Helen Brown Group

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A continuing career of pride and enjoyment

Rick Snyder

  HBG Senior Consultant Rick Snyder

Rick Snyder was the first full-time employee (besides myself) to join The Helen Brown Group in 2005. Quite honestly I got incredibly lucky. A great researcher who loves and takes pride in his work, Rick was also unflappable and a solid sounding board when there was busy chaos around us in those early years. It’s hard to believe that in October Rick and I will have worked together for 18 years! It’s fitting, and I’m honored to feature Rick’s blog post this week as he shares  valuable insight from his career to close out Research Pride month. ~Helen

When Helen kicked off this year’s Research Pride Month, she said that one of the things she wanted to highlight in the blog is “…what keeps it interesting and fresh for folks who’ve been in the field for a long time.” Well, I believe I’m one of those folks. I started my first job in research 27 years ago – and I have a lot of pride in the work that we do and still find it interesting.

I’ve been feeling particularly introspective lately as I look back over my career in research. What triggered this wave of nostalgia is the dawning realization that I’m nearing the end of my run. While I won’t be retiring tomorrow (sigh), it’s close enough that the light at the end of the tunnel is getting brighter. I’ve thought a lot about how I got here and, more importantly, how my enjoyment of the job caused me to stick around.

How did I get here?

It’s not hyperbole to say that I was ecstatic when I landed my first research job. I mean, c’mon, they were going to pay me for doing something every day that I would gladly do for free. How many people get to say that? And somehow after all this time I still feel the same way. Okay, maybe not ecstatic, but still darned happy.

Telling you how long I’ve been around certainly dates me already, but how about this – I found my first job in research when I saw it listed in the classified ads in the local newspaper (the dead tree version, not online). When I read that ad it looked as if the position had been created specifically for me. The wording of it has long since left my memory, but I know it mentioned the same skill set required by the MLS degree I was still hoping was in my future. I dashed off my resume (printed on a dot matrix printer, no doubt) and I dropped it in the mail. After what seemed an interminable wait, I got an interview and landed the job.

Sometimes your imagination of a job doesn’t end up matching the reality of it, but in this case I think the reality was even better. Not only was I spending my time tracking down and sharing information, but it was for a good cause (my alma mater) and I was surrounded by really smart people who were excited by the same thing I was. I was learning something new every day – and that’s still the case after all these years – and my innate sense of curiosity was being constantly satisfied.

Why did I stick around?

I was fortunate to work with a great team in my first research position (and each subsequent one, come to think of it). I had a fantastic mentor who was very talented, very smart, and very happy to teach other people. My enthusiasm for the work was fostered and additional responsibilities were added over time to keep it interesting.

I need to keep learning in order to be satisfied and prospect research delivers learning opportunities in spades. One day you might be digging into the details of valuing stock options and the next you find yourself learning about how executive producers earn money in the film industry. You may also spend mind-numbing hours doing address and email lookups, but those mundane tasks should be outweighed by the more interesting parts of the job.

I also get a lot of satisfaction out of seeing the research I produce get turned into something actionable and, hopefully, result in a gift. I feel as proud today as I did 20+ years ago when I think about a gift officer telling me that she was going to ask a prospect for $50,000 but ended up asking for and receiving a 7-figure gift because my research showed it was possible. I stick around for moments like that.

What can you do to remain content over a long career?

It honestly blows my mind at times when I realize I’m still satisfied doing what I’m doing. I ought to be bored to tears by now, yet I find that I rarely am. I don’t have a secret recipe to share but I’ve certainly given some thought to what works for me. Here are some of the things that have kept me content. Your mileage may vary.

Think about the aspects of the job that excite you the most. Can you find a way to do more of them? If you’re happiest churning out profiles, let your boss know that’s your jam. Conversely, if there’s a task you can’t stand, speak up. You might not be able to avoid it altogether, but your supervisor will know to dole it out in smaller portions whenever possible.

Become a specialist in something – private equity, mineral rights, private business valuation, etc. Become the go-to person in your office for that thing. Give a presentation on it at a conference. Once you’ve got some experience under your belt, mentor someone new. There’s no better way to reinforce knowledge than to teach it to someone else. Helen wrote last week about volunteering and board service. To quote myself from her post, “If you love research, you should love volunteering or being a board member. You’ll help the profession and make some great friends. If you attend an event, look at the number of people who work behind the scenes to make it happen. What’s cooler than being one of those people?”

