For over a decade, the MIT Alumni Association used a three-category model to track alumni engagement. Visually depicted with a Venn Diagram, the circles of Philanthropic, Face-to-face, and Virtual were used to count several engagement activities performed by our alumni. We measured overlaps in the engagement categories, labeled the intersection of the three circles as the Mindshare, and reported on the overall engagement rate. Over the years, what was included in our Venn Diagram evolved as we gained the ability to store additional engagement activities in our database.
Eventually, a number of factors including, but not limited to, the conclusion of our most recent capital campaign, CASE’s launch of the Alumni Engagement Metrics, growing confusion around what activities were counted and where, and a desire to empower more staff to see their work in the engagement metrics, demonstrated a need to introduce a new way to track alumni engagement. After several proposed models, Alumni Association leadership adopted a system that closely mirrors CASE’s four-category AEM.
This session will take attendees through the process of launching an engagement measurement model. All steps will be covered, from getting buy-in from leadership to updating visuals and reports to training staff on the changes. If you are thinking about installing an engagement metrics model at your institution, or are looking to update an already existing model, come to this session to learn about our process, how we’re using the model, and what our plans are for its future.

This presentation will describe the combined efforts of the Prospect Development and the Advancement Systems teams at the University of St. Thomas in Minnesota to adopt a more data-driven and automated approach to prospect pipeline development for major gifts fundraising. It will describe our previous approach to pipeline development work, our motivation for a more efficient and transparent approach, and lessons learned in the process of implementing these new processes and systems. Topics covered include the methods used to systematize prospect pipeline elements such as prospect capacity, quality, and interest areas; dashboards created to visualize, filter, and display the pipeline and constituency; ways that these new systems are being used to prepare and deliver new prospects; and dashboards employed to track pipeline movement.

Say hello to our little friends! Like Tony Montana, we experienced a rapid rise and fall of our dreams (in our case, dashboard development). Unlike Tony, we lived to tell the tale of how we used that experience to move on to an even better environment. We'll focus on our initial use of Google Looker Studio, which is hardly the BI Tool of your dreams, but the price is right (FREE!) and it's proven to be surprisingly versatile for a variety of dashboard needs. In the aftermath of us taking our Looker Studio dashboards behind the barn, we've penned this final love letter to a frustrating yet functional (and FREE!) product in the hopes that a less financially fortunate organization can benefit from our experience. We will give a glimpse of the dashboards we've created for proposal pipelines, portfolio reviews, initiative reports, principal giving profiles, fundraising progress, career center data, integration with Slate CRM, etc. in the hopes that those of you with no shortage of sweat equity can push Looker Studio to the limit. We will also give a glimpse into how the lessons learned from our experience made it easy for us to adapt to Power BI.

Actionable data is more than just insightful data. It is timely, insightful data. If you provide insightful data the day after it is needed, it changes from actionable to at best out of date, and at worst useless. When you are part of a small data shop, your form of currency is often not ability but time. We are always asked if we can do something when the real question is, “Do we have time to do something?”

In Vassar’s Advancement Services area, we have 4 people providing data and reporting needs for over 70 individuals across multiple areas. There are myriad requests that seemingly come in all at once, all the time. What is a small shop to do? Well, what Vassar’s Advancement Systems and Reporting team did was to address the request, and then ask ourselves: Who else might make this request? How would they request it? Can we service that request right now as well?

This started our journey on generalizing requests and being proactive to them as opposed to reactive. We started automating this analysis through the use of Stored Procedures, Functions, Custom Fields, and Dashboards to create safe environments for self service. Then our team could focus on more complex actions.

How can we use metrics in a strategic and accessible way to help us reach our goals and communicate effectively with senior leadership and trustees? How can we use visual storytelling to collaborate as a team, understand our performance and take action? This session aims to arm you with simple, yet powerful tools you can use to facilitate conversation with trustees and senior leadership and bolster your fundraising.

A recounting of Welcomed Triumphs and Unexpected Follies on the journey to deepen our understanding of the nature of our Fundraiser Portfolios and our Visibility into the Future.

In July 2023, our organization embarked on a transformative journey, redefining data analytics and dashboard design, ensuring that all levels of the organization would experience increased data transparency through tailor made dashboards.

During this session, head of strategy planning, Mel Rowan, will outline the steps it took to get buy-in at the highest levels of the organization to mobilize around this effort. The lead for the analytics team, Stacey Barnes, will showcase some of the Tableau dashboards that have been deployed for the executive team, frontline fundraisers, and campus partners. Throughout the session Mel and Stacey will discuss the strategic steps necessary to implement organization-wide analytics, provide technical insights for optimizing dashboard design and lessons learned during the adoption phase.

This presentation is tailored for both data analysis professionals and non-technical experts. Non-technical professionals will acquire valuable insights into formulating a strategy to create a data-informed organization. Meanwhile, data analysis professionals will discover innovative ways to visualize and communicate their insights to non-technical audiences across the organization, as well as explore novel dashboard arrangements to enhance the visual representation of their work. 

Join us for an engaging session that promises to empower attendees with practical knowledge and foster a collaborative environment for leveraging data analytics and dashboard design to drive organizational success.

This will be a deep dive into using Python to automate tasks and improve workflows where we will walk through the evolution of a reporting task as we apply different levels of automation to it.

We will start with a hands on lesson on partitioning a file into multiple files using Python. Building on this, we will present some of the next steps that you could take to improve that task using APIs and prepare it for sharing among an organization. Finally, we will discuss how you can build small workflows for immediate needs and then iterate on them to create a full process with Python that saves labor hours and improves accuracy on a variety of reporting tasks.

Leveraging Power BI for Dynamic Fundraising Dashboards: Enhancing Portfolio Management with Data-Driven Insights"

Overview:
In the competitive field of fundraising, maximizing donor engagement and optimizing portfolio management are key to success. Power BI, a leading business intelligence tool, enables development professionals to transform raw fundraising data into dynamic dashboards that provide real-time insights into donor behavior, pipeline health, and key performance indicators (KPIs). This presentation will focus on how to use Power BI to build effective dashboards that track essential fundraising metrics, helping fundraisers and development officers make data-driven decisions to enhance portfolio management.

The goal of this presentation is to demonstrate how Power BI can be utilized to create and customize dashboards specifically designed for fundraising and portfolio management. Attendees will learn how to track donor movement, visualize portfolio performance, and monitor key metrics such as gift officer activity, prospect pipeline, and donor retention. This session will highlight best practices in dashboard design to support strategic fundraising decisions.

Technical Requirements:
Power BI Desktop (installed on the presenter's computer)
Projector or large display for live demonstration
Internet connection (if showcasing live data)
Sample fundraising data for demonstration purposes

The presenter will share three specific examples of how he identified a problem with fundraiser behavior, developed and implemented a solution, and succeeded in changing fundraising behavior. As an individual major gifts fundraiser, the leader of a lead annual gift officer team, and the Interim Vice President of Advancement, each example addresses how reporting and assessment tools were incorrectly configured to encourage exactly the wrong behaviors. By partnering with advancement services team members to develop more effective management tools and aligning reports and metrics to the true definition of success, the presenter effectively reshaped fundraising behavior and improved bottomline outcomes.