What is it about “the little engine that could” that allowed it to successfully pull the train over the mountain when larger engines refused to even try? Why is it that California pistachio farmers so often become millionaires when the trees take years to mature and bear fruit? What can we learn from the little engine that exclaimed “I think I can…I think I can” as it huffed and puffed to the mountain top?
Can universities and colleges embarking on their first-ever comprehensive campaign learn from these examples? Yes, when one considers the common characteristics or ingredients in a successful campaign: patience, persistence, and a healthy culture of philanthropy. It is almost universal that comprehensive campaigns, especially multi-year, first time efforts, are a mixture of challenges and opportunities. But with patience, persistence and a keen understanding of your culture of philanthropy, the challenges can be met, and the opportunities can bear fruit.
Join us for an in depth look at these issues and obstacles and get tips on how patience and persistence can lead to success:
• You can’t raise money for everything! When every department on campus wants to raise money, how do you go about setting meaningful priorities and goals? How do you respond to shifting priorities?
• Explore strategies when changes in leadership occur, whether at the executive level, key volunteers or even your Development staff.
• Most Advancement officers will squirm a bit when asked if they have sufficient prospects for a campaign. Join our discussion on successful techniques to grow or enhance your prospect pool.
• Return on investment. It takes money to raise money. Explore with colleagues the multiple methods for aquiring resources that will put you on a path to a successful campaign.
• Whether a campaign is big or small, short or long, there comes a time when campaign fatigue sets in. Volunteers get tired or need to move on to other things, staff move on or get frustrated, people will begin to wonder if it will ever end. This session will reveal successful ways to overcome the challenges inherent in campaign fatigue.
• Identifying and growing your culture of philanthropy is essential to campaign success. Explore with us the four key pillars of a robust culture and how you can improve them as your campaign unfolds.

Key Takeaways:
• Develop campaign priorities that are bold, transformational and aligned with your mission and strategic plan. And don’t forget to measure prospect and donor interest. Be flexible and amenable to change if needed.
• Expect to experience changes in leadership – sometimes the president or other executives, development team members, or volunteers. Consider these changes to be opportunities for fresh perspectives and new energy.
• Be prepared to state your case with the need for sufficient resources. You cannot expect to take your fundraising program to higher levels with the same old budget.
• When your prospect pool is insufficient for your chosen goal, you must build the ship while sailing it. Building your pool takes grit, patience, hard discovery work and creativity. Never stop mining your database.
• Remember the story of the little engine that could, which teaches the value of optimism and hard work. Despite a steep climb and a heavy load, the little engine slowly succeeds in pulling the train over the mountain. And keep in mind the lessons of the pistachio farmer, who never gives up and sees from the beginning the value of nurturing cultivation of his trees, just as we must be patient and persistent with our prospects.