# Survey finds wide range of interpretations on 'fundraising stewardship'

- Link: https://fundraising.co.uk/2008/07/02/survey-finds-wide-range-interpretations-039fundraising-stewardship039/
- Published: 2008-07-02T07:30:36+01:00
- Author: Howard Lake

![](https://www.fundraising.co.uk/files/images/news/Stewardship_1214902538.gif)

Fifty six per cent of respondents to the ongoing Relationship Marketing Stewardship
Survey think that there should be a “common, accepted definition” of fundraising
stewardship, according to interim analysis. Unfortunately, there is little consensus
in the sector about what stewardship is.

For example, while 64% of respondents think that thanking donors promptly and politely
is an “essential” part of stewardship, 13% see it as only a “building block of stewardship”
while 16% consider it to be a “self-contained definition” of fundraising stewardship.

Similarly, whereas 29% think that “ensuring all donors everywhere can give more 
for longer periods of time” is not part of fundraising stewardship, 26% of respondents
think that the very similar “acting to ensure the sustainability of the pool of 
public donations” is an essential part of stewardship.

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Director of development at Relationship Marketing, Gordon Michie, who devised the
survey, is not surprised. “The patterns that are emerging are telling us what we
expected – that there is a wide range of opinion among fundraisers about what constitutes‘
stewardship’, he said.

“While we are seeing some patterns emerging, there isn’t really any part of the 
survey that gives the impression that fundraisers are speaking with a single voice.
And while we have a majority of people saying they think fundraisers need a standardised
definition of stewardship, there’s a substantial minority that don’t think we need
it.”

Michie last year wrote a White Paper on stewardship – ‘Pretenders to the Steward
Throne’, available from [SOFII](http://www.sofii.org).

One-to-one meetings with donors should play a “crucial role” in delivering stewardship
programmes, according to 50% of respondents. Telephone, email and direct mail should
a play “major role”. Face to face, SMS and social networking websites however were
judged as less important techniques for stewardship.

Michie said: “It will be fascinating as we drill down into these responses to discover
what correlations there are between how fundraisers scored definitions of stewardship
and how they rated communications methods.”

The full survey results will be presented at [Blackbaud’s annual conference](http://www.blackbaud.co.uk/events/bbe2008/conference.aspx),
facilitated by [Professor Stephen Lee of Henley Management College](http://www.henleymc.ac.uk/General/faculty05.nsf/schoolall/82F71FBA1C2676F3802570ED004B0A94),
to be held in London on 20 October 2008.

The survey is still active and will remain open throughout the summer. Relationship
Marketing is actively encouraging new respondents to complete the survey.

www.surveymonkey.com/relationshipmarketing

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