Fast track your SIEFR experience by utilizing this pre-session to gain a new appreciation for the long history and deep roots of philanthropy and our profession and enhance your understanding of the current philanthropic landscape and the donors on which we rely. This information, shared by one of the best of our business, will give you a great start to an amazing SIEFR adventure.
2:30 – 3:30 PM ET
First Advisory Group Meeting – Welcome and Introductions
All Faculty
Participants will have the opportunity to engage in small group discussion with fellow attendees to maximize their learning throughout the institute. These meetings are facilitated by a faculty leader and are designed to help attendees more deeply explore concepts covered each day. This session will introduce participants to their faculty leader and fellow advisory group members and provide the expectations and guidelines for how to engage during these meetings
Program
12:00 – 9:00 PM
Residence Hall Registration and Check-in
12:00 – 1:45
Institute Registration
2:00 – 3:15
Welcome and Opening Session (All Institutes)
Speaker: Sue Cunningham, President and CEO, CASE
3:15-3:30
Institute Transition Break
3:30 – 4:30
SIEFR Opening Session - Faculty Introductions
4:30-4:45
Advisee Transition Break
4:45 – 5:45
Advisory Meeting #2 - Thoughts at the Outset
Meet with faculty and a smaller group of attendees to help maximize your learning at the institute.
6:00 – 8:00
Welcome Dinner (institute specific)
Cap off your first day by joining the institute faculty and fellow attendees for a welcome dinner to enjoy food, drinks, and good company.
8:00
Institute Adjourns for the Day
8:15 – 8:30
Morning Announcements
8:30 – 9:30
Annual Giving- Skylar Beaver- The Lawrenceville School
Whether you work in the department or not, understanding annual giving is foundational in successful development programs. This presentation will touch on common strategies, efforts and emerging trends; giving you a strong start for an annual giving specialist career or providing insight on how best to leverage the power of annual gifts.
9:30 – 10:00
Coffee Break
10:00 – 11:00
Elective Sessions (choose one of five):
Campaigns 101 / Basics of Campaign Management – Ginny Wise -Tulane University
All successful campaigns have four essential pillars: 1) Case; 2) Leadership; 3) Prospects; 4) A plan. The absence of any of these ingredients’ spells failure. Join us as we walk through a comprehensive campaign plan and review the essentials for success.
Getting Face to Face with Prospective Donors: The Cold Call & Your 1st Visit – Chris Clarke - Duke University
Turn up the heat on your cold calls and keep the door open after your first visit. Learn how to get the appointment, how to start the conversation and keep it on track, and most important, how to end the visit ensuring a productive next step. Have to solicit on that first call? We'll cover that as well. The development professional who masters and enjoys cold calls and first visits is destined for success.
Getting Face to Face with Prospective Donors: The Art of Listening – Trish Jackson – Northfield Mount Hermon School As a leadership annual fund or major gift professional, you are a detective or anthropologist, uncovering clues to your donor's philanthropic interests, motivations and values. And, like a good detective or anthropologist, you have many different tools for gaining the information you need. In this session we will identify some of the critical skills needed to be a strategic listener and observer as well as an active participant in relationship building.
Developing Major Gift Strategies –Armin Afsahi – Harvard University
Working with an individual to make a major philanthropic investment in your organization is a very personal and unique experience, with no two donors and no two gift plans being exactly alike. Your success or failure in closing a major gift depends on how well you know the donor, how well you listen and your understanding of what he or she wants to accomplish with his or her philanthropy. Practice developing major gift strategies, how to use faculty, trustees, colleagues and volunteers, and develop a sense of moves sequence that will maximize results. Walk away with a strategy for one of your donors that you can begin implementing as soon as you get back to campus. In fact, maybe the next step toward that gift begins as soon as this session ends.
Mistakes Annual Giving Programs Make – Lishelle Blakemore – University of California, Berkeley
A strong and thriving annual giving program requires that you must first have a clear vision of the role annual giving plays in your institution’s overall development effort. Understanding this relationship allows you to develop plans for your program in a strategic and meaningful way that increases your chances of having a successful fundraising program and building traditions of giving among your alumni, parents, students and others. In this session we will explore what it means to have a clear vision and mission for your annual giving program, how to develop annual and long term plans based on a variety of factors, set metrics and evaluation methods, and report and analyze your program regularly.
