Building for success.

When starting a development operation, fund raisers can count on a rich resource bank to draw on. But from a practical standpoint, it's even more beneficial to study how other non-profits do it.

When faced with an opportunity to plan and implement a start-up operation in college or university

advancement, how does one proceed? This is the question facing hundreds of new development professionals, and it is of great comfort to know that the Council for the Advancement and Support of Education (CASE) and the National Society of Fund Raising Executives (NSFRE), not to mention several other professional fund-raising agencies and organizations, provide a resource bank of information that makes the job easier. From a practical point of view, however, after gathering all the advice and wisdom from whatever sources may be available, it is helpful to have a long hard look at a case study of a successful development start-up operation. Delaware State University (DSU) is one example.

In some respects the University is non-typical. Although it enjoys a long history of teaching, research, and service reaching back to 1891, it has been a university only since July 1, 1993. It was founded as a "College for the Education of Colored Students" by virtue of the second Morrill Act of Congress approved in August of 1890. Later the name was changed to Delaware State College and remained so until 1993.

Current enrollment is 3,301, but it has been only a few years ago that enrollment was below 1,000. The curriculum now includes 89 undergraduate and eleven graduate programs in five academic schools, including the School of Arts and Sciences, the School of Business and Economics, the School of Professional Studies, the School of Education, and the School of Graduate Studies. There are more than 600 faculty and staff, and over 8,000 alumni.

Like many colleges and universities, alumni programs at DSU have existed since the 1950's, but the development operation came on line much later. Since the early 1980's there has been a development officer and funds were raised on a rather modest scale. The development office was a one-person shop and solicitation was largely by direct mail and telephone. Records were hand-kept and life was fairly simple.

In 1987-1988, however, big changes occurred. The College, as it was then known, hired a new president who began to move ahead with several initiatives. One of these was to upgrade the director of development position to that of vice president for development, and later vice president for institutional advancement. The charge to the new vice president was to develop a new fund-raising strategic plan of action.

Where to start, and what to do were important questions. Available records indicated the institution had been raising less than $200,000 a year from non-federal sources. Granted it was state assisted, and granted there were funds coming from the federal government, but the fund-raising potential for what had become the second largest four-year institution of higher learning in the state had to be excellent.

The second initiative of the new president was to launch a multimillion dollar capital fund drive, and there was excitement in the air as a consulting firm was brought in to complete a feasibility study. A board of visitors was recruited, consisting of 27 outstanding business and civic leaders throughout the region, and strategic planning began to develop a master fund-raising plan.

The third initiative was to update the institution's computing systems, and a comprehensive software package was purchased that included five different modules, including finance, student records, student aid, human resources, and alumni/development.

A fourth initiative was to reorganize the academic side of the house into schools, each with its own academic dean. And following that reorganization to seek legislation changing the name of the institution from college to university.

A fifth initiative was to establish a Strategic Planning Committee and a Campus Planning Committee to review programs and facilities and make recommendations that would impact the institution for the next 10 years.

All of these initiatives affected the development operation, and it became clear the institution needed a gift-seeking operation that would bring in thousands of dollars, and soon a master plan began to take shape.

The signal question posed above, "How do we start?" evokes the single most important answer to building a new development program. "First you develop a plan."

First Develop A Plan

Assuming of course there is competent staff leadership, and assuming there is strong support from the president and the institutions governing board, an important first step toward building a "new and improved" development operation is the construction of a master plan.

At Delaware State University, that master plan incorporated a dual track operation: the Annual Fund Campaign and the Capital Campaign. Both were designed to run concurrently with each other. Experience has taught that to have separate annual fund and capital fund drives at the same time is counterproductive. Fund raising success is far greater when the two are integrated.

Nevertheless, both a short-range and a long-range plan were conceived and approved by the president and the Board of Trustees. The newly created Board of Visitors also gave their support. The short-range plan consisted of a Master Plan of Action for the new capital campaign, called the Century II Campaign for Delaware State College. The long-range plan was given the simple title of the Annual Fund Campaign, and consisted mainly of a fiscal calendar of fund-raising activities by month.

Both plans were concerned with the several components of a successful development operation, including prospect research and identification, donor cultivation and solicitation, gift processing and acknowledgment, donor recognition, stewardship and gift reporting.

The overall development plan also deals with philosophy, goals, and objectives, structure and organization, fund-raising personnel and strategy, time frame, printed materials and special events. It deals with external and internal communication, prospect management, and general policies and procedures.

Put Plan into Action

As has been said, all the good plans of mice or men are worthless unless they are implemented. Experts have said, plan the work and work the plan. It makes no sense at all to develop a wonderful paper chart of action with all the logic of a well defined road map and not follow it. Sure there are poorly constructed plans, and plans cosmetically designed to impress a board; but assuming the plan is well thought out and addresses the what? why? how? when? and who? of the fund-raising initiative in a logical and fairly comprehensive manner, it will bring the desired results, in most cases, if it is followed step by step.

