Recommended
More Related Content
What's hot
What's hot (19)
Similar to What Can Your Law School Do For You? An Approach to Alumni and Constituent Engagement
Similar to What Can Your Law School Do For You? An Approach to Alumni and Constituent Engagement (20)
Recently uploaded
Recently uploaded (19)
What Can Your Law School Do For You? An Approach to Alumni and Constituent Engagement
- 1. What Can Your Law School Do For You? An Approach to Alumni Engagement UNIVERSITY OF DAYTON SCHOOL OF LAW AND OFFICE OF ADVANCEMENT by Robert Gurry, Class of 2005
- 2. Overview ❏ The Challenge ❏ Defining Alumni Engagement ❏ Goals of Alumni Engagement ❏ Guiding Strategic Principles ❏ Improving Alumni Engagement - Quantity & Quality ❏ Tailoring Messages to Motivations and Life Stages ❏ What Do Alumni Want? ❏ Appendix I - Alumni Updates ❏ Appendix II - Creating a Constituent Relations and Pursuit Plan
- 3. The Challenge Declining Alumni Participation and Giving Especially Mid-Size Gifts and Mid-Tier/Size Educational Institutions
- 4. Advance institutional objectives and maximize lifelong alumni engagement - developing the emotional connection (qualitative) coupled with tangible actions (quantitative). ❏ Emerging Industry Standard - Alumni Engagement Index = Alumni Engagement / Total Mailable Living Alumni. ❏ Quantitative - Alumni Engagement = communication + event attendance + volunteerism + giving. ❏ Qualitative - Experiential, surveys, Net Promoter Score. NPS = number of “Promoters” - number of “Detractors.” ❏ Scorecards weighting various attributes (hybrid). Defining Alumni Engagement
- 5. The End Goals Serve the institutional needs by building a strong network of leadership volunteers with alumni, foundations, associations and firms that can share mutual expertise, opportunities, financial, and community support; and serve UDSL Alumni from the moment they enter law school as 1Ls, as they exit their legal education, and as they progress through stages of their lives and careers. Develop Constituent Relations and Attraction Plan to connect the Law School beyond the Miami Valley region (See Appendix II). Ultimate Goal: Maximize lifelong engagement, the number and quality of stakeholders with such a strong connection, they are happy to be ambassadors, endorse, attend, contribute and communicate.
- 6. ▣ Know Your Stakeholders ▣ Find Out What You Don’t Know ▣ Give to Get ▣ Empower Alumni to Serve Effectively, as They Prefer ▣ Don’t Fix What is Not Broken ▣ Measure ROI - Cannot Manage What you do not Measure ▣ Personalize the Message to the Motivations of the Segment Guiding Strategic Principles for Engaging Alumni
- 7. Improving Alumni Engagement Metrics Personalizing Messages to Alumni and Constituents’ Key Motivators Source: Increasing Alumni Engagement and Donations at Every Stage of Life: Align the Needs of Your Alumni to the Needs of Your Institution, Rreeer Higher Education Consulting, (Univ. Wisconsin, Carnegie Mellon (2014)). The research from alumni relations, social psychology and consumer marketing is clear. When professionals segment their alumni population into meaningful affinity groups and tailor messaging to what these respective segments care most about, it drives up each of the underlying metrics essential to maximizing alumni engagement: ❏ Constituent satisfaction and experience, ❏ Response rates ❏ Event attendance ❏ Communication ❏ Giving Research indicates this also improves qualitative satisfaction levels.
- 8. Tailoring Messaging to Different Motivators The alumni segmentation in the engagement model is unique to each institution and should be driven by the institutional (and alumni) goals. Motivations - Compelling and Useful Categorization of Alumni ❏ Reciprocating Relationship: give back for the value and benefit received. ❏ Professional Opportunities: prestige and opportunities at/after graduation. ❏ Professional Benefits: reputation and network enhanced through giving. ❏ Life Satisfaction: give because life has turned out better (or worse) than expected. ❏ Alumni Duty: should pay forward opportunity as others did for them. ❏ Personal Values: giving feels good and improves the world. Source: Developing Donor Segments: A Scientific & Social Approach to Multi-Channel Communication Strategy, Council for Advancement & Support of Education, and Blackbaud higher education consulting.
