Keeping Up After the Campaign

Staff turnover, donor fatigue pose challenges when drive ends

After years of hard work, the capital campaign finally ends. The last thank-you notes are mailed, the final news release issued, and the unused campaign letterhead recycled.

What does a fund-raising director do next? For many, the immediate answer is: Take a vacation — or at least some long lunches.

But once fund raisers have had time to recharge their batteries, a whole new series of challenges awaits them. They must find new ways to keep staff members motivated and excited about their work — or risk losing them. They also must figure out when and how to go back to the big donors who gave generously to the campaign. And perhaps most challenging, they need to make sure that lessons learned about what worked and what didn’t will influence planning for future campaigns.

An organization’s ability to tackle those challenges with skill, experts say, can make the difference between whether the charity keeps moving ahead or gets stuck in a rut.

Too often, nonprofit groups that fail to recognize their internal weaknesses “go into a postcampaign slump,” says Michael Washburn, a fund-raising consultant in New York.

Time of Transition

One of the common challenges after a campaign is coping with a sudden wave of employee departures, sometimes even including the top fund raiser. It is a common time for fund raisers to change jobs — some because their jobs are temporary positions that end with the campaign, while others because they are at their most marketable when they have just raised a large sum of money.

Some level of turnover is to be expected, many fund-raising experts say.

“It’s like running a political campaign,” Mr. Washburn says. “There are people who are junkies for it.”

But a lot of turnover can cause big problems for a charity, so fund-raising experts advise finding ways to minimize the number of departures after a campaign.

At the Maine chapter of the Nature Conservancy, replacing four of the seven fund raisers — including the development director — who left by the conclusion of a three-year, $58-million campaign last year was “a big challenge that soaked up time,” says Alex McIntosh, who was promoted to director of development after the departures. Mr. McIntosh says he and the other two fund raisers who remained had to scramble to fill vacancies at a time when they were busy thanking campaign donors.

Mr. McIntosh attributes the high attrition rate to the frenetic pace of the campaign. He says that while many development professionals regard turnover as a “necessary evil,” he believes it is possible to reduce it by not pushing fund raisers too hard during a campaign to meet financial goals.

Concerns about attrition, especially among young fund-raising employees, prompted the Nature Conservancy’s national headquarters to hire two consultants from Indiana University’s Kelley School of Business last year to teach a series of leadership-training seminars. Mr. McIntosh attended the meetings, along with eight other conservancy fund raisers from other state offices and the international office.

Mr. McIntosh says the seminars not only helped him and his colleagues feel more loyal to the Nature Conservancy because the organization was giving them a chance to upgrade their skills — all nine are still working for the organization — but the experience also improved communication among state chapters because the fund raisers got to know one another better.

Maintaining Continuity

Charities need to make retaining fund raisers a high priority because continuity is key to building long-term relationships with big donors, says Julie Walker, a fund-raising consultant in New Orleans. “Donors can feel frustrated if they have to deal with new faces” constantly, she observes.

She says that giving employees time to take courses, attend conferences, or develop their professional skills in other ways can be an ideal use of the less-frenetic, postcampaign period. “The trick is to set up a clearer path for staff development internally,” she says. “If someone thinks they can be made a manager, learn special skills, or get a new degree, they are more likely to stay.”

Just as important to keeping talented employees after a campaign, however, is regularly reviewing the salaries of fund raisers to make sure that they are in line with those of new hires, Ms. Walker says. “If you get this environment where people can get $10,000 or $20,000 more every time they move, they are going to make that job change.”

Another way to keep fund raisers on the job, says Andrea Kihlstedt, a consultant in Lancaster, Pa., is to acknowledge their accomplishments during and after a campaign. “We spend a lot of time recognizing people who have given major gifts, but we don’t spend so much time thinking about how to recognize the staff role in the campaign,” she says. “A little bit of real recognition goes a long way.”

For example, at postcampaign receptions charities should consider thanking not just the donors but also the fund-raising staff, Ms. Kihlstedt suggests. She says special recognition should be given to those people who have “gone above and beyond” the call of duty.

Other forms of appreciation might include giving fund raisers a special dinner, days off from work, or gift certificates to a masseuse, as well as holding an office “roast” to give colleagues a chance to recall funny moments from a campaign, Ms. Kihlstedt says. Personal phone calls and notes from bosses can also be important, she says, as can small gifts that carry a creative or symbolic message.

Asking People to Give Again

In addition to dealing with staffing issues that arise after the conclusion of a capital campaign, fund raisers must figure out how best to start bringing in new big gifts for their charity after most of the organization’s major donors have already been tapped to help meet the campaign goal.

Many fund raisers recommend that charities continue to find ways to involve donors in planning and events to help open the door to future gifts.

“Once the celebrating and thanking is done, an organization shouldn’t tarry before they involve donors in the next thing they want to do for the organization,” says Ms. Kihlstedt. “The very next best thing is to involve them in helping the organization think through a picture of the future,” to discuss what “expanded horizons” are possible now that the charity has a large sum of money in hand.

Another way to ensure that donors continue to feel appreciated after a campaign ends, says Ms. Kihlstedt, is to send personal notes of acknowledgment for each installment payment of a major gift. Such a letter should provide an update on how the gift is being used.

“It should say something like, ‘The building is almost finished, and we can’t wait to have you over,’” she says. All too often an organization “will thank a donor for the pledge, and then send them ‘bills’ for each installment,” she says. “Not good.”

