buy in - all the way in

We all realize that each of our donor bases consists or a variety of constituents with different levels of interest (or in some cases active disinterest) in our organizations.  One of the audiences that we consistently tend to look through rather than at are our coworkers.  Employee campaigns and ideas have come and gone and come and gone.  The majority of higher education institutions will find that their employee donor files look much like their alumni files - the more recent the graduation or start date, the lower the chance of giving.

The flip side of that reality is that with career mobility at an all time high, we all have fewer and fewer "lifers" and more and more "new" employees.  Those that come from other institutions may know enough to give on their own (depending upon how good that institution was at teaching them to do so) but many will not be aware of that aspect.

The most difficult portion of this is that donors are better employees.  Period.  They are more engaged, involved and interested.  They have some personal stake in the effort and an understanding of how your organization functions.

It is a chicken and egg issue - they don't give because they are not engaged but are not engaged because they don't give.  Ramping up your communications with employees who do not give is crucial.  Get a good student who is attending because of the support of donors to speak to them and explain what difference they can make.  Even better create an opportunity for them to fund a scholarship and then have the student who gets that scholarship be responsible for thanking and soliciting other employees to give.  Most importantly, engage them.  Simply because they are on campus and insiders to what is going on does not mean they "know."  Most likely they don't know at all.  Getting them to pay attention is up to you.