- 9. “Young Guns” (Graduates, 2007 - 2016) ▣ Engagement and fundraising resources focused on 20 somethings doesn’t pay off. ▣ Young people, especially men, do not yet have the level of empathy and emotional connection, to compel giving. ▣ Should be nurtured - they will evolve into some of the best donors over time. ▣ Cultivate relationships; limit budget and expectations. “High Potential Veterans” (Graduates, 1977 - 1986) ▣ Baby boomer-aged alumni are both more numerous* and give more. ▣ Response rates increase with age. ▣ Usually professionally and financially more stable. ▣ Less likely to appreciate social media outreach. ▣ Motivations - legacy, obligation, empathy. ▣ Bricks on campus, not Kickstarter campaign. Segmenting UDSL Alumni Across Life Stages - An Accurate and Reliable Way to Improve Engagement
- 10. Speaking to Different Generations of Alumni Source: EAdventures, Higher Education Research and Analytics.
- 11. Decline in Educational Giving Steeper Among Millennials Source: EAdventures, Higher Education Research and Analytics.
- 12. Baby Boomers Give Disproportionately and are the Largest Donor Segment* Source: Forbes Magazine, Charitable Giving: Baby Boomers Donate More (2013). Baby Boomers (aged 49 - 67) are not only the largest group numerically--with 51 million individuals comprising 34% of the donor base--they are also the largest contributors, giving an estimated total of $61.9 billion per year (43% of all dollars donated). *Millennials numbered slightly more by 2015.
- 13. Know Your Stakeholders Who are our Alumni? What do they care about? How do their interests evolve over life stages? Have we surveyed their key motivators? 88.5% (69/78) Employment 10 months post-graduation 87% (60/69) Of those employed: % in positions where bar admission was required or J.D. preferred 74.1% (60/81) Of all graduates: % in positions where bar admission was required or J.D. preferred $64,998 25th Percentile: $42,500 50th Percentile: $52,000 75th Percentile: $100,000 Average Salary ❏ Demographics: Age, sex, location, religion, family, etc. ❏ Motivators: Surveys, predictive analytics, conversations. Positive feelings, satisfaction with Law School, Alumni Relations.
- 14. What do Alumni Want? Programming that is Valuable and Enjoyable Current ▣ Personal Meeting ▣ Survey of Interests ▣ Reunions on the Road ▣ Social Media/ Communications - Relevant & Useful ▣ Placement, Career Assistance, Networking ▣ Reputation & Performance ▣ Admissions Standards ▣ Bar Passage Potential New Ideas to Assess ▣ Organize Call-Chain to Get 3-5 Closest Classmates to Attend With the Caller ▣ “Experimentalist” ▣ Hypnotist Comedian ▣ Faculty/Judge “Roast” Pannel ▣ “Who’s Where?” Updates ▣ Benefits Affiliate Programs ▣ College Credit for Law School Courses
- 15. ▣ Why UDSL? ▣ What Motivates / Matters to You Now? ▣ How Could Your Law School Give Back to You? ▣ How Would You Like to Reconnect? ▣ Would You Be an Ambassador to Help Revitalize UD’s Law School Alumni Relations? Why Should A Non-Participating Alum Care? What Can Our Law School Do for Them, Today?
- 16. Appendix I: Alumni Updates Feature ‘‘human interest’ alumni updates regarding practice, experience, milestones. And solicit alumni to send more than just contact information to Alumni Relations. Left: example of Who’s Where updates and Torch Travels. Right: Lt. Col. Dale Riedel’s (‘04) career as a JAG officer has taken him to Washington DC, Afghanistan and Los Angeles (pictured below with his legal team and honorary member Scarlett Johansson).
