Strategic Talent Management: Transforming Advancement Talent into a Strategic Advantage

Faculty

Conference Co-chairs

Jon Derek Croteau
Senior Consultant
Witt/Kieffer

Jon Derek Croteau's experience in higher education and nonprofit organizations encompasses human capital assessment, leadership and management. Based in Rochester, N.Y., he is a senior consultant with Witt/Kieffer's education, academic medicine and not-for-profit practices. He has conducted numerous executive searches and human capital assessments for universities, colleges, healthcare organizations, foundations and other nnprofit groups.

Prior to joining Witt/Kieffer Croteau served as assistant vice president for campaign planning and operations and assistant vice president for advancement services/director of organizational development and human capital management for Carnegie Mellon University.

He publishes and presents regularly on talent management topics. He is the author of The People First Approach: A Guide for Recruiting, Developing and Retaining the Right People and Making the Case for Leadership: Profiles of Chief Advancement Officers in Higher Education. He is on the editorial board for the International Journal of Educational Advancement, and is adjunct professor at the Warner School of Education at the University of Rochester.

Croteau has served on the Emerson College Alumni Association Executive Board of Directors, and the Board of Ambassadors for the Home for Little Wanderers and was a mentor for Point Foundation.

---

Christine Rawak
Assistant Vice President, Talent Management and Development Operations
University of Michigan

Christine Rawak is the assistant vice president for talent management and development operations at the University of Michigan. She is responsible for facilitating the overall strategy of talent and financial resources and programs in support of the fundraising goals at the university. She has specific oversight for finance and administration and talent management teams, which includes Recruitment and Human Resources and Development Community Learning.

Rawak received her bachelor's degree in management and communications from the University of Michigan in 1992 and a master's degree in communications from Northwestern University in 2003. Prior to coming to the Office of University Development in 2004, she was director of personnel and business resources in the Office of Alumni Relations and Development at Northwestern University. She started at Northwestern University in 1996 as manager of personnel staffing, before being promoted to director. Prior to her time at Northwestern, she was the assistant women's swimming coach at U-M from 1992-1996.

---

Visiting Faculty

Amy Bronson
Director of Recruitment and Professional Development
Boston University

Amy Bronson is the director of recruitment and professional training at Boston University where she is engaged in building an outstanding team of advancement professionals who are undertaking an enormous challenge: the first comprehensive campaign in the history of the university.

Prior to joining BU in September 2010, Bronson led the strategic staffing initiative for the Light the World Campaign at Boston College, managing the recruitment effort and everything from on-boarding to succession planning for more than 100 new staff for the Office of University Advancement. Before joining BC in 2005, she was at Harvard Law School where her many roles included working in special events, curriculum planning and program administration for executive legal education, and as a fundraiser and administrator at Baker House Alumni Center. Her prior experience includes working for Tiffany & Co. in Chicago and Houston and teaching in Athens, Greece. With more than 15 years of advancement experience, Bronson has presented at numerous CASE and other conferences and is at the forefront of talent management in the nonprofit sector.

Bronson is a graduate of the University of Michigan.

---

Ann Root Keith
Chief Operating Officer
Dartmouth College

Ann Root Keith came to Dartmouth in 2002, during the planning period of its $1.3 billion "Campaign for the Dartmouth Experience." During these eight years, she has held the positions of director of leadership giving, associate vice president for individual giving, and associate vice president for development administration. As chief operating officer for the Advancement division, she overseers an integrated approach to the planning, fiscal, business operations, and support services of Alumni Relations, Development and Public Affairs.

Keith began her career in advancement at her alma mater, Mount Holyoke College, where she gained experience in annual and major giving, also working from a regional office in New York as part a $200 million campaign. In between periods of service at MHC, she worked at the National Cathedral in Washington, D.C., where she served first as director of annual giving and then as associate director of development. Prior to coming to Dartmouth, she was an associate in Goldman Sachs' Private Wealth Management group.

Keith holds a bachelor's degree in mathematics from Mount Holyoke College and a master's degree in business administration from Harvard University.

---

Jerry May
Vice President for Development
University of Michigan

Jerry May is the vice president for development at the University of Michigan, where he has responsibility for all fundraising activities. At Michigan he was responsible for planning and implementing "The Michigan Difference" campaign, which exceeded its $2.5 billion goal to raise a record-setting $3.2 billion at its conclusion in December 2008.

Before becoming vice president at Michigan, May was the vice president for development at The Ohio State University and president of The Ohio State University Foundation. At Ohio State, he planned and implemented the most successful campaign in the school's history, raising $1.23 billion. Prior to OSU, he spent 13 years at Michigan in various senior fundraising positions. During that time, he helped plan the campaign and lead the nucleus fund in Michigan's $1.4 billion campaign.