11:00 – 11:15
Break
11:15 AM – 12:15 PM
Elective Sessions (choose one of five):
Recruiting, Managing and Keeping Volunteers Engaged – Lischelle Blakemore – University of California, Berkeley
One of the joys of fundraising for any organization is the relationships developed with our volunteers – those people who care so deeply about your institution that they are willing to commit their time, energy, ideas, connections, and financial support to your school. We will discuss the value of involving volunteers with your institution, volunteer recruitment strategies, how to engage and partner with volunteers, and how to maintain the post-volunteer relationship.
Leadership Annual Giving – Skylar Beaver – The Lawrenceville School
More and more annual giving programs are starting to invest in leadership annual giving. Many times, these are our most loyal donors…and our future major gift donors. This session will look at how you develop a leadership annual giving program, how you measure the value added back and how leadership annual giving fits in with existing annual giving strategies.
Effectively Managing Yourself and Others – Lacie LaRue – University of Oregon
As your career advances you will face many opportunities and challenges…none so complex as learning how to effectively manage yourself in the various roles you play from day to day (or minute to minute!). This interactive conversation will focus on how to manage up, down, directly, through influence and through change management…all while sharpening your own working style and being part of a high functioning organization.
Getting Face to Face with Prospective Donors: Making the Ask - Jim Piatt - Elon University
It is more than a meeting: it is ensuring success in every stage of a significant solicitation. We often think of a solicitation as a singular event, the moment when we "ask for the order." In this session, we will look at personal solicitation in a broader context, by discussing the five stages of the solicitation process, beginning with the call to request an appointment and concluding with post-solicitation follow-up. Our goal will be to understand how a thoughtful and rigorous approach to each stage can help ensure the best possible outcome in your solicitation of a high-potential prospect.
Gift Planning 101 – What is Your Short Term and Long-Term Game? - Chris Clarke – Duke University
Planned giving is often thought of as complicated and overwhelming. It is also a topic that tends to engender discomfort among donors, volunteers and staff because it can involve discussions of complexity and, in some cases, mortality. At the same time, it is one of the most important areas of our work as we partner with donors to help them make the most efficient and effective gifts possible. Join us for an introductory session on planned giving to learn more about the various types of outright and deferred gift opportunities that can benefit not only your institution, but also your donors.
12:15 – 1:45
Lunch
1:45 – 2:45
Elective Sessions (choose one of five):
***Option for Crossover Electives***
Getting Face to Face with Prospective Donors: The Art of Asking Strategic Questions – Ginny Wise – Tulane UniversityStrategic and generative conversations are at the heart of our work. Questioning and listening are powerful life skills. First, they will help you create productive donor relationships. What organizations do you support with your philanthropy? Where are we on your list of philanthropies? How do you make your philanthropic decisions? What has been your most meaningful gift? Quality questions elicit amazing information that will guide you in the solicitation process and help you build relationships on campus with your supervisor, peers and faculty members. Learn how to develop questions instead of talking points that will inform your gift strategy, advance relationships, and result in a joyful, generous "Yes" to your request for increased engagement with your institution, a significant gift to one of your priorities or for whatever you were hoping that volunteer or colleague would do to help you achieve your goals.
Academic Partnerships – Armin Afsahi – Harvard UniversityCurious? Good, you’re in the perfect profession. One of the greatest privileges of working in education is in a community filled with unbounded ambition. Yes, most academic-development interaction centers around prospect and donor work. This session will explore ways we can cultivate meaningful relationships with members of the academic community to strengthen fundraising potential and expand our intellectual curiosity.
They're BAACCKK . . . but don't be afraid! Take the scary out of reunions and affinity group fundraising. Both are an opportunity to raise more money and engage more alumni. Learn how to refine and renew your reunion and affinity programs to rejoice in record-breaking levels of giving. Explore ways to use volunteers, technology and implement creative gift giving. Discuss how to coordinate your "getting them back" programming (in person or virtually) with your "getting them to give back" programming and make it fun so that when alumni come back, you're glad they did.
Young Alumni Programs- Jim Piatt – Elon University
At many of our institutions young alumni are often overlooked and undervalued as we consider R.O.I. in terms of the deployment of staff resources. As a result many fundraisers are forced to concentrate their efforts on “established graduates” with presumably more time and discretionary resources to support our organizations. This conversation will explore ideas and suggestions ranging from how best to involve current students in the advancement of your institution to strategies for connecting recent graduates and other young alumni with both the school and with each other. By actively engaging our alumni as volunteers and donors at an early age, we set the building blocks for success that will benefit our programs for many years to come. Please join us as we explore ideas to augment programs aimed at better serving the needs of our youngest graduates.