- 17. Appendix II: Creating a Plan for Constituent Relations and Pursuit To thrive, the Law School will need to expand its current constituent base. Creating a plan to do this should be a collaborative effort, harnessing expertise and buy-in from Advancement, the entire Law School and University community, and others. ❏ Leverage the collective expertise, experience, and network of contacts and relationships across all advancement and the University. ❏ Diversify Advisory Board and Board of Trustees. ❏ Leverage UD’s prowess for sponsored engineering research. ❏ Define our unique value proposition. Assuming that a donor is open to considering supporting supporting the mission of UDSL or a Midwestern center of innovation, why UDSL and not 100 other institutions?
- 18. Thank you! Discussion Robert Gurry UDSL 2005 robgurry@gmail.com (937) 475-7795
Editor's Notes
- Thank you Love UDSL, wonderful 3 yrs here, 9 others in practice / LexisNexis. My experience at UDSL greatly impacted my thinking and not just about law and how to solve complex problems, but about the world and how to live a good life. One of the law’s highest orders. Introduction to my current thinking about what is most important for the Director of Law School Alumni & Constituent Relations. And it’s really designed to facilitate back and forth conversation.
- Challenge, as I see it right now what I understand the Goals of Alumni Engagement to be Defining what I think the Alumni Engagement Plan at UDSL should Focus On while also leveraging the dynamism of the University of Dayton as an integrated whole. How to Connect with Diverse Alumni, Across Life Stages My thoughts on What Alumni Want from the Law School - and what would draw them in Some very brief value statements I’m calling Guiding Strategic Principles, but, these are inchoate, or shorthand at this point in time, but also the raison d’etre, the reason for a professional alumni and constituent relations director to exist And then The Appendix, which is a simple example of one of an idea that the alums I spoke to all liked, and you may be doing something like it still, I’m not sure. ?joke - only a lawyer would put a Table of Contents and an Appendix in a slide deck.
- Research shows, in general, alumni participation is flat or in decline for most institutions, and they have been for about 15 years. The economy, peoples’ time-window is more accounted for, and values--or their motivators--are undergoing some change. We’ll come back to this. Council for Aid to Education’s (2014) Voluntary Support for Education report.
- As they relate to this position, UDSL’s Institutional Objectives are, Create and execute an effective Alumni and Constituent Engagement Plan. Not been an industry standard - until recently - but there is now an emerging standard, and it’s called the Alumni Engagement Index (AEI). According to the Alumni Engagement Index (AEI), the Engagement Plan has to do 2 things: 1) improve volunteerism, event attendance and giving (and I have added communications) (essentially all easily quantifiable); and 2) qualitatively improve the experience of alumni and constituents - and I see the executives within Advancement and the other alumni and donor relations executives within the university as a among my constituents - And happily, the qualitative aspect of this is also measurable to a large degree using surveys, and as a shorthand, I would highlight the Net Promoter Score, or NPS. Simple 4 question survey created by Bain & Co, and adopted by thousands of organizations as the most succinct distillation of their constituents’ level of satisfaction with their brand. ……………………………………….. NPS (Bain/Cornell) Survey for events: 1. Based on your experience at this event, how likely are you to recommend a similar event to another Cornellian? 2. Please share with us why you selected the number you did in answering question number one. 3. Is there anything else you would like us to know about your experience at this event? 4. Periodically we reach out to our constituents to learn more from their experiences at UDSL events. If we have your permission to contact you for this purpose, please give us your preferred contact information. People who answer the first question above with a 9 or 10 are called “promoters.” People who answer 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 or 6 are called “detractors.” NPS = number of “Promoters” - number of “Detractors” as a percentage. ……………………………………………………. Virtues - Simple data to collect: # mailable living alumni # annual events # unique event attendees # volunteers (planning/hosting, speaking, mentoring, event assistance) # and amount of gifts per alum Scorecards - proxies that try to quantify and describe individual alums into representative categories. Event attendance, giving (amount, frequency), valid contact information, social media, business infor, volunteerism, campus visits, awards, board involvement.
