How Households Work in Nonprofit Cloud
Each household in Nonprofit Cloud is represented with a business account record. We know that the business account is for a household—and not a business or other nonprofit—because it’s related to a Party Relationship Group object record with the type of Household.
Party relationship groups define groups—such as a family, club, religious congregation, neighborhood, or housing complex—to tailor communications and services to that group.
Party relationship group records can be:
- Time-bound to track a temporary or former situation, such as short-term roommates
- Merged, such as when two households combine in marriage
- Split, such as when an adult child moves out on their own
- Plus, accounts can be part of several party relationship groups at once, such as if a child divides their time between the households of parents who live separately.
If your organization uses Actionable Relationship Center (ARC) components, such as the Relationship Graph, you can view connections in visualization to explore how individual stakeholders and households are connected.
Create a Household Account and Associate Household Members
A household comprises several records: a business account for the household, a related party relationship group record with the Household type, and records that connect accounts and contacts to the group and each other.
Nonprofit Cloud simplifies creating all those records with a helpful guided flow. Let’s use it now to create a household for the person account we created in the last unit.
1. Find and select Party Relationship Groups from the App Launcher.
2. Click New Group.
3. In the first step of the flow, enter basic details and relate records to the household.
a. Enter a Name.
b. For type, select Group or Household.
c. Enter optional details such as the Primary Address, Group Income, and Group Size.
4. Relate members, groups, contacts, and business accounts to the group.
a. A member is an individual who is directly part of the household, and you must add at least one.
b. A related group, such as a neighbor or friend, represents a linked household.
c. A related contact is someone connected to the household but not a member, such as a relative, mentor, sponsor, financial advisor, or lawyer.
d. A related business account represents an organization that the household interacts with in some way, such as an employer, house of worship, or another nonprofit.
5. Click Next.
6. In the second step, we define how individual members and related contacts, groups, and business accounts are related to the group and each other. The navigation for this section groups each entity type.
a. In the Members section, select an account.
b. Define how the member is related to the household by finding and selecting a value in the Role field. Designate one member as the primary member of the group.
c. Optionally, define how the member is related to each other entity.
i. For each: Select a Party Role Relationship that describes how two entities are related. For now, know that the first word in the party role relationship name is assigned to your selected entity. The second word is assigned to the related entity.
d. Track if the relationship is Active.
e. Optionally, set a Start Date and End Date to track the time period of a relationship.
7. Repeat the process for each member and related contact, group, and business account. Each member and related contact must have a role within the group.
8. Save your work.
a. The new household party relationship group, business account, and relationship records are created.
Changes to Households
Remember that households can be merged together or split using other helpful flows.
Other Types of Households and Groups Using the Party Relationship Group Object
The party relationship group records can bring together any group of individuals, such as:
- An extended or multi-generational family that lives with or near each other
- Roommates or unrelated people who live together
- Everyone who lives in the same apartment complex or development
- A cohort of people going through a program together at the same time
Ensure you have the correct values in the Category and Subtype fields on the Party Relationship Group object. These settings can help you define many different types of groupings.