Building a Prospect Management System as a Team of One

How do you create a prospect management system? It can be difficult to know where to start, despite all the knowledge and resources available. Join Don Irwin, Sr. Manager of Prospect Strategy at Lutheran Social Service of Minnesota, as he shares his journey of designing and implementing a prospect management system as a prospect development team of one.

This session is about the process of working with other fundraisers to design and adopt a program for donor management. Don will discuss what it's like to assemble a planning team and gain the support of leaders, transition to a customized system, and embark on a quest for the perfect combination of best practices and data tables. You will learn about the building blocks of prospect management and the challenges of remote work, expectations, decision fatigue, staff turnover, and more. And, you will have the opportunity to see yourself as a leader on your team.

Don will also show how his team integrated opportunities (a.k.a. proposals) and monthly portfolio meetings into their fundraising process. Just as important, Don will demonstrate how the collaborative design, roll-out, and training process can work.

Finally, Don will share how the system he built is continually changing and improving. The journey is not over (because the policies and procedures manual is not finished!), but at the end of the session you might see how flexibility and patient persistence over time can culminate in a robust launchpad for campaign work and transformational change.

Learning Objectives:

• Attendees can describe a path from a one-person prospect research shop to an established prospect development program that can serve a mid-to-large-sized development department.
• Explain how opportunities function as one of the key features of a prospect management system and how they benefit fundraising teams.