Genevieve Shaker

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https://hdl.handle.net/1805/28996

Contributing to Fundraising Practice through Multi-Dimensional Research

Professor Genevieve Shaker's research focus has been on developing and disseminating new research about fundraising and about the fundraising profession. She has conducted several studies, including two about fundraiser job tenure and turnover that have generated knowledge about fundraisers themselves. This work is in alignment with growing attention in the nonprofit scholarly community to the role that fundraisers play in the giving process. Most often, scholars and the public alike focus on donors and the amount of money given to particular nonprofits without adequate consideration of the intermediary. Professor Shaker has a special interest in higher education giving and fundraising. She has conducted several studies in this setting, including a large longitudinal study of giving across 30 years and 400+ institutions, as well as an examination of the philanthropic relationships of fundraisers and major donors in university settings.

Professor Shaker's goal is to strategically share what she has learned through her research -- as well as the insights of other scholars. She does this in a variety of ways including presenting at conferences, teaching for The Fund Raising School, and writing books/articles. In 2021 and 2022, she published two books which translate research into practice. The first, Fundraising for Faculty and Academic Leaders (Palgrave), was co-authored with Aaron Conley and provides a research-based approach for leading advancement teams within the university. The second, Achieving Excellence in Fundraising (5th edition, Wiley), features 39 chapters written by Lilly Family School of Philanthropy faculty, alumni, and affiliates and is the most recent edition of the best selling fundraising textbook. Professor Shaker was the lead editor for the volume.

