Customer success story
Why Dartmouth College trusts Xapien for reputational risk checks
Why Dartmouth College strengthened its reputational risk management
Dartmouth College’s 200-year-old reputation was at risk when it engaged with a donor offering a substantial restricted capital gift. The donor was frequently targeted by demonstrators who would follow them around the country during engagements. Any public association with the donor risked similar demonstrations and negative publicity for the College. This led its Associate Vice President (AVP) of Development, Operations, and Performance to establish a framework for assessing reputational risk and create a process to manage it with the right tools and systems.
The focus was primarily on large philanthropic and capital gifts above $10 million. This ensured the institution wouldn’t be blindsided if problematic information about the donor surfaced later on. The team first attempted to contract a company that produced dossiers on individual prospective donors. The result was a long report (often up to 40 pages), which took three and a half weeks to complete and incurred a five-figure cost. For an institution dealing with a high volume of prospects, it was inefficient and ineffective.
What led Dartmouth to partnering with Xapien
What Dartmouth needed was a comprehensive and intuitive tool to surface red flags and potential reputational risks in a clear and concise format. Previous solutions had proven time-consuming, highlighting the need for a cost-effective solution that would allow the team to conduct reputational checks at scale without straining budgets or resources.
Dartmouth chose Xapien for that reason. Within 15 minutes, Xapien generates a due diligence report on any prospect, highlighting red flags such as associations, convictions, or accusations related to financial crime, environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) considerations, legal proceedings, and other areas of potential controversy.
Dartmouth initially adopted Xapien to support their existing reputational risk research methods. However, its efficiency and depth quickly led it to replace many traditional tools and methodologies. Xapien not only formed part of a robust reputational risk process but also centralised the function across the university. Dartmouth's research team, titled ‘strategic analysts’, now manages all reputational risk assessments across Dartmouth to ensure that red flags are caught and addressed early in the prospecting process.
The ability to perform due diligence and produce comprehensive reports at scale has allowed the team to clear a backlog of donors awaiting checks before this process was fully implemented. In addition to this, it enables due diligence to be done at an earlier stage on prospects. Gift officers now regularly reach out to analysts when they notice concerns based on Dartmouth’s defined parameters for reputational risk.
Why Dartmouth is now lowering its threshold
Before Xapien, Dartmouth had a due diligence threshold of $10 million for checking donations. This left a gap, exposing the institution to risks from donors contributing just below this limit. Since the background research on these donors took several weeks and incurred costs in the five-figure range, raising the threshold wasn’t feasible. As a result, only a small group of donations received thorough checks. Now that they have introduced Xapien which delivers comprehensive reports in minutes, they’re in the process of lowering that $10m threshold. This reduces the institution's exposure to risk and increases the understanding they have about their donor base.
How different Dartmouth teams use Xapien
With the ability to conduct due diligence on any individual or organisation with a digital footprint in minutes, the analysts realised they could use Xapien for additional purposes to protect the institution in other areas. For example, there was a reputational risk assessment they conducted on a potential donor that raised concerns. Although they didn’t halt the conversation entirely, they decided to pause and discuss how to proceed.
Concurrent with this, the same individual was meeting with the director of one of their centres on campus to join their Board of Advisors. The campus director was keen to proceed with this appointment while the Development, Operations, and Performance team was still hesitant about this individual. This situation highlighted the need to conduct reputational risk assessments for anyone in Dartmouth’s pipeline, including those associated with its centres and institutes, as well as its Board of Trustees.
Recognising the opportunity to introduce a more efficient process, the AVP of Development, Operations, and Performance held a meeting with all centre and institute directors. During this meeting, they demonstrated Xapien and its ability to conduct deep due diligence on a wide range of names within minutes. This capability would allow centres to either proceed with confidence or identify cases needing further review.
Previously, individuals in some centres had been attempting due diligence by conducting manual web searches with keywords like "crime," "fraud," or "insider trading." This process produced thousands of irrelevant results, took hours to sort through, and rarely produced meaningful insights to flag potential risks. The directors recognised Xapien’s value when they saw how comprehensive its reports are. Xapien has since become central to the risk assessment process for all individuals across centres, institutes, and the Board of Trustees.
Xapien now serves the entire College and its centres and institutions by assessing donors, Board nominees, honorary degree recipients, international donors and much more. Beyond reputational risk, it is a valuable profile-building tool for prospect researchers.
How different Dartmouth teams use Xapien
1) Analysts once spent eight hours creating a report—Xapien generates them in just eight minutes. By using sophisticated AI technology instead of relying on Google searches, the team has established itself as experts that leverage advanced tools to enhance their work. This shift has boosted confidence in their capabilities and positioned them as pioneers of innovation within the organisation.
2) The AVP of Development, Operations, and Performance can also take a more proactive approach to performing reputational risk checks on donors. This means a risk assessment is already completed by the time a gift officer engages in significant discussions. This reduces instances of fundraisers having to pause engagement with a donor while risks are checked. Instead, the overall cultivation process can proceed smoothly and quickly
3) Xapien has also proven invaluable for conducting checks on prospects involved in international gift conversations, where there are over 250,000 research opportunities globally. This has long been a significant challenge for the research team, as they work across hundreds of different countries. For example, during Dartmouth’s last campaign, donations from international donors increased by 800%, with contributions from around 105 countries. However, the team does not speak all these languages or fully understand the demographics and cultures of each donor.
4) Xapien translates over 100 languages, which ensures that negative media coverage about a prospect in another language is not overlooked, and that local articles—published in the prospect’s country and unlikely to appear in standard search results—are found. As Dartmouth’s fundraising operations become more sophisticated and attract more international donations, Xapien is increasingly vital. It provides the research team with a clearer starting point to conduct risk assessments more quickly, offering valuable insights that can be explored further.
5) For the research team, this means their role remains crucial in verifying results and guiding the creation and presentation of profiles. They are now more involved in the strategic side of their work, collaborating closely with frontline teams and engaging more in day-to-day processes. Xapien enables them to focus on the strategy behind relationships with prospects and donors. This includes supporting fundraisers not only with donation amounts but also with the timing and direction of gift conversations.
"Xapien is our first stop for reputational risk, but it's also becoming our tool for profile-building.”
Michael Foote, AVP of Development, Operations, and Performance
Xapien streamlines due diligence
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