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December 2022

Dec 16

Organizational assessments: What are they and why does your organization need one?

By Sponsor Insight

by Erin Hedges, founder and president, Hedges

It’s that time of the year again … the time when we get to say, “Let’s circle back on that after the holidays” or “We’ll regroup in the new year.” It’s the time for forecasting and budgeting … for reflecting on what was accomplished and what goals we should set for the future.

Nonprofit leaders constantly balance day-to-day management with long-term strategic thinking, but the end of the year always brings that task to bear in unique and time-sensitive ways. As the page turns from Q4 back to Q1, nonprofit executives are often wondering, “Is my organization on track and how do I know?” At Hedges, our recommendation for answering this question is simple: Like any successful employee, organizations need an annual review to measure their health, effectiveness, and growth. We call this an organizational assessment.

What is an organizational assessment? An organizational assessment is a measurement tool designed to assess your organization’s current standing — both in areas of strength and areas where there are critical gaps. Ultimately, it should capture your organization’s key strengths and challenges across the core functions of a nonprofit.

At Hedges, we call these the Four Pillars of Organizational Health. These pillars are Programs & Impact, Leadership & Culture, Marketing & Communications, and Finance & Development. Using this Four-Pillar framework, Hedges benchmarks organizations against 30 Organizational Indicators aligned with leading industry standards and informed by our experience in partnering with more than 140 nonprofit organizations over the last 20 years.

This 30-indicator assessment includes overarching questions such as:

  • Are there systems and processes in place to measure the organization’s impact?
  • Do the individuals impacted have opportunities to inform program delivery?
  • Does the organization have strong staff satisfaction and retention?
  • Is the board of directors high performing?
  • Does the organization have a clear brand voice and strong digital media presence?
  • Does the organization have diverse revenue streams and partnerships?

Who is involved in an organizational assessment? The most effective organizational assessments include input from multiple directions. We recommend that organizational assessments include input from staff, board members, and the individuals your organization impacts. Staff members can provide input through a simple staff satisfaction survey and board members may complete a self-evaluation of themselves and the entire board.

These results can then be compiled with client feedback that is captured through existing program evaluation methods or through a separate client satisfaction survey. Critically, you should be able to draw a direct line between the questions you ask in a survey or evaluation and the indicators you use to make your organizational assessment.

Organization leaders such as the executive director or the board chair should oversee the organizational assessment process, but they may also tap into contractors and consultants who specialize in nonprofit operations and governance.

What are the benefits of an organizational assessment? Not only does an organizational assessment answer the question: “Is my organization on track?” but it also provides the following three key benefits:

  1. An organizational assessment can give you helpful data to use for setting measurable goals. For example, you may have a general goal of improving staff satisfaction in 2023. In an assessment process, you may discover that 80 percent of staff feel like the culture at your organization is positive but only 20 percent describe communication as strong. Now, thanks to this assessment data, you can make you 2023 goal much more specific and measurable with concrete baseline data to inform your year-end goal (i.e., from 80 percent to 100 percent) with a clear area for improvement (i.e., communication).
  2. An organizational assessment can make your funding requests more competitive. Self-awareness is a great character quality in people and in organizations. It shows authenticity, humility, and responsibility — all things that supporters love to see from nonprofit organizations. An organizational assessment is a quick, simple way to demonstrate self-awareness, that you take your mission seriously, and that you want to be honest about where you are excelling and where you have room to grow. The data you glean from an organizational assessment not only strengthens your internal goal setting but should also strengthen your grant requests and donor appeals. For example, in an assessment process, you may learn that 100 percent of the individuals you impact say you make a positive difference in your life, or 80 percent of staff see themselves working at you organization in three years. Those are great data points that will ensure your organization stands out in the crowd.
  3. An organizational assessment sets the tone for a positive, transparent culture. More and more, employees want to see their employers take accountability for the culture and dynamics that are present in their workplace. An organizational assessment is a tool that says, “We hear you.” By conducting an organizational assessment process, especially with the help of a third-party facilitator, your organization can get a holistic picture of both the pain points that are holding you back and the strengths you didn’t know were there.