Women Give!- Trish Jackson – Northfield Mount Hermon School
Focusing on data from the Women's Philanthropy Institute at the Lilly Family School of Philanthropy at Indiana University, this session will demonstrate why every institution should pay attention to and involve their female constituents; it is likely they are key to your institution's increased philanthropy! Come and learn from each other in this interactive session.
2:45 – 3:15
Refreshment Break
3:15 – 4:15
Major Gifts –Chris Clarke – Duke University
No matter how your organization classifies major gifts, these large commitments are the fuel that often drives annual production of private support. This introductory session will explore definitions of major gifts, how they fit into a comprehensive development effort, and what motivates donors to make them. The presentation will provide a conceptual understanding of how the development cycle applies to major gifts and the steps involved in securing them. The session will close by placing these large donations in the context of societal, economic, and philanthropic trends across the nonprofit educational sector.
4:15-4:30
Advisee Transition Break
4:30 – 5:30
Advisory Meeting #3 – Making the Ask
All Faculty
5:30
Institute Adjourns for the day
8:15 – 8:30
Morning Announcements
8:30 – 9:30
Stewardship and Donor Relations – Heidi Hansen McCrory -Furman University
What is our purpose in doing good stewardship and building meaningful relationships with our donors? How do we retain donors and inspire them to keep giving? Our best future donors are our current philanthropic partners already invested in our mission and our future. Explore the why and how of stewardship that results in substantive relationships with donors who are inspired, generous, joyous and invested in our institutions.
9:30 – 10:00
Coffee Break
10:00 – 11:00
Elective Sessions (choose one of five):
Annual Fund in a Campaign – Lishelle Blakemore – University of California, Berkeley -All of our institutions are either preparing for, in the midst of, or transitioning out of a campaign. There is no absolute truth about whether to integrate your annual fund into the campaign, but there are some important considerations to address before you make your decision. And you may even discover mid-way that you want to go in a different direction. This discussion will explore some of the pros, cons and factors to consider in deciding how, when or if to use your campaign to promote annual giving.
Getting Face to Face with Prospective Donors: The Cold Call & Your 1st Visit – Chris Clarke – Duke University
Turn up the heat on your cold calls and keep the door open after your first visit. Learn how to get the appointment, how to start the conversation and keep it on track, and most important, how to end the visit ensuring a productive next step. Have to solicit on that first call? We'll cover that as well. The development professional who masters and enjoys cold calls and first visits is destined for success.
Getting Face to Face with Prospective Donors: The Art of Asking Strategic Questions - Heidi Hansen McCrory – Furman University
Strategic and generative conversations are at the heart of our work. Questioning and listening are powerful life skills. First, they will help you create productive donor relationships. What organizations do you support with your philanthropy? Where are we on your list of philanthropies? How do you make your philanthropic decisions? What has been your most meaningful gift? Quality questions elicit amazing information that will guide you in the solicitation process and help you build relationships on campus with your supervisor, peers and faculty members. Learn how to develop questions instead of talking points that will inform your gift strategy, advance relationships, and result in a joyful, generous "Yes" to your request for increased engagement with your institution, a significant gift to one of your priorities or for whatever you were hoping that volunteer or colleague would do to help you achieve your goals.
Pipeline Development – Lacie LaRue – University of Oregon
A robust pipeline might be one of the strongest indicators of current and future fundraising success. It ensures that your organization will always have the critical philanthropic support that is so need. Attend this session to discuss the various areas within the pipeline, how to create robust pipeline activity and to measure its overall health.
Generational Differences & Giving – Ginny Wise – Tulane University
Millennials are from Mars; Boomers are from Venus. Generational differences affect how successful we are in our workplaces as well as in our work. Do you want that next promotion? Do you want to close big gifts? Effective communication is critical to building productive and authentic relationships – with our colleagues and with our donors. Learn how understanding and adapting for generational differences can help us get ahead in our careers and raise more money for our institutions.
11:00 – 11:15
Break
11:15 AM – 12:15 PM
Elective Sessions (choose one of five):
Getting Face to Face with Prospective Donors: The Art of Listening – Trish Jackson – Northfield Mount Hermon School
As a leadership annual fund or major gift professional, you are a detective or anthropologist, uncovering clues to your donor's philanthropic interests, motivations and values. And, like a good detective or anthropologist, you have many different tools for gaining the information you need. In this session we will identify some of the critical skills needed to be a strategic listener and observer as well as an active participant in relationship building.
