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May 16, 2019 By Helen Brown Leave a Comment

Portfolio spring cleaning

Photo by Arbitrarily0 [CC BY-SA 3.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)]

Not that you would know it from the weather in Boston, but it’s spring out there. I washed my windows last weekend and wow, what a difference! I’m really looking forward to seeing the sun shine through them when it eventually makes an appearance.

My next task is to get rid of this huge cd rack that has been sitting in the corner of my living room since cds were a thing. There must be at least 750 cds on this rack, which is just one part of the problem.

  • There are too many of them
  • We haven’t played any of them in years (some of them never)
  • Since computers don’t have cd drives in them anymore, I have nothing to convert them with
  • We have a sentimental attachment to them
  • Someday they may be worth a lot of money (but seriously, probably not)
  • They’re taking up room we could be using for a desperately-needed additional seat

As I was standing there staring at it last evening, it occurred to me that our cd rack is a metaphor for many under-performing major donor prospect portfolios.

  • Most portfolios have too many prospects in them
  • We haven’t connected with some of those prospects in years (or ever)
  • We don’t have enough time or fundraisers to help convert many of those prospects into donors
  • We have a sentimental attachment to these prospects
  • Someday they may give us a large gift (but seriously, probably not)
  • Prospects that are never going to give (or won’t give anytime soon) are taking up the place for new prospects with higher capacity, interest, and likelihood to give.

So what to do? Well, it’s time for some spring cleaning, isn’t it?

I’m no Marie Kondo, but I do like to keep things simple if I’m going to get some tidying accomplished. When trimming portfolios, I put prospects into three categories: A, B, and C.

  • A – the keepers. They’re definitely or probably going to give in the next year-to-18 months.
  • B – prospects for reassessment. If you don’t have a prospect management director, ask your research team or your research consultant to give you a candid, unsentimental, strategic assessment. You probably don’t need heavy-duty research. The goal should be a simple “Keep in portfolio, they’re an A” or “Move elsewhere, they’re a C.”
  • C – these are the ones to remove. The folks who may be lovely to have lunch with but who will never make a major gift. Move them out of your portfolio to your colleagues in stewardship, annual fund, gift planning, or whatever other department/section that makes the most sense (if your organization is large enough to have them).

But whether your development shop is large or just you, it doesn’t matter – prospects that will never donate at a major gift level should be moved out of your major gift portfolio.

The goal should be to get rid of every prospect that isn’t going to move forward in the 0-24 months. I know – it’s really hard. You’ve become attached to people you’ve formed good relationships with, but when you do this you’ve moved them to a better place for them, for your nonprofit, and for your performance goals.

Once you’re finished you’ll have room for all of those new prospects that your research team or research consultant have found for you that they’ve been excited to move into your portfolio.

Which is great, right?

Say, now that we’ve cleaned out your portfolios, can I get some help schlepping these cds to donate to the library?

Filed Under: Campaign Success, Relationship management Tagged With: major donors, portfolio management, prospect development, prospect management, relationship management

March 28, 2019 By Helen Brown Leave a Comment

So you say you want a revolution, well, here goes….

Our month-long #ResearchPride focus on prospect management closes today with advice from one of the mountaintop gurus on the topic, Lisa Howley. It would be impossible to overstate Lisa’s expertise and generosity in sharing her knowledge over the years, and I’m delighted that she agreed to close out the month for us here on the Intelligent Edge to talk about creating a roadmap for solid prospect management success. ~Helen


We all want to change the world. Or at least our prospect management (PM) systems. It’s a common refrain by prospect management practitioners and gift officers alike. Walk down the hallway in any development office and you may hear someone scream in frustration ‘the system is broken!’

