Thinking About the Role of Money

Thus far in my exploration of mission I have focused on collaboration and creating a strong mission, but I am sure you are asking yourselves, what about the money? The relationship between an organization’s mission and their funding sources can be harmonious but also can lead to tension and stress. I recently read a blog series, Financing not Fundraising, released on the Social Velocity blog that discusses different elements of this relationship.

In the blog post Aligning Money and Mission Neil Edgington presents an interesting model that shows the ideal condition of an organization in alignment. This model represents an organization whose mission, resource engine and core competencies are all in line and complementing one another. The strength of this model is that he represents the importance of each three of these characteristics equally and demonstrates how they work off of one another. Many organizations focus on one or two of these components rather than on all three; in particular the role of the resource engine often gets delegated to the development director or fundraising team and is not included in the work being done by program staff.  

 The original model can be found at http://www.socialvelocity.net/2010/06/financing-not-fundraising-aligning-money-and-mission/.

Although this is a strong model I think it is a little oversimplified since it presents only a static moment. All organizations work within a constantly changing environment that affects their ability to maintain this alignment. Taking into consideration these external forces I think that the model might look something more like this:

This model shows how the mission might be moving in a different direction than the priorities of funders and donors and both of these may move in a different direction from the core competencies of the organization. With these changing factors, how can organizations maintain the alignment described in Social Velocity’s blog post? In my experience this is where entrepreneurship and strategic thinking play a central role. Compare this model with the one above:

 

In this model, the circle is defined by the concepts in bold. Entrepreneurial thinking, innovation, creativity and the others show how organizations can embrace these external changes and works towards alignment by integrating them into the organization’s mission, resource engine and core competencies. Taking this systemic approach allows for a deeper understanding of the different factors at play in managing and growing non-profit organizations and finding the balance and alignment necessary for long term sustainability. In the coming weeks I am going to present different organizations that are working within this circle of entrepreneurship, innovation and strategy in order to grow impactful and successful organizations.

What do you think of these models? Are there other factors that should be included? Are they overly complex?