Hi,
This isn't so much a Tessitura question and it's more of an organizational question regarding program names. I'm wondering if anyone is willing to share their guidelines as to what gets "counted" in your program names. At Pacific Symphony, we're trying to come up with some strict guidelines as to what counts and I would love to see what other organizations are doing!
For example, for your annual fund donors, will you include money received for elevated events as part of annual giving? Do you count endowment and capital campaign money received or do you have a separate listing for these people? Do you count volunteer support group membership money?
Hi Christopher,
We have separate lists for our endowment donors as well as for various special campaigns. We don't include money from elevated events--our annual fund donors are grouped based on membership level and elevated events don't affect memberships.
However you end up doing it, I've found it's useful to spell out in your donor listings what your criteria are ("these listings reflect annual fund gifts made between July 1, 2013 and...") to cut down on donor confusion a little.
Hope that helps!
We include Annual Fund and Elevated Event contributions. As for space, we include donors at $250+ in the printed program, however, offer the entire donor listing online.
We have a separate listing for Capital Campaign donations. These are listed at ALL amounts to the campaign and listed online.
Marie
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Marie Kocher | Development Assistant
Kansas City Ballet | Todd Bolender Center for Dance & Creativity
500 W. Pershing Road, Kansas City, MO 64108
816.216.5582 (D) | 816.931.2232 x1382 (O) | 816.931.1172 (fax)
kcballet.org
From: Tessitura Development Forum [mailto:forums-development@tessituranetwork.com] On Behalf Of Christopher Adriance Sent: Wednesday, September 03, 2014 3:17 PM To: Marie Kocher Subject: [Tessitura Development Forum] Program Names!
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I think it truly depends on the organization. The important thing would be to make a decision, document the rules and be consistent in the entry process. As someone said earlier, be sure to be concise in the description of the listings in the program book.
In one organization we created a program listing and entered the donor names for the elevated event itself as a special thank you in the program that was distributed directly following the event.
And there will almost always be exceptions. There will be those donors who the gift officers know will be sending in their contributions, but have not yet done so. They don’t want to upset them by having their names fall off the list.
Michelle Wohlers
Tessitura and Data Services Manager
2014/2015 International Season:
La bohème, Don Giovanni, Nixon in China,
50th Anniversary Celebration Concert
http://www.sdopera.com/tickets/onsale
San Diego Opera 233 A Street, Suite 500
San Diego, CA 92101
Phone: (619) 232-7636
Fax: (619) 231-6915
www.sdopera.com
From: Tessitura Development Forum [mailto:forums-development@tessituranetwork.com] On Behalf Of Marie Kocher Sent: Wednesday, September 03, 2014 2:10 PM To: Michelle Wohlers Subject: RE: [Tessitura Development Forum] Program Names!
We don’t count event money when determining membership levels for the program and other general recognition (although for a corporation that may not always be true); nor do we count endowment or capital campaign gifts. There are separate lists for those.
Lucie
______________________________Lucie SpielerIT Development and Training Manager
We recognize donors of $200+ to our annual funds in our programmes. We don't include elevated events, ticket donations, or even in-kind contributions (unless it's a sponsorship) in the amount recognized. We acknowledge contributions to special campaigns, such as our capital campaign or our seat naming campaign, separately. We recognize donors who have given for five or more consecutive years with an asterisk next to their name.
We have had some major donors argue that they should be recognized for the cumulative total of their giving across campaigns, and we are exploring the idea for our highest level donors. I don't think it would be feasible for lower level donors, as it's quite a bit of manual work.
How do you all make the process of creating program listings less time/effort intensive?
Unknown said: ...it's quite a bit of manual work.
...it's quite a bit of manual work.
Hi Nick,
We list donors by membership level. When it's time to compile a new list, we've been running a list of current donors through an output set that contains their current membership level, their program name, and the program level. Looking over that data in Excel it's easy to identify people who are missing a program name, or to find anybody whose program level doesn't match their current membership level. (Since the levels on the Program Names tab don't update automatically it's usually a case of verifying their recent giving and changing the level accordingly.)
Program name and level are both custom output set elements, but they're easy to set up. Instructions for configuring Program Name are in the Output Set Builder Cookbook, which can be downloaded from this page.
I'd love to hear how others are managing this process too. It certainly seems like one of those things where practices vary widely by organization!
I insert program names using SQL and current membership information (based on membership organization and expiration date). That way if some donor gives us $17K but for some reason is being recognized at the $25K membership level, I pick up the membership level, not the total gift.
We insert new programs and associated membership levels annually (so we have a record of how people were recognized, at what level, in what publication). We have a “default” program name that anyone with access to the tab can edit, so that if a new donor tells a ticket office rep how he or she wishes to be recognized, it can be set down. All other program names are control-grouped so that they can be seen, as appropriate, but not edited. I then create new program listings by copying the default program name and sort name into a new record that corresponds to the current season program. As I already said, I take level from the current membership. For anyone who doesn’t have an existing program name I insert the standard salutation and sort name from the constituent record. Development then proofreads with an Excel sheet I create that pulls the data and includes the main Dev caseworker, if one exists.
We include program name in our acknowledgment letters (custom add-on field). This way, if someone’s marital status has changed, or other such, we might possibly find out before putting the wrong name into print for a season.
It takes me a couple of hours, start to finish, to insert a season’s-worth of program listings.
We recognize donors at $250 and above in print.
We recognize $2,500+ of annual fund, artistic initiative support, Miami residency support, special fundraising, special event contributions(Gala), in-kind support, instrument donation, touring support, volunteer committee contributions and sometimes endowment and sometimes capital for some donors. Some donors are recognized for the combined total of themselves and their corporation or foundation. Some people are recognized as foundations or corporations and some corporations and foundations are recognized as people. Also some donors are recognized at some levels just because. We also have separate listings for endowed funds, our Heritage Society (planned gifts), cumulative donors of $1m+, and donors to our Sound For The Centennial campaign.
When it's program listing review time (approx quarterly), I put together spreadsheets using the Program Name Listing report and then vlookup the assigned MGO's, the relevant donor contributions and put a total column next to the listing level. This spreadsheet is then sent out to the department for review. Donors are recognized at the higher level of the current fiscal year or the previous fiscal year, unless they're recognized at a different level, again, just because.
There are two really useful tools I've found (so far) that help to manage the process. First, we made a CSI category of "Program Book Modification" - if staff wants to move a donor up or down or change a name or etc, they create a CSI on that donor's record describing the change and the reason for doing so and for how long the change is in effect. This provides me with an easily accessible and trackable list of changes that need to be made in Tessitura and in the book. Once I've verified the change has made it into the book I can close the CSI and the rationale is still there for future me.
The other thing I've found really useful is for any donor that has a listing other than what the math would indicate (e.g. the "just because" or the couple of donors with no AF gifts but we recognize for yearly endowment contributions) I put "!!!" in their program listing name. So, "Jim and Caryn Reynolds !!!". This is a visual indicator for me and the rest of the department when reviewing the listings that this person is a special case. And again, the rationale for why they're listed that way and for how long is stored in a CSI on their record. Then it's just a find/replace to remove the "!!!" before sending to print.