It can be daunting to be tasked with fixing a broken prospect management system. Sure, staff have been sharing their woes, and you have been compiling issues. But where to start? [Read more…]

Filed Under: Campaign Success, Relationship management, Research Department Success Tagged With: #ResearchPride, Lisa Howley, prospect development, prospect management, relationship management

March 21, 2019 By Helen Brown Leave a Comment

What to do when your PM system needs a reboot

What do you do when your existing prospect and performance management systems aren’t working for anyone? That’s the question Misa Lobato answers for us this week in our month-long Research Pride look at prospect management. Misa and her team embarked on a serious soul-searching, data-gathering, preconceived-notion-busting, solutions-finding mission to find out what would make their system actually work. Part of what they learned is that you have to measure what matters. And what matters? Read on! ~Helen


Photo by tracyshaun

Many years ago, when I first started learning about performance management in fundraising, I noticed a strange disconnect: there didn’t seem to be a correlation between gift officers meeting established individual goals and being promoted. In fact, often the gift officers who were promoted hadn’t met their goals. As I dug in a little further, I realized no one cares about these goals.

How did we get there, to the point where goals had been established to measure performance but no one viewed them as an indicator of success or failure? It seemed to me that goals had just been handed down year after year without being questioned. Goals were standardized across titles. Some were based on questionable industry lore–a gift officer should raise X times their salary. And some just seemed to be based on what had always been done. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Campaign Success, Non-profit trends, Relationship management, Strategic planning Tagged With: metrics, Misa Lobato, prospect management

March 14, 2019 By Helen Brown Leave a Comment

Prospect Management – Starting From Scratch

This week I’m delighted to share with you an article written by prospect management expert, Janna Holm. I was introduced to Janna at an Apra conference by Lisa Howley (more from Lisa later this month!), and Janna’s enthusiasm for our field and, specifically, her delight at building strong and dynamic prospect management systems simply won me over. I’m so pleased that Janna agreed to lay out the foundations for us in today’s blog post so you’ll get to meet her, too, if you haven’t already. ~Helen


Air Traffic Controlman Third Class (ACC) Wendy Parrett list a new aircraft arrival from her local control position in the air traffic control tower at Naval Air Station North Island. Photo by PH2 Eric A. ClementResearch Pride Month is such a special time to me—our friends and colleagues around the world come together to celebrate accomplishments and where our industry is headed. Our field has undergone some incredible transitions over the years. In my last job, I went digging for office supplies and stumbled upon a filing cabinet in an old storage closet, only to find it full of index cards holding tidbits of information and asset data on our alumni. This was their “research system” through the 1980s.

I’ve used databases built in the 1990s where cell phone and email fields were hidden away under “miscellaneous info” as they weren’t common enough to have a home yet. Now, in 2019, our conferences are full of discussions about machine learning and artificial intelligence. It’s amazing to think about how far we’ve come.

One of the biggest transitions over the years has been to incorporate prospect management into shops that historically focused on prospect research. I’ve seen and worked at organizations where prospect management was fully established and ingrained in the culture, and others where prospect management was still nascent or didn’t exist. But over the years, this has grown to become a vital part of a major gift shop. So how does it begin?

When to Begin:

Any organization with multiple staff involved in fundraising should start thinking about a prospect management system. An airport with only one flight per day may not need an air traffic controller, but the more planes you add, the more vital coordination becomes. The same is true for prospect management—when more staff and donors are involved, it becomes increasingly important to have a prospect management system in place.

To build out a strong prospect management system, you need to think not only about your constituent relationship management database (CRM), but also the policy around how you work and the procedures that delineate who does what and how that work is done.

Incorporating Prospect Management in your CRM:

Going back to our air traffic controller example, they need to know which planes are taking off and landing, at what times, and in which direction. They need to know their runways, and wind speeds, and who’s ready versus who’s running behind schedule. In order to ensure prospect management is coordinated, it helps to know some data as well.

No matter which CRM you’re using, there should be some ability to begin tracking prospect management or moves management. Most prospect management systems begin by tracking the following elements:

  • Who oversees the relationship with this prospect?

