Letter to Customers March 27, 2007 By Steve Fafel

Earlier today I sent a letter to our customers. Here's part of it:

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Recently some of you received a survey asking your opinion on possible upgrade pricing. While the responses were certainly diverse, the themes were loud and clear:

• you really like GiftWorks
• you want some issues resolved
• and you want pricing options

I read every comment personally. I was surprised both by how many people deeply dislike the idea of subscriptions, as well as the substantial number who like subscription pricing because it can lower the up front cost. So you will have options, and you will not have to change if you choose not to. We hear you! 

IMPROVEMENTS

In the last year, we have made over 100 improvements to GiftWorks, but have not communicated them well. We've also promised features and fixes we've been late to deliver--and I apologize for that. But I think you'll be pleased (hope!) with what we've been working on and what we've committed to delivering in the coming months.

With thousands of customers it would be unrealistic to say that we will resolve every issue faced by every customer, but it is realistic to say that we will deliver very important features that address many, many of the requests. Our plan for the year is still being finalized, but the outline looks like this:

FREE UPDATE, APRIL 23: QuickBooks Integration Part II | We've invested four months of work to greatly improve and simplify our QuickBooks accounting integration, allowing you to post using QuickBooks classes and subclasses, and streamlining the entire process.

FREE UPDATE, APRIL 23: NEW FEATURES | In addition, we've improved pledge reporting and SmartLists, made more fields available for SmartLists and letters, and other additions and fixes.

FREE UPDATE, SUMMER 2007: HOUSEHOLDS REVAMP | This long-awaited improvement makes working with households more flexible, simpler, and more comprehensive. We think you'll be pleased, and encourage your suggestions!

OPTIONAL PAID UPGRADE, Q3 2007 | This upgrade will have top requested features, usability enhancements, and additional web integration.

ONLINE DONATIONS, Q2 2007 | Finally! We're wrapping up the beta testing for this very nicely designed online donations functionality, which allows you to easily set up online donations for your website and easily import the donations into GiftWorks.

In tackling these important projects for our customers, we commit to communicating with you more clearly and frequently on the features, status, and dates of the releases. The list of features and fixes for any of these releases will be published in the Help Center as well as in GiftWorks itself.

GETTING IT DONE | I have asked one of my favorite people, Mary Pat Donnellon, to lead these efforts. She has extensive nonprofit experience and has led our customer support team here, so understands well the issues, challenges, and opportunities you in the nonprofit community face. She will be sending regular communications to you on the status of these free updates and the available optional paid upgrades. She is your GiftWorks advocate here at Mission Research.

Click "comments" below to voice your opinion!

Greener Choices March 24, 2007 By Steve Fafel

I just came across this Consumer Reports site. We're a "green" company--a socially responsible company committed to the "triple bottom line" of people, planet, and profit, so I pay a lot of attention to guides like this one. Check it out...

Back at Work--A bit March 20, 2007 By Steve Fafel

Today Chris Walker picked me up at home and helped me get my jacket on. It's tough with the sling, but I can usually do it myself be now. I'm learning to be self-sufficient as a right-hander with a right-shoulder injury; my left hand is able to write a bit and use a mouse now.

After a few hellos I held a couple of "quick" meetings, mostly about product development. Then we held the first company meeting since the accident. I started with me--people have been asking and wondering when or if I'm ever returning:) The good news about the broken shoulder is it's healing well. The bad news is I'll still be out of the office for most of the next 4 weeks.

Next, I explained a bit about our product schedule for GiftWorks. I'll post the details here in the next week or so, but the short version is we've released 5 free updates containing about 60 features and a larger number of changes or fixes. The next major update comes April 23rd, and that will include a significant upgrade to our QuickBooks integration, plus some other fixes and features you have been clamoring for.

This summer you will have a renewed, redesigned, and simpler way of handling households. Mary Pat Donnellon is the dedicated product manager on GiftWorks and will be posting here about the changes and improvements over the next few months. Oh--the next version of Giftworks is going to rock, and is scheduled for either June 30 or later in the summer, depending on how we decide to roll out the features. I expect you'll want it sooner than later, and for the other additions to come later in the year. Let us know (we'll send a survey).

