Why isn’t there more collaboration among the many wonderful nonprofit organizations (NPOs) in Fairfield County? One would expect collaboration to be the rule and not the exception as we often have similar goals and clients.
For the last nine years, at the helm of the Beyond Limits Academic Program (@blprogram), I have increasingly scratched my head searching for answers. Beyond Limits works with socio-economically disadvantaged students and provides highly subsidized individual, on-site and remote, peer-to-peer math and science tutoring and enrichment programming. Our collaborative spirit has enabled us to significantly expand our program. However, raising sufficient funds to sustain our growth is a formidable challenge.
In Fairfield County, there are ample financial resources. Our “soil” is rich in nutrients except for one — genuine and long-term collaboration amongst NPOs.
In a unique juxtaposition, the abundance of financial resources may diminish the impact of the financing. Competition for funding inadvertently discourages collaboration. Alignment of resources, through collaboration, is not sufficiently rewarded. Services are not being delivered as efficiently and effectively as possible for long-term impact.
More often than not, NPOs expend tremendous effort promoting and substantiating their work with existing as well as potential funders. In many cases, there appears to be a fear that collaboration, including outsourcing program components or resources to other NPOs, might indicate a weakness in a particular program or service, potentially threatening future funding. So, the end result is often a duplication of resources and a propping up of inefficient or ineffective components.
Demonstrable and sustained collaboration with the resulting alignment of resources often goes unrewarded by funders perpetuating inefficiencies. Too many families are desperately in need of far more robust and consistent supports than NPOs are supplying despite all the necessary infrastructure in place.
A genuine commitment to the thorough execution of service delivery can help produce much better outcomes. There is too much focus on superficial quantification — number of hours donated, persons served, or dollars spent — and not enough on impact through collaboration.
Funders should not allow NPOs to merely pay lip service to collaboration in grant applications. They should require consistent evidence of it — i.e., formal site visits, unscheduled drop-ins, periodic questionnaires, etc. — as a prerequisite for continued funding.
Rewarding and verifying authentic collaborations will undoubtedly require more work for funders, but it will result in greater impact.
Andrew Sklover is the co-founder of the Beyond Limits Academic Program based in Stamford.