This could be labeled as a Gift Officer, Relationship Manager, or any number of titles, but it’s helpful to note which person is in charge of the relationship and responsible for coordinating outreach to the prospect.

  • Where is this prospect in their relationship to our organization?

Different organizations use different stages (see the 4-, 5-, 6-, or 7-stages of a gift solicitation), but you’ll want to know who is at each step of whichever cycle you choose.

  • What have we asked this prospect for previously, and how did it go?

You may refer to these as Asks, Solicitations, Opportunities, Proposals or myriad other names, but this would be a place to track what size gift you solicited, what program or project it would fund, when you asked for it, and what the outcome was.

  • What have we done with this prospect?

Tracking your actions or contacts with a prospect ensures you’re capturing their history. Did they attend an event? Did you send them a holiday card? What did you talk about in your last face-to-face visit? Some organizations will track every single “touch” that happens with a prospect, while others focus on more “substantive” actions that move the prospect along through the stages of their relationship to the organization.

As your organization grows in size and complexity, you may want to begin to track other things like additional staff involvement (secondary relationship managers, volunteers, leadership involvement), details about the prospect’s capacity and affinity, the short- and long-term strategy for a prospect, your metrics for fundraising staff, or more in-depth information about proposals or activities.

Creating a Prospect Management Policy:

Once you have those ideas for what you want to track, there are still some vital things to consider. Your system needs to have a policy behind it and procedures in place so your colleagues know how to use it.

Your policy document should cover questions that may arise as your colleagues adopt this new system. Those will look different based on your organization, and you can find some good examples online. It may include topics like:

  • How do prospects get assigned to a staffer?
  • When should prospects be added or removed from a portfolio?
  • How are staff expected to share information about a prospect?
  • What information are they expected to track in the CRM?
  • Who enters that data?
  • What happens if there’s a conflict about assignment, solicitation, etc.?
  • What information can and cannot get entered into the record (due to HIPAA, GDPR, FERPA, or ethical concerns)?
  • What happens when a staffer leaves your organization?

An aspect that should be incorporated into every prospect management system is a glossary to specify what each data element means—what counts as a “visit”? How are you defining “qualification”? It’s hard to stay coordinated if you don’t speak the same language, so make sure colleagues agree on how terms or data fields are defined at your organization.

Up and Running

Once a prospect management system has been crafted and implemented, it will still go through tweaks. Maybe a policy needs to change, or you’re adding some planned giving staff and need to think about their assignments differently, or you realize you need to add a new stage. Building a strong system that colleagues understand and use, and regularly adapting it are key elements of moving prospect management forward.

Our industry is dynamic and we’re progressing faster every year. Our systems should be built to track our history, but also to allow for evolution, so that in 10, 20, or 30 years, we can see a prospect’s journey from stage to stage and gift to gift (and so in 10, 20, or 30 years, we have a data set to use for all that machine learning!).

So, as we near the halfway point of Research Pride Month, I hope you all take a look at your prospect management system. If you’ve had one for years, does it need any edits or changes? If you’re just getting started, what can you do this month to move it forward a bit? Celebrate what you’ve done, and where our industry has been. Let’s keep adapting, growing, and improving!


Janna Holm is Director of Prospect Development at The Trust for Public Land. Currently a board member of Apra Minnesota and a longtime volunteer and speaker for Apra International, Janna is past president of Apra Maryland. She tweets great stuff here.

Filed Under: Campaign Success, Relationship management, Research Department Success, Strategic planning Tagged With: #ResearchPride, Janna Holm, prospect management, Prospect Research Pride Month, prospet research, relationship management, Research Pride

March 7, 2019 By Helen Brown Leave a Comment

Why Prospect Management?

