Major Gifts and Planned Giving:
Working Together as a Team Raises More Dollars
by Lisa B. Lager, Senior Director for Planned Giving, American Cancer Society, Eastern Division, Inc. and Michael J. Baker, CFRE, Senior Director for Major Gifts, American Cancer Society, Eastern Division, Inc.
Major Gifts (MG) and Planned Giving (PG) continue to gain recognition as important fundraising methods as organizations realize the enormous value each function can provide. It is only recently, however, that organizations are becoming increasingly aware of the inter-related nature of these areas, and the tremendous potential that can result when these areas work more closely together. Many non-profit organizations’ development efforts have separate MG and PG departments due to generally different donor age profiles and sophisticated giving techniques. While this structure has obvious benefits, it can sometimes create challenges to maximizing the full potential of the organization’s fundraising efforts. Staff members may often expend too much energy defending territorial boundaries and debating which person gets credit for the gift rather than channeling their full energy to raise critical funds for their cause.
With these challenges and benefits in mind, Michael J. Baker, CFRE, Senior Director for Major Gifts, and Lisa B. Lager, Senior Director for Planned Giving, at the American Cancer Society’s Eastern Division, decided to “team-up” for an overall “win-win” situation, rather than “battle it out” internally for individual gift credits. Although development staff may often target a donor for either a Planned Gift or a Major Gift, it is the donor that ultimately decides how he or she will give. To allow a stronger message of philanthropy, while respecting the donor’s right to choose how they will give, Michael and Lisa combined their marketing and cultivation efforts to connect donors to the ACS cancer-fighting mission and to raise donor’s sights to higher giving levels.
Traditionally, ACS has championed raising funds from special events, with MG and PG fundraising becoming recent priorities for their organization. While Michael and Lisa each have specific goals and responsibilities for their respective areas, they realized that their mutual goals were far more important than their individual objectives. With that in mind, they created a Division-wide MG/PG plan targeting top donors with the capacity and propensity to give to ACS through a moves management system of cultivation activities.
Recognizing the strengths within each of their specialties, they decided that if an opportunity involved a potential Major Gift or Planned Gift, that staff from one area would consult with the appropriate colleague from the other area and seek their advice for the particular circumstances. To encourage this philosophy, collaboration with MG/PG partners is written into all MG and PG staff performance goals, and appropriate credit is given.
The following successes may not have happened in a traditional development office where MG and PG operate more competitively rather than as partners. Recently a donor was interested in giving a very large gift, and a MG Director recognized that a Planned Gift would best suit the prospect. One of the PG Directors was brought in to assist, which resulted in a $1 million bequest being established by the donor. On another occasion, a donor decided to give $200,000 of tangible personal property, so a PG Director consulted with an MG Director to help formulate a strategy to maximize the donor’s current and future philanthropy with the organization.
This new culture shift has allowed partnerships to flourish and has led to increased revenues and shared victories for all.
Lisa B. Lager, Senior Director for Planned Giving American Cancer Society, Eastern Division, Inc., leads the Division’s Planned Giving and Probate and Trust Administration Departments. During her 20 years in non-profit fundraising, Lisa has worked closely with donors and their advisors to help them realize their financial, estate and charitable goals, and has helped raise millions of dollars to benefit many organizations, including ACS, New York Hospital-Cornell Medical Center, Jewish Guild for the Blind, and Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center.
Michael J. Baker, CFRE is currently the Senior Director for Major Gifts for the American Cancer Society’s Eastern Division, where he leads the Major Gifts, Foundation Relations, Capital Campaign and Prospect Research Departments. Michael has been in the non-profit profession for over 11 years, has been published in "The Major Gifts Report," and has also served as a guest lecturer at Columbia University. He is a graduate of the State University of New York-Albany.
This story is part of this month’s newsletter, which is available to members only. Please click here to join. |
