Hi, Friend - Sounds like you're in a tough position. I'd need to know a little more before giving you much more advice, but here are my preliminary thoughts:

(1) Have you considered issues-based advocacy? By that, I mean, grab some parents and go meet with the school board, or go to a public meeting and share your concerns. Now isn't the time to be bashful if it may mean the demise of the organization. Is there anyone on your board who has an "in" with decision makers there?

(2) Go to the media. Get your families involved in a letter writing campaign to the local newspapers, get on the radio show, talk about how important your program is to the community, bring in the local TV station to see the kids at work.

(3) Bridge funding. Are there any foundations or major donors that might help by providing you with funding long enough for you to explore longer-term resources without completely shutting down?

(4) Speaking of bridges, now may be the time to re-build bridges. Consider approaching the "big name" program about taking on your part-time program staff as a pilot program, or contracting with your staff to continue to provide services (assuming no duplication exists). Usually this works best if you can bring something to them as well. For instance, do you have any board members or donors that could join their organization. Could you create good publicity around a merger?

Just a few thoughts...Anyone else have some advice?

--Laura

Laura, I am going to look into this for a small non profit that I am a board member of. Also, I have been considering outsourcing my fundraising experience as a consultant but am unsure where and how to begin. Thanks for the post!

I sit on the Board of Directors for an after-school program in a small city in southeast Utah. We formed the organization 9 years ago because we didn't think that the quality of programs that were offered by the community were high enough, and we wanted to adopt a different model that really focused on building general skills instead of just activities. We wanted to do far more than be babysitters with some activities which is what we thought the other programs were doing. Unfortunately, one of those programs has a "national" brand associated with it, and although we do a much better job serving kids, their cost per kid is much lower. Our school district provides us with about 30% of our funding, and they are cutting back, and they just made the decision to put all of their money in this less expensive program that serves a bunch more kids than we do, but that in my opinion doesn't do a very good job. We can't survive without that funding this year. We have a full-time executive director and four part-time staff. I'm really not sure what we should do.

Any help/thoughts are much appreciated!

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Hi, I'm pulling together information for a blog posting on web-based resources for nonprofit grant writing. Do you know of any that I should include? Just reply and post here, thanks!

Thanks!

--Laura

Via Twitter from @OhioMuseums: ..."Keep the great information coming. You provide very practical advice that applies to so many. "

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In my work, I frequently get asked, "What are best practices for...?" Invariably, I send people to this really valuable tool that was created during trainings with youth services organizations in Whatcom County Washington. I've seen many other "Best Practices" tools, and this is one of my favorites. Do you have a similar tool that you like?

I stumbled on these great tips this morning from Heather Mansfield of DIOSA Communications on best practices for using MySpace. Anyone else doing something really creative on MySpace?

In this just released study from the Meyer Foundation, they discuss the pitfalls and possibilities.

Key findings include:
* Outsourcing may not offer short-term cost savings but can offer significant long-term benefits and cost savings.
* Current business models for outsourcing are often not well suited for serving small to mid-sized organizations, many of which are complex and have significant unmet needs.
*There is a significant opportunity for business entrepreneurs with a deep knowledge of and sensitivity to the nonprofit sector and innovative new business models.
*Areas most in need of better solutions include human resources, marketing and communications, and financial planning.
* Barriers that prevent nonprofits from outsourcing back-office services include the inability to find specialized skills at a reasonable cost, lack of time to find and contract with providers, and negative past experience.
The 48-page study offers ideas for grantmakers, back-office service providers, nonprofit executives, and business entrepreneurs as they consider how to better meet the back-office needs of nonprofits and proposes a framework for evaluating outsourced back-office services.

What do you think? Have you tried this? What worked?