NonprofitEye

Last week, in MISSION WITHOUT I.T. IS LIKE A DAY WITHOUT SUNSHINE I set out to write  ROI, but before I'd finished my first paragraph, I had revealed my own flawed organizational paradigm. Allan Benamer contributed a critically important comment: IT is actually responsible for all the other departments you mentioned (accounting, marketing, etc.) in the best nonprofits? You really can't do accounting, marketing or fundraising without IT. ...you could try but you'd have a heck of a hard time scaling. Think of IT as an umbrella that keeps all the other departments from getting wet. In the best nonprofits, it should be integrated into every department and not be a standalone. The only way to effectively address complaints about ineffective organization? Offer a solution. How about this: replace our world of the three overlapping sets: communications/ operations/accounting--with a new world---mission/community/investment. The catches? If your giving is an investme...

How do you achieve your mission without infrastructure? What is your mission? Help underserved youth get jobs? To get to that mission you'll need to: Tell others about your story? Marketing Ask for help (especially money)? Fundraising Keep your government funding? Accounting Answer an email? IT Congratulations, now you need $100,000 to carry out your mission (not counting your salary of course). Will the purpose, the appeal, the grant request and the communication advance your mission? Sure, but it has to make more than $100,000. Enter the business measurement: Return on Investment or ROI. This is a measure that profit making companies use to determine how much money they make from how much money they used. In other words, if you invest $100,000 and make $500,000, that would be a pretty good return on your investment. Now, what place does ROI have in the no...