Campaigns, Explained: What They Are and Your Part in One
Phases, gift tables, and the quiet phase, seen from the seat of a first-year fundraiser who will be asked to help. Enough to be useful in a campaign before you are asked to lead one.
Through the Higher Ed lens
The support role usually sits inside a large advancement division, where a first-year gift officer might own research briefs for a portfolio manager's principal-gift visits or track a reunion class's share of the gift table. The mapping worksheet matters most here because a comprehensive campaign can quietly absorb every hour a young officer has, at the direct expense of the annual fund calls that are also on their plate.
Continuing education
1.00 points
Securing the Gift · Leadership and Management
Learning objectives
- Define a capital campaign, distinguish it from annual giving, and explain why campaigns are sequenced from the largest gifts down.
- Read a gift table and a campaign timeline, and describe what happens in the quiet phase and the public phase.
- Carry out the support roles a first-year fundraiser is given in a campaign: research briefs, stewardship, pledge tracking, and event and volunteer logistics.
- Map the campaign's demands against the annual program and protect the relationships that fund both.
Designed for CFRE continuing education. Not yet accepted; no CFRE points can be claimed.
Lessons
- 18 min
Video lesson
What a campaign is, and why it runs from the top down
II See · Securing the Gift
- 18 min
Field guide· PDF
Phases, the gift table, and the quiet phase, from your seat
IV Invite · Securing the Gift
- 16 min
Template· DOCX
Campaign support checklist for the first-year fundraiser
VI Accompany · Leadership and Management
- 14 min
Worksheet· XLSX
Your part in one: mapping the campaign against the annual program
VI Accompany · Leadership and Management
This is members-only material.
Members get every lesson, template, and worksheet in all eight tracks, plus the support to put them to work in your shop.
More in this stage
Fundamentals & Ethics
How Fundraising Works
The map you weren't given: where the money comes from, why people give, and what a development program is made of.
Major & Principal Gifts
Your First Donor Conversations
Scripts, practice, and nerve for the conversations that fund your mission: discovery visits, thank-you calls, and your first ask.
Annual Giving & Direct Response
The Annual Fund, Explained
Appeals, segments, and the giving calendar: how recurring annual revenue gets built, one season at a time.