Currently, if a gift is over $250 the President of the College personally signs the thank you note. If it is under the $250 mark, the director in charge of the fund personally signs the letter. We would like all of our letters to be signed by the President of the College or the President of the Board. The volume of the letters will be to large for them to personally signed, so we are thinking about getting letterhead with the signature printed on them. What do other organizations do? Are your letters personally signed? Who signs your letters? Any thoughts would be appreciated! Katie Kupiecki Manager of Development Information Systems Aquinas College

Our CEO signs the letters no matter what the amount. Now granted, it doesn't sound like we have nearly the volume you do, but I would always vote for a personal signature. We feel it humanizes the letter and saves it from being just another form letter. Rebecca Schafer Big Brothers Big Sisters Indianapolis, IN [Email Removed]

I would agree with you. But our VP thinks a higher standing name (even if is a "fake" signature) is better then having a personal signature that is from someone in a lower position. Thank you for your input. It will help the arguement. Katie Kupiecki Manager of Development Information Systems Aquinas College

At my last job, most communications to the membership were signed by the executive director. We scanned his signature and inserted the graphic object into the Word merge template. Mark F. DeWitt, Database Manager College of Engineering University of California, Berkeley [Email Removed]

Hi Katie, For us, reunion years, current parents and gifts over $2,500 are signed by the Director of the school with a personal p.s. if possible. All other letters are signed by the Director of Development. Occasionally we scan a Committee signature, but it is rare. A personal signature is always favored. Good luck!

All of our letters are 'signed' by the President. They all have hand signatures but most are 'ghost signed' by an assistant. Our President only signs Major Donor and VIP letters herself. I recently attended a training in which we discussed this and the presenter had a good thought. This is relationship management and the letter should be signed by whomever was the signer on the ask letter (assuming there was one). It solidifies the relationship and brings it full circle. We were already doing this but were toying with the idea of others doing one or the other and have decided that if there is a change we would need to be able to have them sign both. This may not work for every organization but I liked this thought and we are going to stick with that plan for now. Melissa S. Graves Manager, Development Database & Direct Mail Planned Parenthood of Connecticut [Email Removed] 203-752-2804 *** Sorry my typing is not what it should be!

For our Leadership Givers, anyone over $500 the President signs the letters (or her assistant signs her name for her depending on our President's schedule). We make sure that the letters are signed in blue ink so that it does look like we took the time to hand sign. That being said, I think instead of getting your signature printed on your letterhead and having to mess around with the body of the letter to make sure that the signature is in the correct place, why don't you just scan the signature and insert it into the thank you? We do this with our appeal letters each fall. Margie Solochier United Way of Westmoreland County Greensburg