Recording follow-up communication for candidate families

Daniel Wallach
Daniel Wallach
Sixth Anniversary Kudos 2 Name Dropper Facilitator 1
in Blackbaud Enrollment Management System™

How are you keeping a record of follow-up communication? We've started using EMS this summer, and before that everything was just tracked on a shared Google sheet. I've added “Inquiry follow-up", “Application follow-up”, etc. as internally visible “interview” type checklist steps.

Interviews seem like the best option as we can use different types (phone, Email, etc.), note participating staff, etc. but honestly these aren't necessarily interviews - often this is the initial call to book the interview.

We can use official notes internally to record follow-up, but that can't be included on candidate lists (unlike checklist steps/interview details). I've tried to make the candidate lists function similarly to the google sheet, with columns for admissions process steps so admin can get a quick view of where candidates are at.

Wondering about other schools' processes.

#enrollmentmanagement #admissions #records

Comments

  • Susan Hemingway
    Susan Hemingway
    Eighth Anniversary Kudos 1 Name Dropper Participant

    @Daniel Wallach
    We ended up adding two custom fields in EM: Next Contact Date and Next Contact Notes. We've been updating those custom fields after every significant contact with prospective families with the date we should follow up and a very brief note about why, in addition to entering Official Notes with more detail. We then set up a Candidates List (we called ours “Work List”) with columns including the two custom fields. We can then sort the Work List by Next Contact Date, or use the filters on Next Contact Date to look for families we need to contact this week, or this month, or any date range. It's been a huge improvement, with many fewer “dropped balls”.

  • Daniel Wallach
    Daniel Wallach
    Sixth Anniversary Kudos 2 Name Dropper Facilitator 1

    @Susan Hemingway
    I like this idea! Did you have a different system before outside of EMS, or were the "dropped balls" due to not having a follow-up system?

  • Susan Hemingway
    Susan Hemingway
    Eighth Anniversary Kudos 1 Name Dropper Participant

    @Daniel Wallach Before setting this up we were just trying to keep track on a spreadsheet, but it wasn't reliable. Setting this up was a game-changer for us.

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