Onboarding a new employee

Robert Brown
Robert Brown
Tenth Anniversary Kudos 1 Participant Facilitator 1
in Raiser's Edge NXT Discussions

Hi everyone,

My Chief Advancement Officer has tasked me with preparing onboarding, our incoming Director of Annual Giving with regards to RE7 and RE NXT. That includes deciding what she should have access to in Raiser's Edge, at least temporarily. I should mention that she's not familiar with Raiser's Edge at all.

This is the first time I've been asked to decide this on my own, and I'm not sure where to start. I want her to have access to constituent records, query, export, and reports at the very least, but maybe she should just have view access for now and then add edit access to things when I'm sure she knows what she's doing? What do you think? Thank you.

Comments

  • JoAnn Strommen
    JoAnn Strommen Community All-Star
    Tenth Anniversary Kudos 5 Facilitator 2 July 2026 Monthly Challenge bbcon Sessions

    Viewing access is definitely needed but are think you are quite right to restrict edit, deleting rights at least temporarily. How long depends on your org's procedures.

    Our development staff can create actions and work needed to do their role but updating addresses/contact info and such is limited to a couple of us who understand format and how to keep old info.

  • Dariel Dixon
    Dariel Dixon Community All-Star
    Eighth Anniversary Kudos 5 2026 Spring PUB Raiser's Edge NXT First Reply

    If they aren't familiar with the tool at all, I wouldn't give access to any of it until you start their onboarding and training. You'll need to determine what they will need, and their level of competency before you hand over the correct level of access.

    I think it's probably the proper way to go about this, since your CAO is empowering you to make these decisions. They must trust you and recognize your ownership of the data.

    I'd probably start with view only access to get started, and then set up a schedule for some training so you can get a feel for how the new employee is coming along.

  • Jenny Marquardt
    Jenny Marquardt
    Tenth Anniversary Kudos 3 Name Dropper Participant
    I agree with Daniel Dixon. View only until training takes place. They can at least start by poking around and looking. You might give them a list of board members to review in query so they can use query a little bit. Maybe a list of recent donors, employees, any major donors.
  • Larry Wheeler
    Larry Wheeler
    Eighth Anniversary Kudos 2 Name Dropper Facilitator 1

    I am forced to provide new users the access which has been designated for the position they are filling as soon as they receive a Blackbaud ID. The non-tech “higher-ups” push this access and have blamed me if a new person “can't do their job from day 1”.

    My process is to send them a list of the Blackbaud trainings they need to complete for their job description. I include all of the Basic Trainings which relate to their duties. Once they notify me that they've completed those, I will send them the Fundamentals Trainings which touch on their duties. I also explain they can go further with their training and become certified (Fundamentals, Pro) if they so desire.

    After they have viewed the Basics, they will begin in person training of their duties by the appropriate office personnel. I must trust those training to teach the newly hired well. I have auditing type of queries where I can track (mostly) that individuals are entering data correctly. If I find more, or corrected, training is needed, I begin that process.

    It is not an ideal situation, but when there are problems due to lack of experience/knowledge - “Larry can fix it”, is the solution. ?

  • Robert Brown
    Robert Brown
    Tenth Anniversary Kudos 1 Participant Facilitator 1

    Thank you everyone, you've been amazingly helpful. I appreciate all the advice and now I know what I need to do. Thank you all again!

Categories