Rose Community Foundation’s Three-Year Capacity-Building ... · pains and help grantees skillfully manage their way through. Participant buy-in.The real measure of any capacity-building

BOOSTBuilding OrganizationalOperating Strength TogetherRose Community Foundation’s Three-Year Capacity-Building Initiative

About Rose Community Foundation: Rose Community Foundationworks to enhance the quality of life of the Greater Denver communitythrough its leadership, resources, traditions and values. We value ourJewish heritage and our roots in Jewish traditions including charity,philanthropy and nondiscrimination. We value excellence and uphold thehighest standards in the pursuit of our mission. We value the trust andrespect of the community and continually strive to earn and sustain thattrust by consistent and disciplined adherence to our mission.

Rose Community Foundation’s support for the Greater Denver community isfocused on five program areas: Aging, Child and Family Development,Education, Health and Jewish Life. In addition to grantmaking, RosePhilanthropic Services assists individuals and families in their philanthropicendeavors.

About BOOST: BOOST stands for Building Organizational OperatingStrength Together. It is a three-year program offered by Rose CommunityFoundation to provide a comprehensive package of capacity-building toolsto strategically selected grantees of the Foundation. Structured on theNonprofit Lifecycles Model of organizational assessment and trainingdeveloped by Dr. Susan Kenny Stevens, BOOST offers assessment, training,consultation and grants to plan and implement significant changes in thenonprofit organizations’ business operations in order to better support theirmission and programs.

About Dr. Susan Kenny Stevens: The lead consultant for BOOST, Dr.Stevens is a nationally recognized consultant, author and lecturer onfinancial, management and organizational issues pertaining to philanthropyand the nonprofit sector. Her books and case studies are used throughoutthe country by nonprofit managers, foundations, evaluators and academicsto strengthen their understanding of nonprofit dynamics. In addition toNonprofit Lifecycles: Stage-based Wisdom for Nonprofit Capacity, she is alsothe author of All the Way to the Bank, Investing In Capacity, and BudgetingYour Way to Financial Stability.

About this report: This report is a summary of Rose CommunityFoundation’s first three-year BOOST Initiative based primarily on theBOOST action learning assessment produced by Corona Research, Inc. ofDenver, Colorado, July 2007.

Both this highlights report and the full BOOST action learning assessmentare available online: http://www.rcfdenver.org/initiatives_BOOST.htm

Copyright 2008, Rose Community Foundation

ForewordJanuary 2008

Over the past 15 years, national andlocal foundations have adopted a varietyof philanthropic practices designed tostrengthen and sustain grantee partners.Known as capacity grantmaking, theseprograms reinforce the hand-in-gloverelationship between the sustainabilityof a nonprofit’s mission and its financialand operational well-being—its “capacity.”

In 2003, the staff of Rose CommunityFoundation, while studying differentfoundations’ approaches to capacity-building, learned about the FordFoundation’s Working Capital Fund, amultiyear initiative to assist minorityarts groups to build more durableorganizations. My staff at LarsonAllenand I developed this program for Ford inthe mid-1990s, which engaged 16organizations in a four-year process ofself-assessment, business planning andgrant investments. These activities weresupplemented with technical assistanceand coaching from a cadre of nationalconsultants. The program was based onthe seven-stage capacity model outlinedin my book Nonprofit Lifecycles: Stage-based Wisdom for Nonprofit Capacity(2001), which defines organizationalcapacity as a developmental process andpresents distinct capacity expectationsfor each of the seven stages.

In late 2003, Rose CommunityFoundation launched its first capacity-building initiative, BOOST (BuildingOrganizational Operating SupportTogether), a $2 million program witheight growth-stage grantees. Rose’sprimary impetus was to “boost” thefinancial and operating competency of akey set of grantees in whom the Foun-dation had a mission-related stake, and

who were ready, willing and able tomeet the intensive work of a three-yearprogram.

Now in its second round, BOOST hascaptured the best of the many capacityprograms I have designed and managedthrough the years. And although itshares many common elements withother successful models, BOOST alsoreflects Rose Community Foundation’sown values and grantmaking style.