“Burger and Spudhenge” (c) Julie Kahn

Happy #ResearchPride month! I’m so happy to share something new we’re doing this year on The Intelligent Edge to celebrate. Our field is brimming with great talent and great ideas, particularly around the area of prospect management. This month we’re featuring four experts discussing aspects of the topic that impact most of us in the nonprofit sphere. Jessica Balsam kicks us off with an introduction on why prospect management is so important to your nonprofit’s success. Take it away, Jessica! ~Helen


I’m excited to kick off this #researchpride series on prospect management, because I get really excited about great prospect management systems. Like the bun to the burger, like the burger to the bun (in the words of the Beastie Boys), a great prospect management system exists as a perfect and necessary complement to research.

A great prospect management system is more than some tables and fields in a constituent relationship management database (CRM). It’s more than a collection of reports. It encompasses fundraiser training, portfolio building, analysis, and policy. Just like research, it requires close working relationships with frontline fundraisers and a deep knowledge of the practice of major gift fundraising.

(Oh no, did I lose you because I said policy? Come back! Policies are not scary, I promise!)

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Career development, Relationship management Tagged With: #ResearchPride, Jessica Balsam, prospect management, relationship management

February 14, 2019 By Helen Brown Leave a Comment

A lot to love

There’s a lot to love about fundraising intelligence (aka prospect development), which, for those of you who are new to the term, is comprised of prospect research, prospect management, due diligence, and fundraising data science.

In research, each profile we build is a love letter, of sorts, to the donor prospect we’re writing about. We gather the information carefully. Ethically. Lawfully.

We are curious and diligent. We pull every loose thread. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Campaign Success, Relationship management, Research Department Success, Strategic planning Tagged With: #ResearchPride, Janna Holm, Jess Balsam, Lisa Howley, Misa Lobato, prospect development, prospect management, relationship management, Research Pride

November 23, 2017 By Helen Brown Leave a Comment

More Giving, Thanks to Thanks Giving

When I read this week’s featured article by Kathy Mills on the Apra-Carolinas website, I knew I had to ask share it with you today. Kathy is Senior Donor Identification Analyst at Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center, and I wanted you to read her description of the way that their prospect research and annual giving teams partner together.
They’re making relationship magic – joining their talents to give sincere thanks to donors, and it’s a great lesson – for this season and all year round.
Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours, and warm thanks to Kathy and the kind folks at Apra-Carolinas for allowing us to re-share this!

The Impact of Thanking Annual Fund Donors

When I was younger, my mother forced me to write thank you notes to anyone who had given me a gift for my birthday. It seemed like a chore at the time, but as an adult, I came to appreciate when I was thanked for sending a gift – and I certainly remembered those that never thanked me. Today, sometimes a simple “thank you” seems like a dying art.

As nonprofit organizations, it’s critical that we thank our donors promptly. That $25 annual fund donor could turn out to be a $25,000 donor in the future if he or she feels appreciated right from the start. But every organization sends a thank you letter. What if you took it one step further? [Read more…]

Filed Under: Campaign Success, Non-profit trends, Relationship management, Research Department Success Tagged With: Apra-Carolinas, Kathy Mills, stewardship, Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center

October 19, 2017 By Helen Brown 4 Comments

Don’t make the real estate mistake

          “home yellow” Photo by nikcname (Own work) [CC BY-SA 4.0], via Flickr

Should we – or shouldn’t we – include real estate as one of the factors we use to determine a prospective donor’s gift capacity? It’s a conversation we had just this week in our HBG group chat room.

Everyone commiserated with one HBGer’s lament that some development offices don’t include primary residence – or even any real estate – in their capacity ratings.

And I’ve heard people say on multiple occasions, “Our prospective major donor is never going to give us their house (or sell their house and give us the money), therefore we shouldn’t include it in our ratings.”

Which is true. The donor is probably never going to give your nonprofit the deed to the house they’re currently living in. (<stage whisper>: I won’t mention “planned gift” at this point, okay?)

