Right smack in the middle of our week on measurement comes a post from The Agitator (commenting on a post from DM News)…
…on measurement.
You’d almost think we planned it.
Both articles posit three groups of donors/consumers [Editor’s note: the fact that donors and consumers are interchangeable–does this trouble you at all?]:
- Those whose lifetime donation/purchase total is the highest among your constituents.
- Those whose “share of wallet” (percentage of money spent/donated to you of all they spend/donate in your category) is the highest among your constituents.
- Those whose referral rate (the number of folks in their sphere of influence that they tell about you) is the highest among your constituents.
Both articles ask the same question in an effort to provoke: If you could figure out which of your constituents fell in each of these categories (which you can’t, because you’re only tracking transactional data), which category of donor-sumers would you invest in the most?
To me, such a question is not provocative but roundly disappointing.
I recommend two genuinely provocative questions instead:
- Why would you build a fundraising program where you were investing in people based on your calculations of their ‘investment value’ rather than building a development program where you were investing in people based on their demonstrated willingness to be mentored by you comprehensively in relation to the cause?
- What if the reason we kept measurements on individuals wasn’t so we could determine their ‘value’ but rather to share those measurements with them for their benefit–to help them see things about their growth in the cause and impact on the cause which would help them grow to greater fullness in Christ?
What we’re building up to this week is the concept of ‘shared measurements’: measurements done collaboratively with our champions, according to their eager and explicit consent, for their sake (i.e., to enable them to grow in the cause).
Before we move on to what shape that might take in TG, I can’t help myself but to ask:
Don’t you marvel at the opportunity churches miss to do exactly this when they send their giving summary updates listing your donations for the quarter/year?
These church giving statements–they’re like the register tape in a grocery store, with a thankful/hopeful/concerned/call-the-office-if-you-see-an-error-here letter from the pastor or finance chair thrown in for good measure.
GIFT *** DATE *** WHAT YOU PLEDGED *** WHAT YOU GAVE ***
I just got my ‘statement’ last week. (On the same day, I got my ‘statement’ from the water company, too.) What the church measures–is it for tax purposes? Church budget purposes? For the purpose of coaching their champions into the fullness of Christ?
Check your statement and let me know what you think.
Do the Word 