BOOST was designed with fiveunderlying precepts:

A lifecycles approach to capacity.The “lifecycle” capacity approachpresumes that, to be effective,capacity-building programs mustmeet each nonprofit participant at itsown unique entry point and thendevelop solutions consistent with thereality of its individual needs andlifecycle placement.

Holisitic approach. BOOST also takesa comprehensive, holistic approach tocapacity-building quite different fromepisodic technical assistance. BOOSTuses a facilitated self-assessment toestablish each participant’s capacitystarting point, and then a businessplan to strategize a more capablefuture. Under a trained consultant’sguidance, grantees look first at their mission, market, externalenvironment, and programming, andthen design a set of management,governance, financial and admin-istrative strategies necessary tosupport these mission-relatedactivities. The Foundation’s capacitygrant investment is then made insupport of the business plan strategies.

Operational improvements. As acapacity-building program, BOOST is Page 1

about improving operating perfor-mance. Any process improvement, bydefinition, will require changes toprevious actions and thoughtpatterns. While taking root, suchchanges, particularly to long-standingbeliefs or activities, are likely tocreate a sense of unrest, especially formanagement and staff. Successfulcapacity-building programs anticipate

these changes as normal growingpains and help grantees skillfullymanage their way through.

Participant buy-in. The real measureof any capacity-building program isthe extent to which grantee partners“internalize” newly learned operatingpractices; that is, they take what theyhave learned to heart and turn newpractices into sustainable habits. Thisis very tricky business that requiresgrantees to believe that the capacity-building initiative is truly somethingof benefit to them, rather than“imposed” by the funder. In the caseof BOOST, Rose Community Foun-dation’s reputation for caring aboutits grantees clearly worked to theinitiative’s advantage. Grantee

partners came into BOOST with bothtrust and respect for the Foundation,and were receptive from the start thatRose had their best interest at heart.

Realistic and flexible. A lot canhappen over a three-year program,and Foundation staff and programconsultants must be ready to adapt tothe changing needs of their granteepartners as required. Likewise, goodas they may be, capacity-buildingprograms are not magic. Sustainablechange will not happen over night,nor will it be accomplished in justthree short years. Yet, in all cases, asthe first round evaluation revealed,the capacity-strengthening practicesintroduced through BOOST haveformed the basis for improved andsustainable habit development in eachgrantee partner.

These five principles, common to manysuccessful capacity-building programs,formed the foundation of BOOST. ButRose’s staff put its own unique stamp on BOOST’s program design, too, byincorporating three distinguishingelements that have both contributedgreatly to the program’s success, and arelikely to make a lasting imprint on theDenver-Boulder community.

Community-wide leveragability. Asa program of a community founda-tion, BOOST serves nonprofits in theDenver-Boulder area. In addition tobuilding the organizational capacityof these designated grantees, morethan 75 nonprofit executives, staffand board members have participatedin BOOST over the past four years.These individuals now share acommon belief in the importance ofnonprofit capacity, as well as acommon vocabulary and experienceto discuss lifestyle-related capacityPage 2

Lead BOOST consultant Dr. Susan KennyStevens (third from right) with BOOSTConsultants at a celebration of the initiative'ssuccess. Left to right: Karla Raines, PatriciaSterner, Sharon McClew, Gurudev Khalsa,Bourge Hathaway, Dr. Susan Kenny Stevens,Gail Hoyt and Janine Vanderburg.

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expectations. In addition, 14 consul-tants have adopted the lifecyclescapacity approach in their work withBOOST—and with other clients aswell. In years ahead, BOOST’s lever-age is likely to spread further asparticipating executives and boardmembers move on to other nonprofitjobs or board positions.

Consultant cohort. Equally distin-guishing is the role Denver/Boulderarea consultants played in the BOOST process. The consultants, apart from their work with grantees,gathered two or three times a year inconsultant networking sessions toshare techniques and learnings witheach other. In this way, this group of skilled consultants formed aCommunity of Practice and developedmeaningful collegial relationshipsthat, in the summative BOOSTevaluation, emerged as one of theunforeseen and lasting strengths ofthe program.