May is a regular speaker at development and higher education conferences across the country and is a member of CASE's Board of Trustees, dean of the Big Ten Fund Raisers Institute, and a director of Fifth Third Bank of East Michigan. A native of Michigan, he holds degrees from Hope College and the University of Vermont and did graduate work at the University of Michigan.

---

Scott Nichols
Senior Vice President for Development and Alumni Relations
Boston University

Scott Nichols is the senior vice president for development and alumni relations at Boston University. He is responsible for all areas of advancement. He joined BU in May 2006 as vice president for development and alumni relations, overseeing a staff of 150. Formerly, he was chief advancement officer and associate dean at the Harvard Law School for 20 years. During his tenure at Harvard, which consolidated all advancement functions, he helped to engineer two long-range planning processes that both led to successful campaigns. The first was the $150 million "Campaign for Harvard Law School," an unprecedented effort that was five times larger than any previous capital campaign in legal education. Nichols also spearheaded "Setting the Standard: The Harvard Law School Campaign" that raised $480 million.

Nichols served DePaul University from 1980-86, initially as director of development then as associate vice president. He was also director of annual giving at Northwestern University and held a variety of advancement positions at Bucknell University, including director of alumni relations. He began his career teaching in Morocco as a Peace Corps volunteer.

Holding an undergraduate degree in economics from Bucknell, he obtained masters and doctorate degrees in educational administration from the University of Pennsylvania. Active in the profession, Nichols is a co-author of five books on advancement and was a longstanding trustee of the Council for Advancement and Support of Education (CASE), chairing the International Committee of the Board and the At-Large Nominating Committee. He was also a trustee of CASE Europe and vice chair of the CASE Commission on Philanthropy. Nichols has also served as a trustee of Bucknell University for over 17 years and is on the Executive Committee.

At Boston College, he serves as an advisory board member for the Center on Wealth and Philanthropy. In addition, he has taught the philanthropy module for many years in the Harvard Seminar for New Presidents, the Management Development Program and the Institute for Educational Management. He is currently leading a potential $1 billion campaign for Boston University.

---

Allen Peckham
Chief Development Officer
Partners Healthcare System

Allen Peckham is the chief development officer for Partners HealthCare. His office provides development services and oversight to the eleven Partners-affiliated hospitals and programs including its founding members, Massachusetts General Hospital and Brigham and Women's Hospital. Together, Partners members raise $300 million annually and employ 275 development staff.

Prior to assuming his position at Partners in 1997, Peckham was senior vice president for development and public affairs at Mass General, a position he held for five years.

In his career, he was vice president for institutional advancement at Bentley College where he also served as the director of development and as director of public affairs. He was also director of development at Children's Hospital Boston and director of public affairs at Babson College.

Peckham has served on the boards of several social and professional organizations and is the past president of the Massachusetts Chapter of the Association of Fundraising Professionals (AFP). He is the former president of the Association of Healthcare Philanthropy's (AHP) Health Systems Development Network (HSDN) and is a member of the development leadership committee of the American Association of Medical Colleges (AAMC).

---

Carrie Pelzel
Senior Vice President for Advancement
Dartmouth College

Carrie Pelzel was appointed senior vice president for advancement in June 2010, having served Dartmouth College for thirteen years, nine as vice president for development and four as director of development. This newly created division brings together Alumni Relations, Development and Public Affairs and a staff of over 200. As vice president for development, she led the college's $1.3 billion "Campaign for the Dartmouth Experience" which exceeded its goal on Dec. 31, 2009.

Pelzel began her career in fundraising at Northfield Mount Hermon School in 1975. During her years there she worked in alumni relations, served as director of development, directed a capital campaign, and eventually became director of external affairs. She then assumed the post of director of development and information services at the National Association of Independent Schools (NAIS). After NAIS, she became executive vice president of The Williamson Group, a computer systems company with a vertical market expertise in providing information systems in fundraising to schools, colleges, museums and hospitals. During these years, she was also a partner in The Franklin Group, a fund-raising consulting firm specializing in campaign services for independent schools.

In 1986 Pelzel joined the development staff of Harvard University. She spent 11 years at Harvard, became associate director of university development, and participated in the planning and kickoff of the university's $2.3 billion campaign, completed in 1999.

A graduate of Northfield Mount Hermon School and Trinity College, she is a former trustee of Trinity and the recipient in 1989 of Trinity's alumni medal for excellence.