THE THING IS…

They are also never going to give you their salary (unless they’re Chris Long), sell their yacht, their plane share, or their horses to make a donation, either. They won’t liquidate their art collection, grandma’s diamonds, or that vintage Chanel worn to last week’s benefit. The privately-held company they own will remain unsold. Likewise the stock options that don’t convert for another 5 years.

If the argument is that they’re not going to sell their house, then we should disqualify those other assets, too, right? Because they are never going to give them to you, either.

You can’t pick and choose.

If you randomly take one non-liquid asset off the table, you should take all of them. And you’d never do that, right? It would be illogical.

Figuring out someone’s gift capacity is hard enough to begin with. Purposefully handicapping yourself makes absolutely no sense to me.

I UNDERSTAND

Real estate certainly isn’t the be-all-end-all, but like all of those other assets I mentioned, if nothing else, it’s an indicator of wealth. But I think there’s much more to real estate – even primary real estate – that should be considered.

To start with, it’s solid information. We’re already operating in a realm where anything concrete is in short enough supply. So why ignore a valuable, real, solid, asset?

Also:

Real estate is a green flag. When I’m trying to find new prospects in a sea of regular donors I may skip over someone who lives in a $850,000 home in San Francisco, but I’m definitely not going to ignore a donor who has a $850,000 condo in Aspen. I’m now going to search to find a separate primary residence.

Real estate is a red flag. I was once asked to research someone who had approached an organization out of the blue offering to make a multi-million-dollar gift. What I discovered – by just looking into the prospect’s primary residence – was the first red flag that probably saved the nonprofit from months of wasted time – or worse.

Further:

100% of the world’s high net worth individuals (HNWI) own real estate. And for the more privacy-aware among them, real estate is sometimes the only hard asset we can find for them. Knowing what kind of real estate they own gives you clues into the type of personality they are, how they may want to be cultivated, and what philanthropic investments may interest them. For example:

The billionaire who owns a 20-bedroom party house on Miami Beach is very different from the billionaire living in a three-bedroom ranch in Omaha. Their real estate choices can give you clues to their lifestyle and engagement preferences. One may be a better prospect for naming opportunities with big splashy events. The other may prefer funding boots-on-the-ground clinics for vaccine delivery and student scholarships.

In addition:

We can use real estate for estimates. According to the Capgemini World Wealth Report, real estate accounted for 17% on average of a HNWI’s total assets globally last year. (In the US, it’s 11% of total assets; in Europe it’s 18%). So if all you can find is someone’s real estate holdings, you can still come up with a decent guesstimate of their total assets using that one ratio if they’re in the HNW classification.

And finally:

Real estate is critical to planned giving. There, I’ve said it, and this is really important.

Let’s say you work at a small college and you’ve got childless husband-and-wife alumni couple with a ski resort condo, a vacation home at Los Sueños in Costa Rica and a primary residence in Boston’s Back Bay. They’re consistent donors and lifelong volunteers to the college. There’s no question that the planned giving officer needs to know about them.

And in this case, it’s not only the real estate that’s interesting, but also what it tells us about these special people. Here is an active, outdoorsy couple who possibly enjoy golf, tennis and skiing. A pair that enjoys regular seasonal travel, but whose lifestyle may require extra cultivation time because they are probably not in town very often. What decisions do you need to make about how to engage them?

Look at all the information that just knowing about real estate gives us!

ONE LAST THING

In case you’re wondering, here at HBG we do include primary residence in our total visible wealth calculations on profiles.

We believe it’s a real asset. I think you should, too.

 

Filed Under: Campaign Success, Effective searching, Prospect Development 101, Ratings, Researching Individuals Tagged With: prospect research, real estate

September 7, 2017 By Helen Brown 5 Comments

POISEd for Success

This week HBG team member Angie Herrington shares some great tips to make sure you don’t lose track of an under-the-radar, future group of supporters to your nonprofit. She’s not totally convinced that she’s got the perfect acronym yet, but IMO she’s on the right track! ~Helen

Fundraising is no different than any other profession with our acronyms and jargon. Some are expedient (DO, MGO, 990, CRM, ‘soft credit’) and some make me think too hard and wonder if we’re making it up (LYBUNT, SYBUNT, and CRUT).

