Petrus Blog

Welcome to Season 4 of the Petrus Development Show. Today Andrew is joined by our newest team member, Joelle Fitzmaurice, Junior Consultant with Petrus Development. In this episode, Andrew and Joelle visit about her background, what brought her into the fundraising world and what she’s learning and doing so far with Petrus.

Show Notes:

Background

While she now resides outside of Washington D.C., Joelle is originally from small town Wisconsin. When deciding on college, it was important to her to keep her Catholic faith during college and decided on Belmont Abbey College in North Carolina. During college she interned with the Alumni Program which was her first stint in fundraising. After college she worked in politics before being called into missions and connected with FOCUS, where she worked for two years. In June of 2021, she came on board at Petrus Development.

Fundraising for FOCUS

How did participants react to fundraising? Those that are familiar with fundraising...

 By Mary Hernandez, Petrus Blog Contributor

Online giving days have been growing in popularity and reached compulsory status since the pandemic forced non-profits out of the rhythm of traditional in-person fundraising events. Whether you will participate in #GivingTuesday, her Catholic cousin #iGiveCatholic, or another online giving day that has traction in your region, these strategies can help to guide you in developing a successful online giving day plan.

RECOGNIZE AND BUILD YOUR TEAM

Online giving days are built to capitalize on the power of crowdfunding. First-time giving day participants can get discouraged after a poor showing on a giving day if their strategy consists of harnessing the power of the crowd by sharing a social media post (even a really compelling one) and expecting dollars to flow in. The crowd is a bit of a misnomer here. I rather liken a giving day to teamfunding. You may not know all the folks in a crowd, but you do...

By Mary Hernandez, Petrus Blog Contributor

Three Cheers for the Class Gift

The class gift tradition is widely recognized in educational circles. Schools have received benches, statues, fountains, trees, and other commemorative items from grateful grads. Many Catholic ministries have invited their graduates to consider participating in a monetary Class Gift. This type of Class Gift is one of the most significant ways for a graduate to leave a legacy, support future students who will find their home at the Catholic Center on campus, and participate in its mission. This initiative builds an automatic connection between the ministry and its alumni, leaves room for flexibility and growth, and naturally provides many opportunities for stewardship and alumni celebrations as giving milestones are reached. There is no downside to implementing a Class Gift in your ministry.

Learn More about the Class Gift

Teach Students to Give Early and Often

But why wait...

In this episode, Andrew visits with Cory Howat, Executive Director of the Catholic Community Foundation of the Archdiocese of New Orleans and the founder of #iGiveCatholic. If you have ever spoken with anyone from Louisiana, odds are you have heard a good story. Today, Cory shared with us some wild tales of rubber chickens, crying with priests and bishops and even a brief mention of that time he met Michael Jackson that will not disappoint. In the midst of those stories, he also shared so many nuggets of wisdom about fundraising, stewardship, generosity and having a heart for serving the people of the Church. You’ll laugh, you’ll probably cry and you will definitely learn something new about development.

Show Notes:

Cory Howat, Executive Director of the Catholic Community Foundation of the Archdiocese of New Orleans and the founder of #iGiveCatholic

Background

A prayer in his junior year of high school, "Lord, use me."

He became familiar with...

In this episode, Andrew visits with Sarah Du Preez, Director of Development for the St. Thomas Aquinas University Parish at University of Arkansas. Sarah started in her role last summer, which happened to be the same week that the ministry kicked off a feasibility study for a $12.5 million dollar capital campaign. They discuss Sarah's experience in development and her track record of success working on big projects, as well as being nervous and a bit apprehensive about her new role because of the enormity of the project they are in the midst of.

Today, they are sitting down together at the official launch of the campaign and next year, they will sit down again for a part 2 conversation about what she has learned through the process. And we are pleased to be here for the journey!

Show Notes:

Sarah Du Preez, Director of Development for the St. Thomas Aquinas University Parish at University of Arkansas. 

