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The final part of my October series for leaders and stakeholders at non-profits and associations.
Over the past four weeks, we’ve looked at board reporting, funder reporting, community storytelling, and digital presence. Four different topics, and yet I kept coming back to the same observation.
The people who feel the problem, the people who own it, and the people who approve the fix are rarely in the same conversation.
Here’s how it tends to play out.
Communications feels it first. They’re the ones chasing numbers the week before the annual report, rewriting the impact story for the third funder, and fielding questions about why the website is out of date.
Operations owns it. The processes that produce those numbers, the systems that store them, and the handoffs between programs all sit with them, usually alongside a full workload of their own.
Leadership approves it. The Executive Director and the board decide what gets funded, often based on a request that arrives from one of those two groups without the other’s perspective.
So communications asks for a new website. Operations asks for a new database. And leadership, reasonably, wonders why there are two requests for what sounds like the same problem.
Why this happens in good organizations
None of this reflects a lack of care. It’s what tends to happen when capable people work hard in their own lane, and the work that sits between the lanes has no clear owner.
Reporting, digital, and operations overlap more than most org charts suggest. When each group sees only its slice, each proposes a fix for its slice.
What helps
Bring the three perspectives into one room for one purpose: to walk through a single process together, start to finish. The board package, a major funder report, or the annual report all work well.
The conversation that follows tends to surface more than any one group could find alone. Where the same number is entered twice. Where a story gets lost. Where the website depends on a document nobody has updated in a year.
From there, you can build a plan in phases, one the whole team recognizes and your board can a prove with confidence.
A self-check before planning season
With budgets taking shape for next year, this is a good moment to try what I call the 1-to-5 self-check:
Rate your operations documentation: 1 = lives in people’s heads; 5 = living documentation the team uses and updates.
If you’re at a 1 or 2, the Three Step Start is where I’d begin. At a 3 or 4, the Multiplier Method helps you build on what’s already working. And if you’re at a 5, I’d like to meet you.
Guest perspective
From the board table, and from your work with foundations and charities, what gives a board or funder genuine confidence in an organization?
What gives a board or funder genuine confidence in an organization isn’t perfection. It’s evidence of stewardship.
Stewardship shows up when an organization can clearly explain where it is trying to go, how it makes decisions, and how it responds when circumstances change. The most trusted organizations aren’t necessarily those with the biggest budgets or the highest recent returns. They’re the ones that demonstrate discipline.
From a board perspective, confidence comes from seeing management make thoughtful decisions today without compromising tomorrow. From a funder’s perspective, confidence comes from knowing that resources will be treated as a responsibility, not simply a revenue source.
-Craig Swistun, Lexicon Financial Group
Connect with Craig on LinkedIn
Picture your next planning meeting
Communications, operations, and leadership walk in with the same picture. The priorities are already agreed because the people who feel the problem helped shape the solution. The board approves a plan they understand, phased in a way the organization can afford.
That’s what I mean when I say processes empower people. Clear processes don’t only save time. They give everyone the same ground to stand on.
I’ll leave you with a question to sit with:
When did communications, operations, and leadership last sit down together to look at how your organization works, and not just what it needs to buy?
If you’d like to have that conversation with a guide in the room, that’s what we map together in a complimentary Insight Session. I’d welcome a conversation. Our team can set one up at info@kaosgroup.com.
The gap between where you are and where you want to be is rarely about effort. It’s about having the right support to get there.
About KAOS Group™
Through our Organize. Optimize. Profit.™ methodology, we work alongside owners, leaders, and stakeholders to build and implement the behind-the-scenes systems that turn operational complexity into clarity their teams rely on, and uncover where automation and AI can take real effort off their plates.
The result is an organization that’s sustainable today and ready for whatever comes next, without depending on a key person.
Sometimes the most useful next step is talking it through with someone who’s seen it before. I’d welcome the conversation.