In-house management and hands-oncommitment. Unlike many capacity-building programs that use outsideintermediaries to manage theprogram, Rose staffed and managedBOOST internally. This hands-onproject management approachprovided increased buy-in fromFoundation staff, and kept BOOST anactive and ongoing part of theFoundation’s activities. Indeed, the

Foundation’s initial decision tolaunch BOOST, in addition to helpinga set of grantee partners buildcapacity, was based on a desire tocreate a foundation-wide sharedactivity for its five program areas.Through BOOST, Rose programofficers became their own Communityof Practice as they shared individuallearnings that enhanced the Founda-tion’s overall grantmaking knowledgeand capacity.

Rose Community Foundation and I aremost excited to share the specifics of the BOOST program and experience with you and know you will find thepages that follow informative andinspirational.

Of the dozens of capacity-buildingprograms I have developed for numer-ous national and local foundations, I can truly say that BOOST, and theopportunity to work with the talentedgrantees, consultants and Foundationstaff involved in this program, has beena most satisfying and rewardingexperience.

Susan Kenny Stevens, Ph.D.BOOST Lead Consultant

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“The BOOST Initiative was a shot ofconfidence. It made us feel like wecould get things done. It took us outof the mindset of ‘How do we stayafloat?’ and gave us the ability toimagine what we could become.”

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Table of ContentsThe Idea . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5

The Process . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6

Phase I — Selecting Grantees(2003) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6

Phase II — Self-Assessment andBusiness Plans (2004) . . . . . . . . 6

Phase III — Implementation ofBusiness Plans (2005-06) . . . . . 8

BOOST Evaluation . . . . . . . . . . 9

The Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

In a Nutshell — How Organizations ChangedDuring BOOST . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10

Key Success Factors PromotingOrganizational Strength . . . . . . 11

Key Resources PromotingOrganizational Strength . . . . . 12

Lessons Learned from BOOST . . 14

From Survival to Success — Building Organizational Capacity Effectively . . . . . . . . . . 15

BOOST Participants . . . . . . . . . . . 16

The IdeaIn its first seven years of grantmaking(1995-2002), Rose Community Founda-tion made several thousand grants insupport of organizations across theGreater Denver community. While many of the grants met or exceededexpectations, the Foundation’s seniorprogram staff also recognized a commonchallenge: some project funding andsupport for organizations’ new ideas didnot achieve the desired impact—notnecessarily because the programs wereflawed, but sometimes because theorganization lacked the infrastructure toadequately implement and sustain them.Realizing that the Foundation’s goalscould best be achieved through stronggrantees aligned with its strategicobjectives, Rose’s program staff beganlooking for ways to strengthen selectedgrantees systemically. They sought amodel that could promote nonprofits’organizational development andencourage sound financial practices.

In addition, Rose’s five senior programofficers were seeking a way to worktogether across their fields to develop acommon understanding and approach tobuilding nonprofit capacity. They pooledjust over $2 million from their respectiveprogram areas’ grantmaking budgets tofund a cross-program initiative.

Early in 2003, Rose’s program staffbecame aware of the work of Dr. SusanKenny Stevens and her NonprofitLifecycles Model. Dr. Stevens’ approachoffered a new way of working closelyand intensively with selected grantees tobuild their financial health and improvetheir capacity and effectiveness.

In Dr. Stevens’ book, Nonprofit Lifecycles: Stage-based Wisdom for Nonprofit Capacity, she describes how

organizations go through a seven-stagecycle of development. They begin at the idea stage, progress to start-up,continue through growth, reachmaturity, then can slip into decline, atwhich point they can turn around or,when there is no longer energy ormarket need, terminate. She considerseach stage in the lifecycle to presentpredictable leadership and management

challenges requiring stage-appropriatestrategies and investments.

The Foundation invited Dr. Stevens tohelp it design an initiative to strengthenthe leadership and organizationalcapacity of eight growth-stage grantees,and to serve as the initiative’s mastertrainer and lead facilitator. Havingconsulted on successful initiatives tostrengthen organizations across thecountry, Dr. Stevens stressed the

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“We had identifiedgrowth/capacity issues, but were uncertain how todeal with them. BOOST and Rose CommunityFoundation gave us theresources and structure to do it.”

