We encourage our groups to take a close look at their events and evaluate whether each event really connects people to their mission. Many groups come to realize that it is time to phase out a popular (or not-so-popular) event. If the decision were theirs alone to make, they would know how to eliminate it. But events tend to build up loyal followers and supporters, often for emotional (and no longer rational) reasons. Often the biggest challenge is convincing board members and volunteers that the time has come to eliminate an event.

The best way to eliminate an event is to do an analysis of what it costs versus what it yields and then do a phase-out plan and proposal for your board or development committee, retaining the best aspects of the event or inserting them into other events you are keeping.

In other words, do your homework. Put together the spreadsheets showing the true costs associated with putting on the event, including the hidden staff time and the opportunity cost of having staff focus on this event rather than on other major gifts work. Document the results that have come from the event. Propose how to capitalize on the best parts of the event—the sponsors and some of the key guests—and connect them even more to your mission. Explain how streamlining the event will give you time to do proper follow up. Present all this to the executive director and the people on the board who will be most supportive of eliminating the event. Secure their buy-in before taking it to the full board (if full board approval is necessary).

For example, we have a group that had a fancy awards banquet to honor donors and volunteers. The money it raised came mostly from sponsorships for corporate tables. The event had become quite stale. Most guests had no connection to the organization or the award recipients. They were given a "ticket" from their boss and told to attend. While some of these people could have become genuinely interested in the organization during this event, that was unlikely without a large dose of the mission inserted into the event to educate and inspire them. That is a tricky thing to do at a fancy banquet.

Rather than keep this event going as is, they converted it into a Free Feel-Good Cultivation Event^™ for all of their Multiple-Year Donors, making it special and free for them to attend. They made sure that the award recipients showcased the various program areas of the organization, using stories about each program in the actual award presentation. They restructured their program to include a brief Visionary Leader^™ Talk and a testimonial from a person whose life had been changed thanks to their work. The total program lasted thirty minutes and left people inspired and educated about their organization. They reduced the number of sponsors down to one so that it was a special privilege to be the sponsor of this event, with more visibility and a more exclusive audience. Then they asked some of the other prior banquet sponsors to sponsor their other events, such as other Point of Entry^® Conversion Events like their golf tournament—which they decided to keep doing—as well as their Ask Event^™.

Even if you see that you need to eliminate several events, I recommend that you design a two- to three-year phase-out plan so you can test out the impact of each one as you continue to show results over time with the model—both from your Ask Event and the other one-on-one major gifts asking you will be doing. That way, when you are ready to phase out the third or fourth event, critics will have seen the impact of the model. In the worst case, you will decide to keep these other events, and the board will see the importance of hiring someone else to manage them, freeing you up to keep focusing on growing the model towards sustainable funding.