- Strategically, -- success and stability of the institution, first. Then & most respects - ask first what alumni want and needs. Help them help you. And they should be extremely closely aligned. glad to share their stories, endorse the law school, speak on behalf of it, participate in events, make gifts, invite others, send their kids. Organizations/entities who believe in the law school’s mission and see or can be shown mutual benefit and reward in partnering with it. More than merely attending events, or even financial commitment. Emotional connection coupled with specific actions. It’s one reason to the extent this is a professional sales position, I want to be selling something where I can legitimately ask for a piece of people’s hearts in the mix. I believe that people make most of the most important decisions emotionally, and vet them through rational reasons.
- These cohort descriptors here come from weighted Scorecards: Alumni expect more in 2017 - more personally, relevant to them. Research shows - higher levels of participation, giving, and satisfaction. Smaller time windows - People have to deal with more noise. Unsubscribes and blocks on the rise because people lack time. Ability to contribute is not enough. We need ability & motivation. Who they are, what they care about, and how best to reach them. Every opportunity to provide something your alumni need is also an opportunity to engage, to build affinity, and to increase the likelihood of donation. based on motivational differences from a CASE - Council for Advancement & Support of Education training. Why do we need to segment the message and offering? https://www.slideshare.net/ConvergeConsulting/case-v-and-vi-presentation-on-alumni-segmentation Increasing Alumni Engagement and Donations at Every Stage of Life Align the Needs of Your Alumni to the Needs of Your Institution
- Different life stages are one of the most reliable and accurate ways to segment a population. Millennials, whom we define as those ages 18-34 in 2015, now number 75.4 million, surpassing the 74.9 million Baby Boomers(ages 51-69). And Generation X (ages 35-50 in 2015) is projected to pass the Boomers in population by 2028. ... Pew Research Center has established that the oldest “Millennial” was born in 1981. ……………………………………………………………………………………... Different messaging and offerings for different demographics, life stages has increased giving, renewed lapsed donors, and changed from restricted to unrestricted giving. --Associate Vice President of Marketing, Carnegie Mellon University. What does a 52-year-old lawyer, a 28-year-old research specialist at LexisNexis, and 70-year-old retiring judge have in common? If they’re all UDSL alumni, plenty. But in terms of catering to their interests and needs, the messaging and opportunities to connect can be tailored to maximize the likelihood and rate of response. That’s the conclusion from years of alumni segment analysis consultants who have helped increase engagement rates at University of Wisconsin and Carnegie Mellon University, using consumer marketing and psychology about the the evolving needs of alumni over changing life stages. Increasing Alumni Engagement and Donations at Every Stage of Life Align the Needs of Your Alumni to the Needs of Your Institution: Align the Needs of Your Alumni to the Needs of Your Institution, Reeher LLC, fundraising and alumni engagement software and consulting.
- Leave this up. Here, we can start to see some of the differences in motivators for the two age groups of alumni Baby boomers give more out of a sense of obligation Millennials are disproportionately interested in program activities
- Comparing the major trend in charitable giving in education against all charitable giving. Next slide defines a couple of these, but the categories at bottom are an example of “Affinity Clusters” that could come out of a Weighted Scorecard, which we touched on above.
- ………………………………………………... Boomers (aged 49 to 67) with so-called "Matures" (who are 68 or older), Gen X (33 to 48) adddddnd Gen Y (18 to 32). The survey, commissioned by Blackbaud, which provides software to nonprofits, found that not only are Boomers the largest group numerically, with 51 million individuals comprising 34% of the donor base, they are also the largest contributors, giving an estimated total of $61.9 billion per year (43% of all the dollars donated). Matures accounted for 26% of the donations; Gen X, 20%; and Gen Y 11%. Millennials, whom we define as those ages 18-34 in 2015, now number 75.4 million, surpassing the 74.9 million Baby Boomers(ages 51-69). And Generation X (ages 35-50 in 2015) is projected to pass the Boomers in population by 2028. ... Pew Research Center has established that the oldest “Millennial” was born in 1981.