Of course, the plan must be somewhat flexible, because fund raising is by nature a dynamic enterprise, never static, but it follows the basic tenets of good planning, namely,

* What do you want to accomplish, and why?

* How will it be accomplished?

* When will it be accomplished?

* Who is responsible for seeing that it is accomplished?

It is not the object of this writing to discuss the planning process, merely to say that in any start-up development operation the strategic master plan, long-range and short-range, is vital to the success of the operation.

Hire The Right Personnel

You cannot raise a million dollars a year without the professional and support staff to execute the wonderful plan so carefully developed. It is a physical impossibility for one man or woman to raise that kind of money, unless of course he or she is a genius on whom lady luck showers an endless supply of major gifts. The president of any college or university who expects miracles from a one- or two-person shop is either naive or misinformed.

It is also clear from the wide range of publications on fund raising and the counsel from CASE and NSFRE professionals that highly successful development departments employ specialized professional staff. Ideally, even in the smallest development shop, there should be a director of development, whose responsibility is to oversee the total development operation and whose skills include a wide range of fund-raising activities. There should be a person in charge of annual giving, a person in charge of major gifts, a person in charge of gift receiving and processing, and a person in charge of corporate and foundation relations. These individuals preside over key areas of fund-raising activity.

SUGGESTED DEVELOPMENT OFFICE START-UP BUDGET

PERSONNEL                                      $188,500

Director of Development                         $40,000
Annual Fund Director                            $34,000
Major Gifts/Planned Giving Director             $38,000
Corporate and Foundation Relations Director     $35,000
Senior Secretary                                $15,000
Financial Secretary                             $14,000
Receptionist/secretary                          $12,500

EQUIPMENT                                       $29,000

Computers for Professional Staff
and two secretaries                             $15,000
Software                                        $2,400
Copier                                          $2,040
leased @ $170 a month
Furniture/file cabinets                         $10,000

TRAVEL                                          $15,500

Conference fees                                 $1,500
Fund Raising Trips                              $6,000
(transportation)
Lodging and meals                               $5,000
Entertainment                                   $3,000

TELEPHONE                                       $2,500
(3 lines)
POSTAGE                                         $3,500
PRINTING                                        $15,000
Brochures, flyers, letterheads, etc.
CONTRACTUAL SERVICES                            $20,000
Video, Marketing, Food Service, etc.

SUPPLIES AND MATERIALS                          $9,000

Awards/incentives
Resource books etc.
Subscriptions
Office supplies, etc.
TOTAL                                           $283,000

In addition to the above in larger shops are directors of prospect research and management, of donor relations and recognition, of planned giving, of special campaigns, of capital fund drives, and of telemarketing. In the Alumni Office there are persons charged with the responsibility of parent giving, reunion class giving, and special events involving fund raising. It goes without saying, of course, that alumni personnel and development personnel work closely together to accomplish the fund-raising goals of the University. They have to, because they really do need each other. There are exceptions in some institutions where alumni and development go their separate ways, but by and large colleges and universities have found that it works best where the two go hand in hand.

An Adequate Budget

The president and the governing board have to understand that it takes money to raise money. Fortunately, the return on the dollar is abundant. For every dollar spent, you can expect 10 in return, and for business minded, bottom-line administrators that should speak loudly. As you look at business and industry, what ceo is there in any company who would not heartily rejoice to have an investment return of 90 percent or more? The development office of the division of institutional advancement is worth the weight of its professional staff in gold. Strangely, however, there always seems to be some nit-picking about increasing budgets for the development office. The new development officer needs to make the case for adequate budget loud and clear, even before he/she takes the job.

A budget allocation is certainly needed for essential elements of the development operation, including travel, telephone service, printed fund-raising materials, special events, computers, supplies and personnel. It is also important to have funds available for recognition of donors, for entertainment of donors in the course of cultivation and solicitation, and for a resource library. In a moderate startup budget, the budget at left would be essential, and it would vary somewhat with the particular college or university.

Once the personnel and budget issues are solved, the other pieces will fall into place rather easily. There are, incidentally, quite a few other pieces, such as prospect research, donor recognition, personal solicitation, phonathons, special appeals and special fund-raising events.

First Things First

The order of business for beginning or expanding the development operation is as follows:

Development Start-Up Priorities

1. Facilities - The development unit needs adequate housing for staff, equipment and materials.

2. Furniture, equipment and materials - The unit needs desks, chairs, file cabinets, computer tables and other furniture. It needs computers, a copier, a facsimile machine, printers and other necessary equipment. It needs notebooks, paper, pens, pencils, paper clips and many other office supplies. It needs printed materials for direct mail, phonathon and personal solicitation. It needs reference materials for prospect research, e.g., The Foundation Directory, The Foundation Grants Index, The Corporate Yellow Book, Corporate 500, CASE Match- ing Gift Details, Henry Rosso's "Achieving Excellence in Fund Raising", Michael Worth's "Educational Fund Raising" and many other publications.