Some of our legacy terms can also be polarizing. Ever dropped the word “suspect” on PRSPCT-L over the past 20 years? If you’re feeling sassy, try that one and let me know how it works out for you. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Campaign Success, Prospect Development 101, Prospect identification, Relationship management, Research Department Success, Strategic planning Tagged With: Angie Herrington, prospect management, prospect research, relationship management

November 17, 2016 By Helen Brown Leave a Comment

Why wealth screenings – and prospect researchers – are so reliant on real estate

life-saver-ring

Here’s the complaint I hear frequently about wealth screenings, prospect research, and real estate: Knowing what our prospect holds in real estate is useless! She’s never going to give any of those houses to our organization!(*)

That’s absolutely right. She’s probably not. But that completely misses the point of why real estate is key.

Here’s why:

Imagine with me that you’re on a lovely sailboat. You’re out for the day with friends in the Caribbean enjoying the sun and the breeze. You’re moving along at a pretty fast clip with the wind, but all of a sudden an unexpected gust causes the boom to flip from one side of the boat to the other, and somehow you’re overboard.

The water’s warm but it’s going to take a few minutes for your friends to turn the boat around and get you. That thin orange ring they tossed you is by no means reliably holding up your weight, but it’ll help keep you up while you tread water until the boat comes back. That orange ring may be crummy, but it’s the most solid thing you’ve got right now. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Most popular, Prospect identification, Ratings, Researching Individuals, Wealth screenings Tagged With: Capgemini, prospect research, ratings, real estate, wealth screenings, World Wealth Report

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David’s career in prospect research began in 2009, as a graduate research assistant at the Shippensburg University Foundation. In 2011, He became a development researcher for the University of Virginia. In 2015, David became assistant director of prospect research at the University of Baltimore, serving for 3 years. Recently, he was the director of development for Trees Forever. David Joined the Helen Brown Group as a research assistant in January 2020. He earned a B.A. in Theater at Indiana University of Pennsylvania and a M.A. in Applied History at Shippensburg University. David is a member of APRA and APRA Great Plains.

Kenny has worked in development since 1999 and has been involved in prospect research since 2002.

Prior to joining The Helen Brown Group, he was the director of donor and prospect research at the United Way of Massachusetts Bay. Kenny is a member of APRA and NEDRA.

Tara first began her career in development in 2002 supporting the Major Gifts department at Simmons College, and ultimately went on to serve as Assistant Director of Prospect Research. Since that time, she has also worked as a Senior Research Analyst at MIT, as Associate Director of Prospect Management and Research at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, and as Director of Development Research at Combined Jewish Philanthropies (CJP).

Tara originally joined the Helen Brown Group team in 2007 and served as a Research Associate and ShareTraining coordinator until 2008 – she rejoined the company as a Senior Researcher in 2013 and was promoted to her current role in 2018.

She has been an active volunteer with NEDRA for many years and served on the board of directors from 2010-2016. During her time on the NEDRA board, she served in many different roles, including terms as Vice President, Secretary, Chair of the Website and Technology Committee, Chair of the Volunteer Committee, and as Chair and Editor of NEDRA News. She is currently a member of the NEDRA Bootcamp faculty. In addition, Tara has also been involved as a volunteer with Apra, serving stints on the Membership Committee, Chapters Committee, and Bylaws Task Force.

Angie began her career in development in 1999 at Virginia Tech in Corporate and Foundation Relations and later in prospect research at the University of Connecticut Foundation.

A graduate of the University of Tennessee at Martin, her experience includes grants management at the University of South Carolina, program evaluation for South Carolina Research Authority and human resources analysis for Nissan North America.

