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Against the Current: Jose “Che” Ramirez
For close to 25 years, I worked in the basement of America’s largest homeless shelter, where we built D.C. Central Kitchen into the model program it is today. But no matter how efficient and impactful we were, we still operated amongst the chaos and co …
Against the Current: Eunice Lin Nichols
I’ve been focused on aging in America since the early 2000s, when I learned there’s already a waiting list for Meals on Wheels in many communities. But I was interested in more than just food: I was interested in isolation, fighting the beauty myth, an …
Time to Fold: Keys to Gracefully Winding Down a Nonprofit
It looked like the Cancer Prevention Institute of California had a royal flush of a winning hand—a 40-plus-year track record of groundbreaking research, a stellar global reputation, 85 dedicated employees, a balanced $13 million budget, and one of the …
#RiskyBusiness: Why Earned Income Isn’t All It’s Cracked Up To Be
“When will your organization be sustainable?” This question is asked of nonprofits at an increasingly alarming rate in recent years. Where did this come from and who decided it is such a critical metric of success? More importantly, how can you determi …
Succeeding When You’re Small: Lessons Learned from DonorsChoose.org
Although the Blue Avocado audience consists of community-based organizations, we can still learn from the experience of those who started a nonprofit out of their basement and grew to be nationally recognized leaders in the field. DonorsChoose.org is o …
Whose Nonprofit Is It Anyway: When a Nonprofit Leader Moves On
Call it founder’s syndrome, the succession slump, or something not suitable for work, when a nonprofit leader moves on, the process isn’t always easy. But when control of a signature program or the organization itself is on the line, questions about wh …
Following a Founder or Long-Timer Requires a Hard Head
When Blue Avocado asked for potential interviewees who had followed a founder or a long-time executive, we didn’t expect 58 people to respond. We interviewed 18 executive directors who followed founders, and another 10 who followed long-time execs. Las …
The Sustainability Question: Why Is It So Annoying?
This morning, I woke up early and realized I was face-to-face with my son Viet, who has been sleeping in the same bed with his mom and me. Looking at our sweet little baby, who was still sleeping peacefully, one tiny hand under his soft and rosy cheek, …
Deconstructing Nonprofit Sustainability
Maybe in some mythic past it was possible to think first about strategic impact goals, and then about how to raise the money. But today we know better: you can’t talk about what you’re going to do without talking about how to get the money. And, …
Standing on the Shoulders of Movements . . . editor notes issue #65
The generational handover of the nonprofit sector — one organization at a time — is well underway. Take a look around any conference and you’ll see it! An important but dangerously unnoticed difference between baby boomers and the Next generat …
