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The Worth Claim: How to “Sell” Your College’s Value

by W. Kent Barnds

Whether we like it or not, admissions counselors are increasingly thought of as a college’s sales force. Yet I don’t completely understand why many of my colleagues in admissions bristle at the idea of being a “salesperson.” After all, we are charged with generating awareness, building and managing relationships, and “closing the deal” with interested students. Furthermore, we are regularly asked to introduce our college’s new programs, processes and ideas. Why should we run from this comparison? Why Being Seen as a Sales Force is an Opportunity In my experience, the involvement of the sales team often comes too late in the process of developing programs, resulting in less-than-optimal messaging and differentiations at the point of sale. Using the “sales force” comparison presents an opportunity to help other campus stakeholders understand what we need from them in order to be the best sales team we can be. I recommend: Redefine admissions as a “sales force.”Perhaps the reason so many of my colleagues resist being compared to salespersons is the assumption that, driven by their eagerness to sell, salespeople don’t always speak the truth. We need to redefine the admissions “sales force” as a group with the integrity and insight to […]

4 Lessons Learned from Campaign Volunteers at Gettysburg College

by Ashlyn W. Sowell

THE SUCCESS AT GETTYSBURG COLLEGE This article is the first in a series by Ashlyn Sowell, Gettysburg’s associate vice president and campaign director. Here, Sowell reviews 4 lessons about campaign communications and volunteer management that she and her team at Gettysburg learned — from their volunteers. “Leveraging these key lessons,” Sowell adds, “we have successfully engaged over 100 volunteers in the quiet or leadership phase of the campaign and are tracking ahead of our goal.  I believe with volunteers leading the way we will involve more Gettysburgians in the public phase of the campaign, exceed our goal, and groom the leaders needed to be successful in the next campaign for the college.” We hope you will find this article useful and share it with your colleagues. As we embarked on the largest campaign in our school’s history, our campaign consultant gave us some important advice. She said that our campaign must be owned by the president and by the volunteer leadership, not by the staff. We took her advice to heart. With our board chair, we carefully selected each volunteer that would help us during our planning phase. The board chair personally recruited each volunteer, and I believe that got […]

Why Honor Rolls of Donors are a Waste of Time

by Lynne Wester

In her new book The 4 Pillars of Donor Relations, Lynne Wester of Donor Relations Guru® helps you rethink donor relations practices and offers specific tips for more powerful acknowledgements, stewardship and impact reporting, recognition, and donor engagement. Get this comprehensive guide to donor relations for your shop today, and transform the way you steward, recognize, and engage your donors. The article that follows is an excerpt from Lynne’s book. In all my time in donor relations, I have never heard of a donor who gave an organization a million dollar gift because their name was in a textual list of donors. Yet I must get asked at least once a week what I think of honor rolls and their place in donor recognition and stewardship. I think they have no useful purpose, they provide opportunities to make costly mistakes, they are a huge waste of human resources, time, money, and they are otherwise foolish. Why Honor Rolls Don’t Provide Any Benefit Time and time again, we have asked donors what they want and how they want to be recognized, and the three things that appear most often in their answers are: Donors want handwritten notes from students. They want to meet those that […]

How One Institution Ensured its Crisis Management Plan Didn’t Just Sit on the Shelf

by Daniel Fusch

The University of Wyoming’s emergency preparedness plan has become a template for plans at other Wyoming institutions and state agencies—including Casper College, which used emergency protocols based on the University of Wyoming’s in responding to a tragic crossbow shooting incident on campus in December 2012. In a recent conversation with Academic Impressions, Mark Collins, the University of Wyoming’s associate vice president for administrative operations, shared with us some of the story behind how he and his colleagues developed the institution’s emergency management protocols—and why their plan didn’t just sit on the shelf. He also offered some practical takeaways for other institutions—see below. The Challenge: From Draft to Effective Protocols “In 2010, we had put together a draft of an emergency response plan for the university,” Collins recalls, “and it had already gone through a number of iterations. But it never felt done, it never felt like something we had full confidence in implementing.” For the University of Wyoming, a 2010 Academic Impressions conference on emergency management held in Chicago, IL, proved the catalyst for moving from draft to actual protocols that would be implemented, communicated, and drilled. Collins attended the event with three colleagues, from university communications, student affairs, and […]

The 5 Forms of Support Your Adjunct Faculty Need

by Private: Caleb Tegtmeier

According to the Pullias Center for Higher Education, roughly half of higher education faculty are part-time employees. Increased reliance on contingent faculty has led many institutions to internally audit the level of support and the faculty development opportunities they offer to adjuncts. In a recent online training from Academic Impressions — “Supporting and Developing Adjunct Faculty” — Jennifer Strickland of Mesa Community College elaborated on the importance of effectively supporting this growing population of instructors. During the training, Strickland also shared a list of the highest priority faculty development needs for adjunct faculty, those areas where intentional support can make a difference in engaging, developing, and retaining your adjunct faculty. Strickland recommends: How does your institution match up in each of these 5 areas? 1. A Thorough and Engaging Orientation This is the first point of contact with your adjunct faculty, and it is important to make it count.  While finding ways to engage your audience is critical, it is imperative to also cover policy essentials. Aspects such as ADA policies, course syllabus requirements, and grading procedures must be included in this type of environment. 2. Needs-Based Training However, just offering an annual orientation by itself will not be enough to […]

