Perhaps you met me at a conference, heard a presentation I made, or you learned about Inperium through one of your networks. If you’ve arrived here, then you are probably spending a lot of time pondering the future of your organization. Any first step into that future requires a great deal of unemotional, realistic evaluation of your current standing. I’ve developed a series of four step-by-step guides/assessments that you can use to evaluate if affiliating with Inperium might be the right choice for your organization. It’s not a simple decision. Some organizations can continue independently. Others reach a point where they need additional structure and support to keep moving forward. We customize exactly what affiliation looks like for every organization because we know that every organization is unique, as are the circumstances that have led to exploring options that can ensure the sustainability of your mission.
I encourage you to start with my guide to “Thinking Through Affiliation.” It will get you asking the practical questions about your organization, clarifies what affiliation is and what it’s not. Then you might want to turn to my guide titled “Why Strong Nonprofits Still Fail.” Here I examine why organizations doing meaningful work, with strong teams and real impact, can still find themselves under pressure. By drawing on Inperium’s experience working with dozens of organizations across multiple sectors, we have witnessed the patterns that go on behind the scenes that organizations can’t always observe because they are so focused on mission outcomes.
From there you can benefit from seeing how your organization matches up on what I call “Built to Last: A Framework for Durable Organizations.” This framework is designed to help you step back and look at your organization through a different lens—one that balances mission with the realities required to sustain and grow it. It walks you through an examination of “The 6 C’s: Capital/finances, Care/quality, Commitment/leadership organization, Capacity/infrastructure, Context/strategic positioning, and Clarity/reality.” Here I detail bullet points that allow you to measure your status in these six areas against the qualities displayed by durable organizations built to scale, adapt, and endure.
These three guides set you up to compete the “Scorecard” where you can take an honest assessment of your organization. Completion can provide you an assessment tool that allows you to step back and evaluate where your organization stands—the things that you can’t always see because you are so deep in day-to-day operations. By identifying where you have gaps, whether those are financial, structural, staffing, or some combination of all three, you can get a better sense if your organization is at risk. These tools can’t provide you all the answers, but they can let you assess if you’re ready to have a conversation and learn more about how Inperium can help. That’s a conversation I’m happy to have at any time. You can contact me directly or reach out to any of the other dedicated Inperium experts.