Constituent who is also an Organization

Jeannie Goings

We have a constituent whose name and whose business name are the same: Jon Black, Esq. The business, John Black, Esq., manages several private foundations. The constituent John Black, Esq. is a parent of a student. I am wondering if any of you have encountered this scenario and if John Black, Esq. should have one or two constituent records.


I should mention that we have submitted funding proposals to two of the foundations managed by the business entity.

Liz Hackett

Hi Jeannie Goings‍ 

I would have seperate records, one for the individual and one for the business.  The communication preferences may change over the years, as may the relationships and spliting a record into two after a few years of data being recorded... is a real nightmare!

It's also better to maintain the individual's revenue seperate from the business, as there may be tax reasons for the person donating either from their own funds or via a business.  Also easier to keep track of any changes in contact details, interactions etc.

Definitely use the relationship fuctionality to link the two records together, otherwise they may be picked up in a duplicate merge process.

Hope that helps!