In Service: The Column of the ADRP President
Jen McGrath
Senior Director, Donor Relations & Stewardship
MIT Resource Development
Watch a video message from the president!
I just finished watching the October webinar, a great presentation from our partners at BrookGlobal. (Full disclosure: I missed the original airing, but thanks to a member benefit, I was able to access the recording of it on the ADRP website.)
The webinar topic was What is the Donor Experience? How Can You Improve Your Donor Experience? BrookGlobal generously shared five best practices (and the practical steps and questions you can ask to test your incorporation of those practices) to build a donor engagement program that assures meaningful, mutually-beneficial, sustained relationships with your donor partners. (Be sure to check it out for some really great tactics backed up by studies and stats presented in a super-organized, accessible way and tell them what you think @brookglobal.)
As I watched this, I realized it was applicable not only to my work as a donor relations practitioner, but also to my role as president and board member for ADRP. In the former, I'm charged with thinking about donor experience and how it shapes long-term support for MIT and, by extension, impacts the world; in the latter, I'm mindful of member experience and how it contributes to the sustained success for ADRP and, by extension, strengthens our profession.
As now-Past-President Eliza McNulty (@elizamcnulty) and I shared during the ADRP Annual Meeting last month, ADRP has been working hard to evaluate and enhance the member experience. And as it turns out, our approach pretty closely mirrors BrookGlobal’s recommendations.
Thanks for the privilege of sharing reflections in two parts. This month, I'll address partnership and feedback. Next month, I'll cover motivation; innovation and collaboration; and communication.
Partnership
ADRP is 1,800 members strong, with about a third who are newcomers, a third who have 4–8 years of experience, and a third who have been in the profession for longer than 8 years. Two thirds of us are currently serving higher education institutions, with 15 percent in healthcare and another 15 percent serving other organization types.
And, yet, we are individuals with needs that ADRP should nourish. Members are also partners. Together, we are consumers, curators, and creators of the content that is delivered to us and by us through our listserv, The Hub, webinars and regional and international conferences.
Feedback
There's only so much we can know from our demographics. That's why last year, we asked you to participate in a member survey. We wanted to understand which ADRP services members find most important and how well ADRP delivers those services. We also asked for information about responsibilities in order to get insight into what content might be most valuable and relevant to provide.
We had few significant gaps (though members flagged our webinars, website, and regionals for more attention—see more below.) The survey helped us to see that the services members viewed as important (and the corresponding satisfaction) varies by length of time in the profession. We recognize that as our profession has matured, so has our membership and the need for advanced content for our most seasoned professionals.
The Board also participated in member persona exercises, thinking about the membership experience from the perspective of Newbie Nancy, Middle Matthew, and Experienced Erin. Your survey responses affirmed these personas and corresponding member needs.
In this space next month, I'll talk about how your feedback is already informing improvements to our existing offerings and influencing our exploration of new initiatives. Thanks for reading so far.
Given that November brings to us Thanksgiving (in the U.S., at least – and a happy belated Thanksgiving to our Canadian friends!) this seems like a good place to stop and invite you to join me and your fellow ADRP members in giving your #ADRPThanks. Engage with ADRP on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter (@ADRPtweets) and celebrate all that we do together, for and with each other, in service to our Institutions and our profession. I hope you'll give a shout out to a colleague, idea, or inspiration that has come to you through ADRP, and as always, I'd love to hear from you directly on LinkedInand Twitter (@JenNesbit).
How Donor Relations Is Like Managing a Kindergarten Class
Krystina Wales
Director of Stewardship & Donor Relations
GBMC HealthCare
If the thought of 20 five-year-olds running around vying for your attention makes you cautious, donor relations might not be for you…
From Transactional to Transformational: Curating a Donor Experience
Shannon Morris
Manager of Donor Communications
Cincinnati Museum Center
As donor relations professionals, we could probably recite the standard tax language in our sleep.
“Your tax deduction is limited to the excess of the contribution over the fair market value of any goods or services received in exchange for the donation…”
It’s at the end of all of our acknowledgment letters. It’s embedded in our gift agreements. But have we ever stopped and asked ourselves what it really means?
The Donor Experience: A 360-Degree View
Suzanne Bellanger
Manager, Direct Marketing and Strategic Stewardship at Brown University
Linkedin: Suzanne (Ferro) Bellanger
With all the competition for donor dollars that the current political and social climate is generating, it’s becoming harder and harder for non-profit organizations to attract new supporters. Acquisition alone cannot sustain a healthy growth model. Instead, non-profit organizations must find innovative and compelling ways to retain and encourage expanded support from active donors.
Member Spotlight
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Name: Liz McFarlin-Marciak
Institution: Carnegie Museums of Pittsburgh
Position: Director, Continuing Engagement
ADRP member for 1 year
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What do you like most about being a member of ADRP?
The webinars and the annual conference. I’m very new to ADRP (2017 was my first conference), but I have been a member of both AFP and CASE before, so I’ve been to many fundraising conferences. I think ADRP’s webinar series and conference sessions are invaluable. I’ve implemented a lot of the learnings from the conference at my job, and the webinars – especially those about acknowledgements and gift officer-stewardship relations – are critical, since we don’t currently have any full-time, exclusive stewardship or donor relations positions at the museums.
Write for The Hub: We Want to Hear from You!
The Hub is seeking article proposals for new monthly issues!
Do you have a success story you would like to share? How did you handle a particular problem or project that seemed insurmountable? Have you discovered effective tactics that help gain a seat at the table? What are your thoughts on best practices or new, emerging ideas that take a donor relations/stewardship program to the next level?
We want to encourage our members—new and experienced—to share their insights, best practices, and what works (or doesn’t work!) when planning their shop’s programming and responsibilities.
We welcome all submissions related to donor relations and stewardship, but we especially encourage ADRP members to step forward and share their expertise and experiences in the profession.
The 2018 submission form is available any time you have an article proposal to submit. We have included the webinar topics for each month, in case you would like to tie your article to a specific webinar topic.
Please submit your article proposal today! We can’t wait to hear what you have to say!
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