- Of this, the largest categories of employment are in small to mid-sized law firms (2-10 attorneys), followed by business and industry and then government. Would help to have someone who can relate to lawyers, but what about those not practicing. Sometimes I think those that aren’t practicing don’t come to events if they think it’s going to be another CLE, or something only for practicing lawyers - I’ve been in both camps, so I’m sensitive to that. Office ascertained the employment status of 96.3 percent (78/81) of UDSL’s 2016 graduates. 36 percent of those employed (25/69) supplied us with salary information. Members of the Class of 2016 began their careers in 15 states and 64 percent remained in Ohio. Name, address, contact info, employer, work address, semesters on campus, age, sex, religion, race/ethnicity, marital status, family, number of legacy relationships, positive feelings, satisfaction with alumni relations https://www.slideshare.net/ConvergeConsulting/data-driven-alumni-communications-the-method-to-the-madness
- ……………………….. Personal Meeting Survey of Interests Reunions on the Road “Who’s Where?” Practice Updates Feature Profiles Alumni Weekend Dean’s Classic College credit for law school courses Benefits affiliate programs Placement, career assistance, networking Reputation & Performance Admissions Standards Bar passage Social Media if relevant and useful. Networking Career Opportunities Business Development - should also be a course in law school. Messaging: How can we help you? How can we mutually benefit each other? Can we have some fun in the process? Social Media if relevant and useful. Networking Career Opportunities Business Development - should also be a course in law school. Messaging: How can we help you? How can we mutually benefit each other? Can we have some fun in the process?
- Make it THEIR law school again; Let them know about it. I’ve been in sales for a while. Customary at about this point to go into a value proposition. But let’s not yet. 1. Why Did You Choose to Invest Your Legal Education with the University of Dayton? Even if it wasn’t necessarily other law schools, everyone had options, and thus, everyone had reasons. Do they remember what they were? I do. Mine was a spiritual calling to make the world a better place. I’m not going to discuss how exactly - not going to discuss that, and in part because it changed and broadened while I was here. But I’ll share this. Dean Kloppenberg asked a packed courtroom this question and whether it had to do with helping people in some way? Every hand went up. 2. What matters to you today? What are your interests, and what matters to you? About UDSL? Fellow alumni, classmates? Legacy? Reputation? We live in a time when institutional roles and importance are changing. When you look back over your life, what communities, groups of people are important to remain connected to? Are your law school classmates, your fellow alumni among them? How are you connected? Are you as much as you’d ideally like to be? How Could we Give Back to You? I’m asking several things really: a. Tell me how you’d like to be sold to. If you were ever going to consider participating in law school alumni events, activities, programming, how would you recommend I persuade you? Their are dominant industries today that exist almost entirely because of how the customer likes to buy. DVDs and blu ray are superior in almost every way to most streaming - better picture, vastly better sound on the home theatres so many people have invested in - and yet Blockbuster didn’t stand a chance, because immediacy was how the customer wanted to buy and rent movies. 3. What would you like to see UDSL offer to its Alumni? To you? Social media - love it vs. gag reflex. -Benefits? Good feelings? Giving back? Peer networking? Events? Success stories? Mission? Information? Accessibility? Scholarships? -Fun? Golf? Opportunities to give back? Service? Pro Bono, volunteering.* Performance? Results? Bar Passage? Admissions? Employment rates? Admissions (LSAT, Grades)? 4. How would you like to reconnect? In person? Want me to meet with you? Want to ask one of your closets classmates to come with you? Want me to have one of your classmates reach out to you and share some experience and ideas? Social media? Events? 5. Would you be willing to be an ambassador for your alumni class? -What does that mean? We are revitalizing our alumni. Alumni involvement, programming, activities, social, networking, sharing success stories, and connecting alumni who we know are busy in their lives and practices, but genuinely miss what they were given as part of their experience at UDSL: friendship, ideals, mission, something larger than each of us alone, sounding board, venting/commiserating, in shaping the legal profession, and specifically the growing ranks of UDSL lawyers doing good. Leading. Serving. And still learning. -What if you had it to do all over again? Would you recommend others attend, or consider attending UDSL? Why/Why not? Since I know members of my class also were very engaged in serving those in need, that at least bookends from 2005 – 2016.