Supporter Relations Team Review
UK ‘Top 10’ Charity
We reviewed a UK charity's Supporter Relations Team to address post-COVID morale issues and provided actionable recommendations, resulting in the adoption of 30 out of 31 strategies to enhance team effectiveness and supporter engagement.
Sector: Third Sector
Location: UK
Ownership: Charity
Duration: Short Term
Situation
The charity’s long-established Supporter Relations Team had experienced considerable staff attrition through Covid-19, including at the management level. It was showing signs of poor morale and attracting criticism from internal stakeholders. After a re-organisation of the Fundraising department, we were asked to “define the Supporter Relations Team (SRT) approach and function to support [the charity] in 2022 and beyond”.
Solution
The following discovery and analysis steps were undertaken:
Remote meetings with a very wide range of colleague stakeholders
Time on-site with the SRT team, both side-by-side observing contact handling & processing work and discussing roles, challenges, frustrations, etc
Benchmarking of the SRT supporter proposition vs that of 5 other major charities
Benchmarking SRT salary levels vs those of comparative roles both within the organisation and more widely
Analysis of operational data provided and some research-generated statistics
Review of training, quality management and knowledge materials and processes
Outcome
Full range of recommendations, including:
Identification of a number of ‘quick wins’ including IVR changes, changes to call-type prioritisation, addressing telephony reporting errors
Cost analysis, providing a financial view of the SRT team’s direct and indirect value to the organisation
Full stakeholder mapping, providing new SRT interim head with a summary of the state of key internal relationships, priorities for development and opportunities to enhance two-way information flows
Technology review, detailing relatively low impact opportunities to improve supporter care (especially on digital channels)
Roadmap to describe how the charity might start to achieve its ambition to turn SRT staff ‘from response handlers to fundraisers’
30 out of 31 recommendations were adopted by the client.
Client Quote
“Simple and effective – just what we needed. Steve really took the time to understand our organisation and listen to what was being said and interpreted it really well. We’ve been able to put the report and recommendations straight to work!”