Salesforce Helps Starlight Children’s Foundation Grant Wishes!

Starlight Children’s Foundation is an Australian Charity, whose mission is to brighten the lives of seriously ill and hospitalised children, teenagers and their families. Since 1988, the Starlight Children’s Foundation has warmed the hearts of countless Australians though a range of programs managed by a team of 130 office-based staff, 120 in-hospital staff and a network of over 1,500 volunteers:

• The Wish Granting Program grants once-in-a -lifetime wishes to seriously ill children and their families.
• The Starlight Express Rooms offer a medical free respite in Australia’s major children’s hospitals, where children and their families can enjoy games, movies, crafts and other activities, all orchestrated by Captain Starlight – the charities ‘superhero’.
• The Livewire Support Community offers a safe and supportive place for members (10-20 years old) to connect and share experiences, in hospital and online.

Mike Peppou, Data Manager at Starlight tells the story of how since moving to Salesforce, Starlight has combined its core operations of fundraising, donation processing, volunteer management and marketing together with the unique requirements of its Wishgranting program into a single platform that allows everyone at Starlight to see the full picture of its complex relationships:

Wishgranting with Salesforce:

“After carrying out a formal review process, we decided to work with Salesforce along with supporter360 – one of several applications in the AppExchange. Our move to Salesforce was completed in only 8 months and this covered all fundraising set-up; including automated processing of over 20,000 monthly donations, setting up a management system for Starlight’s large team of volunteers, and the complex migration of over 3 million records of data from the previous database.

“The fast implementation time was one of the reasons for choosing Salesforce, but equally important was the capability to rapidly develop integrated applications to meet Starlight’s unique needs, such as Starlight’s Wishgranting program.

“Starlight Wishes give a once in a lifetime opportunity to seriously ill children and teenagers to have their dream come true. Each Wish is unique and designed to give them something to look forward to during their treatment and provide their family with happy memories that sustain them when things get tough.

Addison’s wish was to have lunch with her favourite Disney Princess, Ariel, and to swim with dolphins – Starlight is working on 800 wishes at any time.

“As the number of Wishes has grown, so has the challenge of managing them. With over 800 Wishes in progress at any one time, managing Wishes becomes a significant business process challenge. Efficiencies of scale are of paramount importance to growing the program and maximising the value of every dollar donated.

“Prior to Salesforce, Wishes were being managed by a basic workflow system, share folders, spreadsheets and lots of emails. The process was further complicated by the need to share information within the team whilst maintaining privacy of the personal and health information of the child.

“The Wishgranting application made possible by Saleforce manages the whole lifecycle of the Wish, from the original referral from a member of the child or teenager’s health team, through to the magical day the wish is granted and beyond, as many of the families become supporters of Starlight.”

Jo Dann, Manager of the Wish team sums up how Salesforce has helped her team: “Salesforce allows the team to work simultaneously on a Wish file and see at a glance where the process is up to. All the information is captured in one place, giving us a clear view of each Wish and driving efficiencies through every step of the Wish process. The team love using Salesforce and as the team manager I feel like I can be easily and instantly across all aspects of the program, there’s no more guess work or having to trawl through lots of different documents to get a full view of a Wish.”

Going to Dreamforce this October? Don’t miss Mike Peppou’s presentation about Starlight Children’s Foundation’s journey with Salesforce. You can add it to your Agenda Builder today!