Have you heard about year-round pledging? Rather than having an annual pledge drive in Fall or Spring, some congregations have instituted a program where they divide people into groups and ask those groups to pledge at different times of year. This might mean that if you join in June, then every June you are asked to pledge for the coming year. Those who join in July, pledge in July, etc.
If you think about it, you immediately realize how complicated this gets with budget building, tracking, reporting, communicating – well just about every congregational system. Headline: it’s challenging and lots of planning is needed to roll it out well.
We will be presenting a workshop at the UUA General Assembly this June about the topic. It is called Year-Round Giving: The Next Big Thing? The presenters are myself, Mark Ewert, along with Rev. David Pyle who is the Executive for the Joseph Priestley District of the Central Eastern Regional Group (CERG) and Jason Kenworthy, a lay leader from the First Unitarian Society of Denver.
Rev. David will talk about the “back end” – everything you need to do behind the scenes with your accounting, database, staff orientation, reporting, etc. to make year-round pledging work. Jason will talk about the “front end” that is all of the communications with the congregation, recruiting and orienting volunteers, agendas for meetings, etc.
If you have heard about this and are curious, are considering it, or are doing year-round pledging now, come and join us at the GA workshop. Come early, seats are bound to fill up!
DAY & TIME:
Saturday 6/27/2015, 1:15 PM ‐ 2:30 PM
Oregon Convention Center
ROOM:
OCC ‐‐ B115‐116
Mark Ewert is a stewardship consultant, a Chartered Advisor in Philanthropy® (CAP®), and a professional leadership and philanthropy coach (PCC) certified with the International Coaching Federation.
His experience includes founding a nonprofit, working as a fundraiser, and leading a national organization. Reach Mark at Team@StewardshipForUs.com
Unfortunately, I will not be able to be at GA in Portland. But, I am SO interested in this topic — actually talked to UUA staff about it in May to find out if anyone was doing this and, if so, how it was working. I would love to talk with you about this off line. Any chance this workshop will be streamed live over the internet so I can attend on my computer????
Or, if not, can I give you a shout after GA, Mark?
Blessings,
Rev. Gretchen Weis
Murray UU CHurch
Attleboro, MA
713-385-8912
Hi Rev. Gretchen, So glad you are interested! Sadly, this one will not be live-streamed so you can view it at home. We will be posting the slideshow from the session on this blog – and it has plenty of information in it. If you want a notice of when that posts, add your name and email to the Join Us on the right of the screen. You will get our monthly email blast with notifications. Cheers! Mark