If you’re looking ahead to 2023 and wondering what your organization should focus on and where you need to invest your energy, consider starting with an organizational assessment. Having concrete data to describe where you are now is the best way to articulate where you want to be.

Erin Hedges is the founder and president of Hedges, an Indianapolis consulting firm that advances social change by strengthening Indiana’s philanthropic sector. Contact Erin at erin@hellohedges.com to learn more about Hedges’ 30-Indicator Organizational Assessment.

Dec 16

Freetown Village: Insights on sustainability from a small nonprofit

By Feature

by Shari Finnell, editor/writer, Not-for-profit News

For decades, Freetown Village, a small nonprofit organization based in Indianapolis, had been focused on educating its audiences about a unique period in America’s history — specifically 1870, when freed African American slaves experienced a series of firsts, according to founder Opehlia Wellington.

That distinct period served the organization well, according to Wellington. “When I first started Freetown Village, I decided to focus on that period since there were so many things that happened after the Civil War to benefit African Americans,” said Wellington, referring to the passage of the 15th amendment,  which granted African American men the right to vote, as well as the 13th and 14th amendments, which abolished slavery and provided all U.S. citizens, including former slaves, equal protection under the laws. “It was an unusually safe period of time for African Americans.” 

About 15 years ago, Wellington decided to modify and expand that focus — among the many steps she has taken to ensure that Freetown Village maintains its resilience. “After research, I decided we need to expand beyond that era — after 1870 and even before 1870,” she said. “It allowed us to talk about a more inclusive history of African Americans in Indiana. It gave us the liberty to do something different.”

While expanding an organization’s mission can have advantages, it also comes with disadvantages, according to Wellington. Although Freetown Village has put on numerous productions since modifying its mission, the organization continues to address questions related to its productions set in other time periods. Another consideration is determining how to repurpose or address previous marketing materials, she said.

“A lot of people still think we’re only making productions in 1870,” she said. “Many of them are surprised. It requires a significant amount of marketing to inform people.”

Maintaining sustainability as a small nonprofit

With the nonprofit organization celebrating its 40th anniversary, Freetown Village has avoided a statistic that haunts many other nonprofits. According to the National Center on Charitable Statistics, more than 30 percent of all nonprofit organizations will fail within the first 10 years. And, the fallout from the global pandemic will likely result in even higher numbers of failures.

Wellington, a former educator who first conceptualized Freetown Village in 1982, notes several lessons learned as a small nonprofit that has been able to sustain itself after numerous decades. One of the key factors is ensuring that you have a mission that excites you, as well as addresses a need that is not being met by other nonprofits.

“Do you have an audience?,” she asked. “Are other people excited about seeing the value in what you’re doing?”

The next step is determining how to make the nonprofit sustainable. “It’s really about the planning,” she said.

As part of determining whether others see the value also lies at the heart of fundraising because you will need to solicit support at numerous levels. “There are many nonprofits that get money from foundations as well as individual contributions,” she noted. 

However, Wellington noted, smaller nonprofits, including grassroots organizations, have traditionally had challenges with the fundraising aspects of sustainability. Even small nonprofits that have been able to sustain themselves often are not able to generate enough money to do the things they had envisioned, which has happened with Freetown Village.

“There are many things that we had talked about doing but just never got the funding to make it happen,” she said. “There are some inequities in the amount of money that is distributed. Only recently have foundations realized that only about 2 percent of their funding is granted to organizations led by African Americans.”

Wellington said she is hopeful that trend is changing as numerous foundations have intentionally sought to make funding more equitable in recent years.  “Within the last two or three years, with some of the DEI funding, we’ve been able to pick up some new supporters,” she said. “Some of them I would never have wasted my time submitting a proposal because the amount we would have received would have been insignificant.”

“It’s hard to do the same quality of programming and services when other organizations are getting significantly more,” she said. “That’s not to say that all white-led organizations are flush. It’s just that a majority of black-led organizations are experiencing similar problems with fundraising.”