TURNAROUND TERMINALIDEA START-UP DECLINEMATURITYGROWTH

© 2001 Susan Kenny Stevens. Excerpted from the book Nonprofit Lifecycles: Stage-based Wisdom for Nonprofit Capacity. All rights reserved.

Nonprofit Lifecycles Model

essential components of: 1) theNonprofit Lifecycles Model; 2) granteeleadership teams; 3) multiyear grants;and 4) consulting expertise to create andimplement a business plan. As a result,the BOOST Initiative employed a holisticapproach, fueled with coaching, peerlearning and value-added grants toenable the grantees to develop into more stable organizations.

The ProcessPhase 1 – Selecting Grantees(2003)

The Phase 1 planning stage for BOOSTtook place in 2003 as program officersfrom each of the Foundation’s fundingareas—Aging, Child and Family Develop-ment, Education, Health and JewishLife—selected key grantees to participate.

The screening process for granteesconsidered three main criteria: closealignment and proven track record inaddressing one or more of Rose’sgrantmaking priorities; experiencing orpoised for rapid growth; and readinessto participate in the comprehensivethree-year initiative.

As the initiative eventually involveddozens of people, multiple contracts andnumerous training sessions, it required a project manager. Rose assumed theresponsibility internally, assigning aprogram officer to the role. And, wish-ing to further build local consultingexpertise in nonprofit managementissues, the Foundation contracted withconsultants from the Denver area towork with the growth-stage grantees.Each consultant was trained in Dr.Stevens’ approach and was matchedwith a grantee to work with throughoutBOOST.

Dr. Stevens conducted a site visit withgrantee organizations to assess organi-zational challenges and determinewhether each was poised to benefit fromthe initiative. Her assessments alsogauged each organization’s commitmentto and capacity for an intense and long-term change process.

Phase II – Self-Assessment and Business Plans (2004)

Once Dr. Stevens and the Foundationfinalized the group of participatinggrantees, each organization assigned upto two board and two staff members,including the executive director, to serveon leadership teams. The leadershipteams were responsible for drivingBOOST forward in their own organi-zations. The initiative’s structuresupported grantees through coachingprovided by the consultants, a potentialPage 6

Seven Goals of the BOOST Initiative1. Develop organizational capacity in governance, management,

programs and administration beyond the capacity starting pointsoutlined in the organizations’ self-assessments

2. Understand individual program economics and the financial levers orbenchmarks needed to attain financial success, and use this knowledgeto aid future financial planning, budgeting and decision-making

3. Value financial health and adhere to sound financial practices asevidenced by annual revenues that exceed expenses

4. Develop a network of peers to serve as an ongoing support andresource, and thus break the sense of isolation

5. Develop a common vocabulary based on the Nonprofit LifecyclesModel for use among peers and within organizations

6. Use business plans as a holistic “master plan” within which allprogrammatic, operational and financial decisions are made

7. Effectively learn to use a leadership team to champion businessplanning strategies and implement organizational changes necessitated by the plan

infusion of up to $120,000 over thethree years in strategic operatingsupport, and a learning cohort withwhich to learn and troubleshoot.

BOOST’s theory of change was that thegrowth-stage organizations would bebetter able to accomplish their missionsand increase programs and services bytaking time to look strategically atwhere they were going, creating abusiness and financial plan to supporttheir direction, and focusing onstrengthening internal structures thatwould enable them to be sustainable.

Dr. Stevens brought a key diagnostictool to BOOST: comparing anorganization’s structure to a table.Organizations must balance mission andprograms (the table top) on the legs offour internal operations—governance,management, financial resourcedevelopment and administrativesystems. Often, growth-stage nonprofitsare “a marble top on twig legs.” Toreach maturity, an organization’sstructural components of the table—itsunderlying business components—mustbe strengthened. Until a balance isachieved, the weak leg, or vulnerableinteral area, will continually hold theorganization back.

