¡Adelante! Supporting Nonprofits During Transitions

Happy September! Fun fact, this month is National Hispanic Heritage Month, and in acknowledgement of that and Labor Day, we’d like to begin this blog by highlighting one of Texas’s own heroines.

So, in the 1930s, there was a San Antonio Texas Native, Emma Tenayuca, known as "La Pasionaria de Texas", who fought for immigrant, women’s, and worker’s rights at the height of the Great Depression! She braved death threats, beatings, and arrests to advocate for fair labor practices for all Americans.  

Read more about her here. 

Calling all Emma Tenayucas!

We at Mission Capital understand that there are thousands of Emma Tenayucas in the world, and we’re hoping to shore up the resources of local nonprofits so we, too, can sow a change in our community!

Not every nonprofit organization and community leader faces such dire circumstances, but the nonprofit sector has been hit with its own hardships this year. From the pandemic-induced Great Resignation, the Great Retirement, and “shecession” to inflation and increased service demands, the struggle, as the kids say, is real.  

Supporting You During Transitions

We’d like to share a few of our core services that may help your nonprofit proactively navigate these important change moments in our community. 

Executive Transition Management (ETM)

The first of these services is Executive Transition Management (ETM). If that sounds long and complicated, it’s only because this is a big job! This is a consulting offering dedicated to helping nonprofit boards and staff identify and hire key staffing positions such as: executive directors/CEOs, CFOs, and development directors through the lens of racial equity. Now, we don’t step on your toes and find someone to fill the post. Instead, Mission Capital’s ETM consulting engagement supports the hiring committee by posting the job, going over equitable hiring ideology and practices, and vetting the pool with you, so we can work shoulder to shoulder with your organization to locate the leader who best fits your organization now and into the future.

Transition Planning

If you’re one of the dozens of nonprofits that are finding themselves losing a substantial part of your team, how do you handle a transition that huge? Say your CEO of fifteen years has retired, Mission Capital’s Transition Planning is a strategic organizational planning process where you can learn how to proactively transition executive responsibilities and functions, while being mindful of a nonprofit’s life cycle or “State of the Union”. As a guide on the side, Mission Capital focuses on supporting nonprofits to lead through important organizational change to encourage a thoughtful and planful transition. It’s hard to pass along work when you’ve had an Emma Tenayuca running the show! Our goal is to make things a little easier.

Succession Planning

Succession Planning is a very similar program, but works better in different circumstances. Say your Program Director is moving to Mexico City. It’s a huge opportunity and everyone is happy for them, right? But how can anyone possibly begin untangling the numerous projects and knowledge they were responsible for handling? Sounds like a headache and some unpaid over-time. Well, MC will provide a four-day succession planning workshop to the public this spring. Think about this workshop as a way to create a formal plan before your Program Director jumps on that plane.

Succession Management & Strategic Leader Development

Long-term succession planning, when done well and with intentionality, can strengthen a nonprofit’s capacity by identifying critical positions and highlighting potential vacancies; selecting key competencies and skills needed for continuity of care; and focusing on the development of individuals to meet the nonprofit’s future needs. This primer will focus on long-term succession planning models. Custom offering for nonprofits and contract goes off a time frame that works for you.

Workplace Experience Model

Last but not least, the Workplace Experience Model. This service has a survey tied to it and can go a long way towards understanding how to sustain your current workforce. Instead of watching your employees flit away during the Great Resignation, learn all the different ways to keep your team together and happy for many years to come! Any Baby Can is a recent partner who can testify that this came in handy for them!

Any Baby Can’s work with Mission Capital was an amazing experience. From the beginning, Katie and Katelyn verified they understood the data we needed, took the time to ensure communications to our leadership teams and entire staff were thoughtful and clear, made great recommendations based on the feedback they received, and overall did an awesome job working with us. The survey feedback we received aligned with results from our employee exit interviews but also provided an outside view for our leaders, which was valuable.

As a result of our partnership with Mission Capitol, the Any Baby Can leadership teams have met with their staff and have developed great action plans and next steps before we conduct a mini-pulse survey later this year. We continue to improve our communication process and streamline other processes because of the feedback received from the survey. We implemented improvements to our performance appraisal process which is occurring now and have received favorable feedback from leaders and employees. We also developed an agency wide recognition program which will be implemented this fall.

All in all, Any Baby Can is very appreciative of the work Katie and Katelyn managed and consider them part of our extended team!

We See the Passion in You!

Even the first modern nonprofit (The Peabody Education Fund) tackled some difficulties, so please never feel as if you’re falling behind or doing this whole “change” thing incorrectly. The historic year 2022 is coming to a close, and has been a challenging one for sure, but we believe in your ability to live up to Emma Tenayuca’s passionate legacy.  

We’re not asking that you, too, be inducted into the San Antonio Women’s Hall of Fame, only that you keep doing incredible things, and, in Emma’s words, the “… basic underlying faith in the American idea of freedom and fairness. I felt there was something that had to be done.” 

As we reach into the last months of 2022, we celebrate and thank all of you who do what must be done.  

If you’d like more information on any of these services or on how Mission Capital can support you, please reach out to us.