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September 22, 2008, 07:58 AM ET
How Colleges Can Improve Their Fund Raising in Hard Economic Times
Half of America’ s largest colleges achieve increases in contributions, while half do not, according to research by John Glier, a Chicago fund-raising consultant.
Mr. Glier and his colleagues examined the past fund-raising performance of 20 to 50 big colleges and universities during each of four previous recessions.
Institutions whose contributions dropped during one or more recessions were those that failed to hire a sufficient number of fund raisers, lagged in their efforts to recruit donors, or failed to promptly fill a key fund-raising or other leadership job, Mr. Glier said.
Colleges and universities where fund raising continued to flourish during hard times, he says, tended to be those that planned for the economy to sour as well as those that were sensitive to the need to take special measures and took a long view of their fund-raising operations.
He points to one university he is working with now that exemplifies the type of institution likely to keep contributions growing throughout the current turbulent economy and beyond.
Mr. Glier says the institution, which he declines to name, “has one of the highest compound annual growth rates in higher education” and is already spending $40-million annually on fund raising. Just recently, he says, it decided to put another $21-million into its development operations, $9-million in the 2008-9 academic year alone.
The decision, Mr. Glier says, has nothing to to with an impending campaign; the university has just completed its biggest fund-raising drive yet.
To survive a recession, says Mr. Glier, “take the long view. High performance makes the difference.”
To see more about how five nonprofit institutions increased their fund raising, see this special feature from The Chronicle of Philanthropy.
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