(07-02-2012 09:21 AM)fauowls561 Wrote: (07-02-2012 08:58 AM)arkstfan Wrote: My two cents.
Hope the guy works out but I am utterly convinced most of us are doing it wrong.
I've seen guys come in touted for their skills raising money at SEC schools and the skills required just don't transfer. I'll never forget the AD who led our transition from I-AA to I-A. He needed to raise a bit over $1 million back in 1990 and thought it would be a piece of cake. He was used to making 5-10 phone calls at Bama and one of those calls would produce $1 million.
Most of us don't have an ample pool of people willing to cut a $1 million check or a $5 million check. The Ohio States, Bamas, and USCs of the world have cultivated a large number of fans and out of that a large number of potential big hitters.
At ASU for example we have one section of the stadium where the season ticket holders pay $61.67 a game (ticket plus donation) and two full and three partial sections where people pay $45 a game (ticket plus donation). The average ticket holder at Florida pays $437 per game but you can get in the stadium at $51.29 pergame. The average ticket holder at Arkansas pays just over $220 per game but $53.57 will get you in.
You are dealing with a wholly different market.
Schools need to quit trying to hire people to run their program like a mini-Ohio State or Florida. You wouldn't want an NFL marketing person for Green Bay or Denver where there are long waiting lists for tickets running the marketing the Jaguars where they struggle to sell tickets because those guys don't understand the dynamics of struggling to sell tickets. Give me someone who has turned around a lower division team or someone who has done marketing in Major League Soccer or minor league baseball who understands what it means to hustle and is willing to do something other than try to replicate the situation they walked into as an assistant where all they had to do was work the EXISTING database of big dollar donors.
I get what you are saying, but I don't think there is just one right way to do this. You hire the person, not the resume. Just because someone has worked at a place like Ohio State doesn't mean he doesn't "get" how to do the job at a smaller program. You talk to as many candidates as possible and hire the best fit, regardless of where they came from. FAU interviewed many different kinds of candidates, including ADs and Assistant ADs at I-AA programs. I'd like to think they chose Chun because he was the best person to fill the position and not just because of where he came from.
Without question everyone hires the person who looks like the best candidate in the pool. I'm just not sure we fish enough different places. You won't catch much salmon fishing the banks of the Mississippi and won't catch many marlin fishing the inland waterway.
There are great candidates out there wanting to move from a big name school who get what it is that needs to be done. I just think we could improve our odds fishing some different holes as well. Look at the Pac-12. They hired a commissioner with no real college background and so far that has been a home run.
I'm not sure being on staff at Oklahoma State when T. Boone wrote a fat check means anyone at Ok State is a good fund-raiser. I suspect Pickens was such a fan that all it took was not pissing him off. The largest donation ASU's academic side has ever received came when an alum who received the stock end of year beat the tax deadline with a donation letter called them up. The VP in charge of fund-raising most certainly updated his resume to say that in his time the university received its largest ever donation but that doesn't mean he did anything that every school in the nation isn't doing. That nickle just happened to turn up a jackpot.
Texas may well have people on staff who could become an AD in CUSA or Sun Belt and do incredible things that are innovative and creative but it might also produce people who think you get $1 million by placing a call to the five largest donors.
I just want to see schools broaden their searches to go after people who are used to promoting and market teams and programs that aren't the biggest game in town.
Most schools award donor benefits on a sliding scale. Give X and you get these benefits. Give X+ $500 and move to a higher level. Its pretty much stock practice around the country. Yet that isn't the system airlines and hotels use in their loyalty programs. They award points that vary by money spent and the type of activity. You choose how to use your points. Want a free room or free flight? You can do that. Want to use the points to upgrade your regular priced flight or room to a suite or first class? You do that. Want to use your points to get a new laptop or a new GPS for your car? They'll let you do that too. The booster club for Sporting Kansas City lets you choose perks like free tickets to road games, merchandise, or food, soft drinks, or beer at the stadium.
I don't know of any school that does that.
I suspect we lose some money because people say "I like the tailgating in the lot in the back corner better than the one close to the stadium, so I'll donate at that lower level and stay in my current parking lot."