Most development professionals have experienced an uncomfortable, offensive, or harmful donor-constituent interaction. This cannot just be seen as “part of the job” rather something that is addressed to create a culture and systems that build brave spaces and policies and procedures that result in greater safety and professional satisfaction.

In need of a new event to energize alumni, engage volunteers, and offer opportunities for collaboration, the Alumni Engagement team at Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo looked to the past to create a new annual tradition — Founder’s Day! Celebrating the university's founding on March 8, 1901, Founder’s Day aims to engage as many alumni as possible in new and exciting ways. During the inaugural event on March 8, 2024, 17 alumni communities hosted unique events across the United States, reconnecting alumni to Cal Poly by celebrating this special day in history. During this session, you’ll learn more about how we collaborated with our Board of Directors, alumni volunteers and campus partners to facilitate the planning, timing, pricing, food & beverage, and all other event details needed to pull off this successful engagement event. We’ll go over planning a timeline and marketing plan, as well as lessons learned and planned improvements for this year’s celebration. Join us for this interactive session and leave with a few ideas on how you can utilize your university or institution's unique brand and history to engage alumni on new levels.

Why is it that there is sometimes a tension between frontline staff and Advancement Services? Is it because we don't speak the same language? Join us in a lively interactive session with Dhiraj Chand, Principal Gifts and Paul Majnik, from the University of Utah along with Clay Buck, Kindsight Fundraising Coach and Caroline Chang, VP Product Evangelism, as they dive into why there is a communication gap and what we can do to bridge that gap to speak the same (love) language.

Are gift clubs dead? Not if you ask their members! But Starbucks, Target, and Amazon have changed what people expect from loyalty programs, and fundraising needs to follow suit. See how the annual giving team at Caltech put personalization over perks and stewardship over rewards to build a leadership annual giving program that accounts for nearly 90% of their annual gift revenue and is growing at a rate of 10% each year.

In the dynamic world of advancement for education, effective management and support of volunteers is crucial for organizational success. This session, "Advancing Board Management," delves into the volunteer component of advancement, exploring how to optimize work with a variety of volunteer groups including alumni boards, advisory boards, foundation boards, governing boards, task forces, and committees.
We will begin by examining the best practices of high-functioning boards, highlighting key strategies that drive efficiency and impact. Learn about proven techniques to cultivate a productive board culture, establish clear roles and responsibilities, and implement robust governance structures.
Next, we’ll explore effective engagement strategies for board members that enhance participation and commitment. We’ll share innovative approaches to involving board members in meaningful ways, ensuring they are both motivated and empowered to contribute their best.
Finally, we’ll discuss ways to leverage communities of practice to increase collaboration among colleagues doing similar work, helping to provide for a more cohesive and coordinated approach towards effective board management.

Universities across the country deploy regional development teams to engage and cultivate alums who are far from campus. While cultivation opportunities have become more accessible virtually, remote alumni still crave in-person engagement with campus leadership for an impactful experience. The UC Berkeley East Coast Major Gifts team developed a program to efficiently and effectively bring campus leadership, from Deans and Vice Chancellors to the University Chancellor, across the country specifically for development work and donor meetings. This system, tailored over years of iteration, has resulted in historic fundraising revenue from the region, contributing over $373M to the recently completed Light the Way Campaign. Brown University deployed a similar strategy on the West Coast, including a bespoke events program focused on campaign priorities and key donors. In this session, we will outline the strategy and implementation plan to collaborate with campus fundraisers, build a sustainable regional donor pipeline, and use qualitative and quantitative data-informed strategies to bring campus leaders to regions in which their time will be used effectively to drive forward major gift conversations.

Career programs and initiatives are expected from an alumni association. Not only are you asked to serve students with alumni volunteers, but you are asked to create meaningful opportunities for alumni and their career development processes. In this session we will explore the three C's framework to guide your team to develop a strategic and impactful suite of programs. Content, Connections, and Commendations are the three C's that any team can frame their programming strategy on any budget or staff size. This session will explore the three areas and share some realistic examples that participants can think about implementing on their campuses. The presenters will share sample programs and resources to help your team implement initiatives that will work for your school. Whether you are just getting started or you have a robust alumni career team, this program will give you sample events and programs that can meet your alumni's needs.

This session is designed to equip fundraising leaders with the tools and strategies to elevate their entire advancement team’s awareness of planned giving, even among staff who don't specialize in it. Attendees will learn how to train their teams to recognize planned giving opportunities, identify key donor signals, and seamlessly introduce these conversations into routine donor interactions. By the end of the session, leaders will be prepared to empower their staff with practical knowledge that strengthens donor relationships and ultimately increases planned gift commitments.

The #1 way to ensure your institution's success & your future success as a fundraiser is ambitious, consistent discovery now. But discovery is one of the hardest parts of fundraising! When you're getting in the door with amazing new potential donors, discovery can feel like an adventure. When you're slogging through names in your database and getting zero responses, discovery can feel overwhelming and oppressive. Join this session for tactical discovery tips from sending better emails to cold calling to turning the conversation to money in that first visit.

Learn from Arizona State University's College of Nursing on how we seamlessly integrated alumni relations in to the Marketing and Communications department. This partnership has produced a cross-collaborative relationship that is not only mutually beneficial, but contributed to new projects and programs that the university is looking to duplicate on a large scale.