Getting Face to Face with Prospective Donors: Making the Ask – Jim Piatt – Elon University
It is more than a meeting: it is ensuring success in every stage of a significant solicitation. We often think of a solicitation as a singular event, the moment when we "ask for the order." In this session, we will look at personal solicitation in a broader context, by discussing the five stages of the solicitation process, beginning with the call to request an appointment and concluding with post-solicitation follow-up. Our goal will be to understand how a thoughtful and rigorous approach to each stage can help ensure the best possible outcome in your solicitation of a high-potential prospect.
Annual Giving Strategies – Skylar Beaver – The Lawrenceville School There is no shortage of solicitation tools in annual giving, and every year we see new strategies and platforms added. How are successful programs incorporating emerging trends like mobile giving, crowdfunding and Days of Giving into their existing tried-and-true strategies like direct mail, Telefund and email.
Major Gift Stewardship: Art of Saying Thank You & Preparing for the Next Ask – Armin Afsahi – Harvard University - Our best prospects are philanthropic partners already invested in our mission and dreams for the future. How effectively we thank a benefactor for a gift determines, in large part, whether an additional commitment will be made. Explore meaningful strategies to make your "thank you" an important step in cultivating that next gift.
Digital Transformation – Lacie LaRue – University of Oregon -The future is here, but are we ready for it? Digital transformation is all the buzz within the higher ed Advancement industry, but very few organizations are successful in implementing comprehensive digital strategies. Applying a digital lens over traditional development work can help organizations reach further, faster and make donors feel well taken care of. Come discuss some of the industry trends around digital transformation and how this approach can fit into relationship-based work.
12:15 – 1:45
Lunch
1:45 – 2:45
Elective Sessions (choose one of five):
***Option for Crossover Electives***
Authentic Leadership: Defining Yourself as a Leader – Chris Clarke – Duke University
Leadership has many dimensions and can be defined in a range of ways, but what does it mean to be a leader? Many books have been written about how to turn yourself into a leader: stand taller, be more confident, be decisive, be collaborative, talk more, talk less. But at some point can’t you just be yourself and also be an effective leader? This session will be a dynamic conversation about how you develop your own personal brand of leadership, adapt it to your team and environment, and remain authentic to who you are and your life experiences.
Donors Speak: A Volunteer Panel – Trish Jackson – Northfield Mount Hermon School - What draws a donor to your cause? How do you build that interest into a lifetime partnership? Join us for a spirited discussion featuring engaged philanthropists who will share their own journeys to engagement and subsequent investment.
An Intro to Donor Prospect Management and Research- Lacie LaRue – University of Oregon
Finding that “needle in the haystack” prospect is exciting for any fundraiser and a strong relationship with the Prospect Management and Research teams can be the key to success. We'll explore tools and approaches that will help you identify high value prospects, optimize your portfolio and work with your prospect management and research to team to hit your goals together during this session.
Mastering our Craft: Pathways to Peak Performance – Armin Afsahi – Harvard University - Why do some fundraising & advancement professionals thrive where others struggle? What can we learn from individuals who arrive at the highest levels of performance? How might recent studies of expert performers inform our approach to our work? We will explore these questions and review techniques that are essential to our craft. Join us and discover why advancement stars are made and not born.
Annual Fund and Alumni Relations: True Partners – Lishelle Blakemore – University of California, Berkeley
Close and effective coordination between alumni engagement efforts and annual giving programs not only yield increased immediate support, it can also improve the levels of giving across generations. Building meaningful relationships with alumni should be an integrated process where all outreach and communication is intentional, coordinated and well executed. This session will help you to enhance your alumni engagement efforts to where the natural outcome is a desire and willingness to invest more deeply in the institution.
2:45 – 3:15
Refreshment Break
3:15 – 4:30
Career Panel: Next Steps, Getting Involved - What can a career path in advancement look like? A straight line? A squiggly doodle? Career decision making - should I stay or should I go? Join a panel of exceptionally talented faculty to discuss careers in fundraising and lessons learned and unlearned.
4:30-4:45
Advisee Transition Break
4:45 – 6:00
Advisory Meeting #4 - Ethics
All Faculty
6:00
Institute Adjourns for the day
Free evening, dinner on your own
8:00 – 9:00
Ask Me Anything (choose one)
Join your faculty for topic-based “Ask Me Anything” (AMA) sessions. Pick your topic and bring your questions; the discussion will be tailored to address specific questions attendees have about that particular subject. You’ll choose from annual giving, major gifts, personal solicitation, and management and strategy. This is a great way to get the answers you’re seeking at the 2022 Institute and you’ll learn from the questions of others as well!
