Giving Compass' Take:

• Eric Griswold, writing for Forbes, discusses the four areas that nonprofit boards and directors can focus on to sustainably scale nonprofits. These include infrastructure, budget, people, and operating strategy. 

• The author suggests that nonprofits need to first understand what scale means to them. How do nonprofits go about doing that?

• Read about why Indian nonprofits are experts at scaling up. 

Every nonprofit will face a time when they will ask themselves, “How do we scale our organization?” While words like "growth" and "scale" are becoming buzzwords across all industries, you need to decide what growth or scale means to your nonprofit.

"Scale" can mean many things. It can mean substantially increasing the operating budget to provide more services. Or it may mean growing from a regional to a national organization. Once you’ve determined what scale means to you, that’s when the real work begins.

In order to successfully grow your organization, it's important to have certain structures in place that will allow you to grow sustainably.  To effectively scale your nonprofit, here are some areas you, the management team and/or the board of directors need to focus on:

  • Infrastructure: From a systems standpoint, your organization needs to have the capacity to handle the expected uptick in traffic and information data. Make sure you have the right software and tools to disseminate and organize that data in the way your organization wants and needs.
  • Budget And Funding: With newfound growth comes greater responsibility -- especially with funds. It is imperative that there is a plan on how to grow your organization’s budget and how to disperse funds to new partners.
  • People: Too often, organizations forget the people aspect. When expanding your nonprofit's reach, you need to ensure you have the necessary and right people in place to not only execute against your team’s vision but also effectively handle its newfound growth.
  • Operating Strategy: After presenting a strategy on what the organization will look in the future, it is important for the management team and board to focus on the minute details of how, operationally, it will successfully scale.

Read the full article about sustainably scaling nonprofits by Eric Griswold at Forbes