Data Manager for Development

Hi,

We are exploring possible new development department staffing structures that would provide better data management/list building support for our Development campaign managers. Do any of you have a departmental structure in which there is a single departmental manager who is responsible for Tessitura set-up and supervising data management and list building, and who oversees financial reconciliation and reporting? Or do you have a shared position with other departments? If so, we'd really appreciate hearing about how you manage and staff this. Thanks for any and all insight you can offer!

 

  • Former Member
    Former Member $organization

    Hi Charlotte!

    This is what I do at City Center, actually (under the title of "Database Coordinator").  I create many of the department's lists and extractions, do quite a bit of our reporting (though our VP and managers run many reports on their own), and do all of the department's gift entry.  I also answer many of the Finance department's questions about our gifts.

    I am strictly a Development officer.  City Center does have an overall Tessitura Applications Manager, though,and I work with her a lot to make sure things are set up correctly.  For example, Margaret sets up the funds and general ledger codes, but I will create all of the development Campaigns and Appeals.

    In my biased opinion it works well.  Part of the reason this position was created (as I understand it) was due to inconsistent gift entry, and that has not been a problem with everything going through one person.

    Hope that helps.

    -- Mike

  • Charlotte,

    At City Opera we have one person (me) in Development who is responsible for Tessitura for Development.   I would be glad to send you a detailed list of my duties, here's the summary:

    setup/maintenance, some gift entry, staff training, lists, reports, customization, data entry protocols, data monitoring

    I also do a few random things like coordinate the hiring of Development interns, primary liaison with Finance, liaise with IT for random IT issues, etc.

    We also have a person with a similar function in our Marketing Department and we have staff in our IT department that help us with custom reporting if needed.

    Our Development Department is 14 full-time staff and our Marketing Department about 10 full-time staff.

    Dale

  • Former Member
    Former Member $organization
    DocumentEmail MicrosoftInternetExplorer4

    Here at Strathmore we combine financial and data management responsibilities.  I do all the financial recording and reconciliations – I’m an accountant so this is a logical assignment.  I am also the primary list/extraction person for development (although I rely heavily on my friends in marketing for the trickier ones).  Unfortunately, I don’t have any programming knowledge, so while I can add items to certain tables, set up funds and G/L accounts, etc., I can’t design special reports – that would be a great addition.  Because I also spent time in a previous life managing large antitrust document cases, I’ve had a lot of experience in working with databases and do most of the data entry for the development department with the hope of exercising some quality control over the development records.  Development does work with Ticketing to try to establish some general guidelines, but we all know the issues related to lots of people creating records (both employees and patrons on line). 

     

    Finance tells me that having someone with accounting knowledge in development makes their lives a little easier.

     

    P.S.  I do this in three days a week, so it’s possible to structure a job to take advantage of part-time talent.

     

    _______________

     

    Julie P. Hamre

    Development Associate

    Strathmore Hall Foundation, Inc.

    5301 Tuckerman Lane

    North Bethesda, MD  20852-3385

    301.581.5136; fax 301.581.5201

    www.strathmore.org

     

    Become a Strathmore Member!

    Support what you love. Members enjoy advance

    ticket purchase, discounts in the Shops at

    Strathmore and Tea Room and access to special events.

     

    Join now at http://www.strathmore.org/support/membership.asp

    or call (301) 581-5135

     

    -----Original Message-----
    From: Tessitura Development Forum [mailto:forums-development@tessituranetwork.com] On Behalf Of Charlotte Hussey
    Sent: Friday, October 16, 2009 5:23 PM
    To: Julie Hamre
    Subject: [Tessitura Development Forum] Data Manager for Development

     

    Hi,

    We are exploring possible new development department staffing structures that would provide better data management/list building support for our Development campaign managers. Do any of you have a departmental structure in which there is a single departmental manager who is responsible for Tessitura set-up and supervising data management and list building, and who oversees financial reconciliation and reporting? Or do you have a shared position with other departments? If so, we'd really appreciate hearing about how you manage and staff this. Thanks for any and all insight you can offer!

     




    This message was sent automatically to you by www.tessituranetwork.com because you subscribed to the Tessitura Development Forum. You may reply to this message to post to the Development forum or visit the site to search, read and post to the forums. In the interest of keeping the forum posts from becoming cluttered, we encourage you to delete previous message text from your reply before sending. Thank you!

  • Hi Charlotte,
     
    At The Playhouse, I hold the power user position within the Development department; my title is Development Operations Mgr.
     
    I set up new users/solicitors within our dept's log in groups, update systems tables related to devo's tasks, configure new funds/campaigns/appeals, enter contributions/adjustments and generate acknowledgements, monitor the credit card server as it relates to Devo charges, create lists and extractions for Devo merge documents, manage membership renewals/annual fund, coordinate Telefunding lists for our in-house callers, maintain the data integrity of the donor records, coordinate e-communications (WordFly) for our dept., facilitate the FY reconciliation processes between Devo and the Finance dept, and generate ad-hoc reports.  In addition, I oversee the dept's expense budget and supervise an assistant and interns.
     
    Marketing and Box Office have their own power users and we all are backed up by our IT staff.  We are also in constant communication with each other because many of our projects cross-connect.
     
    Like Mike at City Center, I believe it's important to have consistency in contribution entry--following a donation through to membership renewals/adjustments and then on to acknowledgements--because there are often exceptions that need to be implemented along the way.  The rest of the Devo team updates constituent contact information related to their portfolios, manage their solicitation records, update activity records ...and any other information gathered from cultivation and research.
     
    I'm happy to answer any other questions that you may have.
    -Jayne

    Jayne Atkinson
    La Jolla Playhouse | Mgr of Development Operations 
    858| 550-1070 x 132

    $upport the Playhouse Today!


     

    From: Tessitura Development Forum [mailto:forums-development@tessituranetwork.com] On Behalf Of Charlotte Hussey
    Sent: Friday, October 16, 2009 2:23 PM
    To: Jayne Atkinson
    Subject: [Tessitura Development Forum] Data Manager for Development

    Hi,

    We are exploring possible new development department staffing structures that would provide better data management/list building support for our Development campaign managers. Do any of you have a departmental structure in which there is a single departmental manager who is responsible for Tessitura set-up and supervising data management and list building, and who oversees financial reconciliation and reporting? Or do you have a shared position with other departments? If so, we'd really appreciate hearing about how you manage and staff this. Thanks for any and all insight you can offer!

     




    This message was sent automatically to you by www.tessituranetwork.com because you subscribed to the Tessitura Development Forum. You may reply to this message to post to the Development forum or visit the site to search, read and post to the forums. In the interest of keeping the forum posts from becoming cluttered, we encourage you to delete previous message text from your reply before sending. Thank you!
  • Thanks to everyone for taking the time to share, this is very helpful!