As she looks to the future, Wellington said she will continue to explore options to expand Freetown Village’s mission as she did with the recent production “Sign of the Times,” a one-woman show that shed light on the women’s suffrage movement in the mid-1920’s.

“Knowledge changes the world,” Wellington said. “With every program we do, regardless of the year, we try to make a current connection to it. For our recent show, we were talking about women’s suffrage. Now, in 2022, we see a resurgence of people trying to keep not just women from voting, but black people and Hispanic from voting. It can be eye-opening to see that the same playbook is being used from 100 years ago.”

Dec 05

How to get your nonprofit news covered by the media

By Feature

Local journalists and PR consultants offer tips to promote your cause

by Shari Finnell, editor/writer, Not-for-profit News

As a nonprofit leader, it’s likely that increasing awareness about your organization can be just as challenging as fundraising. While digital marketing and social media outreach can be effective ways to reach new audiences, gaining media coverage can be the key to promoting your mission, and consequently, engaging more supporters and donors.

But the process for successfully getting their news covered by local media outlets can elude many nonprofits, especially those without the resources to hire a public relations consultant.

During Media Access Workshop recently presented by the Indianapolis Association of Black Journalists, local media representatives, including those from the Indianapolis Star, WISH-TV, WTHR, and Not-for Profit News, and communications consultants and public relations experts offered key strategies for nonprofits and churches that want to effectively engage with local media outlets.

After attending the workshop, Paradise Bradford, CEO and founder of Pretty Passionate Hands, said that the insights she gained alleviated some of her frustrations about getting media coverage for her grassroots nonprofit organization, which supports and mentors teen parents.

“It can get discouraging when you see stories highlighted about other organizations,” she said. “You may think, ‘Why are they on the news?’ It gets discouraging because you start wondering if what you’re doing is important.”

Bradford said some of the key takeaways from the session was understanding when and how to send press releases, as well as identifying the media teams that would be most likely to cover her nonprofit’s events and news updates.

The session, which was sponsored by the Indianapolis Recorder and Indiana University Purdue University at Indianapolis, also included the following tips:

Pitch a compelling newsworthy story. Make sure your idea for media coverage is newsworthy. As Jasmine Minor of WISH-TV noted, first ask this critical question: “Why would someone care?” Is your organization celebrating its 10th anniversary? That’s not unusual. Many organizations are celebrating milestones. Explore more newsworthy angles, such as the impact that your organization has made in the community in a specific area. Provide data, whether national statistics related to the story or data unique to your organization’s impact. Pitches backed up by data can make a more compelling case for an article, according to Alexandria Burris, investigative reporter for the Indianapolis Star. It’s more likely to get a reporter’s attention.

Understand your audience. Before pitching a story to a news reporter or media outlet, do your research first. Most media outlets have reporters who cover specific areas, such as crime, education, sports, government, traffic, etc. Take the time to research reporters’ areas of specialty and interest before pitching an article. An education reporter may be interested in the work done by nonprofits that are addressing learning loss caused by COVID-19. Most online publications, newspapers, and TV stations will have a listing of their reporters on their websites. They also will include contact information, including email addresses. Consider reaching out on various platforms, including LinkedIn and Twitter.

Develop a press release. When proposing a story idea, make sure to include the Five W’s — Who, What, When, Where, and Why — in a concise format. In most cases, a press release should be limited to three or four paragraphs on one page with a short attention-grabbing headline. Include contact information of the person who will be responding to reporters’ inquiries. Also, be prepared to share your story as part of a broadcast, whether you receive a request from a TV station or a newspaper.

Don’t be afraid to engage with the reporter on a personal level. If you feel like your news pitches are constantly ignored, send a quick email to ask the journalists on your list what types of stories they’re interested in or if there is another person on their team that would be a better fit. Journalists are often inundated with press releases and advisories. Be consistent in following up and trying to engage them.

Send press releases at least a week or two in advance. Depending upon the news outlet, you will need to send a press release in time for them to consider it for publication. Most daily publications and TV stations will need at least one- or two-weeks’ advance notice about your news story, while weekly and monthly publications will require even more time.