Finally, Online Donations will be ready in 2 weeks. This has taken longer than we expected, but it will be well worth the wait. The forms are well-designed and easy to use, and the transactions import easily into GiftWorks. More on that later from Chris Walker when we get closer to the date.

It's good to be back. While I was there I squeezed in a meeting on the Lancaster Free Wireless project, which I'm catalyzing but not working on directly, and another with the ED of the Lancaster Y (I'm on the Board). By 4 pm I was pretty tired and ready to head home.

My takeaway from today? Hire great people. And ask them to recruit people who will reflect well on them. We have a great set of people working hard to serve customers, and we get it right most of the time. It's a pleasure to see thing running  so smoothly, so see how deeply everyone cares about serving nonprofits and how they will go to the mat to solve a problem or get a feature or change approved. We don't always get it right, but with the right people, always make it right.

So everyone at Mission Research, thanks for your support. And customers--you too. We've heard you and we're digging deeper to do well for you. I love this job.

Brass Tacks Preparation March 15, 2007 By RussBurke

Our CEO, Charlie Crystle, makes a strong and unfortunately painful, testimonial to planning for "what happens".  I think we all would recognize that while things happen, we professionals must practice due diligence in planning for what might be.  Certainly, in this case, all of us will pull together to make sure things progress as they should.  Charlie, you can count on it.

Due diligence goes very far, too, when planning for investment in fundraising software.  In my last post, I offered up a document designed to assist buyers in evaluating competing fundraising software.  The process really doesn't stop there.  Having a worksheet is simply not enough to ensure that the tools you are considering will do the right job.

Today, I had a great opportunity to sit in on a webinar put on by Citrix Online and TechRepublic concerning using online meeting tools.  I was looking to learn more about how to help our current and prospective customers.  Among many instructive things, I heard this chilling statement: 60% of all technical implementations fail, due not to technical aspects but to faulty implementation methodology.  Specifically, the point was made that software implementation is a process not an event.

The implications are many.  A robust implementation methodology includes all the people who will be involved in using and supporting the software...ceo's, directors, clerks and technicians. It also involves asking the right questions and listening intently for what is said and what is left unsaid.

I once heard the story of a large university that spent an entire year and hundreds of thousands of dollars implementing new advancement software.  It was such a botched job that they spent the next two years, starting all over again, implementing a brand-new software product.  The disappointment for the observer of this event was the shear cost of failure in the first implementation:  It was failure to give due consideration to user community involvement in the choosing and implementation process.

On that chilling note, let me offer you a bit of good advice.  And I was reminded of this in today's webinar.  One of the tools you should not overlook when evaluating competing software is the creation of a standard case scenario.  You might do several and each should describe jobs, processes and their objectives that you currently employ and for which you expect your new software to support.  Some discussion among your staff of users at all levels should easily give you three to six good case scenarios which in themselves currently confound you by their "cost", unpleasantness or wastefulness. 

Then when you are evaluating your final two or three products, make sure that you look or ask for opportunities to have demonstrated how this new software will help your organization address those case scenarios.  You need to see this in detail.  It is essential for you and your colleagues to understand what will be required to do the things that software makers claim you can do so easily with their products. 

It is important, here, to recognize that a good software solution is not one that just solves your current problems the same way your old software did.  What you should be looking for is something that will ease your pain by making you more efficient, more effective, be easy to learn and open doors to new advancement possibilities.  That's the mark of a good fundraising software solution. 

Good luck...stay healthy and be careful of that ice.

Succession Planning March 12, 2007 By Steve Fafel

9 days ago I was on a date and in a moment of proving chivalry was not dead, I slipped on ice while reaching for the passenger side door, landing on my shoulder. The shoulder shattered, and ever since I've been out of the office coping with the constant pain and regular painful muscle spasms. It's going to be a long road--8 weeks, but likely more if they decide to operate, which is likely given the doctor described my shoulder as "mush". Thanks doc.