Applying Dr. Stevens’ model, granteesfirst undertook an organizationalself-assessment facilitated by theconsultants. The assessments revealedthat the financial “leg” of all theBOOST grantees was less developedthan the other legs of their tables.Each grantee lacked internal financialexpertise and a comprehensive businessplan to guide its future. Rose provided

BOOST participants with a financialseminar designed to establish anunderstanding of program-basedbudgeting within their economic model,and establish financial goals.

The Foundation also provided granteeswith $20,000 to invest in operationalupgrades and systems development tojump-start their work. The grantees,with help from their consultants, thencreated comprehensive three-yearbusiness plans to chart their financialand programmatic destinies. Thesestrategic “master plans” articulated allprogram operations and financialdecisions needed to attain sustainability. Page 7

Dr. Susan Kenny Stevens uses theanalogy of a table’s structure to depict

the important elements oforganizational strength.

“Knowing that differentlifecycles bring predictablechallenges made the processeasier. When I began to seeour organization in theframework of start-up/growth, it depersonalizedany of the problems wewere experiencing.”

Phase III – Implementation ofBusiness Plans (2005-06)

For Rose, a viable business plan fromthe grantees ensured that subsequentoperating support would result innecessary impacts and outcomes. Oncethe Foundation approved each grantee’splan, it provided the first of twostrategic operating grants of up to

$50,000 to carry out the business plan’simplementation.

The most common use of BOOST grantswas to hire additional specialists onstaff—particularly in the areas ofdevelopment, marketing and finance oraccounting. Some also upgradedtechnology and databases.

The organizations further progressedtoward their business plan goals byaddressing their programs and systems.Consultants aided the grantees inevaluating the implementation of their

plans and providing feedback regardingwhat was working or not, and how torevise strategies as needed.

By the end of 2005, the grantees hadcompleted a full year of business planimplementation. Each was asked torecord and reflect on changes andprogress toward their business plangoals and to submit an annual audit orfinancial statement.

In early 2006, once the Foundationdetermined that the grantees weremaking notable progress toward theirbusiness plan goals, the organizationsreceived an additional $50,000 grant forstrategic operating support.

Throughout the three-year initiative,grantees, consultants and Rose programstaff continued to meet semi-annually inlarge-group meetings for specifictraining, sharing and trouble-shooting.The consultants also met together toexchange information and shape theinitiative. The eight executive directors,in particular, coalesced and realizedconsiderable benefits from sharingstrategies. They began to meet togetheron a regular basis. This Communities ofPractice model was one of BOOST’sdistinguishing features, encouragingexchange networks among peers.

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It’s cupcake time at the Boulder JewishCommunity Center Preschool. ThroughBOOST, the Boulder JCC realized that itneeded to separate (amicably) from itsparent organization, the Boulder JewishCommunity Foundation.

“By defining our focusmore strategically, we haveset in motion a moreaccountable organizationthat does not makepromises it cannot keep.Our customer service hasimproved significantly.”

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BOOST Evaluation

Initially, an external evaluation of BOOSTwas designed to gauge whether theprocess was working and grantee organi-zations were becoming more sustainable.However, as the initiative evolved, Dr.Stevens and the Foundation staffdiscovered that the evaluation wasn’tcapturing the learning taking place withinand among cohorts, and how changeswere occurring. In 2005, they decided achange of direction was necessary.

The new action-learning assessmentdesign set out to capture the dynamicprocesses by which grantees madechanges to governance, management,financial resource development andadministrative systems. The new evalua-tion also assessed the Foundation staff’sand consultants’ learning and theirobservations about the grantees’ progress.

The ResultsOver the three years of BOOST, granteesidentified and then implementedsignificant and necessary changes. Giventhe complex nature of organizationalchange and the valiant effort needed tobring it about, the Foundation and theparticipating grantees considered thegrantees’ accomplishments impressive,and the initiative a success.

Grantees were overwhelmingly pleasedwith the results their organizations

realized from their participation inBOOST. Some observed that BOOST’stiming was critical to its success in theirorganizations. They expressed theimportance of beginning the programwith organizations that are poised tomove forward in their lifecycle stage.

All grantees made notable progressalong the Nonprofit Lifecycles Model.

