NAADD released its 2020 Award Winners back in February. In lieu of being recognized in person at the NAADD Convention, Tim Folan has accepted the NAADD Fundraiser of the Year award virtually. We are pleased to provide a Q&A with Tim below, we hope you will take a few minutes to read about a leader in our profession below! 


Tim Folan
Senior Associate Athletics Director, Development and Alumni Relations
University of Pennsylvania
Twitter Handle: @timfolan
 
1.What about athletics fundraising interests you? To date, what are you most proud of in your athletics fundraising career?
My interest in fundraising is centered on providing opportunities and creating a better future for our young people. Fundraising is all about providing others with opportunities that they never would have experienced without the resources that the raising of funds provides.  Whatever the non-profit, charity or cause that is raising money, it's to benefit others and in our case, college athletics is no different. As a former college athlete, I believe that we aren't just creating resources for our student-athletes while they are on campus. These young people will become spouses, partners, fathers/mothers, co-workers, neighbors, etc. and the lessons they learn during their four years on colleges/universities will impact the people that they interact with in each one of those roles throughout the rest of our student-athletes' lives.  I value that the work we do will positively impact countless of lives.
 
Also, there are very few things I like more than winning in competition and in college athletics fundraising plays a major role in this. Knowing that our team plays a key role in the overall competitive success of our department is extremely exciting.
 
I take a great deal of pride in seeing the maturation of former student-athletes once they leave campus knowing that our staff contributed to this growth. We were recently on a Zoom call with three former Penn football players who are now in the NFL and knowing that our office contributed to their ability to not only become NFL players, but 3 outstanding young men gives me a great deal of pride. Considering the times we are all experiencing now and being able to see the strength exhibited by all the former Penn student-athletes that are now doctors, nurses and other front line medical staff is super rewarding. Knowing that they are equipped with the fortitude to face the tough challenges ahead in part b/c they played college sports creates a great sense of pride.
 
2.During the 2019 fiscal year, your team set two new records. Can you tell the NAADD membership how you went about setting these new records? The $63.4 million dollars for Penn Athletics and then accumulated over 6,000 donors to the Penn Champions Club.
There are too many elements that contributed to this, but I'll mention three more high level items that ultimately had a huge impact on our success: it's really all about culture, vision and strategy. Going all the way back to 2013, a lot of turnover existed, there was very little consistency and as a result there was an overall lack of direction in the approach the office was taking. Dr. Scarlett Schneider really turned that around when she arrived and hired an incredible team that helped establish the internal expectations of how we are going to operate. High quality and character people like Tim House, Mike Bamonti, Mike Murray and John Kerzetski helped establish consistent tone of hard work, accountability, collaboration and really getting excited for each other's successes. I got to Penn about a year later and from what I heard and witnessed, that was the first time that our donor base was truly able to connect with the staff in sustained and meaningful ways.  Those colleagues have all moved on, but they established a legacy with the culture they helped create that still lives in our office today.
 
About six months after I arrived at Penn, Dr. M. Grace Calhoun was hired as our Director of Athletics and Recreation. She was able to quickly and effectively create a powerful vision for where Penn Athletics was headed while establishing her own approach with key donors and volunteers that was rooted in transparency. She did this while always having the Penn Athletics compass pointing towards what was best for our 1,000 student-athletes. Her approach created incredible buy-in with University partners as well as external partners in a way that hadn't existed for quite a while, ultimately making fundraising a much more manageable task.
 
Lastly, over the last three years we have made some tweaks to our organizational structure, which ultimately allowed our more experienced gift officers to focus more of their time on major gift work, while allowing our more junior teammates to focus less on "back office work" and get out on the road to truly grow the donor base through annual support.
 
When you combine the right culture, with the right vision and the right strategy, success is generally going to follow. In the end, it's a very simple equation, but it's a challenge to get there and we've been fortunate that the people that have touched our office in one way or another moved us forward in a positive way, leading to the year we enjoyed in 2019-2020.   
 