Julie Yurko, director of major gifts at the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, agrees that such regular communication is critical to building a foundation for future fund-raising requests.

“If you stay in contact with donors, and if you have a close enough relationship, you’ll have an idea of what they might be interested in supporting next, so then when the opportunity arises, you can go in and talk to them about it,” she says.

The orchestra has maintained continuing contact with major donors to its recent $112.7-million, four-year campaign by inviting them frequently to postcampaign events — but without necessarily asking for another donation right away. For example, it held a “hard hat” concert so that donors and key volunteers, as well as all of the construction workers and technicians who helped build the new Symphony Center, could hear the orchestra perform there.

“People were able to see the hall for the first time when the plaster was hardly dry,” Ms. Yurko says.

In addition, the orchestra also organized at least a half-dozen smaller “naming” events for individuals who had contributed money for rehearsal rooms. For each, it held a special concert and reception for the donors and their friends and families.

Ms. Yurko says she tries to call major donors frequently to let them know about performances and programs at Symphony Center. “We’ll say, ‘We wanted to tell you about a new education initiative we have going on,’ or about a special artist coming to perform,” she says. “If they continue the conversation with us, then we know it is something they are interested in.” Afterward, she sends additional information in the mail and follows up with the donor on any topics of particular interest to them.

Planning the Next Drive

Fund-raising experts say the postcampaign period can be an ideal time to tackle big-picture projects, such as long-term planning — including preparing for the next campaign.

“The end of one campaign is the beginning of the next campaign,” says Charlie Trautmann, executive director of Sciencenter, a museum in Ithaca, N.Y., that recently completed a four-year, $5.1-million campaign.

“Even if the new campaign doesn’t happen for the next 5 or 10 years,” he says, “it is very important that three-quarters of the way through the campaign you start thinking about writing a comprehensive report that is then the springboard for your next campaign.”

Such a report, Mr. Trautmann says, should start with the first campaign meetings. What planning processes did the organization use? How did it recruit new board members? How did it groom campaign chairmen? The report should also include lists of donors, details on what went well and what didn’t, and thoughts about “missed opportunities,” he says.

A document like this can help deal with the loss of institutional memory caused by staff turnover, Mr. Trautmann says. “It should include everything that would allow a completely new team to pick up the ball 5 or 10 years later and start a completely new campaign that exceeds what was done before,” he explains.

Bucknell University, in Lewisburg, Pa., prepared such a report after its most recent, $180-million campaign. As a part of that process, the university’s fund raisers and trustees were asked to share their thoughts on what worked, what didn’t, and lessons that could be drawn from the experience.

“In past years everyone talked about it, but no one wrote it down,” says Shelby Radcliffe McClintock, Bucknell’s director of prospect research and management. “So next time we have a campaign we can pull that out and learn from last time.”

Some fund raisers devote time after a campaign to analyzing the mounds of new information they collected on donors.

As the University of California at Los Angeles wraps up its seven-year, $1.6-billion campaign, fund raisers there plan to review donor records to help the university answer such questions as: Who are the institution’s new donors? Did the university identify any prospective donors who were not contacted during the campaign? How long did it take to identify and cultivate a new million-dollar-plus donor?

Dennis Slon, UCLA’s associate vice chancellor for development, is also considering conducting a follow-up survey with those alumni who did not give to the campaign to ask them why they declined to do so, with the hope that the answers will inform the institution’s next campaign.

For some nonprofit groups, the period after one capital campaign and before the next one can be extremely short.

Back-to-Back Campaigns

Some charities try to build on the momentum of a campaign by making their next fund-raising effort a “mini-campaign”: a smaller-scale project to benefit a specific division or department that was not mentioned as part of the campaign. These fund-raising drives carry specific monetary goals but may not be called an actual “campaign.”

When Chatham College’s first-ever campaign ended in June — having raised $31.7-million, $10-million more than its original goal — college leaders decided to follow up with another project. So the Pittsburgh women’s college started an $18-million fund-raising effort to renovate the athletic facilities.

The project has a narrower focus than the campaign, which has helped distinguish it, says a college spokeswoman, Genna Cavanaugh. Just as important, she says, is having new board leaders to oversee the effort and put a new face on the project. To help raise money for that and future projects, the college is making permanent the three development jobs it created as part of its capital campaign.

The Shakespeare Theatre, in Washington, is taking on an even bigger challenge by contemplating back-to-back campaigns. In December, it wrapped up an $11-million campaign, and it may soon start a $77-million campaign to build a second theater.

“It’s fair to say the organization’s board was very generous in the last campaign, and it is certainly challenging for them to contemplate going into another one,” says Brian Marcus, the theater’s development director.

One reason the theater can consider starting another campaign so soon after the last, says Mr. Marcus, is that the organization has tried hard to ensure that donors and board members feel a strong connection to the theater’s work and mission.

For example, the theater invites board members and other major donors to open rehearsals and “meet the cast” receptions for every play it performs. It also holds behind-the-scenes tours and educational programs to introduce board members to all of the different people who work for the theater — from the costume department to the marketing division.

At every board meeting, the theater’s longtime artistic director talks about the theater’s current production, and sometimes brings a cast member along. At one recent meeting, the actress playing Antigone in the theater’s production of The Oedipus Plays talked with the board about how she was approaching the role.

In the end, says Mr. Marcus, the more the theater keeps its board excited and informed, the more “they have a much better understanding of why they are out there banging on doors and asking people to write checks.”

David Whelan contributed to this article.

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