While not all organizational changeswere sequential, grantees discovered thestrategies needed to build capacity andsustainability. The lifecycles approachvalidated the experiences and challengesof the grantees, and assisted the consul-tants in working with the organizationswhere they were in their development.The model was a critical component fororganizational self-assessment andprovided a framework for thinkingabout stage-appropriate capacity, whilehelping to depersonalize barriers andproblems.

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Metro Volunteers puts on a downtownvolunteer fair to match people to

service opportunities. A BOOST grantallowed Metro Volunteers to hire

branding and marketing consultants,with one result being a new motto

and call to action: Change Yourself.Change the World.

“BOOST for us was trulytransformational. It forcedus to focus on issues thatneeded to be addressed.”

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“BOOST hasserved as agalvanizing forcein our organiza-tion and continuesto act as a beaconin charting thecourse for ourfuture program-matic andinfrastructuralstability andgrowth.”

In a Nutshell — How OrganizationsChanged During BOOST

BOOST grantees compiled a long list oforganizational “firsts” and other strategicand tactical changes. Here are changesinitiated by one or more BOOSTparticipants.

Mission and Programs • Clarified mission, vision and values• Shifted from making decisions based

on intuition to making decisionsgrounded in mission, values, businessplan and financial analysis

• Eliminated programs that did not fitmission or were not financially viable

• Improved and added programs tobetter align with mission, financialneeds and strategic direction

• Implemented program evaluation• Expanded partnerships and

collaborations• Increased program-specific funding

Management• Implemented new organizational chart• Added new positions and hired people

that were the right fit for the growthstage

• Freed up the executive director’s timeto focus on strategic issues

• Created new branding and marketingmaterials

• Implemented new succession plans,job descriptions, employee evaluationand management teams

• Paid more attention to financialmanagement on a regular basis;shared financial information withmanagers

Governance• Implemented new job descriptions,

committee structures and officers• Improved board recruiting processes• Added new board members

• Conducted board self-assessments• Implemented new policies• Increased board engagement in

fundraising and financial management

Financial Resources• Used financial management tools

(such as program-based budgets) tobetter understand financial reality ofeach program

• Recognized that sustainable funding isa necessity

• Changed attitude from “survive” to“succeed”

• Implemented more accurate,responsive and timely financialmanagement systems

• Engaged board and management staff in financial managementthinking and planning

• Established strong finance committee• Used financial data to guide program

decisions and expansion plans• Shared a “dashboard” of key financial

information regularly with the board• Pursued new funding opportunities• Hired development director for the

first time• Hired in-house financial staff for the

first time• Used multiyear planning and

budgeting• Upgraded accounting software• Performed cash flow analysis• Used accrual accounting• Reported “budget to actual” financial

performance

Administrative Systems• Implemented new policies and

procedures for human resources,financial management and other areas

• Strengthened technology—website,computers and database upgrades

• Purchased accounting and fundraisingsoftware

• Moved to new office spacePage 10

Key Success Factors PromotingOrganizational Strength

BOOST participants stated that fourfactors were pivotal to building capacityand sustainability:

Readiness. Readiness meant thatgrantees were psychologically ready forchange. Strong buy-in was also seen ascritical. The commitment of time andenergy required from BOOST necessi-tated involvement from all levels of theorganization, especially the executivedirector and the board of directors.Without strong buy-in, organizationalgrowth and change would not havebeen sustained.

Board engagement. This was consideredcrucial in driving the growth-stageorganizations forward. Grantees thatstruggled overall seemed to havedifficulty in getting their boards to taketrue ownership of their organizations.

Without an engaged board everythingfell on the executive director’sshoulders. Engaged board members tookmore ownership of decision-makingoverall, and in their governance rolespecifically.

Financial management. Strong financialmanagement, another element of

healthy nonprofits, was consideredespecially challenging at the growthstage; it required a fundamental shift inthinking, practices and systems in orderfor organizations to achieve long-termsustainability. While many granteesmade significant improvements in theirfinancial resources, the most successfulorganizations experienced a funda-mental shift in thinking and began to

take a long-term perspective on bothfinancial management and resourcedevelopment. Grantees used acombination of strategic financialdecision-making, more sophisticatedsystems, increased expertise on boardand staff (including finance staff anddevelopment directors) and morediversified funding. They used a varietyof tools to understand their programeconomics, made use of financialinformation in planning and decision- Page 11

During the three years that the Center for African American Health

took part in BOOST, the organizationrewrote its mission, changed its name

and doubled the size of its staff.

