Solicitor Goals

Stephen Pappas

Is there a way to set a monthly solicitor goal that starts afresh automatically at the beginning of the following month? I know how to set the goal for a solicitor but don't want to have to go in each month to start a new one and delete the previous one but rather have an ongoing goal that resets each month.


Thanks!

JoAnn Strommen

Not a way to do this of which I'm aware. Sorry.

Keri Barnhart

Stephen Pappas:

Is there a way to set a monthly solicitor goal that starts afresh automatically at the beginning of the following month? I know how to set the goal for a solicitor but don't want to have to go in each month to start a new one and delete the previous one but rather have an ongoing goal that resets each month.


Thanks!

We do something similar on an annual basis, but it's not for campaign, fund, or appeal goals. We have goals for actions, total credited-to-solicitor gifts, and proposal counts/types. Depending on the goal you're calculating, you might set up an Unspecified Goal and use the Category to identify the Year/Month of the goal. It doesn't work with the built-in reporting tools, but at least you don't have to lose that goal information. You can import Solicitor Goals, so you can add the year's worth in one go, then export specific goal categories and amounts to use in your external reports.


That is how we do it. Since we use the goals to aid in Moves Management, they're thing like "Discovery Actions" or "Solicitation Actions". We put the goal count in the amount (it's a $ instead of a plain number, but excel doesn't care), then export all active goals and all Actions for the date range. I have a formula for each of our solicitors that looks up the action type that matches the goal name, then counts the number of actions that match. It reports that number next to the original goal amount and we can evaluate the solicitors on whether they met their individual goals and their overall activity. It was a little complex to set up because of the sheer number of goals and using it for three different types of data (which meant 4 query exports to grab it all), but I don't actually have to do anything to run it now except export the queries and refresh the tables, so it's not so bad. If we add or remove goal types, it will automatically adapt, because of how we named the goals.


You could do it for Campaign, Fund, or Appeal goals, too, you'd just have to create Unspecified goals instead of using the provided types, and you'd have to figure out how to get your data and external reporting tools to work together. It will be up to you and your team if it's worth the time and effort to build something like this. Once you're doing the reporting on unspecified goals outside of RE, it's almost a question of whether it's worth even maintaining the goal list in the database (we say yes for historical records, but ours are annual, not monthly).

Stephen Pappas

Thanks Keri and JoAnn for your responses. Keri, I will review your response more in depth and see if that seems like a good solution for us.


Thanks again!


Keri Barnhart:

Stephen Pappas:

Is there a way to set a monthly solicitor goal that starts afresh automatically at the beginning of the following month? I know how to set the goal for a solicitor but don't want to have to go in each month to start a new one and delete the previous one but rather have an ongoing goal that resets each month.


Thanks!

We do something similar on an annual basis, but it's not for campaign, fund, or appeal goals. We have goals for actions, total credited-to-solicitor gifts, and proposal counts/types. Depending on the goal you're calculating, you might set up an Unspecified Goal and use the Category to identify the Year/Month of the goal. It doesn't work with the built-in reporting tools, but at least you don't have to lose that goal information. You can import Solicitor Goals, so you can add the year's worth in one go, then export specific goal categories and amounts to use in your external reports.


That is how we do it. Since we use the goals to aid in Moves Management, they're thing like "Discovery Actions" or "Solicitation Actions". We put the goal count in the amount (it's a $ instead of a plain number, but excel doesn't care), then export all active goals and all Actions for the date range. I have a formula for each of our solicitors that looks up the action type that matches the goal name, then counts the number of actions that match. It reports that number next to the original goal amount and we can evaluate the solicitors on whether they met their individual goals and their overall activity. It was a little complex to set up because of the sheer number of goals and using it for three different types of data (which meant 4 query exports to grab it all), but I don't actually have to do anything to run it now except export the queries and refresh the tables, so it's not so bad. If we add or remove goal types, it will automatically adapt, because of how we named the goals.


You could do it for Campaign, Fund, or Appeal goals, too, you'd just have to create Unspecified goals instead of using the provided types, and you'd have to figure out how to get your data and external reporting tools to work together. It will be up to you and your team if it's worth the time and effort to build something like this. Once you're doing the reporting on unspecified goals outside of RE, it's almost a question of whether it's worth even maintaining the goal list in the database (we say yes for historical records, but ours are annual, not monthly).