Prospect Research & Portfolio Intelligence
How a shop learns who a donor is before meeting them, without turning a person into a file: identification, screening, verification, qualification, and a research function a small team can run.
Through the Higher Ed lens
This sector has the most mature screening infrastructure of any track, and the exact failure this lesson names, a portfolio of wealthy strangers, is the classic higher-ed mistake: an alum flagged on capacity alone with no real connection to the institution since graduation. The qualification standard's clause requiring a substantive conversation in the last eighteen months is the direct corrective, and a lapsed-at-level list often surfaces the alum who gave generously once and stopped after a disappointing experience with the school.
Continuing education
1.25 points
Current and Prospective Donor Research · Leadership and Management
Learning objectives
- Explain what donor research is for, what it must not become, and how the Association of Professional Researchers for Advancement's ethics and the organization's privacy standard bound it.
- Identify potential donors from internal and public sources, run and interpret a wealth and affinity screening, and verify the results before anyone acts on them.
- Apply a written qualification standard so that a portfolio holds people with whom a true invitation is possible, and review the portfolio by relationship as well as by capacity.
- Design a research function proportionate to the shop: hours, tools, ownership, policy, and the first ninety days.
Designed for CFRE continuing education. Not yet accepted; no CFRE points can be claimed.
Lessons
- 20 min
Video lesson
Research is how you see a person before you meet them
II See · Current and Prospective Donor Research
- 20 min
Field guide· PDF
Screening, verification, and the qualification standard
III Discern · Current and Prospective Donor Research
- 20 min
Template· DOCX
The research profile and portfolio review template
II See · Current and Prospective Donor Research
- 16 min
Worksheet· XLSX
Building the research function in a small shop
III Discern · 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.
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