Take some pleasure from the little things. Researching someone with a unique name gives me an inordinate amount of joy. Discovering there’s only one person in the U.S. with that name is like a free pass or a Get Out of Jail Free card.

If you’ve learned something new that makes you smile, pass it along. We’re all largely a bunch of nerds, so your colleagues aren’t apt to mind if you geek out over something that most other people wouldn’t get. Recently, I came across a couple of situations I’d never encountered before. I posted about them in our group chat partly to see if anyone else had experience with them, but mostly because I was genuinely happy to share something weird. Don’t keep it to yourself – pass it on. It’s those little things that accumulate over time into a body of knowledge.

Find your voice and use it. Conferences used to be full of sessions with titles like “Finding Your Voice as a Researcher” and “Getting a Seat at the Table.” I see far less of them now, so I guess that most of us are being heard and our opinions respected, which wasn’t always the case. Don’t be afraid to editorialize and insert your opinion in your research. We aren’t just looking up facts, we’re being paid to analyze what we’re seeing. Add value to your research. Don’t expect your gift officer to draw the same conclusions you do. If you see something, say something. I guarantee that you’ll find more satisfaction in your job if you develop true partnerships with the frontline staff and they start to ask you what you think.

As an adjunct to voicing your opinion, do what you can to train the end users of your research on making appropriate use of your time. Many researchers are supporting a large number of frontline staff and you can do yourself a big favor by helping them understand what level of research they need. I can’t tell you how many times I wrote a profile only to find out later that all the requestor really needed was an email address or phone number. Also, I did a brief, lackluster stint in major gifts and discovered that I didn’t want or need as much information prior to a visit than I expected I would. It radically changed what I began asking of my researcher and it has informed my work ever since. How much info does your fundraiser really need? You know if you look long and hard enough you might be able to find the prospect’s eye color and the name of her dog, but is that necessary? When you find yourself going down a rabbit hole, stop for a moment and reassess. Find your off switch. That’s a tough one, I know. It sort of runs counter to being satisfied – finding things is what we do, after all – but I like to use my time well.

I have yet to meet a researcher who wasn’t seriously smart (the ones who aren’t probably don’t last long). Get to know your fellow researchers’ interests and areas of expertise. If you work in a one-person or small shop, reach out virtually. None of us know it all. Don’t be afraid to ask questions, even if you’ve been around for a long time. As I read somewhere recently, if you’re the smartest person in the room, you’re in the wrong room.

Roll with the punches. When I first started in research it was a very different job. Definitely harder. I say this not to impress you with how difficult it used to be, but to point out just how much things can change in a relatively short amount of time. Think about any single one of the numerous research resources you have at your disposal, then consider that almost none of them existed 25 years ago. I started just before online resources became available. Google was still 3 years from being founded (seriously) and Yahoo – at that time the best directory of websites, but now an unrecognizable shadow of itself – was barely a year old. As Helen noted in her post on 3/16, there are “…things that are still evolving or that we can’t even yet imagine.” Virtually all of the things we take for granted now – the ubiquity and ease of access to online resources, data intelligence, screening services – were barely imaginable not all that long ago. It stands to reason that in another decade or two the things you’re doing today in your job are going to seem quaint. What’s going to be the next disruptor? Probably AI. Learn and adapt.

Last, but not least, I’ve always loved that the work I do supports great organizations. Don’t wait for Research Pride Month to roll around each year – take pride in what you do as often as you can and pass it on. I felt like the luckiest person in the world when I got my first job in research and it’s pretty special that I still feel lucky today.

      Rick Lobster

Hi, Helen here again: Rick will go to many lengths to support our local Apra chapter, the New England Development Research Association (NEDRA), as evidenced by this photo. Here’s me with Rick, the 2007 incoming NEDRA president representing our chapter at the Apra conference’s Showcase of Apra Chapters evening in his now-famous lobster suit.

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All aboard!

Happy Week 4 of Research Pride month! What have you been doing to celebrate this most wonderful of professions this month?

I hope that last week’s article gave you some inspiration to consider standing up and sharing your knowledge with others at a conference or just among colleagues at some point soon or in the future.

There’s something else I want to talk about with you to honor our profession this week, and that is stepping up as a volunteer for board service for our professional associations.

