Catering to nonprofits, Daniel Island software maker expands consulting unit

The past week has been one of the busiest Laura Kennedy's ever had.

As vice president of human resources at Daniel Island software maker Blackbaud, Kennedy is on a bit of a hiring tear, a rarity in the technology sector nowadays. Kennedy and her team of five recruiters are scrambling to fill as many as 70 openings, representing a nearly 10 percent increase in Blackbaud's 754-person worldwide workforce.

What's even more telling about the company is who it's hiring. Many of its open positions are the result of the company's efforts to expand its offerings to the nonprofit world. "There's a lot of activity," Kennedy said. "We've been looking at opportunities to expand and grow into companion areas that are still serving the nonprofit market."

Those efforts, she said, are gaining traction. Hiring some of these people can be difficult, she said, in part because people with their experience cannot readily be found here. Formed in 1981, Blackbaud in recent years has expanded into non-software businesses like consulting, a move that it undertook soon after Robert Sywolski took over as chief executive in 2000. Indeed, it no longer considers itself a mere software company. The consulting services have helped Blackbaud attract bigger nonprofits, like the Alumni Association of the U.S. Naval Academy and Loyola University in New Orleans.

"That is a growing area of business for us," Kennedy said. She noted that a couple of new contracts can eat up considerable staff time over six months to a year, which is why Blackbaud is beefing up its consulting unit.

Blackbaud is also adding sales staff. Over the past year or so, the company has established a team to target large nonprofits. "That's a unique skill set," Kennedy said. "We've been going out to the market to find very experienced sales reps."

The vast majority of Blackbaud's customers are nonprofits, many of which have struggled in the past couple of years because the economy has made fundraising difficult. Kennedy said the company has felt its clients' pain somewhat, but sales are still over the previous year's level. Overall, she said, Blackbaud has consistently stayed in a hiring mode, save a couple of years ago when its divisions paid close attention to individual hires. It never had a full-fledged hiring freeze, she said.