IT Times Spotlight: Meet the AA&D Advancement Systems & Analysis Team

Fundraising is increasingly data-driven, with reporting and analysis of fundraising activities being critical for improved decision making, fostering continuous improvement, maximizing efficiencies and meeting ever-growing fundraising targets. This team is made up of the following individuals:

• Shelly Marshall – Analyst, Data Analysis
• Michael Szlawieniec – Analyst, Reporting Analysis
• Alex Cutler – Analyst, Data Governance.

Some of the key activities this team is responsible for include:

• Data/list requests
• Specialized data analysis and reporting
• Data governance leadership.

Through their work, this team supports AA&D staff in identifying potential donors, personalizing donor engagement, improving campaign strategy and event fundraising, optimizing donor acquisition and tracking donor retention and lifetime contributions. They partner with units across U of G, including the Data Strategy team, to analyze and visualize data and ensure a fulsome understanding and application of results.

“We are really trying to lean into the Data Strategy to share and report on data in more effective ways. We don’t want to be in our own silo and shoehorn data in our system. We want to be a good partner, where we leverage shared knowledge that leads to better results for everyone.” - Paul Hossie, Associate Director, Advancement Systems & Analysis"

This is the core technical team within the ASA group. They support the many applications used by AA&D staff, alumni and donors, and provide multiple levels of support for the various applications. This team is made up of the following members:

• Joe Huang, Manager, Advancement Technology & Development
• Simgton Lay, Systems Support Coordinator
• Ebad Babar, Analyst, Web Applications & Development

Together, they are responsible for the following activities:

• Application development and support
• Web development and support
• Hardware systems support (in partnership with CCS).

The applications and platforms they support include:

• Cannon CRM: This is AA&D’s customer relationship management (CRM) system, which is a Blackbaud product that the Technology & Development team develops and hosts in-house with the support of CCS teams including the Network Infrastructure and Systems Management teams.
• Alumni website (https://alumni.uoguelph.ca): The team performs active development of the new Alumni website, which was launched in partnership with the AA&D Engagement Services team. The site is hosted in collaboration with Communications & Marketing and the CCS Web & Development Solutions team. The CCS Web team is a key partner, helping to ensure the Alumni website consistently aligns with University-wide web strategies.

Other applications:

• BBIS (Blackbaud Internet Solutions): This tool hosts online giving pages, online registration and profiles, and the Pet Trust OVC Vet Portal.
• Luminate Online: Used for email marketing, team/personal fundraising, etc.
• ThankView/ODDER: A video-based email marketing tool and endowment donor reporting.
• VanillaSoft: Telemarking software.
• Make Giving Happen – Peer2Peer fundraising platform (currently under development).

This is a key project currently in progress across AA&D, with the ASA team being a key driver. The overall intent is to take a deep dive into the current work of fundraisers from a strategic perspective and look at how AA&D’s systems and processes can better support these strategic activities. This project involves all three of the ASA pillars: there are significant data and reporting, application development and business improvement activities involved. They want to understand how staff can best use the available tools to best support their fundraising goals. Once these goals are established, the ASA team will deliver the development work, apply necessary system changes and ultimately train AA&D staff to ensure they understand and can leverage these tools effectively.

In the summer of 2023, the ASA team, like many other U of G IT teams, had to migrate servers to the CCS Next Generation Data Centre (NGDC). The ASA Technology & Development team were the key partners in this project, working with the CCS Systems Management team to successfully migrate 21 servers. In addition to the migration, the team concurrently performed a major application upgrade. This involved significant user acceptance testing, in which the ASA Business Improvement & Training team played a big part. The team also helped with the change management for any short-term service outages and new workflows that resulted from these server migrations.