“How can you win if you can’t see the scoreboard?” Susie Egr – my favorite supervisor back in my retail days used to often ask in her tours. Her coaching was gold; at that stage in my development as a leader and a manager proved to be not only right on, but the challenges were invigorating, empowering and most of all – results oriented. “The behaviors that drive results;” was a phrase my team and I were very used to hearing and implementing; not surprisingly, when we wrapped our minds around the principal, it proved incredibly valuable.
A fact is a fact is a fact:
In sponsorship, this same principle can be applied. As a sponsorship opportunity representative, there’s likely a routine that you have in place for analyzing efforts. These are the things you have established as critical information; it’s what you need to know in order to even begin to report value of what transpired to those who care (supervisors, partners, internal implementers, board of directors, etc). Ex: Reviewing reports, crunching numbers, uncovering growth or lack thereof, comparing this year to last year, logging how your efforts were implemented, noting the state of the economy or outside impacting factors, consider your projections vs. your realities, etc… The first round of these efforts is fact – it is what it is. Basically put the entire experience under a magnifying glass and observe away. These things are not arguable, they are statements of reality; “our sales at the concessions stand went up 8 percent this year; and the average attendee ranked this experience at a 9 vs. last year at a 4.”
Infer based on fact:
Once you have established some clear and valuable facts; you can start inferring what I call the “whys.” X happened because Y happened. You tie a result to an action step; “we had more volunteer support this year than last year, from 76 to 89. There were more volunteers this year because: a- our sponsor involved their internal staff this year with 15 more volunteers than last year; b- we promoted the opportunity through social media over 4 different mediums for 6 weeks; c – we rewarded our volunteers with 5 free tickets to the event, plus held a “thank you” party on their behalf.” This step is critical because if you stop at the results, you never understand why you got the results that you did – you end up crippling your ability to plan well for your next year/effort. When you make logical inferences, you’re then able to speak to the root cause of that result. Perhaps you were talented in your ability to implement and activate, but if you can’t speak to why, you just look plain lucky – and we all know that luck runs out at some point; you know this and your partner knows this.
Behaviors:
You can break this down even further. “Sarah Smith was in charge of our sponsors this year. She visited our partner and met with their management team, drew up a plan to invite internal staff to volunteer, and offered sign up forms that were distributed throughout each department with clear instructions for how and why to be involved. Last year we did not offer these forms – it was all web based sign ups. In addition, the thank you party was a huge success, with a motivating speech, food and ‘dress rehearsal’ skit of what to expect; volunteers ranked their level of excitement and preparation for the event at an 8 instead of a 5 last year.” This is clearly just an example, but can you see how this string of thought processes enables a manager to more clearly communicate to the appropriate individuals what’s working and how the partnership proved valuable. You can even take this information back to a chat with Sarah Smith to say, thanks for your efforts – your ability to motivate and inspire as well as plan and drive execution resulted in ….” You get the picture. Obviously before you can report on these insights, you must have accurate reports to reference which point back in support of your inferences. This builds credibility and strengthens your insights. Sponsors can be like small children, always asking “why?” especially when you are inferring something that might be a behavior you want to see from them. It’s easy to argue with opinion, but it’s tough to argue with supported numbers.
So… what does this have to do with sponsorship best practices?
Before you start thinking you just read a blog on management and reporting vs. sponsorship, let me explain to you why this is so incredibly relevant. Being able to drive behaviors that achieve results can make or break the longevity and success of a sponsorship opportunity. When you can speak intelligently to what works and what doesn’t, your sponsorship partners are more open to getting creative, they trust your insights, and they can speak intelligently to their superiors about why they should continue the relationship with you. What's more, you drive accountability and leverage strenghts. Money is tight, sponsorship is competitive, people require helpful reporting as your partner and it can be the reason they don’t come back if you don’t report well or in a timely manner. When you report, stay accurate. Sponsors appreciate knowing what worked and why; as well as what didn’t work, or were your opportunities were - along with a proposed solution. If you can get their wheels spinning around how to improve an effort for the next year, you’ve already got them thinking about the future of your relationship. When you know the behaviors that drive results you can create action plans around what you want to see happen.
Here’s another reason. During all my time in management, the number one reason why I see individuals failing in certain positions is a lack of role clarity and the ability to speak intelligently to the cause and result of their efforts. Once they can do this, you’ve empowered them to self motivate and self adjust. If you can coach your team (or if you’re not the coach, if you can proactively figure this out) what’s working and what’s not, you will be able to see the mood elevator in your team improve, the ability to lead and earn the respect of your team will be easier to maintain, and you will be better able to inspire and motivate towards a behavior that drives a result.
So do you know what your scoreboard reads? Any great examples on reporting – inspire the sponsorship community with your examples!