Ellen Bristol is the founder and driving force behind Bristol Strategy Group, the Miami-based company she launched in 1995, after a 27-year career in sales and marketing for top-tier mainframe computer manufacturers, where she managed major deals worth millions - like a Major Gift Officer. Ellen had a personal mission to make sales teams more productive, using strategic approaches based on formal process management.  Soon after launching BSG, her nonprofit colleagues and clients convinced her that her innovative approach could benefit the profession of fundraising.  This insight prompted the development of  Fundraising the SMART Way™.  Fundraising the SMART Way delivers the science that makes the art of fundraising possible while improving fundraising results.  The SMART Way creates objective, agreed-upon criteria for prospect selection, opportunity management, and simplification of performance metrics, all of which help your organization to Raise More and Work Less.   Ellen has become a thought leader in this area, innovating ways to make fundraising organizations and initiatives more effective through the use of simplified metrics and objective criteria. Her role at BSG now includes product development, facilitation, major-account management, and team recruitment and development.

"Raising money - either through sales or fund development - is a two-edged sword; it's both wonderful fun, exciting and empowering, while at the same time it's grueling, difficult and anxiety provoking work.  It seemed to me that we could get better results, and manage the development team for better productivitiy, by setting up metrics that would be easier to use, and other techniques that are empowering and enjoyable for donors and development officers alike.  If I can do it that way and be so successful, then you can too."

Ellen's newest e-book for nonprofits is De-Mystifying Fundraising, Seven Steps to Fundraising Success.

Rebecca Staton-Reinstein, Ph.D.

Rebecca Staton-Reinstein, Ph.D., works with organizations on four continents to increase top- and bottom-line results while engaging employees and delighting customers.  Rebecca serves as the senior practice management specialist for BSG's enterprise strategic planning initiatives. Rebecca is the president of Advantage Leadership Inc., a boutique consulting firm specializing in enterprise strategic planning, with a sub-specialty in IT quality assurance.

Rebecca focuses on strategic planning, leadership development, process improvement, and IT assessments.  She delivers highly customized, successful solutions to complex business problems in  a wide variety of economic sectors throughout the world. Rebecca works with your leadership team to execute a robust strategic plan with measurable results. Her approach, captured in the results-driven methodology, Success Planning: A ‘How-To’ Guide for Strategic Planning, is used around the world by public, private, military, and nonprofit (NGO) organizations to reach their goals and change the way they do business.  A companion e-book is also available, 30 Days to Building a Strategic Plan that Gets Results.

 “My goal is to transform organizations and their results using my unique perspective based on strategic leadership as practiced by contemporary executives and the U.S. founding fathers.” Rebecca documented the most important elements of those proven practices in Conventional Wisdom: How Today’s Leaders Plan, Perform, and Progress Like the Founding Fathers.

 Lauren Kanter Miller, M.S.

Lauren Kanter Miller, M.S.  is our Grantsmanship expert.  She handles all aspects of grants funding, from the strategic to the tactical, with services covering Grants Writing, Grants Management, General Fund Development, and Fund Development Performance Evaluation and Improvement. Most important - Lauren understands that while so-called "grant writing" is deceptively simple, grants-based funding can produce little "return on effort" and even take your nonprofit far off course unless you master critical fundamentals and best practices.

Lauren's 37 years of success in planning, developing, managing, evaluating, and obtaining funding for a variety of organizations make her a valuable asset for nonprofits seeking to improve their grants-based funding strategies.

Lauren provides services in the following areas.

• Funding prospect research
• Preparation of grant proposals to private, public, and government sources
• Grants management
• Design and implementation of program evaluation protocols
• Development and delivery of training workshops on grantsmanship and fund development