A Hate-Hate Relationship
Every role I’ve had as a major gift fundraiser has been marred by my battle to consistently enter cultivation work into the organization’s donor relationship management system (DRM). I’ve found very few major gift fundraisers who are highly disciplined in doing this task.
Has this ever happened to you?
As an MGO I was hitting my stride, exceeding all fundraising goals. I met weekly with my manager and leadership team, giving both verbal and written reports on all (past, present, future) activity. Then came time for my performance review. My manager zeroed in on the missing DRM documentation of my activity. They were putting me on notice that something had to change, even though I successfully raised 10x my salary and benefits in the first year of employment with the organization.
Since then I’ve given a great deal of thought to why this occurred. What could I have done differently? What could they have done differently? What if I was the manager in the above scenario, how could I have helped?
First, a gentle exhortation to managers of MGOs: This is a dilemma that requires your attention. You cannot expect the MGO to solve it for themselves. If their activity is not getting documented in the DRM, it’s as much your problem as theirs.
Allow me to ‘lift the hood’ a bit. MGOs (speaking for most of us) do our ‘math’ (aka major gift work) in our heads. Managers, understandably, want us to show our work. MGOs often consider data entry busy work and resent spending time on this task. Some of you might recall the math teacher who insisted on students showing their work every time… it could become maddening.
Consider this MGO Manager’s approach…
MGO Manager:“What seems to be the biggest issue with getting the entries done properly?”
MGO:“It takes too much time and distracts from the donor work I need to be doing. Most of my time is spent away from my desk and I’m unable to pull out a laptop to properly make entries. The user interface on mobile devices is subpar (it sucks).”
Manager:“Ok, understood. I know you are documenting your activity in some way. Tell me about that.”
MGO:“Between my email, calendar, messaging apps and/or the reports I submit every week to you and the leadership team, I can find everything I need.”
Manager:“Got it. Ok, keep doing that and we’ll find a system that works for both of us.”
MGO:“Thanks so much.”
Unfortunately, this isn’t the way most management meetings go. More commonly, the MGO walks away with the hapless duty of ‘fixing’ something they don’t know how to fix and wondering how this is going to help them reach their fundraising goals.
Here is how you can turn the above dilemma into a win-win relationship:
💡Recognize the MGO is a verbal processor with a remarkable ability to remember details of all that happened at least 10 days previous.
💡Acknowledge they are already reporting weekly on their work in two existing meetings.
💡Assign a ‘database assistant’ to spend ~60 minutes per week entering the MGO’s activity into the database.
As an MGO Manager you might say, “We don’t have the budget for that”.
My response? Figure it out. It’s the cost of doing business.
I recommend you budget ~$1,500 annually to hire a database assistant. For one hour a week you can provide support to a highly effective MGO, rather than risk losing a great team member.
If you are managing MGOs who have trouble keeping their documentation updated, I suggest two things:
- Ask them to show you how they are documenting their activity. It is likely happening somewhere in some way.
- Find a way to get into their jetstream of activity and task someone else to keep up with their database entries.
MGOs, you’re not off the hook here! I’m coming for you next week! In upcoming posts I’ll share ideas on how to mitigate the pain of keeping your DRM updated while cultivating relationships with 100+ high maintenance people.
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I look forward to hearing about your good work.
Blessings,