3. Professional and support staff - The unit must be adequately staffed with competent, experienced development staff, most important of all is the director of development, because he/she drives the activity of the entire unit.

4. A master plan - The unit must carefully develop a master plan of action that includes goals, purpose, activities, special events, personnel held responsible, time schedule, budget, assessment and evaluation.

5. Budget - The unit cannot be successful without a realistic budget. All the old ideas should be discarded a new budget built on a zero base, taking into account all the necessary expenditures for developing a strong productive fund-raising operation.

6. Management policies and procedures - The unit needs a clear set of written policies and procedures that control the operation, including policy on gift receiving, processing, and stewardship, policy on thank you letters, donor acknowledgment and recognition, policy on gift solicitation, pledges, gifts-in-kind, memorial gifts, matching gifts, prospect and donor tracking, call sheets, file memoranda and intra-campus communications.

Hundreds of questions will arise in the course of the fiscal year's activity, and it is important to have thought things through ahead of time and have the answers.

7. Gift receiving, processing, acknowledgment, record keeping, and reporting - The unit needs to have these activities in place and running smoothly before going out on the streets and asking for money. Donors are remarkably good at holding the institution accountable for the receiving and handling of the monies.

Active Fund Raising

When the above are in place, you can begin to look at such things as funding sources, methods and materials of fund raising, donor prospect identification, information, cultivation, solicitation and follow-up, stewardship or responsible allocation of gifts, and ways and means of reporting and communicating with external and internal constituencies.

Where is the money coming from? Who is likely to make the gifts you seek? General categories of sources adopted by the Council for Financial Aid to Education include the following:

* Alumni,

* Friends (non-alumni individuals),

* Foundations,

* Corporations,

* Religious groups,

* Other organizations, such as agencies, consortia, clubs, and groups.

When the funding sources are identified, the question then becomes - How will we go about soliciting gifts from them? The answer is fairly simple:

* By means of direct-mail appeals.

* By means of telephone solicitation.

* By means of personal visitation.

The chief development officer needs to make decisions regarding the letters, telephone conversations and personal visits. Of great concern is how should they look or be received to be most effective. There is a mountain of material available through CASE and NSFRE dealing with how the letter should look on the page, what its content should be, even what color combinations work best.

Phonathons are so common now there is a great body of experience revealed in case studies that is helpful in regard to telephone solicitation.

Major gifts are almost exclusively obtained via personal visitation, and there is much written about that. This writing is not intended to explore the hundreds of nuances of solicitation, but rather to point out the importance of planning to implement effective ways of solicitation embodied in the three methods named above: direct mail, telephone and personal visit.

Once the "how" is understood, we can deal with the "when," and there is no better time than the present to begin. Good development officers have learned from experience that nothing is to be gained by putting it off, whatever the "it" may be. Truth be known, there often is no "good" time to raise money. Board members and volunteers are quick to suggest that "we should hold off because the economy is down," or because unemployment is rising, or because elections are coming up. Well meaning friends can think of a hundred reasons why "this is not the right time," but development officers know, generally speaking, that there is no better time than the present.

Of course, there are exceptions to that rule, and one has to review all the data from current prospect research before making a decision. Obviously, one would not launch a capital campaign if the feasibility study indicated negative reaction from key donors and certainly it would be foolish to do a fund appeal just after Christmas.

Within the parameters of the Annual Fund Campaign or the Capital Fund Drive, however, timing is important. A basic rule of thumb regarding when is the best time to ask is "Ask when the donor is ready!" The donor will not tell you, but you can read between the lines, keeping in mind the following steps in solicitation:

1. Identify the potential donor,

2. Get his/her interest,

3. Involve him/her in activities.

4. Get his/her investment.

Investment is translated "gift." The prospect will not give unless he/she develops an interest in the institution, and frequently he/she may not make a gift until he/she becomes involved with the institution in some way, such as attending some special event or serving on some advisory board. Furthermore, the donor may never be completely ready. The director of development has to have the professional judgment and maturity to realize when the time is right. Often days, months, even years of donor cultivation is needed before the solicitation can achieve positive closure.

With mail campaigns and phonathons March, April, October and November are the best months for solicitation. Early December is effective for year-end appeals, but anything after the 15th is not productive. January and February are least effective. Target appeals in May and June are good. July and August, however, are not so good because of vacations and travel away from home.

Reduced to its three major components, the development operation of any college or university is dependent on plan, personnel and purchasing power or budget. Building a new development program or enhancing one already in existence succeeds or fails by reason of these three components.

William W. Tromble is vice president for institutional advancement at Delaware State University. He is currently directing the University's first comprehensive multi-million dollar capital campaign. Prior to this appointment he was director of special campaigns at Ball State University, Muncie, Indiana, assisting in a $40-million capital campaign