3.Since your time at Penn, you have raised record breaking amounts of money. Can you talk about how you went about that and what has led to your success thus far?
I can borrow a lot from my answer to the previous question to answer this one, but I would like to add two additional ideas. The first is focusing on fundamentals. Our work is very bottom line focused and it's easy to begin moving too quickly and forget about the fundamentals of the work we do in an effort to close a gift. Over time I think it's easy to gravitate further and further from proven successful practices if you aren't cognizant of their importance. One of biggest disappointments for me in the cancellation of the NACDA/NAADD Convention this year is missing out on the FOAD breakfast as it always serves as an anchor for our team to refocus on the fundamentals of our work at the end of one fiscal year and the beginning of the next.  
 
The other thing that's been so valuable is that that our staff tries to have no ego about raising money. We all try and learn from one another and there is rarely no major decision that I make that I don't hear the perspective of most people in our office. The reality is I don't know it all and it's important that we all recognize this and value the perspectives from others in our office (as well as outside our office) as we try and get to best possible place for Penn and its student-athletes.
 
4.Can you share with the NAADD membership the technology that you and your team at Penn are using both internally and externally?
We use a proprietary database that is your basic donor management database—those who use Raiser's Edge, Advantage, etc. would be familiar with its functionality. For ticketing we use Paciolan.
 
Our donor database has ran its course and we're expecting to replace it in the next couple of years and will probably transition to a more name brand tool. We are also piloting Venmo across the University and are expecting to be able to start using that as a tool, which we see as critical to the engagement and acquisition of the young alumni population.
 
Along with everyone else reading this, we are also using a lot of Zoom/FaceTime/MS Teams both internally and externally. Personally, I think as we transition back to a more normal lifestyle there is going to be an increased desire to use this tools with donors, but based on what I have witnessed to date, I don't believe they will replace face-to-face interaction.
 
5.In addition, can you tell the NAADD membership about the largest individual ask you yourself have made? Tell the story, did you get the ask? Why or why not?
**FYI, the below is about an anonymous donor and an anonymous amount, so I have left out details that could identify the project/sport/donor
 
All capital projects at Penn need to be privately financed through philanthropy (very rarely are there shared University funds and even more rarely are there city or state funds available), so our capital project always carry a significant fundraising burden. One particular building project carried a $30M price tag and we were fortunate that we had two families with significant capacity as well as the inclination to support the project.
 
We spent close to 18 months working with both families with the hope that they would split the cost the building equally. However, as the months passed, family #1 was reluctant to commit at which point we weren't 100% sure we were going to have a project. We went to family #2 and made an ask for the entire $30M, which thankfully they agreed to. This provided us rare leverage and the ability to go back to family #1 knowing that even though they were non-committal at the time, they really wanted their name associated with this project. Family #1 ended making a transformational gift in their own right, so family #2's commitment was less than $30M in the end, but we did successfully make the ask at the $30M level.
 
6. You have worked at various Division I institutions in development. Can you speak on all those opportunities and how they all differ or are similar?
I have been fortunate to work at three different institutions that are member institutions of three different conferences. Aside from all three being located in large cities (Washington, D.C., Nashville and Philadelphia), all three are small to mid-sized private institutions.  From a fundraising perspective, at all three stops we had dual reporting lines to the AD's office as well as to central advancement. With any organizational structure there are pros and cons, but I found this to be truly advantageous to our mission in the athletics department as any time you can gain fresh perspectives from extremely smart and successful people that aren't living and breathing college athletics everyday it should be considered a positive.
 
Working at institutions in the A-10, SEC and now the Ivy League, has exposed me to a varied set of experiences as well as a wide range of expectations from each constituent group. These multiple stops have given me an appreciation for the different models that colleges and universities employ to execute their work, but more importantly it's taught me that each college/university has an identity and culture that was well established long before you got there and that will be there well after you leave. It's important that you're able to bring something new to the table while respecting the identity of the institution and being able to meaningfully connect with the supporters that makeup that identify.  
 
