PD Rewind: Individualized Stewardship Plans

Feb

Mary Weingartner
Managing Director, Donor Relations | UNICEF USA

Individualized Stewardship Plans in Principle and Practice was a virtual workshop focused on creating strategic individualized stewardship plans (ISPs) for donors and partners. Last month, six diverse facilitators brought experience from higher education, healthcare, community service, environmental, and humanitarian organizations to a three-hour professional development course consisting of a presentation, panel discussion, Q&A, and small group discussion. We shared best practices, ideas, ambitions, and challenges with 30 donor relations professionals from across the U.S. and Canada. Together, we explored the very real ways donor relations professionals can propel our relationships with individual donors, and we discussed how to establish ourselves as strategic partners.

Before

In the planning stage, the facilitators repeatedly returned to a few themes, and ultimately, we developed a workshop that emphasized the following:

There is no “right” way to build an individualized stewardship program. Each organization is unique in size, donor base, staffing, and data quality, etc.
There is no “right” way to build an individualized stewardship plan. Each organization, donor, and relationship is unique.
Individualized stewardship plans should be rooted in data and strategy with the intention to help an organization reach specific goals.
Donor relations professionals bring expertise, knowledge, and a valuable strategic perspective to individualized stewardship planning. We are not the “deli counter.” We are consultants, strategists, consensus-builders, subject-matter experts, and much more.
Individualized stewardship planning programs are challenging to scale and sustain. They must be built cautiously and avoid putting donors in “permanent stewardship” with no strategic objective.

During

The three-hour workshop truly flew by, and we packed in plenty.

	Hour One: Introductions, and contributions of questions, ideas, challenges, and wins during a presentation, panel discussion, and Q & A.
	Hour Two: Three discussion groups according to program status of (a) building a program, (b) launching/piloting a program, and (c) optimizing an established program.
	Hour Three: Takeaway discussion, the panel fielded final questions, offered words of wisdom, and a tour of accompanying resources.

After

Today, workshop participants belong to a dedicated MyADRP community. There, we can also access the workshop recording and toolkit of resources. There is no doubt this talented and committed group will continue to drive excellence in the donor relations field and contribute to the success of their respective organizations. Like all others in MyADRP, the goal of this community is to keep fellow members talking and learning lessons from one another.

Participants engaged actively and generously before, during, and after the workshop. Through registration, they shared valuable information about their organizations, teams, and programs – as well as goals for the workshop. The data further informed content and helped facilitators create breakout groups where everyone shared knowledge and experience in formal and informal ways.

Thank you to all who contributed to a great learning experience!

About our Facilitators

Each facilitator possessed broad knowledge and expertise and brought unique points of view to the conversation. Analisa and Corey contributed the perspective of mature programs in two different sectors. Andrea and Gian shared some of the know-how that comes with building and piloting new programs – again in multiple sectors. Sam and I contributed our experience optimizing existing programs. All of us thoroughly enjoyed making 30 new friends with such deep commitments to our field.