Innovative Practices in Higher-Ed Leadership Development

The external search is engrained in the culture of higher education, but this is already beginning to change as an aging workforce forces institutional leaders to address issues of succession planning and leadership development. Across the country institutions are starting or increasing their investments in in-house leadership development programs. This paper reviews 3 innovative practices that institutions can learn from to make their programs more effective in cultivating high-potential leaders: In this paper, you can review a national snapshot of investments in leadership development programming, and hear from select institutions that have launched effective in-house leadership development programs. Read the paper

The Best Questions Gift Officers Can Ask to Move Prospects Toward Solicitation

by Jim M. Langley

Knowing how to turn a discussion with a prospect toward a specific gift commitment requires intuition and skill. It is a matter of timing that requires us to know where each prospect is in the philanthropic decision-making cycle. This we know: From the time we begin the philanthropic dialogue with a prospect until she or he makes a significant commitment takes, on average, 21 months and involves nine interactions. The following advice, therefore, assumes that the prospects you’ve selected have given previously to your institution for years or have given elsewhere for an extended period of time.  It further assumes that you have had at least three or four earlier interactions in which you have determined that your prospect: Engaging the Prospect Early If all of the above are true, you can begin to turn the dialogue toward investment by saying that you would like your prospect to become more deeply engaged in the direction-setting of the institution or in the realization of important goals. Then, ask any of the following: These questions are designed to prompt early-stage engagement and to give the prospect a voice in the development of the project, which demonstrates that you value their time and […]

Presidents’ Advice for Campus Leaders in a Crisis

by Cindy Lawson

While writing a chapter for Managing the Unthinkable: Crisis Preparation and Response for Campus Leaders (ACE, 2014), I had the opportunity to interview two retired presidents/chancellors with whom I had worked – former University of North Carolina Wilmington Chancellor Rosemary DePaolo and former Texas A&M President Ray Bowen.  DePaolo faced two different student incidents in which a student was stalked and then murdered, after which the perpetrator committed suicide. Both incidents occurred within a two-month period early in her tenure at UNCW.  Bowen was president during the Texas A&M bonfire collapse that killed 12 students and injured another 27. I asked them, “Given what you have learned from successfully managing a number of significant campus crises, what’s the most important advice you would give to other presidents, chancellors and campus leaders in times of crisis?” Advice from Rosemary DePaolo DePaolo shared the following: Campus safety is paramount, and that includes having the best possible crisis response protocols in place.  Consider asking an outside expert to evaluate your crisis response plan. Too often university leaders either deny that anything could happen at their institutions, or they become defensive, rebutting individuals who question existing practices. Don’t let a crisis divert your attention […]

Crowdfunding: Stats and Critical Advice

by Daniel Fusch (Academic Impressions) Crowdfunding can increase alumni engagement and participation while serving as a cost-effective tool for acquiring updated alumni contact information, re-engaging donors, and serving faculty and students in their philanthropic efforts. Recently, we have released a series of resources for higher-ed professionals interested in exploring crowdfunding initiatives: Higher-Ed Crowdfunding: What Is It and Why Does It Matter? – This September 2013 article on how crowdfunding fits into the larger context of new donor acquisition strategies. Is Crowdfunding Right for You? – This January 2014 paper on the pros and cons of crowdfunding, for which we interviewed a variety of advancement and alumni relations professionals in higher education and providers of crowdfunding tools. Crowdfunding in Advancement – This new online training by Shad Hanselman (Arizona State University) giving an in-depth primer on launching a crowdfunding initiative. LEARN FROM GEOFF HALLETT Join us for this prerecorded webcast if your shop is interested in developing your own crowdfunding initiative but is unsure how it will complement your advancement strategy. You will learn how to bring crowdfunding from inception to launch, while ensuring that this latest fundraising innovation helps boost your overall program. During the first release of our online training, with […]

6 Questions Deans Need to Ask when Calling on Prospects

by Jim M. Langley

The following article is based on “The Appointment with a Prospect or Donor: DOs and DON’Ts,” the second chapter in Jim Langley’s book Fundraising for Deans. A dean’s role in fundraising is to cultivate the relationships that are critical to sustained fundraising success. That kind of relationship begins when two parties make a “connection” based on a shared purpose or shared values. In making their first calls on prospects, deans will not make the best possible connection if they see the call merely as an opportunity to tout their school or college.  Such an approach presumes that prospects are not aware of their institution’s strengths, and signals that they are there to ask for more without having expressed appreciation for what has already been done. Deans will create a far more positive impression if they begin by conveying their interest, appreciation and respect for prospects. That can be achieved by asking the right questions. A STATISTIC TO KEEP IN MIND: According to a national survey of higher education alumni conducted by the Collaborative Innovation Network for Engagement and Giving and presented to the Annual Giving Directors Consortium (April 2010), only 52 percent of alumni at those institutions with the highest […]

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