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Now showing 1 - 10 of 21

The Hybrid and Dualistic Identity of Full-Time Non-Tenure-Track Faculty
(SAGE, 2011-11-01) Levin, John S.; Shaker, Genevieve G.
Colleges and universities rely on full-time non-tenure-track (FTNT) faculty to achieve their teaching, research, and service missions. These faculty are deemed both symptomatic of and partly responsible for academe’s shortcomings. The ascriptions, however, are made with little attention to the faculty themselves or to their consequences for FTNT faculty. Through analysis of interview data of university faculty, the authors present and explain FTNT faculty self-representations of professional and occupational identity. Assumptions drawn from institutional and professional theory contextualize the research, and narrative analysis infuses the application of the framework of cultural identity theory. These FTNT faculty are found to possess hybrid and dualistic identities. Their work and roles are a hybrid and contain some elements of a profession and some of a “job.” Their identity is dualistic because as teachers, they express satisfaction, whereas as members of the professoriate, they articulate restricted self-determination and self-esteem. This troubled and indistinct view of self-as-professional is problematic both for FTNT faculty as they go about their daily work and for their institutions, which are in no small part responsible for the uncertain conditions and identities of FTNT faculty.
Turnover intention and job tenure of US fundraisers
(Wiley, 2022) Shaker, Genevieve G.; Rooney, Patrick M.; Nathan, Sarah K.; Bergdoll, Jonathan J.; Tempel, Eugene R.
Fundraisers secure financial resources that organizations need to achieve their missions. Raising money, particularly large gifts, can follow years of relationship building with individual donors. When fundraisers leave these efforts can be set back substantially, making fundraiser turnover particularly worrisome and worthy of exploration. This analysis addressed the issue with US survey data (n = 1663) and examinination of three research questions. What are the job tenure and intent to leave of fundraisers? How is fundraiser job tenure affected by intent to leave? What relationships do job tenure and intent to leave have with fundraisers' individual demographics, position attributes, and organizational characteristics? We found that the study participants had current mean job tenures of 3.6 years (median = 2 years) and mean tenures across their fundraising jobs of 3.9 years (median = 3 years). Twenty percent intended to leave their organization and 7% intended to leave fundraising within the next year. Of the tested variables, salary consistently had the largest effects and was the most significant. Older and more experienced fundraisers had longer tenures. The study provides nuanced information about fundraisers' job-related behaviors, includes careful attention to theory and related research, and presents specific ideas for organizational interventions for increasing fundraiser tenure.
How donors give to higher education: Insights report
(TIAA Institute, 2020-03) Shaker, Genevieve G.; Borden, Victor M. H.
The public good, productivity and purpose [Summary Report]
(TIAA Institute, 2016) Shaker, Genevieve G.; Plater, William M.
The TIAA Institute commissioned two papers to address the question of how to demonstrate higher education’s contribution to the public good. Genevieve Shaker, editor of a book on faculty and the public good, and William Plater, an emeritus provost, explore higher education’s institutional responsibility to deliver civic value. A companion piece addresses the issue from the perspective of individual faculty members. Another recent article by Shaker and Plater speaks specifically to the responsibility of trustees to ensure higher education’s commitment to the public is met.
The Global Public Good: Students, Higher Education, and Communities of Good
(Higher Learning Research Communications, 2011-10-30) Shaker, Genevieve G.; Plater, William M.
Along with introducing the purpose and cohesion of the essays that form this special issue, we also wish to highlight the force on which all of these lofty hopes depend: educated students. Without question, the authors who wrote these essays understand and appreciate the importance of students, especially as the prepared and empowered agents of future actions that will be sustainably transformative in the conduct of their lives. In fact, students are so pervasively important to most discussions of higher education and the public good, including the UNESCO report, that they are often taken for granted in a rush to address institutional and faculty responsibilities. However, no student of any age or educational goal should ever be far from consideration. They are indeed fully present in the essays that comprise this issue of Higher Learning Research Communications.
The public good, productivity and purpose: New economic models for higher education
(TIAA Institute, 2016) Shaker, Genevieve G.; Plater, William M.
This paper is one of five in the TIAA Institute Higher Education Series: Understanding Academic Productivity, an initiative undertaken in support of NACUBO’s Economic Models Project. That project was launched by NACUBO with the aim to provide colleges and universities with knowledge, ideas and tools to advance the difficult structural, cultural and political changes required for moving to more sustainable economic models. Given NACUBO’s goal of offering thoughtful, objective and credible scholarship on the issues at hand, the TIAA Institute was a natural partner for the project. This paper, written by Genevieve Shaker, author of a recent book on faculty and the public good, and William Plater, an emeritus provost and faculty member, explores the question of how to account for enhancement of the “public good” in the academic productivity equation. The authors address that question here from the perspective of institutional responsibility to deliver civic value; their companion paper, also a part of this series, looks at the issue from the perspective of individual faculty members. Their thoughtful work will help to enrich and elevate the complicated discussions surrounding academic productivity that senior campus leaders face.
Understanding and Supporting Full-Time Non-Tenure-Track Faculty
(Wiley, 2011) Shaker, Genevieve G.; Palmer, Megan M.; Chism, Nancy Van Note
As the face of the American faculty profession changes, targeted academic development becomes more important. A phenomenological qualitative study of full-time, non-tenure-track faculty in English portrays an experience characterized by a love of teaching but fraught with professional challenges stemming from low status and poor reward and recognition structures. These data provide the point of departure for recommendations on expanding organizational and faculty development strategies for supporting, integrating, and encouraging full-time, non-tenure-track faculty.
How donors give to higher education: Research report
(TIAA Institute, 2020-03) Shaker, Genevieve G.; Borden, Victor M. H.
This investigation of U.S. higher education philanthropy examines 30-year trends in higher education philanthropy, specifically exploring the questions: How have the purposes that donors support changed over time? How and for what purposes do different groups of donors give across institutions? We used a longitudinal national sample (1988-2018) of approximately 400 public and private institutions from the Council for Advancement and Support of Education's (CASE) Voluntary Support for Education survey (VSE). In the sample, constituted primarily of 4-year institutions, giving increased by an inflation- adjusted average of 3.6% annually and 175% overall, from $9.1 billion to $25.1 billion during the study period. Donors showed an increasing desire to limit their gifts through restricted giving and supporting current operations rather than capital/endowment purposes. Research was the largest recipient of the restricted current operations dollars. The proportion of current operations dollars for student financial aid declined. All donor types gave more over time. However, organizational donors' contributions increased more as foundation donations surpassed alumni donations. Corporations’ share of the giving declined the most. Organizational donors ultimately gave more to public colleges and universities in comparison to individual donors who gave more to private institutions. Consequently, support for public institutions rose during the study and, by 2018, public institutions received more dollars than did private ones. Adapting to ongoing changes in donor behavior, like those discovered in this study, will require institutions to be increasingly tactical and data-driven. Public approval and higher education revenue models are changing substantially, and institutional leaders must attend to complex external forces while also maintaining mission-driven philanthropic strategies.
A Grounded Theory Study of Major Gift Fundraising Relationships in U.S. Higher Education
(SAGE, 2021-11-26) Shaker, Genevieve G.; Nelson, Deanna
Nurturing relationships with major donors is a priority for nonprofits, and “relationship fundraising” is the dominant paradigm. This grounded theory study addressed practical needs and a dearth of research by analyzing how fundraisers develop relationships. In a first-of-its-kind study, we interviewed 20 pairs of higher education fundraisers and major donors (n = 40) from multiple U.S. institutions. We discovered five tiers of relationships from a basic connection, personalized association, confident relationship, purposeful partnership, to a consequential bond. Fundraisers initiated the progression until the final tier; the theoretical model shows their intentionality in the relationships’ development. Major gifts occurred in all tiers. The model illustrates how fundraisers build relationships, explores donors’ expectations, and affirms the relational nature of major gift fundraising. It provides some of the only empirical evidence regarding major donors, and the relationship fundraising philosophy touted in practitioner literature. The analysis reveals connections to theories from social psychology and relationship marketing.
The Generosity of an Urban Professoriate: Understanding Faculty as Donors and Academic Citizens
(CUMU, 2012-01-01) Shaker, Genevieve G.
Although faculties are often portrayed as institutionally uninvolved, evidence exists that many of them are actually academic citizens who contribute beyond requirements and expectations. Using a phenomenological approach to examine major giving by faculty and their academic citizenship at an urban university, this study of limited sample size shows that faculty citizenship was grounded by philanthropic values such as those that inspired financial giving among the participants.

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