You may think that board membership is all about boring meetings and decisions. Or maybe that it’s being part of an elite group of people that are somehow separate from others. You might have some doubts about whether you have the qualities that it takes to be on a board. Maybe you’re beyond busy and don’t have the time to fit it in right now.

There are lots of reasons to think “Maybe this isn’t the right time” or “Maybe I’m not the right person for that” or “I don’t know enough yet.” Those things could be true, but they could also be holding you back from one of the most rewarding professional and personal experiences you may ever have.

I know what my board and volunteer service has meant to me (really great; wouldn’t trade it for the world), but I wanted to find out if my experience was universal. What were other peoples’ experiences like? What did they gain from it? What did they learn about themselves or about the profession? Did it help them in their careers, and if so, how?

I asked some friends and colleagues to share their experiences with me. My sincere thanks to Misa Lobato, former Apra president; Lisa Howley and Dina Zelleke, former NEDRA and Apra board members; Elizabeth Dill, current NEDRA board president; and Rick Snyder, former NEDRA board president, for sharing their insights and experiences.

Joining a board

Misa Lobato had been a prospect researcher for all of 2 years when a friend and colleague approached her to consider serving on the Apra Rocky Mountains (then CPRA) board. She had doubts about what she could offer being so new to the profession, but her colleague encouraged her to go for it anyway. Misa says:

“When I started on the CPRA board, I was writing our newsletter; I was our director of communications. That was a great role for me at that stage in my career because I was able to interview people about research and prospect management and learn from others. I provided resources and tips and tricks to share with our members. It was a good education for me and I really enjoyed having the experience of being with these board members that I had a lot of respect for and learning from them.”

It’s important to have people on an association board who have a wide range of experiences. How better to know what new researchers need to help them grow professionally, than to include someone with that level of experience in conversations about professional development?

And although someone that new might have doubts about their ability to contribute meaningfully, there’s always something, like a newsletter, or helping with conference programming, that someone with a fresh perspective can bring that’s of great value.

And of course, the friendships and professional connections they make can widen their networks and help their career trajectory.

For folks with more experience, their reason to join an association board might be different.

Said Lisa Howley: “For me, it was just a way of giving back. I really wanted to have more impact and involvement in the community and in the nonprofit world.”

Dina Zelleke agrees: “I would say the same thing. For me, NEDRA was the first professional education event in this industry that I had gone to. So I feel like NEDRA was very much there for the beginning of my learning.”

Another important benefit for some, including myself, was having the ability to directly influence change for the better for members. Advocating for our profession is hugely important to me. But with that comes the responsibility of giving members the tools they need to be successful and good at their jobs.

Being on a board, you get the opportunity to strategize about what your association can do, and then actually do something about it.

As Dina says, “I think that that board service gives you the ability to make that impact to people. I’m thinking about the toolkits, the Body of Knowledge, and all of the work that has been done by APRA, because they were particular things that were identified that would be helpful to membership. So being innovative about how you can create solutions that will help benefit your members, and then implementing those ideas is important.”

Rick Snyder confirmed this, saying, “I particularly liked feeling like I was providing service to a profession that I loved. I also enjoyed knowing that decisions we were making were (hopefully) going to strengthen the organization.”

Stepping up, giving back, and making meaningful improvements; great reasons for joining a board. But…

Does board service give something back to the board member?

Let me back up here for a second. One of the questions I asked my colleagues was very specific: “Besides all of the amazing friends you made on the board, did serving on a board give you back anything?” And the reason I asked the question in that way was because if I hadn’t, the only answer I would have gotten was “the amazing friendships that I made with my fellow board members!!”

And it’s really true. Serving on a board can be fairly intense. All of you are together on this journey at sea. There are some old hands on the board with more experience, and maybe you have an association management office to help guide you, but basically you’re all figuring it out as you go along.  (Such is life)

But you’re all in it together, and this honestly forges some great and lasting friendships based on shared experiences, intense discussions, and getting stuff done. Maybe you won’t love everyone all the time, of course, but years later they’ll be people who help you find jobs, who you still have virtual coffee with every month, and/or you can call on to share their thoughts for an article about board service.

So, back to the question: besides making lasting friendships, does board service give something back to the board member?

The answer was an enthusiastic “absolutely”.

For some, it was gaining first-hand experience with how a nonprofit is run, because in many ways, those same mechanisms and procedures – like board development, budgeting, and strategic planning, just to name a few – are the same at for-profit companies.