7.Given the current circumstances, how have you changed your approach and strategy surrounding alumni relations and activities?
One unique item about Penn is that we have a somewhat siloed approach to fundraising in the sense that our priority is to raise annual money by sport as opposed to prioritizing an unrestricted centralized fund.  While I wouldn't advocate for this model everywhere, it does work extremely well for us and one of the positive byproducts for us is that we have built very strong communities by sport.  This allowed us to quickly transition into the Zoom world where we set up town hall style calls for all 33 of our teams as well as a couple featuring our director of athletics.
 
In addition, in attempt to create more of connection between former players (as opposed to having an interactive session with a coach/administrator) we set up "decade calls" across many sports where former players/managers from a specific decade were able to connect with the coaching staffs, former teammates as well as network with former players/managers that they had never met.
 
Lastly, we held a Zoom call with all three of our current NFL players and a former MLB player who is now a studio host, which both were big hits.  Through all of our virtual meetings/town halls, we were able to connect with close to 2,000 people and keep them engaged with Penn Athletics during this time.   
 
Over the six or seven weeks we did a lot of video conferences and phone calls just checking in on our donors and making sure they were staying healthy, but also letting them know that we are here to help in any way that we can.
 
We have made a University-wide decision to return to active fundraising over the last week or so and the early returns have been very positive.  ~35% of our annual fund traditionally comes in during the months of May and June, so the next several weeks will be critical to our financial year and we're hoping that our engagement strategy during the first seven weeks of lockdown will help in that regard.
 
8.Also, during this time, how have you been engaging your team and engaging with donors? Do you find yourself communicating more frequently to your team? Are you taking a different approach? How has your strategy continued to evolve?
I think a lot of what I wrote for the previous question is applicable here, but I'll add that we tried to immediately get into a routine. With so much uncertainty and fluidity surrounding the situation we find ourselves in, we felt it important to establish some items people could count on regularly. We have staff meetings twice a week on Tuesday and Friday mornings and I have a standing 1:1 with everyone in our office at least once every other week. Our team is at its best when it's feeding off one another and the fact that energy is not being created daily in the same ways as before because we aren't in our office has been one of the hardest things to overcome, but we're doing what we can to stay connected to one another. There are some staff meetings that could be shorter then they end up being, but I see that need and desire for our staff to interact with each other and more often than not we end up using the full 45 minutes to an hour even if it's not always completely work related items we're discussing.
 
9.Someone asked in the NAADD Online Community and we want to extend this question to you; What is your recommended resource that you use to be 1% better tomorrow than you were yesterday? (i.e. books, blogs, podcasts, webinars, etc.)
I find it important to stay current on industry news, especially because universities/conferences all employ different models to go about their business, so there is so much to learn and take note of from what peers are doing across the country. There are a ton of resources out there (many of them free) to use such as the NACDA Daily Review, the D1 Ticker, Athletic Business, College AD, etc. 
 
I am big believer in continuing to get perspectives from outside the industry as I find it to really help frame some of our thoughts and decisions. I read a lot of non-fiction about people or events I find interesting. Generally these are people that are pioneers in their field or incredible leaders. I also listen to podcasts on my commute or when I am walking the dog and one that I would highly recommend is The Knowledge Project, which also has a weekly email you can sign up for called Brain Food.   
 