She returned to development in 2007 and worked in various prospect research positions at Vanderbilt University, including Associate Director. She was named Director for Vanderbilt University Medical Center’s research office in 2015, and joined The Helen Brown Group in 2016.

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Josh began his career in development as the Phonathon Coordinator at Keene State College. He then worked at non-profit consulting firm Schultz & Williams in Philadelphia.

He started his research career at the University of Pennsylvania as a Research Assistant in 2005. He then moved over to the Wharton School of Business, where he became the Associate Director, Research and Prospect Management. Josh joined the Helen Brown Group in 2016.

Josh is also a Colorado licensed Realtor and graduate of Lehigh University.

In March 2017, Kristina joined the Helen Brown Group as a Research Associate. Before joining HBG, she was the Research Manager at Pratt Institute in Brooklyn and an Associate Manager of Prospect Research at City Harvest, a food rescue organization. Kristina started her non-profit career as a legal assistant at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 2004.  She is a member of Apra and Apra Greater New York. She was Apra Greater New York’s Director of Programming from June 2014 to May 2016. Kristina graduated from The University of Chicago and the Bard Graduate Center.

Grace began her career in development in 2001 as Executive Assistant to the Chief Development Officer with Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH), a Harvard Medical School-affiliated academic medical center.

In 2003, she became a prospect researcher for the BWH principal and major gifts team and spent the next 11 years in various research positions with BWH, culminating as Assistant Director of Prospect Research. She has been affiliated with The Helen Brown Group since January 2014.

Heather began her career in 2002 as a prospect research coordinator for the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation and then moved to Carroll College in 2004.

In 2005, Heather began working on her own as a freelancer and eventually started her own consulting firm, Willis Research Services, in 2007. She joined The Helen Brown Group in 2012.

Heather is a member of the Association of Professional Researchers for Advancement and the Montana Nonprofit Association.

Jennifer began her career in development at her alma mater, Wheaton College, where she was an administrative assistant for the major gifts department.

She joined The Helen Brown Group in March 2008. She earned a master’s degree in library science from the Southern Connecticut State University in May 2009. Jennifer is a member of APRA and NEDRA.

Rick has been a member of the Helen Brown Group team since 2005. Prior to joining HBG, Rick was director of research at St. Paul’s School in Concord, New Hampshire. Rick has worked in development since 1996, both in prospect research and major gifts fund raising. His experience includes the University of Vermont, Phillips Exeter Academy and St. Paul’s School.

Rick is past president of NEDRA and is a member of and frequent volunteer for APRA.

Josh began his career in development as the Phonathon Coordinator at Keene State College. He then worked at non-profit consulting firm Schultz & Williams in Philadelphia.

He started his research career at the University of Pennsylvania as a Research Assistant in 2005. He then moved over to the Wharton School of Business, where he became the Associate Director, Research and Prospect Management. Josh joined the Helen Brown Group in 2016.

Josh is also a Colorado licensed Realtor and graduate of Lehigh University.

Mandi has worked in prospect research and management since 2006. She began her development career as a research analyst in development research at City of Hope, an NCI-designated comprehensive cancer center in Los Angeles. From there, she became the manager of prospect development at Huntington Memorial Hospital, a community hospital in Pasadena, CA. Most recently, she was the associate director of prospect research and management at Occidental College, a private liberal arts college in LA.

Mandi has a BA degree in print journalism from Southern Methodist University and a master’s degree of library and information science from UCLA.

She joined the Helen Brown Group in May 2019.

Kelly began her career in development in 2008 as an administrative assistant in Major Gifts at Wheaton College.

In 2010, she became a research analyst at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in the Division of Development & Jimmy Fund as part of the prospect identification team. Kelly joined The Helen Brown Group in 2013.

She is a member of APRA and NEDRA.

Jayme began her career in development in 2008 at the Rutgers University Foundation, where she spent the next seven years, first in prospect management and then prospect research. She spent several years at Monmouth University as their senior prospect research analyst, working with the fundraising staff, university president, and top leadership. She has worked as both a volunteer and consultant for non-profits in the areas of research and writing.

