Bring order to how gifts move, get coded and get governed.
Governance, gift-processing controls and operational clarity—built around the systems, vendors and staff capacity you already have.
Raiser's Edge NXT · Salesforce · Microsoft 365 · Power Automate · DMBOK-aligned
Designed for organizations outgrowing ad hoc process.
A practical fit when:
- Gift processing and reconciliation depend on one person's memory.
- Coding is inconsistent between Finance and Fundraising.
- No one can say who owns a given data or process decision.
- A vendor manages part of your data or gift processing with little oversight.
- Multiple chapters, regions or affiliates complicate gift allocation.
- You want a governance foundation, not a five-year policy library.
Questions this answers:
- Who is accountable if a gift is coded or receipted incorrectly?
- What happens if the person who understands our process leaves?
- Can we show an auditor or board that our controls hold up?
- What should we fix first?
Fundraising Operations Assessment
An eight-week, fixed-scope engagement that establishes governance foundations, stabilizes the highest-risk gift-processing controls, assesses current-state systems and vendor dependencies, and produces a prioritized implementation roadmap.
Discuss an Operations AssessmentTypical inputs
- Current policies, procedures and org chart
- Gift-processing and reconciliation samples
- Vendor contracts and service outputs
- Access to Finance, Fundraising and Data Operations stakeholders
What you receive
- Governance charter, RACI and decision-rights matrix
- Gift-processing procedure and reconciliation framework
- Current-state system and data-flow assessment
- Team workload and responsibility assessment
- Prioritized, phased roadmap
Six focus areas. Scoped to what you need.
The Fundraising Operations Assessment above is built from these six areas. Most engagements scope in two or three—governance, gift-processing and coding are the most common starting point. Nothing here is a separate purchase; it's how the one engagement gets tailored to your situation.
Governance foundations
- Data governance charter
- Governance committee terms of reference
- Accountability RACI model
- Ownership and decision-rights matrix
Gift-processing and reconciliation controls
- Gift processing procedure, intake through receipting
- Revenue reconciliation framework
- Exception handling and escalation rules
- Control calendar
Finance-fundraising coding and allocation models
- GL account and revenue coding model requirements
- Multi-chapter or multi-entity gift allocation standard (scope)
- Finance–Philanthropy alignment sessions
- Coding crosswalk documentation
Vendor account and service control frameworks
- Vendor account control framework
- Data receipt, recording and acknowledgement checks
- Service-output quality checks
- Issue log and escalation process
Data, technology and knowledge management assessment
- Current-state system inventory
- End-to-end donation data flow map
- Source-of-truth matrix
- Microsoft 365 knowledgebase concept (SharePoint, Teams, Copilot agent)
Data operations team assessment
- Responsibility mapping
- Workload assessment
- Operational pain-point analysis
- Efficiency recommendations
A practical boundary
Governance comes before policy-writing. The engagement prioritizes assessment, accountability and stabilization over drafting every policy on day one. Detailed procedures, coding-model finalization and system changes follow only once governance, ownership and current-state risk are understood.
Reporting definitions and BI-ready data quality are addressed under Analytics Services.
Assess. Stabilize. Map. Roadmap.
Assess
Clarify governance gaps, current controls and stakeholder accountability.
Stabilize
Document and control the highest-risk gift-processing and reconciliation activities.
Map
Assess systems, data flows, vendor dependencies and team capacity.
Roadmap
Deliver a prioritized, phased implementation plan.
What growing organizations usually ask
Do you replace our CRM or vendor?
No. This builds governance and control around the systems and vendors you already use.
Will this slow down gift processing during the engagement?
No—stabilizing gift processing is a priority deliverable, not a byproduct.
Do you write every policy for us?
No. Policy drafting is intentionally sequenced after governance and ownership decisions are made; policies written before that get rewritten.
How long does this take?
The initial assessment runs about eight weeks. The resulting roadmap is phased over the following months.
What does our team receive at the end?
A governance charter, documented controls, a current-state assessment, and a prioritized roadmap your team owns.
Bring one governance or control problem—not a finished specification.
A short conversation can determine whether an Operations Assessment or a smaller internal fix is the right next step.