So in addition to having direct experience on a nonprofit’s board, this insight will help you understand in a first-person kind of way how other sorts of companies, institutions, and organizations operate successfully, which will make the information you provide at your job even better.

If you’re a manager (or aspiring to be one), practical board experience will help you be better at that, and/or a better candidate for leadership.

Misa says, “there were lots of things I learned about strategic planning, and about structuring an organization and how to get people into roles that harness their skills. In terms of my leadership skills, it was incredibly informative. Board service also helped me understand how nonprofit boards function and why they make the decisions they do. And so, in my day-to-day work, I’m so much better equipped to think about how the work of our board affects my work and the work of my organization.”

Lisa says, “the one thing that I have found to be so applicable [to my work now] is that at every organization I’ve worked since I was on the Apra board, I’ve been able to work with development leadership and the board of trustees on what an ideal board would look like… I have had a real impact because I was helping the board understand what the right composition should be.

Misa adds one more benefit: “I also was exposed to ideas that were really cutting edge, and to people [who were] thinking strategically about the future of our profession. I wouldn’t have been exposed to that if I hadn’t been on the board.”

Ladders and Chutes

It’s not all roses, of course. Boards are like any other gathering of people with a passion for something and differing opinions. Sometimes there are going to be politics and personalities to navigate. But this, too, provides opportunities to learn how to navigate tricky conversations and hone your diplomacy and personal communication skills. These are especially important for anyone who wants to advance in their career, take on more management, and interact with (or become) senior leadership.

And then there are things that you have no way to plan for – like a pandemic – that can completely upend what you thought your board’s priorities were going to be. In those cases, you learn adaptability and the importance of delegating to, picking up the slack for, and relying on other members of the board and volunteers to help each other to make the best of a bad (or tricky) situation.

These life lessons are important in many ways for your personal growth. But sometimes even getting on the board can be a bit of a journey. For Misa, who ultimately became Apra president, it took two tries to get on the board. Former Apra president Elizabeth Crabtree has shared publicly that it took three rounds of nominations before she was elected to the board.

It’s not uncommon – there are lots of amazing people in our profession, and Apra and its chapters are looking for different kinds of people every year to add specific talent or make up for knowledge, experience, or other gaps that applicants will have no way to know about. It may be that the next round of openings will leave a gap that exactly fits what you bring. And that kind of tenacity, commitment to service, and belief in their abilities are perhaps what helped contribute to Misa and Elizabeth Crabtree’s success as Apra leaders.

What have these leaders learned about themselves by serving on a board?

Both Rick and Elizabeth Dill said that serving on the NEDRA board has given them more confidence in her own abilities. Elizabeth says, “I was a little nervous about considering it, because of all the responsibility and all the big shoes to fill, honestly. There have been amazing presidents in the history of NEDRA, but I think you just can’t be afraid of that, and [you should] know that you can do whatever job you want to do.”

Rick shared, “When I was board president, I struggled initially with being in charge. I guess I equated being in charge with telling people what to do, which kind of made my skin crawl since I’ve always liked to work collaboratively and seek consensus. It took me a few board meetings to realize that I was just setting an agenda, not running the entire organization. I think I learned more confidence from the experience.”

Misa also shared a great self-realization observation, and one that I’ve heard from other leaders, too: “I’ve learned where I have gaps in my own strengths and my own skills, and how to work with other people that can help fill in those gaps.”

Finding others to surround yourself with that can bring strength to your weak side will not only enhance what you bring but will create an even stronger team to deal with challenges ahead – whether on a board, at work, or in your personal life.

Still conflicted about board service?

Misa’s comment about why some folks don’t seriously consider board service really struck home with me: “If I think about ‘what are the resistance points of doing that kind of volunteerism?’ The thing that was holding me back a lot was this was a belief that I didn’t personally have enough expertise to offer that would make me worthy of serving in a leadership position. And I think we all have to believe that our unique experiences are valuable.”

Adds Rick: “If you love research, you should love volunteering or being a board member. You’ll help the profession and make some great friends. If you attend an event, look at the number of people who work behind the scenes to make it happen. What’s cooler than being one of those people?”

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Musings on the digital economy and what it means for prospect research

Rick SnyderThis week we welcome HBG Senior Researcher Rick Snyder to the blog. I always appreciate Rick’s thought process and insight, and this week he shares what he’s been thinking about – about the economy, people who find themselves newly high-net-worth as a result of their investments in digital currencies, and what’s happening with all that money. ~Helen

In my last blog post I mused about my career in prospect research and the enjoyment I continue to find in learning about a broad variety of topics that shed light on how our prospects earn and spend their money.