“We believe one of themost important factors inour success with the BOOSTprocess was the fact that wewere ready for BOOST whenthe opportunity came to us—and that’s huge.”

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making, valued financial health andadhered to sound financial practices.

Organizational balance. BOOSTorganizations that made progress acrossall of the structural components were,generally, more successful overall. Theseorganizations consistently focused onunderstanding the progress they hadmade and the steps that must be taken

for them to continue to move forward.Their success confirmed the conceptpresented by Dr. Stevens that nonprofitcapacity demands an equally balancedsupport system of management,governance, financial resources andadministrative systems.

Key Resources PromotingOrganizational Strength

Tools and resources provided to BOOSTparticipants varied in their importancefor moving the initiative forward andpromoting organizational strength. Thoseconsidered most valuable to grantees, inorder of importance, included:

Consultants and coaching. The three-year relationship between consultantsand organizations’ leadership teams wasvaluable and fulfilling to both parties.

The consultants often acted as mentors,and their ongoing coaching made facing new challenges less daunting forleadership team members. Consultantsappreciated the opportunity to workwith an organization intensively over aperiod of time and to be able to see thechanges play out.

Strategic investment grants. Theincremental and strategic grants fromRose allowed for deliberate investmentsPage 12

BOOST helped the Women’s Bean Projectlearn that less is more. By concentratingon their strongest line of business andshutting down the other, they becamemore focused without losing revenue.

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i“The most rewarding thingabout working with my clientwas looking back and seeinghow much they accom-plished since becoming apart of BOOST. Their entiremindset is now different. The executive director said,‘We now look at all ouractions with reference to thebusiness plan.’ That was great to hear.”

BOOST Consultant

by the grantees’ board of directors andmanagement teams in their operations.These investments led to systemicorganizational change.

Business plans. Grantees benefitedsignificantly from developing theirbusiness plans. The plans caused themto prioritize, kept them on track andbecame their guiding document. For

many, for the first time, the plans servedto foster agreement across the organiza-tion on shared goals.

Initial self-assessment. Many con-sidered the initial self-assessmenthelpful in getting them started andgiving them a better understanding of where they were in their owndevelopment. The assessments forcedthem to take a hard look at theiroperations.

Leadership teams. The ability of theleadership teams to move the changeprocess forward in their organizationsaccounted for much of BOOST’s success.Having multiple internal championsfrom an organization leading theirchange efforts reinforced the need forboard and staff to work together inpromoting organizational strength.

Important synergies occurred betweenthese BOOST resources and, ultimately,each was interdependent on the others.

Although all the BOOST tools andresources were perceived to have valueto at least some participants, the largercohort meetings were considered theleast important resource provided.

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Right Photo:BOOST helped The Senior Hub to add a

new development and communityrelations position, and to diversify its

revenue by offering for-pay services toclients who could afford them.

Left Photo:Hillel of Colorado credits BOOST withenabling the organization to make a

transition from its former 800-square-foot facility to a new

8,000-square-foot building.

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Lessons Learned from BOOST

The experiences of the growth-stagenonprofits, the consultants and theFoundation staff over three years ofBOOST revealed several importantconclusions about nonprofit capac-ity building using Dr. Stevens’framework:

• Organizational change is not linear.Some grantees made significant stridestowards maturity, others advancedwithin the growth stage and a fewothers found they needed to gobackwards in order to move forward.

• Sustained change requires more time,energy and commitment thanparticipants may expect. Extensiveeffort was required of the grantees’boards and staff members over thethree-year initiative. For all involved,however, the return was consideredworth the investment.

• Readiness and buy-in are critical when undertaking an initiative such as BOOST. Without them—and acommitment to sustained change—participation would have stalled outalong the way.