---

Betsy Rigby
Director of Development
Partners Healthcare System

Betsy Rigby is currently the director of development at Partners HealthCare (PHS) and works to coordinate services from the PHS Development office to over 250 development staff in the Partners system. She joined Partners in 1991 to launch the coordination of recruitment and retention efforts for fundraisers across the system and created a professional development series for fundraisers. In her current role, she helps to build an infrastructure that fosters philanthropic leadership, organizational effectiveness and the professional growth of staff.

Rigby has worked exclusively in fundraising for nonprofits since earning a master's degree from the Harvard Graduate School of Education in 1989. She has worked with the American Red Cross of Massachusetts Bay, The Medical Foundation and the League of Women Voters.

She has been active in professional associations throughout her career. She served on the Board of Directors of the Massachusetts Association of Fund Raising Professionals for 12 years and on the Board of Directors of Women in Development for two years. She is currently a member of the Group on Institutional Advancement of the American Association of Medical Colleges (AAMC).

---

Amy Rueda
Director, Strategic Talent Management
University of California, Los Angeles

Amy Rueda was appointed director of strategic talent management for UCLA's Development organization in September 2008. She is responsible for the department's strategic staffing, training and retention programs, including significant recruitment efforts, long-term succession planning and professional development. Rueda has significant experience in all facets of executive search. For more than 15 years, she has exclusively focused on conducting searches for public and private universities and colleges, national nonprofit and governmental organizations, art institutions, and several academic and community medical centers.

Her extensive career as a recruitment professional in executive search includes serving as a senior consultant, associate director and an associate for multiple top ten national and international retained search firms including Heidrick & Struggles, Witt/Kieffer and A.T. Kearney. Rueda specializes in conducting assignments for clients in higher education and healthcare with a functional sub-specialty in the field of development.

Prior to her experiences in higher education and executive search, Rueda began her career in the public sector, having served as a consultant to the California State legislature. Rueda holds a bachelor's degree in political science from California State University, Fullerton.

---

Robin Sober
Director of Organizational Effectiveness
University of Michigan

Robin Sober is the director of organizational effectiveness at the University of Michigan and leads learning and talent management initiatives for the university's development community.

Leveraging strong partnerships across the development community, Sober led efforts to create new programs and tools that build a foundation for talent excellence. These efforts include the development of a mentoring program, competencies for gift officers and the creation of the Michigan Philanthropy Academy. The academy provides curricula that deepen learning experiences for major gift officers and development staff who support fundraising. Her team is broadly recognized for setting best practices in on-boarding new development staff and for ongoing programs that provide opportunities for individuals to share knowledge, learn and network within the development community.

Sober co-wrote a recent article for The International Journal of Educational Advancement, "Generative Knowledge Interviewing: A method for knowledge transfer and talent management at the University of Michigan," which outlines an innovative method of tacit knowledge retrieval that has led to understanding key capacities of high-performing gift officers.

Prior to her four years at University of Michigan, Sober led organizational effectiveness, learning and change management initiatives for financial, technology and retail organizations in Canada and the United States for over 20 years. She received her undergraduate degree at the University of Western Ontario in Canada.

---

Darrow Zeidenstein
Vice President for Resource Development
Rice University

Darrow Zeidenstein is vice president for resource development at Rice University, overseeing all aspects of university fundraising, alumni affairs and development services. Prior to his promotion to vice president in July 2007, he served as associate vice president, heading up all individual fundraising programs and overseeing capital campaign strategy and analysis.

Before coming to Rice University, Zeidenstein was a managing director with Marts & Lundy, Inc., where he served both as a campaign consultant and head of the firm's Digital Solutions practice. Under his leadership, Digital Solutions provided highly customized services to clients needing assistance in evaluating or developing high-impact fundraising strategies using advanced analytic methods and digital technologies. He was also involved in the firm's planned giving practice group.

At Marts & Lundy, Zeidenstein worked with a wide variety of nonprofit organizations.

Before joining Marts & Lundy, he was executive director for strategic planning and marketing strategy at the University of Texas at Austin where he facilitated the design and implementation of the university's advanced development strategies and played a key role in planning the university's successful $1B comprehensive campaign. He also served as the university's chief gift planner and as head of its central major gifts team. Before coming to the University of Texas at Austin, he was director of planned giving and director of research and systems at the Stern School of Business at New York University.

Zeidenstein holds a doctorate in economic anthropology from the University of Texas at Austin. Specializing in the economic development of the Middle East, he was a Fulbright scholar (Syria), National Science Foundation fellowship holder and a Social Sciences Research Council post-doctoral fellow (Morocco). He graduated summa cum laude with his bachelor's degree in social anthropology from the University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana.

---