A year ago, I was looking at the cost of hiring domestic staff.

Fast forward to today and researching the salary of a nanny seems downright quaint compared to what I’ve been reading lately. I’ve been focusing a lot on the economy and some of the changes we’ve seen over the past year. It seems that the pandemic has not only upended many parts of our personal lives, it’s also scrambled and rearranged how people are spending their money. It’s grabbed my interest and I’m trying to make sense of it all. What I’m offering here isn’t an explanation (I don’t have one), but a few observations and thoughts about what’s going on.

A recent cover of New York Magazine captured the spirit of our current times with the title “Can I SPAC My Stonks With NFTs?” The article inside, “There’s Nothing to Do Except Gamble”, referred to the “new money weirdness” and I can’t think of a better way to describe our current economy and our increasingly strange relationship to money. I believe that we are living through a transformation of our economy that is both exciting and a little bit scary, at least to me.

The SPACs and NFTs mentioned in the magazine were covered well by Helen in these pages already, so I won’t travel that road again. Not only did she explain them better than I can, but I have to admit that, try as I might, I still can’t wrap my head around NFTs well enough to offer a cogent explanation of them. I’m also not going to dive into the world of Reddit-driven “stonks,” though that’s also intriguing and entertaining. These are relatively new phenomena and indicative of how fast our economic world (and the language used to describe it) is changing.

My personal and professional interest in today’s economy is two-fold: First, I want to understand how we’ve reached the point where a person can spend $69 million for a piece of digital art (the buyer, a cryptocurrency billionaire who goes by the name MetaKovan, said he was prepared to pay even more and thinks it was a steal since it should be worth $1 billion).

Second, I can’t help but think the indicators are flashing red that we are somewhere near the peak of a bubble economy and wonder when that bubble is going to burst.

The first interest is almost voyeuristic – I can’t tell if we’re watching the prelude to a car crash or a butterfly emerging from its chrysalis – but the second is more serious and existential.

There are scores of brilliant people who understand the economy far better than I ever will and they don’t all agree on what we’re seeing. Some are warning that we’re cruising for a bruising and others are claiming there’s little to be concerned about.

The traditional indicators – things like the U.S. Treasury bond curve or the P/E ratio of stocks – either don’t apply any longer or aren’t as reliable as they once were. Unemployment is decreasing and GDP is rising, but there are still millions of people struggling with the economic effects of the pandemic. And in the midst of all of the good news/bad news, we’re seeing the creation of new ways for people to spend astronomical amounts on things that barely existed just a year or two ago.

The easiest explanation is that the economy is awash in money and it all has to go somewhere. Billions of dollars have been injected into the system over the past year. We are still living under varying forms of COVID restrictions, but that isn’t stopping us from spending what we’ve got.

The New York Times reported that Deutsche Bank analysts have estimated as much as $170 billion from the most recent round of federal stimulus will go into the stock market. Mortgage rates are at historic lows and house prices are rising. Redfin reports that 42% of homes have been selling for more than their list price – 16% higher than the same period last year – while at the same time Google reported that the search “When is the housing market going to crash?” had spiked 2,450% in the past month.

Bitcoin was trading at $6,853 a year ago. As of writing, it is at $53,545 and by the time this posts it could be thousands of dollars higher or lower. I assume that a good bit of what is driving the NFT market is that people are sitting on mounds of crypto that has appreciated wildly since they bought in. As a personal example, a few months ago I realized that I’d forgotten about a crypto wallet I’d left a small amount of money in a number of years ago. When I looked at it, I literally laughed out loud at the value. It wasn’t enough to be life changing, but for people who invested earlier than I did and paid just a few bucks for some Bitcoin, I can easily imagine why they’d have no problem spending some highly appreciated digital currency on a piece of digital art.

I also discovered that people are breeding and selling digital horses on the NFT market – one sold for $125,000 – and they’re participating in digital races. I had to check the date on the article to make sure it wasn’t an April Fools’ joke. If this isn’t a sign that people have more money than they know what to do with, I don’t know what is.

Along with the sea of money sloshing around in the system, we’ve seen over the past year that life is short and it should come as no surprise that people are willing to make riskier financial bets than before. Might as well YOLO your stimmies into some stonk while you can.

