Scaling personalized stewardship with efficiency and impact

Christine Russo, Senior Reporting Analyst, Stewardship & Donor Engagement at Boston College and her advancement team faced a significant challenge—generating roughly 2,000 stewardship reports annually across diverse graduate programs from nursing to social work to law—while ensuring each donor receives a meaningful, personalized experience.

With only 10% requiring printing, the team needed a digital solution that could move their donors to dynamic, web-based experiences without sacrificing the authentic and tailored communications their donors expect.

Mythos made it possible for Boston College to transform how they connect donors with student impact stories, freeing their team from monotonous manual tasks to focus on more meaningful work.

From cookie-cutter to customized impact

“Donors don't just want cookie-cutter ‘thank you for my financial aid,’” explained Christine. “They really want to know the impact that they're having on the students’ lives.”

The challenge was clear: how to tell authentic, specific stories when you’re managing thousands of reports across multiple programs? Each program has its own unique context—a nursing student's experience at a Boston hospital looks vastly different from a law student's clinical work or a social work student's community engagement.

Mythos automated, data-driven, conditional survey logic became the game changer. “A question that I may want to ask a nursing student is going to be different than a social work student versus a law student. Now we're able to really hone in on things that, if you're supporting a nursing student, you really want to hear about the work they're doing at Boston hospitals or clinicals.”

This approach means looking at impact collection in a new way, moving beyond repetitive, generic queries to questions that generate responses that resonate with the next generation of donors who expect authentic, meaningful engagement.

Workflow efficiency at scale

Managing 2,000 reports a year requires more than good intentions—it demands systematic processes. Mythos' email manager transformed Boston College’s outreach capabilities.

“We have everything in one place,” the team explains. “We can just filter and say, ‘Give me everybody who hasn't even clicked on the link before,’ and we can send out reminder emails. You're able to schedule reminder emails.”

But the efficiency gains go deeper than email management. Workflow statuses and assignment capabilities allow the team to manage complex report generation across multiple team members. “Just something simple as being able to have different statuses and being able to assign stories to different people for various reasons—having those workflow efficiencies when we’re generating so many reports and managing everything at once is game changing.”

The ability to upload data and generate beautiful reports instantly means the team is no longer spending countless hours on monotonous manual tasks. “Mythos has freed up our team to do a lot more meaningful work.”

Partnership, not just a platform

What sets Mythos apart for Boston College isn't just the technology—it's the relationship.

“I don't think you could ask for better customer service than what we're receiving from Mythos. If we're having an issue or we just don't know how to do something, we email and they respond almost immediately—it's crazy how fast we get answers back.”

But it goes beyond response time. “It really feels more like we're not just using their system. We're a partner with them. They're very open to suggestions and modifications. They're always looking for ways to improve and innovate.”

This partnership approach led to a critical innovation: custom subdomains. Boston College was experiencing issues with recipients not opening emails because they didn't realize they were from BC. “That's one of the great things about Mythos—you tell them you're having an issue and you don't just kind of get brushed off. They really are listening to their clients.” The subdomain solution means reports now look like they're coming directly from the university, dramatically improving open rates and engagement.

For Christine's team, the transformation is measurable: 2,000 personalized reports generated annually, conditional surveys tailored to nursing, social work, and law students, and email workflows that manage themselves. But the real win isn't what Mythos does—it's what it enables the team to do.

"Mythos has freed up our team to do a lot more meaningful work," Christine reflects. Hours once spent on manual report generation now go toward relationship building, strategic donor engagement, and the high-touch stewardship that creates lasting connections. When donors receive authentic stories from nursing students working in Boston hospitals or law students in clinical practice, they're not just reading another thank-you letter—they're seeing the specific impact of their generosity.

That's the shift from operational burden to strategic capability: technology handling the repetitive, humans focusing on the meaningful.

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