps

Visit Reports for Gift Officers - Before

Former Visit Report Form required the following steps:• Hassle Gift Officer to complete forms• Send Gift Officer blank templates to facilitate

receiving of forms• Threaten Gift Officer with number of

outstanding reports• Receive document from Gift Officer,

proofread, enter giving history, recent gifts, gifts given during visit, suitable for events, etc.

• Send via email to CAO, DLG, Research colleagues, and various other stakeholders

• Breathe sigh of relief. Start process again with next completed report.

Visit Reports for Development Assistants - Before

Visit Report Workflow Overview- Before

1. Visit takes place2. Gift officer takes notes on paper or in

email draft3. Notes are transformed into narrative4. Narrative is emailed to assistant5. Assistant formats document and inserts

narrative6. Officer edits and approves document7. Assistant enters visit into Colleague and

distributes document8. Research saves final document into

prospect file

66%

34%

FY13 Visit Reports

Uncompleted Completed

Project Goals:• Increase data hygiene• Increase file rate• Increase timeliness of entry• Eliminate busy work

Process Goals:• Get buy-in from frontline

fundraisers• Pilot web report capabilities• Make use of our resources

Visit Report Reform – Planning Stages

Do all of this without resorting to a punitive system!

Fundraiser Involvement in Planning Stages

• Gretchen requested Senior Development Officer and Development Assistant involvement• Josh and Elisabeth created mock-up of form prior to first

meeting with Leadership Giving team• Took feedback on design, but with a grain of salt• Demonstrated commitment to project lead to lower

skepticism rates in end users• Open secret of college-provided iPads on the horizon helped

the cause

Data Flow

Web Application Architecture

• Pre-populated Google Form or Doc• Access form• Report from database for background data – PDF or Word doc• Vendor form• Salesforce• SDO goes into database on their own

Other Options

Current Visit Report Form requires input of the following:• Visit summary• Visit notes• Next steps

Former Visit Report Form required the input of the following:• Donor name, giving history, progress

level, next steps• Donor dog name, donor grandchildren

name, donor grandchildren dog name • Home suitable for event, possible

trustee candidate, good speaker for event, questions for research

• Color shirt donor wearing during visit, color chair sat in during visit, color drink drank during visit

• Donor strategy, cultivation notes, next steps

Optimizing Gift Officer Time and Brain Space

Current Visit Report Form requires the following steps:• Proofread• Distribute to list auto-

populated in final Word document

Former Visit Report Form required the following steps:• Hassle Gift Officer to complete forms• Send Gift Officer blank templates to

facilitate receiving of forms• Threaten Gift Officer with number of

outstanding reports• Receive document from Gift Officer,

proofread, enter giving history, recent gifts, gifts given during visit, suitable for events, etc.

• Send via email to CAO, DLG, Research colleagues, and various other stakeholders

• Breathe sigh of relief. Start process again with next completed report.

Optimizing Development Assistant Time and Brain Space

Visit Report Workflow Overview- After

1. Visit takes place2. Gift officer takes notes on paper or in

email draft3. Notes are transformed into narrative4. Narrative is emailed to assistant5. Assistant formats document and inserts

narrative6. Officer edits and approves document7. Assistant enters visit into Colleague and

distributes document8. Research saves final document into

prospect file

97%

3%

FY14 Visit ReportsCompleted Uncompleted

fills out visit report form

3.4.

• Gift Officers care about getting their reports in• Increased institutional appreciation for getting information out of

brains and into database• Data is more trustworthy• SDOs are more prepared for visits• Speedier portfolio reviews• Ability to build more automated reports for external (board) and internal

(CAO) audiences

• Reportable form increases accountability• Drastically improved file rate

Results

• Continue to use framework developed for the Contact Report web app to build additional internal and external applications• Create wider-ranging visit report forms for larger advancement

community• Add more Prospect Management resources to My Prospects to push

data from database into the hands of fundraisers

Ongoing Work

• Gretchen Dwyer: gdwyer@amherst.edu• Elisabeth Parker: eparker@amherst.edu• Joshua Wallace: jwallace@amherst.edu

Questions?