What does any of this have to do with our work? I can think of at least several ways.

First, the top tier of earners has done extraordinarily well over this past year, so we need to keep tabs on what they’re doing – that’s what we do every day, so there’s no change there.

Second, the flow of money into SPACs, NFTs, and retail stocks shows that there are a number of new players who are spending freely. How are we finding, researching, and qualifying them? Are you developing new ways of looking at people with names like MetaKovan and Roaring Kitty? We know they have millions to spend, so how can we add them to our prospect pools?

Third – and this is what I was thinking the most about when I began writing – if we are indeed in a bubble economy, that bubble will burst at some time and quite possibly in a very dramatic fashion.  Though we can’t really predict when the economy will take a downturn, it most certainly will.

When it does, it will affect charitable giving* and that affects each of us in our jobs as researchers. When development budgets shrink, prospect researchers may seem to some as an extravagant expense to some managers. It behooves us all to be proactive in researching or at least giving some thought to those in our donor pools who work in sectors that fare better than others in a down economy. Helen wrote about this in blog posts in April and December of last year, as well as in a white paper. They merit re-reading as you ponder economic trends.

* The Lilly School of Philanthropy and Vanguard Charitable wrote a 2019 report, “Changes to the Giving Landscape” [PDF], that shows a decline in charitable giving that began in 2000, but the drop accelerated at the time of the 2008-2009 recession. From 2000 to 2008, roughly 65% of households reported giving to charity. Total giving dropped by 7.2% in 2008, then by another 8% in 2009.

 

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At your service

This week we welcome HBG Senior Researcher Rick Snyder to the blog. One of the things I really appreciate about Rick is his ability and interest in looking beyond the obvious to see the hidden details of wealth that makes his research…well…richer. In today’s article, Rick shares some of those hidden details with all of us. ~Helen

Something that surprised me when I first started in research – and that I’ve continued to enjoy over the years – is the vast array of topics that I’ve had to educate myself on. Whether it’s estimating compensation for the owner of a civil engineering firm or determining the costs and profits of fast food franchises, I feel like I’m always learning something new. For me – and most likely for all of you – these learning opportunities go a long way toward keeping the job interesting and satisfying.

One learning moment I recall, although I remember few of the precise details, came while reading an article in Vanity Fair in the early 2000s. It was about some of the newer waterfront homes in Greenwich, CT, that owners were building on the sites of older, multi-million-dollar homes that had been razed to make room for something bigger and better. The article was interesting throughout, but it contained one piece of information in particular that gave me an aha moment – namely that in one of the homes mentioned the curtains in one room alone cost $50,000.

I found that figure to be staggering. I also felt somewhat foolish that such a thing had never occurred to me. Rather than missing the forest for the trees, I realized it was the trees that I should have been looking at. Up until that time I would ooh and aah and marvel over the spectacular homes that I’d come across, but I never thought beyond the overall value of the home to consider what it cost to decorate, furnish, maintain, and in some cases, staff the place (or places, since many wealthy people have multiple homes).

It set me off on a binge of researching the cost of numerous luxury items. And while I went down a rabbit hole in pursuit of $20,000 AGA stoves and $41,500 Meneghini La Cambusa refrigerators, one of the things that I never researched was cost of staffing a home. I recently decided to rectify that oversight.

I’ve always been intrigued by domestic staff. The popularity of shows like Downton Abbey tells me that I’m not alone in this. Who hasn’t dreamed of having someone to cook for you, do your laundry, or make your bed? Although having a butler at your beck and call may seem like a thing of the past, there are many wealthy families that employ personal assistants, nannies, drivers, and the like, and it seems that understanding more about it could come in handy in our work.

What I’ve recently learned is that this kind of work, dubbed “wealth work” by MIT economics professor David Autor, is one of the fastest growth sectors in the US economy. The Associated Press estimates that “there were 3.2 million wealth worker jobs in 2017, up from 2.8 million in 2010. They have grown faster than such traditional occupations as sales, education, manufacturing and office administrative work.” Although any employment is great news for some, these jobs don’t tend to come with the security or benefits they once held.

