The unreliability of nonprofit funding and alarm about scarce resources is driving nonprofits to form partnerships between each other and with for-profits. The benefits of growing collaborations include cost efficiencies, new revenue opportunities for nonprofits, more sustainable nonprofit organizations and better services for communities in addressing vital issues in economic development, urban revitalization, education, health care, the arts and conservation.
The new partnerships represent a wide range of relationships, including (but not necessarily) full-scale organizational mergers. There is a wide spectrum of possibilities. Nonprofit executives, board members and funders should consider the following opportunities:
- Establish offices for multiple nonprofits
The Atlas Performing Arts Center in Washington, D.C. is an excellent example. The Atlas provides back offices, in addition to practice and performance space, to 13 diverse performing arts groups, yet each organization operates entirely independently. Not only does this model enable significant cost savings, but the environment stimulates shared creativity among the staff members and cross-selling for audiences. Furthermore, the Atlas became a catalyst for community revitalization, bringing life to the previously blighted H Street neighborhood with new restaurants, bars and cafés. The Atlas has also become integral to the neighborhood, and residents are engaging and benefiting. For example, a senior resident is the Atlas’s house manager, and she brings fellow senior citizens to volunteer as ushers and to attend events. And a local charter school participates in the Atlas’s dance programs to fulfill their physical education requirements.
- Build program collaborations
Relight New York, a program of Children for Children, partners with schools, businesses, nonprofits and Mayor Bloomberg’s office in a large volunteerism campaign to switch homes and offices over to CFL light bulbs to conserve massive amounts of energy. Children for Children expands its reach exponentially with multiple programs through such broad-based organizational relationships.
- Collaborate for hub and spoke programs
Food Bank for New York City provides free tax assistance through 12 community agencies in the five boroughs of New York City, involving volunteers from corporations and law schools, the City of New York, the IRS and unions. A single one of its 12 sites, for example, is the East River Development Alliance (ERDA), which has deep roots and relationships among tens of thousands of residents in public housing in Long Island City. And once members of the community come to ERDA for tax prep services, ERDA then engages them for financial training and assistance, jobs programs and youth services. In this way, the Food Bank has an exponential impact through a collaborative model.
- Establish nonprofit and for-profit partnerships
A national model is American Express’s (AmEx) partnership with the National Trust for Historic Preservation, which is called Partners in Preservation. Through this program, AmEx and the National Trust are revitalizing urban neighborhoods to stimulate tourism and economic development by restoring diverse cultural and historic sites in San Francisco, New Orleans, Chicago and Boston. A unique aspect of the Partners in Preservation approach is broad-based public and community engagement in the site selection, including online voting.
Con Edison also provides a good example at the local level in New York City. For every customer who switches to electronic billing, Con Edison donates $1 to trees for New York’s tree planting fund. So, Con Ed is providing an incentive for customers to collaborate with the company to reduce paper waste and lower greenhouse gas emissions by planting trees through a nonprofit partner. Con Edison also partners regionally with Global Learning and Observations to Benefit the Environment (GLOBE), an organization whose international model is built on partnerships.
- Consolidate regional chapters of national organizations
Many national organizations are investing in more business-like national infrastructures and fewer, but more vital, regional chapters that are strategically located – a model that is designed for cost efficiencies, more rigorous measurement and quality oversight, as well as better outcomes.
- Merge nonprofits
Merge nonprofit organizations strategically. In many cases, larger organizations are absorbing smaller nonprofits in order to ensure that core programs are sustained; multi-year funding assurances from key donors are important to seal the deal. For example, Northern Virginia Family Service (NVFS) assumed responsibility for services previously provided by the Center for Multicultural Human Services. Each year, NVFS helps more than 22,000 people, including significant immigrant populations, to find affordable housing, counseling and childcare; access low-cost medical and dental services; utilize foster and respite care; participate in job training; benefit from trauma recovery; and more.
Nonprofit boards and funders have the power
Who can facilitate progress? Back offices (#1 above) can be established by philanthropists like Jane Lang, who led the Atlas initiative; or by foundations, like the Blue Ridge Foundation in New York, which built and supports a robust NYC back-office incubator.
Programmatic collaborations (#2, 3 and 4 above) can be developed by nonprofit CEOs, shared with their boards, and supported financially by funders – including corporations, foundations, individuals and government sources.
Nonprofit boards, led by their officers in partnership with the organization CEOs, are the right players to explore and make decisions about nonprofit consolidations and mergers (#5 and 6 above). Funders can help make these strategic changes possible, since there are costs involved in making the transitions.
The pressures of this economy are already driving enterprising and savvy funders, nonprofit boards and executives to pursue innovations, partnerships and efficiencies that can ultimately result in higher impact services for our communities. As the economy strengthens, the nonprofit sector will be the better for it, and ready for greater infusions of funding to provide education, health care and vibrant economic opportunities and communities for all citizens of the world.
By Alice Korngold, a corporate consultant who trains and places executives on nonprofit boards for corporate social responsibility. Contact her at alice@korngoldconsulting.com or visit http://www.alicekorngold.com/.
