Why the Hurry?

I recently had a conversation with a planned giving officer in one of the nation’s largest research universities.  She expressed deep frustration that the mindset of the university development office is to close, close, close  —  even in the planned giving office.

This leaves almost no room for meaningful relationship building, especially with the sorts of donors who want to give serious consideration to their gift and financial planning.  If you agree with me that the largest gifts are made not from income but from assets, it becomes vital to invest time in building trust and rapport so the potential donor will share the details of life events, giftable assets, and personal considerations in the context of meaningful gift planning.  I’m talking about the difference between a pledge of $25,000 and a commitment of the asset that produces the $25,000.

One of the great lessons of my career was taught me when I worked in the planned giving office at another major university.   My boss, the VP for Planned Giving, would periodically walk into my office and show me something like a $150,000 Charitable Gift Annuity Contract and say to me, “Dan, it took eight years to close this gift.”  I got both messages in that statement – that my boss understood the value of relationship building and that she was not going to pressure me beyond building my own pipeline of relationships.  By the time I left that job I was closing nearly $10 million in gifts per year.  Significantly, the split between deferred and outright gifts was almost 50/50.  I had become an effective relational major gift planner.

Rushing the donor relationship, practicing transactional fundraising, accomplishes two things none of us should aspire to.  It closes doors with a lot of prospects.  Worse, it leaves a lot of money on the table.