Today’s “servant economy”—as The Atlantic’s Alexis Madrigal has called it—is vastly superior to that of the late 19th century (to say nothing of the slave economy that preceded it). The nannies, house cleaners, and cooks of the past had little to no recourse, not even in name, to the protection of the law if their employers maltreated them. But their work was also less anonymous; the hired help tended to live with their employers, where they would cook, clean, and care for children. These workers were integrated into family life in a way that is unthinkable for the anonymous wealth workers of the modern world.” –The Atlantic

Unfortunately, it’s been very rare in my research to read anything about an individual employing domestic staff. Perhaps it’s a social faux pas to discuss your butler, yet we know they exist. A glance at a floor plan from some of the top buildings in New York reveals that many of them have rooms for staff, so we may presume that the owners employ help, but beyond that we’re left largely empty handed. This is where we need to employ our frontline staff as researchers. We need them to pepper their contact reports with details like what artwork was on the prospect’s walls, what sorts of rare collectibles they own, or the fact that they employ a personal chef and house manager. This is where we come along with a second wave of research to help determine what these wealth indicators are worth.

So, what does it cost to staff your home(s)? It should come as no surprise that the salaries cover a broad range. Not only does it vary by location, but the job duties differ considerably. Some job listings combine the duties of several people in a single position. One recent posting for a housekeeper/nanny in Raleigh, NC, listed the some of the following responsibilities:

  • Managing and providing full-time care of the family’s residence, hands on role, up your sleeves approach
  • Planning prep and oversight of dinner parties and other household events
  • Preparing and cooking meals as needed upon requests
  • Personal shopping, running errands, stock procurement and special requests, etc.
  • Heavy organization throughout the home including pantries, kitchen, closets, etc.
  • Ability to work in tandem with vendors, contractors, other domestic staff, etc.
  • Driving the principals as needed upon request

This position is live-out, requires caring for a 5-year-old, pays $60,000-$80,000 a year, has a 5-day schedule, includes 3-4 weeks of vacation, and entails spending 3-6 weeks in Maine each summer. That’s decent money and it could be quite interesting, but it also sounds like a lot of work.

Staffing agencies will often suggest that you hire more than one household staff member rather than combine so many responsibilities. As one said, “In many instances, a family will hire a housekeeper, but expect them to act as a nanny, personal chef and cleaner rolled into one. This can burn out a single person, and often involves tasks that don’t fall into their skill set anyway. This is why households need to consider hiring multiple domestic staff to handle the various roles they require.” [source: Colonial Domestics]

Hire Society, an agency owned by a former butler/estate manager, covers New York, the Hamptons, and Palm Beach. It provided the figures below to Business Insider. The salaries run considerably higher than those in other regions. Some of their current job openings can be found here.

POSITION                                      SALARY RANGE

  • Chief of staff                                 $200,000-$500,000
  • Estate manager                            $150,000-$300,000
  • Executive house manager            $100,000-$150,000
  • Assistant house manager             $90,000-$120,000
  • Office manager                            $100,000-$175,000
  • Butler                                            $85,000-$125,000
  • Executive assistant                       $90,000-$200,000
  • Junior executive assistant             $65,000-$90,000
  • Personal assistant                         $85,000-$150,000
  • Junior personal assistant              $65,000-$90,000
  • Head chef                                     $110,000-$225,000
  • Sous chef                                      $80,000-$100,000
  • Cook                                              $75,000-$90,000
  • Executive housekeeper                 $75,000-$100,000
  • Housekeeper                                 $65,000-$80,000
  • Ladies maid                                   $75,000-$85,000
  • Laundress                                      $75,000-$95,000
  • Baby nurse                                    $300-$1,000 per day
  • Nanny                                            $65,000-$185,000
  • Family assistant                            $65,000-$90,000
  • Governess                                     $100,000-$250,000
  • Driver                                            $80,000-$100,000
  • Executive protection                     $90,000-$125,000
  • Domestic couple                           $130,000-$300,000
  • Tutor                                             $100,000-$150,000
  • Houseman                                     $75,000-$125,000

For comparison, here are several others:

Knight Frank, publishers of several wealth research reports, recently released their biennial Estate Staff Salary Survey for the UK. My favorite position listed is that of ghillie: a person who acts as an attendant on a fishing, fly fishing, hunting, or deer stalking expedition. And when I looked that up, I discovered that in days past there used to be a ghillie-weetfit, a ghillie whose duty it was to carry his master over streams.

While there was no salary information in it, an article in Modern Luxury Palm Beach revealed that a polo playing couple employs a traveling veterinarian when they play in other parts of the world. I include it here as an indicator of the variety of positions some people employ.