I can barely type, certainly not more than a few minutes at a time, even though my fingers are fine. I can't drive my car (yay Prius!). I can't play piano or guitar, can't tie my shoes, and many times simply can't move. The pain medication helps as long as I don't move or get jostled. Riding in cars is now completely out of the question after the past few days of my drivers hitting speed bumps and potholes. Ouch.

In my absence, COO Leron Lehman will take over some of my duties. Chris Walker will step up for others, and we'll have team leader meetings in my living room. I'll still coach and help people make decisions, but I'm dropping out of product cycles. I'll still have a hand in marketing, but other than that, I'm toast.

Last year we had the Truck discussion: what happens if I get hit by a truck? Or rather, what happens if I can't work ever again, or for 3 months, which is possible now?

We started looking for a director of operations last summer. Leron was my accountant, and had startup experience and was not your typical accountant--he is a strategic thinker. So after a few months of getting to know each other better, we hired him as COO, my right hand man.

Over the past 18 months we've been careful to hire team leaders who can act autonomously, lead their teams, and still follow the overall strategic goals. Mary Pat Donnellon was one of those hires, and we've recently assigned her to be product manager of the new version of GiftWorks, scheduled for later this summer. Internally we've developed Megan Corr into a self-driven marketing manager; actually she was already self-driven, but now she's really grown into her role.

We've hired a sales and support manager in Joe Rock, who has brought clarity and unity between the two groups and is currently building out that team. And Russ Burke, as always, takes the initiative on a number of customer education efforts regularly.

We're not finished succession planning or disaster planning, but we're close. My question to you is this: what happens if YOU are hit by a truck? Who picks up from where you left off? How does your board know who to bring in, or how to recruit? is your role documented enough that someone could read it and start filling in right away? Do you have a statement of principles for everything you do?

We do, and we don't. I've been working on institutionalizing my  role as much as possible over the past 6 months, in case something like, well, this happens. We are doing it for all of our roles, and for the company principles. We're also doing some of the basic disaster planning stuff, but that's a lot easier.

I'm tired from typing and should get back to bed. You can still email me but I'm generally not working, and only holding occasional meetings. If you'd like to send flowers or chocolate or a nice guitar, save it and send a check instead to the Lancaster Y---it would be most appreciated. In the meantime, develop your Truck Plan, the instruction manual for when you are suddenly incapacitated. And I hope, truly, that it gathers dust for all time.

Help Is On The Way March 4, 2007 By RussBurke

So... you're thinking about getting new fundraising software.  It really doesn't matter how you got to this point, as much as it matters how you go forward.  But sometimes just getting started is tough.

Trouble is, most of us don't have much experience with software selection.  We simply don't get opportunities to investigate and evaluate fundraising software often enough to get experienced.  It's hard to know all we need to know, ask the right questions and, sometimes, to even evaluate the answers. 

Often, in our inexperience, we fall into the trap of just thinking about our immediate need to get something to do this or that specific thing.  Instead, we should be looking at what this software will do for our organization into the future.  We must also think about the cost of getting it functional, ease of use and ongoing training. There's no doubt, looking at this strategically is a much harder evaluation. 

To help get you started, however, I've created a software comparison tool designed to help you evaluate fundraising software features.  To save you a bit of time, it's been pre-populated with GiftWorks information: Download software_decision_table.xls

Hopefully, this will get you off on the right foot, even if you just think of it as a list of features you should be thinking about.  Before you get started, though, I have three observations:

1.  Feel free to change the tool anyway that works for you and your organization.  Due diligence, here, really pays off.

2.  Don't take my word for it!  That's right, we want you to really understand what GiftWorks can do, so please take our free online tour and ask to see demostrated any of the features on the list that really interest  or concern you, your staff or your Board.

3.  Finally...Don't overlook the possibility that an experienced fundraising consultant will do your organization a world of good at this particular point.  Dollars spent here will very likely turn out to be an astute investment.  Don't know one?  Just visit our website and click on Partners to access our Consultant Directory.  These folks are familiar with GiftWorks and lots of other software products.  We never ask them for exclusivity...we want them to help you evaluate what's best for you.

I truly hope you get the software you need...and at a price you can afford.  Your mission and those you serve are depending on it.