GIVE BACK Project Simulation Details
Background
For this project simulation, you have beenhired as the event planner (project manager) by GIVE BACK, a 401(c)3non-profit organization that collects money and essential items forthose in need. GIVE BACK partners with other non-profits to assist themin fulfilling their respective missions. Funds and essential itemsdonated to GIVE BACK are distributed to their partnering non-profits sothey can then get those resources to individuals in their community whoare in need of those resources. Resources donated and distributed haveincluded food, clothing, and essential items such as toothpaste, soap,shampoo, and cleaning supplies. Financial donations are primarily usedto cover operating expenses of GIVE BACK. A portion of funds receivedare donated to young adults in the form of educational scholarships.
GIVE BACK has been in business for 10 years.Each year, they hold an annual fundraising event to celebrate theirannual three-month GIVE BACK campaign. The Annual Fundraising event is ablack-tie affair attended by companies and individuals who support GIVEBACK with financial and essential item donations as well as volunteertime to support day-to-day operations as well as special events, such asthe annual GIVE BACK giving campaign and GIVE BACK black-tie event.
Your first responsibility as event projectmanager is to initiate, plan, and execute GIVE BACKs annual black-tiecharity event. It is currently the third Friday of January, and theevent will be held on the first Saturday of November of the same year.You report to David Hemingway, Director of GIVE BACK. Another projectmanager that you will interface with is Julie Price, funding drivecampaign manager for the annual three-month GIVE BACK giving drivecampaign that will conclude the last Saturday of October, prior to theannual black-tie gala.
GIVE BACK Organization Chart
For this black-tie gala, there will be other key stakeholders and resources that will help make this event a success.
Event Venue
This year, the event is to be held at one ofthe event spaces at the local performing art center (PAC). This is thefirst time this event has been held at this venue. Based on previousyears, you are given a goal of getting 300 RSVPs for this years event.This is a 10% increase over the previous year. Each table will fit 10people. Tables cost $10,000. Individual tickets to the event cost$1,000. The PAC has assigned you an event manager, Megumi (Meg)Tatsukawa, to coordinate event activities and resources for the PAC.
The venue does not provide catering. Instead,they allow outside catering and food trucks to operate on-site andcharge a fee for doing so. Below is an approved list of catering andfood trucks they have worked with in the past.
- Black-Tie Catering
- Its All About the Food catering services
- Food Fight catering
- BBQ 2 U event catering
- Luaus R US catering
- Jamaican Mon food truck
- Korean Pop food truck
- Curry From a Truck
Sponsorships, Tables, and Bid and Raffle Items
One of the key sources of revenue forthe event is selling tables to key corporate sponsors. The effort tosign up sponsors begins in January and is a year-long commitment tomaintain those sponsorships. Below is a list of last years top 10 keysponsors:
| Sponsors | Annual Sponsorship Commitment | Gala Tables Reserved | Raffle & Bid Items Donated |
|---|---|---|---|
| Family Insurance | $50,000 | 2 | $5,000 |
| EPIC Systems | $50,000 | 2 | $5,000 |
| Extract Sciences | $50,000 | 2 | $5,000 |
| Andrus Law | $25,000 | 1 | $2,500 |
| General Hospital | $25,000 | 1 | $2,500 |
| The Nelson Family | $20,000 | 1 | $1,000 |
| Hammons Grocery Stores | $20,000 | 1 | $2,000 |
| The Smith Family | $10,000 | 1 | $1,000 |
| Hometown Hardware | $5,000 | .5 | $1,000 |
| Reinhart Realty | $5,000 | .5 | $1,000 |
Representatives from each of the above listedsponsors are on the GIVE BACKs advisory board and are influential inselling event tickets, procuring donations from businesses in thecommunity, and recruiting volunteers.
Raffle items are won by buying tickets forone winner to be drawn at the end of the evening. Bid items are itemsthat are on display around the perimeter of the event space. Eachattendee has a bidding paddle with a unique number. Attendees can writedown their bidding paddle number and the amount they wish to bid on eachitem. Bids are closed at 9 p.m., when winners are announced. Last year,there were 35 bid items displayed on tables and 5 raffle items.
Entertainment, Keynote, and Auction MC
Entertainment will be a dance band thatperforms at weddings and events such as this. This year, a new band isbeing hired as the band that had performed at the event for the previousfive years had a conflicting schedule.
This year, it is planned that a motivationalspeaker will be hired to give an inspirational address to attendees andMC the high-dollar auction items. The event this year has identified aprominent sports figure to give the keynote address and MC the biddingof action items. This individual is new to the organization and theevent. It will be the first time this person has MCd such an event.
Auction items have in the past includedweekend and weeklong trips to vacation destinations, tickets to sportingevents, and annual memberships to golf courses and health clubs. Thiswill be the last activity for the evening and will culminate in thehighest dollar auction item. Bidding wars between attendees are alwaysexciting!
External Factors
The current economy is inflationary. After aboom economy with government COVID subsidies, prices across the boardhave been inflating and product supply has been limited with longer thannormal lead times due to unrest in other parts of the world and supplychain issues and labor shortages caused by the COVID pandemic. Laborshortages have persisted for the past 12 months and are expected tocontinue. With the economy slowing down, GIVE BACK has noticed fewermonitor donations in recent months. Also, it has been noticed that localcharitable giving has been going down due to the increase in competingglobal charitable giving to the Ukrainian people in support of theirunfortunate situation.
The black-tie event has a budget of $30,000.This budget is firm and is not to exceed. This budget must covercatering, band, speaker/MC, marketing material, promotions, invitations,tables, chairs, staff, sound, dance floor, audio and visual equipment,drink service, and hors doeuvres, to name a few of the expenses.
There is a rumor that EPIC Systems maywithdraw their sponsorship and may not attend the gala this year as theyare in the middle of restructuring their philanthropic giving strategy.
There are currently no stakeholders that are opposed to this event and its activities.
Over the years GIVE BACK has developed itsown project management plan spreadsheet document in Excel to help manageits projects, which you downloaded above. This multi-tabbed Excelspreadsheet is iterated on each year. It is a dynamic template thatimproves each year based on lessons learned.
This template includes all documents thatwill be submitted for this course as well as other documents that arenot required but may be useful.
As this is an event the non-profit hasexecuted since its first year in existence, the organization is familiarwith such a project. As such, a predictive life cycle is assumed. Thereis a Project Lessons Learned document from past events. Below are keylessons learned from previous projects:
Lessons Learned
GIVE BACK Lessons Learned from previous GIVE BACK Black-Tie events include the following.
- Assume 5% of those that RSVP will not attend.
- Plan for 10% more staff managers than expected as unforeseen events cause some volunteers to cancel.
- Have the auction as the last activity of the evening as it is the most anticipated and will keep people from leaving early.
- Keep the bidding items open until 9 p.m. to allow more time for people to bid up items throughout the evening.
- Send out RSVP invitations no later than March.
- Consistent monthly advertising andpromotions six months prior to event are critical for both donationdrive and black-tie event success.
- Black-tie volunteer event committee mustform no later than second week in February for proper planning andexecution. Ideal size for event committee is 12 people.
- Lead sponsors must be secured no later than last week of February.
- Event venue space should be secured as early as possible and no later than six months out to ensure space availability.
The above simulation details provide enoughbackground for you to make other assumptions about risks, constraints,issues, key stakeholders, scope, and schedule.
