Margaret Magnus
“I hadn’t realized how much humor was part of our group, and how lovely it is to laugh together over this serious business. To continued laughter...”
Spring is a time of rebirth, a season that reminds us to review and renew our purpose in what we do. Margaret Magnus finds purpose in her attachment to a special place – Meher Mount, a 172-acre universal spiritual retreat at the summit of Sulphur Mountain in Ojai, California. This place of refuge has drawn Margaret since the 1970s, and she has become even more actively involved since retiring in 2003.
In 2010, Margaret noticed that in order to preserve and improve the site at Meher Mount, the organization needed a more effective way of collecting and tracking donations and managing relationships. She found Salesforce’s cloud based solution, and began using it in a limited fashion to record donations and track thank you notes. As often happens, she soon began to have other ideas when she realized that with a CRM, “R means ‘relationship’ – it doesn't just mean data tracking.”
Margaret does not consider herself innately tech savvy, so her involvement with the Database Sherpa Practice Group was a great help in her non-profit’s transition to Lightning. She especially appreciated the step-by-step demonstrations by group members who were working to accomplish some of the same tasks she needed to complete. Through her involvement in the practice group, she has grown more confident in using Salesforce, and the Meher Mount non-profit organization is using their database more extensively.
Margaret’s time in the practice group has ended for now. Right now she’s “on a journey to raise more money and to get better at it,” and views the Salesforce software as a tool in that effort. As Margaret turns her focus to improving fundraising efforts, she knows that their database is equipped to support those efforts. She admits the database is 98% working as their organization needs – tracking relationships, communications, events – although there is always more that could be changed or improved. It is time to turn a new page.
Margaret’s practical perspective as a fundraiser who wants to become more effective has been valuable to the practice group, and she has appreciated that the group includes people from all different roles and backgrounds. She’s already agreed to come back to the group as a guest to share what has happened in her fundraising efforts, and is thinking of things she wants to share.
For all of us, there is a reason why we do what we do. It makes the change of seasons easier when you know what that reason is. Margaret remains grateful for what she has learned participating in the practice group, and her eyes are focused forward.
"I hadn't realized how much humor was part of our group, and how lovely it is to laugh together over this serious business. To continued laughter..."
We wish Margaret the best as she continues with her support of the mission of Meher Mount.