She earned a bachelor of arts degree from Drew University and a master of communication and information sciences from Rutgers University. She is a member of APRA.

Jayme joined The Helen Brown Group in April 2019.

Julie has managed finances for The Helen Brown Group since its founding.

In her spare time, she is an editor for the PBS series Masterpiece at WGBH. Julie was nominated twice for an Emmy award for her work on the PBS show Zoom.

Heather began her career in development in 2001 as a prospect researcher for National Wildlife Federation (NWF). She was with NWF for more than thirteen years, including nearly five years as director of research and analytics. Heather is a former secretary of the board of directors of APRA-Metro DC.

She joined The Helen Brown Group in October 2014.

David began his career in development at The Gunnery school in northwest Connecticut in 2011, where he worked in database management and prospect research. Subsequently, he joined the College of Saint Rose as a development research analyst before leading Albany Medical Center Foundation’s prospect research efforts as Associate Director of Prospect Research. He has a Bachelor’s Degree in Sociology from Siena College and is a member of APRA and CASE.

Michele began her career in development in 2012 when she joined the UC Berkeley corporate and foundation relations team as a development analyst. She spent a year and a half at Cal before returning to UC Davis as a prospect analyst. She was with the prospect management and relations team at UC Davis for almost three years prior to joining the research and relationship management team at George Washington University as a Senior Prospect Analyst in 2016.

Michele received her BA in creative writing from Florida State University and her MA in higher education leadership from CSU Sacramento. She currently resides in Northern Virginia, is a member of Apra International, and serves as the social media chair for Apra Metro DC. Michele joined The Helen Brown Group in July 2018.

Angie has worked in development since 2002, partnering with a wide range of nonprofit institutions. She began her professional career at Vanderbilt University in research and prospect development.

She has also worked with a number of community nonprofits in front-line fundraising, grant-writing, and event management. Angie holds an MPA in Nonprofit Management from the Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy and a BS in Journalism from Middle Tennessee State University. She resides in Nashville, Tennessee, and is a member of AFP Nashville and APRA MidSouth, where she has been active on the executive team.

She joined The Helen Brown Group in October 2015.

Maureen has been a part of the non-profit world since 1991. She started out in annual giving at Harvard Law School and continued her career as director of annual/special gifts at UC Santa Cruz.

In 1999 she made the switch from front-line fundraising to serve as director of prospect research/management at Bentley University and in 2001 began her role as administrator for the North American Foundation for the University of Manchester. She became part of the HBG team in September of 2011.

Helen has been a development professional since 1987. Her previous experience includes The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the Albert Einstein Institution, Boston College, the Harvard School of Public Health and Northeastern University.

Currently she works with a variety of clients to establish, benchmark and re-align research departments; identify major gift prospects; and train researchers and other fundraisers through on-site and web-based training services.Helen is a former member of the board of the Association of Professional Researchers for Advancement (APRA) and is past president of the New England Development Research Association (NEDRA). In 2006 she received the NEDRA Ann Castle Award for service to the prospect research community.

Helen is Special Advisor on Fundraising to the North American Foundation for the University of Manchester and is a member of the board of directors of Factary Ltd. (Bristol, UK). She is a member of NEDRA, APRA, the Association of Independent Information Professionals (AIIP), Women In Development, the Association of Fundraising Professionals (AFP) and Researchers in Fundraising (UK).

Helen is a frequent speaker and has led seminars for a number of professional associations, including Action Planning, AFP, APRA, the Council for Advancement and Support of Education (CASE), NEDRA, RIF, the Planned Giving Council of Central Massachusetts, the Georgia Center on Nonprofits, the International Fundraising Congress and Resource Alliance.

Helen is also co-author (with Jen Filla) of the book, Prospect Research for Fundraisers (Wiley & Sons, 2013).

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