This brief overview will help you get started on your own trip down the research rabbit hole. Before I go, I have a few other thoughts to share.

First, while I was doing my research for this post, I really wanted to be able to determine an inflection point at which people decide that they need to hire a personal assistant or a property manager. I wasn’t able to, but it’s something I’ll continue to look at. We’re always on the lookout at HBG for things that signal a particular level of wealth in an attempt to find a more formulaic method for determining assets and capacity.

One of the figures we often use to estimate wealth comes from the CapGemini/Merrill Lynch World Wealth Report, which states that real estate comprises approximately 15 percent of high net worth individuals’ total assets. Wouldn’t it be great to be able to do the same with other wealth indicators like the employment of domestic staff? For example, if Joan Prospect employs a chef and personal assistant, then she must have X amount of wealth. If you’ve got any thoughts along these lines, please share them in the comments. And if I uncover anything more in my research I’ll be sure to update this post.

Second, and perhaps a bit contrarian: what good is any of this information to us? Does knowing that the prospect employs an estate manager mean that he or she will make a gift to your organization? No, of course not. What it tells you is that the person has a certain level of wealth. It also suggests a certain ease with spending money. If they can spend $100,000 a year on their nanny, it might not be a stretch to make a $100,000 gift for the scholarship that your gift officer is presenting to them.

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Full Spectrum Research

Hiring the right person for an open position is always complicated. You want someone with the right skills and the right knowledge, but also someone who has an innate…something that will make them a right fit for the long haul. This week we welcome back HBG Senior Researcher Rick Snyder to The Intelligent Edge to talk about a group of people with traits that may just be perfect for your prospect development hiring pool. ~Helen

Back in 2016, I wrote about the one key trait that makes for a great researcher (TL;DR: curiosity).  Today I’d like to expand on that topic a bit but take it in a rather different direction; namely, hiring from a subset of the population who seem custom-built for prospect research. [Read more…]

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Just Compensation

This week I’m delighted to feature an article by Senior Researcher Rick Snyder, who shares his considerable knowledge on pulling at that tricky loose thread of compensation information. Rick’s main takeaway: It’s not just about resources (although he has a nice list of great sources to share), it’s also being mindful of how and when to use them, and how you might be able to ‘back into’ useful information by rocking back on your heels and coming at the problem in a new way. ~Helen

Many of us use research checklists as we do our work and use profile templates where we fill in the blanks. This allows us to be consistent and helps remind us to use all our resources. One by one, we work our way through the list.

Property value? Check.

Foundation affiliations? Check.

Non-profit and corporate board service? Check.

Compensation? Hmmm. [Read more…]

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The most popular articles of 2016 from The Intelligent Edge

I’m going to get to the top posts of 2016 in just a second, but as we bid goodbye to 2016 – a rollercoaster year if ever there was one – we at The Helen Brown Group wanted to take a moment to say thank you.

To our clients, thank you for making 2016 our best year yet. Your missions – and your personal dedication to them – inspire us to do our best work for you. Our appreciation also goes out to the kind folks who point others in our direction – grateful thanks for your referrals.

To our 1,200+ Intelligent Edge subscribers and to the readers who drop by, thanks for signing up, for reading, and for your comments, both on and offline. Two years ago, our mailing list comprised 65 hearty souls! We couldn’t be prouder of the way our readership has grown or thank our wonderful guest bloggers enough. Thank you.

We also really appreciate our vendor partners, who make the great tools we use and who share our commitment to using quality information to make the world a better place.

And to our colleagues in the prospect development community – thank you so much for your support and for the part you play in building and growing this wonderful profession.

And now, to our top five… [Read more…]

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An Ideal Researcher

Googling monkeyTo kick off the New Year, Senior Researcher Rick Snyder shares his knowledge on the one key trait that makes for a great researcher.

Having recently celebrated my 10-year anniversary of working for The Helen Brown Group and 20 years spent in this profession, I’ve had occasion to think a bit more than usual about my career.

I’ve thought about how much has changed in the past two decades, about the sheer number of individuals I’ve researched, some of the quirks and oddities I’ve uncovered in the course of my daily work, etc. I’ve also thought about how I got here, which in my case was a fluke, a chance reading of a job description (in the newspaper classifieds, as odd as that now sounds) that left me wide-eyed and astounded that they’d apparently created a job that uniquely fit my talents and interests. [Read more…]

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