As a school advancement professional, you have a direct impact on organizational and student success. Our role is also incredibly dynamic and challenging. Between managing donor relationships, raising funds, and promoting your organization’s mission, there is a lot of work to be done and, generally, few hands to do it. 

You are not alone. 

No matter the size of your team, you can reach your goals while you build a stronger, more sustainable school advancement shop. With our experience supporting advancement office success for K–12 schools of all sizes, I’m going to share four essential tips to help you focus on where to start. 

1: Build a Foundation of Trust With Your Team

If there is one thing that will prevent any team from succeeding, no matter how great your goals or strategic plan, it’s a lack of trust among colleagues. This is especially true in the advancement world. 

Take a minute to consider your fellow senior leaders and, for multi-member teams, the people who report to you. Is trust a persistent pain point? Do you have buy-in from your senior leadership team, especially your head of school? If any of this is in question, this is where you need to start to build a sustainable program.

How to start:

• Coffee or lunch: Keep it simple, and start by hosting conversations with team members over a coffee or lunch break. Get to know each other on a personal level and learn more about everyone’s professional goals. Developing personal bonds and connections, even in quick breaks and visits, goes a long way to build trust. 
• Reach across departments: Everyone wants to focus on doing their job well, but that can often mean a very siloed approach to work. You can foster a healthier team environment by demonstrating a willingness to understand your colleagues’ professional challenges. Then, figure out how each department can enable the others to succeed.

Dive Deeper in Our Digital Toolkit: Learn how to facilitate opportunities to create mutual understanding between departments.

 

Who Should Be Involved in Advancement?

An integrated school advancement office should include development, communications, and alumni or community relations. In most cases, especially in highly tuition-driven schools, it should also include enrollment management. Team members across these areas should work closely together in mutual strategy, understanding, consistent storytelling about the school, and support.

2: Measure Effectively 

While trust and teamwork are goals you can begin to work toward for the long term, measuring the right performance indicators is an impactful step you can take in the near term. 

It’s common, especially for schools, to aim for an annual fund goal. But that alone is not a sustainable strategy. 

Here are five things you should start to measure today:

1. Your % to goal to date. While it’s not the only measure, it’s the most important one. It sounds obvious, but people ask me all the time where to begin. You do have to keep an eye on your progress toward your main goal as the guiding star each year.
   
    
2. Program vulnerability. What percentage of your overall fundraising is coming from your three largest donors? That will tell you how top-heavy your program is, and ultimately, how vulnerable it is over time, especially if you don’t have other donors in the pipeline to replace those who are at the top today.
   
    
3. Leadership donors. Do you know what percentage of your donors are leadership donors? Similar to the above, you want to work toward a broader base of leadership donors to avoid vulnerability in your program. 
   
   
   
   Actionable tip: What should you do if you don’t know what your leadership giving levels are or they aren’t established yet? Either ask a school that’s similar to yours or start with a figure that is generally 10% of tuition as the baseline for leadership giving.
   
    
4. The midway benchmark. Start measuring what percentage of your annual fund goal is raised before the midway mark in your academic year. 
   
    
5. Donor capacity opportunities. What percentage of your leadership donors do you plan to upgrade in the next year? For example, do you have a donor giving $5,000 who has the capacity for a $10,000 gift? In that case, ensure you’re having conversations about the donor’s inclination for future gifts to create a plan to upgrade them in the future.
   
    

“There is often a misunderstanding, particularly in school advancement, of how to effectively evaluate your own progress. Your monetary goal is important, but you also have to make sure your goal is sustainable. You need to work in partnership with your other key leaders to be sure you’re making progress toward solid long-term goals and that what you’re aiming for is actually helping both the school and the donor base.” 

—Ann Snyder, Senior Director, Communities Engagement

3: Understand Your Impact

Advancement leaders have an obvious impact on the school’s budget, but they also play a significant role in the culture of the school. It’s important to work closely with the head of school to understand what his or her goals are. When you can clearly see your big-picture impact, you can lead more holistically and make better decisions on behalf of the advancement, alumni, and engagement offices. This will ultimately help you make a greater impact down the line. 

4: Integrate Your Advancement Team 

Whether your advancement program is made up of multiple team members or you’re a shop of one, following an integrated advancement model will make you stronger and more effective. The path to integrating your advancement office is different for every school. We’ve put together a comprehensive toolkit to guide you. 

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Remember, it takes time and incremental effort to build a stronger advancement office and culture of philanthropy at any organization. Start by applying these four recommendations, and determine the primary factors you need to start evaluating right away. Gradually, you will notice the benefits in your relationship with donors, your collaboration with colleagues, and your influence at work.