• As a complex, multiyear initiative,BOOST required ongoing relationshipmanagement and course corrections.Issues emerged that were unexpected,such as addressing grantee-consultantmismatches, clarifying consultants’roles during business plan implemen-tation and redesigning the evaluationprocess.

• Team members will change over thecourse of the three-year initiative as aresult of personnel changes and boardmembers rotating on and off theirrespective boards.

• A Community of Practice succeedsonly when the community memberswant to become part of one. Theexecutive directors’ Community ofPractice was seen as valuable by mostand a tool to overcoming isolation. Bycontrast, the larger cohort meetingsPage 14

The Colorado Agency for JewishEducation (CAJE) saw staffing changesand increased board involvement as aresult of BOOST.

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“BOOST has been thesingle most importantinitiative we’ve undertakenin the past several years!The funding helped, but ittruly was secondary to theeffective business planningprocess and consultant-ledfacilitation that wereceived over the pastthree years.”

did not serve to build a large Com-munity of Practice. This may be basedin part on the structure of thosesessions and the content presented.

• Both Foundation staff and consul-tants gained significant tools andknowledge alongside the grantees,enabling them to use these newpractices in other areas of their workin the community.

From Survival to Success—Building OrganizationalCapacity EffectivelyBOOST provided a catapult to not onlylaunch a change process, but to sustainit. Through strategic and unprecedentedcoaching and support, the initiativeimproved the sustainability of the eightgrantees and led a cadre of funders,consultants and nonprofit organizationsto become more effective.

The participating nonprofits changedtheir attitudes from “survive” to“succeed” and all became positioned toaccomplish their programs and missions.The consultants learned a proven modelfor building organizational capacity thatthey have woven into their consultingpractices. And Foundation staff

recognized the importance of lifecycleassessments, business plans, coachingand other components needed—ratherthan just the “$5,000 strategic plan”—tostrengthen organizations.

As BOOST 2003–2006 came to a close,Rose was already planning how toreplicate the process with a secondcohort of grantees in BOOST 2007-2010.Dr. Stevens agreed tocontinue in her role as leadconsultant using theNonprofit Lifecycles Model.The second initiativetargeted nonprofit organ-izations in a variety ofdevelopmental stages rather than only in thegrowth stage. Nevertheless,all were at criticaljunctures in their devel-opment and recognizedthat organizationalcapacity-building couldmake a significantdifference.

Building on the resultsfrom the first three-yeareffort, the Foundationlooks forward to continuing in its practice of strengthening granteessystemically while supporting nonprofitcapacity builders to work moreeffectively.

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Focused on helping families give their children a good start in life,

Colorado Bright Beginnings creditsBOOST with helping the organization

become proactive about the future byfollowing a business plan.

“Change and growth arethe operative words forus….The benefits of BOOSTwill linger for years tocome.”

“There is NO WAY wewould be where we aretoday without the invest-ment made in us by RoseCommunity Foundation….Our results have been farbeyond what we expected.”

Phot

o by

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is T

akag

i

BOOST Participants

ConsultantsBourge Hathaway, Ordinary Magic

Gail Hoyt, Financial & AccountingSupport Specialists

Gurudev Khalsa, Trilight Development

Richard Male, Richard Male &Associates

Sharon McClew

Karla Raines, Corona Research

Patricia Sterner, JFB & Associates

Susan Kenny Stevens, LarsonAllen

Catherine Sunshine, The SunshineConsultancy

Nonprofit OrganizationsBoulder Jewish Community Center

Center for African American Health

Colorado Agency for Jewish Education

Colorado Bright Beginnings

Hillel of Colorado

Metro Volunteers

The Senior Hub

Women’s Bean Project

FundersRose Community Foundation

Sheila Bugdanowitz, President and CEO

Senior Program Officers:

Lisa Farber Miller (project manager)

Therese Ellery

Phillip Gonring

Elsa Holguín

Barbara Yondorf

The Jay and Rose Phillips FamilyFoundation funded the participation ofMetro Volunteers

Page 16

At a final celebration of BOOST2003–2006, participants received a giftrepresenting the table graphic (page 7)with a tabletop holding the mission(vase of flowers) and four strong legssupporting it.

Rose

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mun

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n fil

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