Annual Giving
Major Gifts
Personal Solicitation
Management and Strategy
New Technologies in Advancement
9:15 – 10:15
Practicing Diversity, Equity, inclusion, and Belonging (DEIB) in Advancement - Jessica Elmore - CASEInclusive philanthropy requires deliberate actions that permeate throughout advancement organizations. Advancement services, alumni relations, fundraising, and marketing and communication professionals will learn DEIB advancement strategies and work to develop a skill set that will add value to their organization.
10:15 – 10:30
Coffee Break
10:30 – 11:45
Advisory Meeting # 5
11:45 AM – 1:45 PM
Lunch
1:45 – 2:45
Elective Sessions (choose one of Four):
***Option for Crossover Electives***
The Art of Storytelling – Skylar Beaver – The Lawrenceville School
For more than 10,000 years humankind has been moved by great stories. Stories have changed the course of history, been used to right wrongs, and to educate new generations. In fact, at the Summer Institute, we devote an entire General Session to hearing stories from our faculty, revealing key lessons learned while they were in the field. Each of our educational institutions is bursting with powerful, meaningful stories. As advancement professionals, we have the opportunity and the challenge to capture this vital information and bring it to life. Many believe that the best fundraisers are also exceptional storytellers. This elective session will build upon some of the lessons learned in the General Session while diving into the techniques and approaches that will help anyone learn to tell a great story, including time to role play what you’ve learned with your classmates!
An Intro to Donor Prospect Management and Research – Lacie LaRue – University of Oregon
What size prospect portfolio do you really need? Can you really determine the capacity a donor has for making a substantial gift? How can you design the research effort to meet priority goals and objectives? How do development officers work with a research staff? What if you, the development officer, ARE the research staff? Are we directing our attention on the right prospects for our institution? We'll explore tools and approaches together during this session. Explore the fundamental roles of prospect research and management to maximize your organization's fundraising potential: information gathering techniques, strategies for identifying new prospects, and methods of evaluating prospect capacity.
Parents Programs – Jim Piatt – Elon University
Timing is everything for successful parent fundraising programs. There is a narrow window of opportunities for engaging, cultivating, soliciting and stewarding parents, so we must thoughtfully plan the critical fundraising touches along the way - from the admissions cycle through graduation. If we do this well we can achieve our goals and provide rewarding experiences for our parents and families. Let's explore the journey of parents/families and discuss ways to optimize fundraising opportunities along the way.
Strategic Thinking and Planning – Heidi Hansen McCrory – Furman University –
Your head is full of everything you've learned about annual giving, alumni, volunteer engagement, personal solicitations, direct mail, prospect management, advancement services, communications and campaigns. Now what? How do you pull together all the pieces for a successful program? Strategic thinking and planning, of course! We'll discuss ways to plan for success, whether you're managing an office, a program, a staff-or just yourself.
Student Philanthropy Programs – Trish Jackson – Northfield Mount Hermon School
Though many institutions have solid senior class gift programs, those schools, colleges and universities that introduce comprehensive philanthropy programs from the time students first matriculate, are well-positioned for greater success. Explore some of the best practices in creating a culture of philanthropy on your campus and consider how you can design effective programs that work for your institution, even in a time of constrained resources.
2:45 – 3:15
Refreshment Break
3:15 – 5:00
Plenary Session / Closing and Wrap-Up
Putting the Pieces Together – Armin Afashi – Harvard University and Lacie LaRue – University of Oregon
How do we leverage all the tools of development to enhance fundraising/face to face experience and outcomes? Using a donor pipeline approach, this session will focus on alumni and donor engagement, using events for prospecting, strategic stewardship to facilitate future gifts, creating a seamless hand-off culture, and using technology without sacrificing a personal touch.
Trends and Opportunities in Educational Fundraising– Lishelle Blakemore – University of California, Berkeley
Over the past 2 years, we’ve experienced a global pandemic, an unprecedented economic collapse and fitful beginnings of a recovery, and the most explosive social upheaval on issues of race and justice in more than a half-century. Our work doesn’t happen in a vacuum; how do these massive disruptions impact our work? We will hear from some of the best brains in our industry on our challenges going forward, how we can successfully address those challenges, and why there are always reasons to be optimistic.
5:00
Institute Adjourns
6:00 – 9:00
Closing Reception/Dinner/Fun Activities to Wrap-up Institutes
