Importance of the Relationship AFTER the Gift
We spend so much time in the philanthropy industry talking about, worrying about, and dealing with getting gifts. I find myself, and many others, forgetting about the importance of stewardship.
This has come into a very clear focus for me, personally, over the past year or so. Two separate, but similar experiences remind me of what happens when the relationship seems to “end” after getting the gift/sale.
On the nonprofit side, I’ve been trying to increase my monthly giving to an organization I believe in. My wife and I are decent-sized donors - nothing spectacular - but monthly gifts that add up to a respectable annual total. We also happen to belong to the Heritage Society because of the gift intentions in our estate. To trigger the increase, I wrote an email to the gift officer asking about the details and also to change the credit card. I got an email back saying, “here’s someone who can help you.” I then received another email from that person saying to call a number and they could help me. I’ve called the number six times. All I get is voicemail. My schedule doesn’t allow me free time to answer unscheduled calls and I don’t have enough time to play phone tag. Now, two things have transpired. One, the organization has not received an increase to the monthly gift. Two, I’m a little aggravated. After 20 years of donations totaling a good amount, plus having a planned gift in our estate for this organization, making this easier on me might be to their advantage.
On the for-profit side, I’ve had to change investment brokers/financial planners recently. If you want an arduous time-consuming task, change your investment planning and brokers. My former retirement planner was missing things. Errors were being made and we didn’t hear from him very often. My wife and I have worked really hard to save for retirement. We are certainly not in the stratosphere with millions and millions of dollars put away in our accounts. But there’s enough money to pay attention to. I’ve spent hours and hours fixing mistakes regarding our retirement and my company. This was incredibly frustrating, and eventually we made the choice to move to someone else.
You always read, and maybe personally experience, how hard it is to get new donors or new business. Doesn’t it just make sense to take care of the people who care about you in the first place so you don’t have to work quite as hard to go find new clients? It would seem like a simple concept, but too often it’s forgotten. This has served as good reminder for me as I deal with my clients, and for all of us who have donors who deserve our undivided attention.