This is part 1 of A Campaign Story

Background

Grew up in...

In this episode, Andrew visits with Kevin Cotter, Executive Director of Amazing Parishes, a ministry of the church that offers instruction and education to pastors as well as coaching to help them develop a team around them to make their parish amazing. We all know and have experienced our church leadership transitioning over the years. Many priests and pastors struggle to know how to lead and how to build up an enduring leadership team that can survive those transitions, illustrating a point that parish leadership is so important and critical to the community and to the lives of the parishioners. In this episode, Andrew and Kevin dive into this issue as well as discussing the importance of the apprenticeship model in the church and the need for a strong prayer life both personally and professionally. 

Amazing Parish will be gathering for their 2021 conference in Kansas City on June 21-23. Please pray for everyone involved in that and if you want more information...

By Mary Hernandez, Petrus Blog Contributor

What is it about a photograph that draws a person in and compels one to fixate on the point of interest long enough to find himself somewhere in that captured landscape?

My photographer friend Amy explained the Rule of Thirds in photography - which is not so much a rule as it is a principle – that tells us "how the human eye perceives beauty." 

"Our eyes are drawn to the brightest, most compelling parts of an image.  That point is made compelling because of how it is framed, what surrounds it, and what relation it has to the picture as a whole.”  Practically speaking, "the composition of a photo places the subject at the intersection that is divided into thirds, both horizontally and vertically. " This is known in the photography world as the crash point. Amy goes on to explain, "As a whole, it tells a story, and we are drawn to the whole story, not just the singular collection of pixels that makes...

By Mary P. Walker, Petrus Blog Contributor & Local Charity Board Member

In-Person Conferences: They’re BACK!!!

For over a year, we’ve zoomed our way through classes, conferences and special events. I have two fundraising lunches and a state convention on my calendar in the next month. In-person events are BACK! And, masking for the vaccinated is no longer recommended!

Yet, we’ve been conditioned over the last year to keep our distance and cover our faces. Do you automatically add some distance when you walk past somebody? I do. We’ve all changed our behaviors, AND made judgments about: (1) how people are over or under reacting to the risk of disease; (2) the response of our civil authorities to the disease; (3) the response of our Church and ministry programs; and (4) our personal levels of risk tolerance.

With the Petrus Conference just around the corner, and the three in-person events on my calendar in the next month, how are these dynamics going to...

In this fourth episode of the Blueprint for Development series, we dive into Major Gifts. Tara Doyon, Director of Client Services and Josh Whelan, Vice President of Petrus Development, will take you through the first four areas to look at when building a fruitful and successful Major Gifts program. They also discuss the buzz word process of Moves-Management, what steps to take to get started and setting your mindset for building the Kingdom through development and evangelization. 

In case you missed the previous episodes in this series, you can find them here:

Blueprint for Development: Infrastructure

Blueprint for Development: Communications

Blueprint for Development: Annual Fund

Show Notes:

Major Gift fundraising all starts with relationships and having deep relationships with your benefactors. A common mistake is believing that fundraising is just going around and playing golf and taking people to happy hour and the money just rolls in. Unfortunately, there is no...

In this episode, the Blueprint for Development series is on it's third installment. Tara and Sarah are back with Annual Funds, also known as an operating budget or director's fund. How can you create a new or sustainable development program that doesn't depend solely on that one event or those 1-2 major donors? Tara and Sarah give some great starting tips on making that change from dependence to sustainable. 

If you missed the first two episodes in this series, you can find them here:

Blueprint for Development: Infrastructure

Blueprint for Development: Communications

Show Notes:

Tara and Sarah are back in this third installment of the "Blueprint for Development" series, discussing Annual Funds, aka operating budget or director's fund. 

This is your general operating funds that come in from donations. Funds that you can generally count on as part of your general budget. 

Due to 2020, there's a need to look more critically at annual funds. Parishes especially have...