It Starts with a Conversation
We’ll begin by having a thoughtful discussion so that I can learn more about your organization. I want to hear from you about what’s working.
What is an Organizational Assessment?
Organizational assessments are how I figure out what's working, what's quietly getting in the way, and what your organization is genuinely ready for. Sometimes this is just an intro conversation, sometimes it’s more in depth. When you're considering what’s next - be it a campaign, fundraising goal, grants, or otherwise - doing an assessment before you take that step can help strengthen your foundation and expand your reach for years to come.
How I Get to Know Your Organization
Your Donor Data
I carefully review any data you have available. For example: year-over-year giving, gift size, retention, and engagement patterns. This data tells an important part of your organization’s story.
Stakeholder Interviews
Another great source of knowledge and context are your organization’s board members, key donors, and organizational leadership. Depending on the work we’re doing, I will conduct confidential interviews with some of these individuals to deepen my understanding of your organization to help inform our next steps.
Opportunity Map
For some projects, I will conduct a work session to align your organization’s objectives. We’ll find out how to maximize your opportunities to meet your goals and deadlines in the most mission-aligned, highest-impact manner possible.
Leadership and Staff Capacity
Getting a realistic look at your staff and leadership’s capacity will help me plan for what’s doable. We’ll explore things like what's not getting done and why, naming any gaps surrounding skills, resources, and structure so we can make plans tailored to your unique organization.
How Organizational Assessments Help
The most useful information is rarely the most visible. These are a few ways that starting with organizational assessments have helped past clients:
Surfacing new grant categories to apply to
Increasing donor gifts
Clarifying board roles
What Shifts
Organizational assessments are organic, thoughtful conversations that happen in the early weeks of my consulting within your organization. When we start our work focused on deep understanding, we can build out more realistic and fully formed plans for what you’re looking to accomplish. This is foundational work to inform success within your organization.
A clear order of operations
What to do now, what to build toward, and what probably isn't worth the effort, mapped against what you actually have.
Ready for what’s next
Whatever your named goal is (grants, campaigns, fundraisers, etc) you'll know whether you're ready and exactly what needs to happen before you are.
A foundation for everything else
Once the assessment is done, I know your organization well enough to be useful in real time. That's what makes everything that follows faster.