10.In conclusion, what is the one piece of advice you would give on how others can leave their mark and continue to succeed at their institution in development?
I don't think people should have a mindset focused on his/her legacy or leaving his/her mark per se. Personally, I think this approach can detract from a true team environment that when created in the right mold, leads to sustained success. That being said, a thought I would share, especially for young people in our profession, would be to resist the urge to focus on title or money early in your career. I know it's hard, but your career is going to be 40+ years long and it's truly a marathon and not a sprint.  I think there's a tendency for people to jump from job to job for a better title and I think in a lot of instances it hurts that person's development.  The grass isn't always greener and I have always felt that in most instances a person's growth curve remains fairly steady for their first couple years at a new institution and begins to grow exponentially after 18 or 24 months.  The majority of the time your skill set will grow much faster and you will learn much more by staying in one place for four years as opposed to taking two different jobs for two years each.  Again, there are exceptions to this, but generally this my perspective on what I see as somewhat of an issue in our industry.   
 
Statement of Thanks:
It's truly an honor to receive this award on behalf of Penn Athletics and the Penn Champions Club. I would like to thank NACDA as we are so lucky to be a part of this incredible organization that fosters collaboration and continued learning across college athletics. In addition, NAADD and the NAADD executive committee have provided so much to me over the years, so it's truly humbling to be honored by an organization and a group of people that I have learned so much from and that I continue to look up to as true leaders in our industry.
 
It was a super conflicting feeling when I found out that I would be receiving this award: on one hand I was ecstatic because it served as a validation point for all the hard work we had put in, but on the other hand I knew that this recognition didn't happen solely because of me and there are so many people that deserve to share in this honor. It all starts with our director of athletics, Dr. M. Grace Calhoun. She arrived at Penn 6 years ago and quickly established a vision for Penn Athletics that's enjoyed complete buy in from our supporters and positively changed the trajectory of our division. This ultimately has made our jobs in the Penn Champions Club a lot easier. She's been a great partner and our staff owes her a thank you for her contributions to our success. I'd like to acknowledge John Zeller and Steve Dare, Penn's SVP and AVP for DAR respectively, for their guidance and involvement surrounding our efforts.
 
Penn Athletics is blessed with one of the most loyal groups of supporters and volunteers and none of what we have accomplished would be possible without their commitment to our University. There are so many to thank, but specifically I want to highlight Jamie Greene, Kate Lyons, Gibb Kane, Mark Werner and Chuck Leitner for not only their support to Penn and mentorship to our staff, but for their alumni engagement and development efforts as part of our campaign steering committee.
 
I feel so fortunate to work alongside such quality people in the Penn Champions Club and I can't thank each of them enough for embracing their roles and making us better with a singular focus on improving the experience of our student-athletes. Each of our team members deserves a piece of this award. If we were all together in person at the Convention, I would ask that they stand up to be recognized by their peers because this award is much more about them then it is about me. They deserve great credit for all they do for Penn.
 
I want to recognize the past winners of this award. I have sat in the room when this award was giving out and remember being in awe about what the recipients accomplished as well as the impressive standard that they set for the profession. It's an honor to be recognized alongside all the past awardees and I hope I represent this honor in an appropriate manner going forward.

There are so many people in our industry that I feel should have their name on this award before me. I have been blessed to work with many of them and want to thank a few:
-Dr. Scarlett Schneider hired me twice and gave me my first opportunity in this business. She has been an incredible friend and mentor and I will forever be indebted for what she taught me and the opportunities she afforded me.
-Mark Carter at Vanderbilt. No one does it better in the business—pure class, intelligence and leadership wrapped into one and I am indebted to him for all that he taught me.
-MG Bailey whom I worked for at GW—he went out of his way to teach me the right way to do things and I am not sure his passion for the business is matched anywhere else.
-Mike Bamonti, Tim House, Jon Kerzetski and Mike Murray: my stomach was sore from laughing so much during the two years we worked together. Looking back, I am not sure how anything got done, but I learned an incredible amount from all of you. You left Penn much better than you found it and I can't thank you enough for all you did for Penn.

Lastly and most importantly, I want to thank my wife, Korin, and my two sons, Declan and Braedan. They sacrifice daily to allow me to pursue this career and truly deserve their own award.
Thank you again to the NAADD community for this great honor and look forward to gathering in person at next year's convention.