Developing a Progressive AdvocacyProgram Within a HumanS.docx

Developing a Progressive Advocacy
Program Within a Human
Services Agency
Linda Plitt Donaldson, PhD
ABSTRACT. This paper brings together knowledge from
research and
practice to suggest a set of building blocks on which a
progressive advo-
cacy program could be developed within a human services
agency. Pro-
gressive advocacy is defined as advocacy motivated primarily
by a desire
for social change that addresses underlying structural and power
inequi-
ties that includes methods to meaningfully engage agency
clients or con-
stituents in all aspects ofthe advocacy process. The paper
concludes with
a case study showing the development of an advocacy program
within a
nonprofit homeless services agency and discusses the
constraints on its
development. Implications for research, education, and practice
are also
discussed. doi:10.1300/J147v32n02_03 [Article copies available
for a fee from
The Haworth Document Delivery Service: l-800-HAWORTH. E-
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© 2008 by the Haworth Press. All rights reserved.]
KEYWORDS. Advocacy, nonprofit, human services, leadership,
em-
powerment, social change
INTRODUCTION
Since the emergence of the charity organization societies in the
late
1800s, nonprofit human service agencies have been the
cornerstone of
the U.S. response to community needs. The common image of
nonprofit
Linda Plitt Donaldson is Assistant Professor, Catholic
University of America,
National Catholic School of Social Service, 620 Michigan
Avenue, NE, Washington,
DC 20064.
Administration in Social Work, Vol. 32(2) 2008
Available online at http://asw.haworthpress.com
© 2008 by The Haworth Press. Ail rights reserved.
doi:l0.1300/J147v32n02_03 25
26 ADMINISTRA TION ¡N SOCIAL WORK
human service agencies as providers of shelter, food, clothing,
and other
forms of treatment for the symptoms of intractable social
problems over-
shadows their important history as social change agents. For

example, the
poverty movement, battered women's movement, and gay rights
move-
ment were enabled by the participation of nonprofit agencies
that served
the needs of those groups. This skewed view of nonprofits as
purveyors
of charity but not justice may lead important agency
stakeholders like do-
nors. Boards, Executive Directors, and staff, to the conclusion
that ad-
vocacy practice is neither worthwhile nor appropriate as a core
function
for human service agencies.
The purpose of this paper is to stimulate a greater understanding
of
the role and purpose of advocacy as a distinct program within a
human
service agency and to lay out a framework for developing one.
Advo-
cacy is defined as "any attempt to influence the decisions of any
institu-
tional elite on behalf of a collective interest" (Jenkins, 1987, p.
197). The
term progressive advocacy practice refers to advocacy that (1)
seeks to
address underlying structural and power inequities as distinct
from ad-
vocacy motivated by organizational interest, and (2) applies
strategies
that meaningfully engage clients or constituents in all aspects of
the ad-
vocacy process.
The paper begins by attempting to deepen the rationale for

nonprofit
human service agency advocacy practice by framing it in the
context of
a public policy making theory. After framing the context, the
paper of-
fers a set of core practice principles and building blocks for
developing
a progressive advocacy program within a human services agency
fol-
lowed by a case study illustiating the development of an
advocacy pro-
gram within a nonprofit multi-service agency serving people
who are
homeless. Although the agency does not achieve the ideal
progressive
advocacy model, its constraints demonstrate the challenges
embedded
in developing such a program. The paper concludes with a
discussion of
the implications for social work research, education, and
practice.
RATIONALE FOR ADVOCACY PRACTICE
WITHIN A HUMAN SERVICES AGENCY
Because of the front line nature of social work practice in
nonprofit
settings, the social work profession has a powerful opportunity
to assist
nonprofit human services agencies integrate progressive
advocacy func-
tions into their work. The profession's ethical obligation
(NASW, 1996) to

Linda Plitt Donaldson 27
engage in advocacy practice arises from the fact that the
populations
they serve are disproportionately reliant on government-funded
social
services. Furthermore, the degree to which these services do not
meet
sufficient measures of equity and adequacy have grave
consequences
for the quality of life of families and individuals in need. In
addition,
given their direct experience with addressing human needs,
social ser-
vice agencies have a unique perspective to speak authoritatively
about
the root causes of social problems, and they have access to the
true ex-
perts on the solutions to social problems, their clients, or as
they are re-
ferred to in this paper, their constituents.
Trends in public policy making and social service delivery
support
the need for nonprofit human service agencies to leverage the
knowl-
edge and expertise of their constituents and staff to advocate for
social
justice. The devolutionary trend of public policy making from
federal to
state and local governments may make the policy-making
process more
accessible to community-based agencies as local decision-
makers are
physically located closer to them as compared to federal policy
decision-

makers. However, devolving policy making to local
governments typi-
cally goes hand-in-hand with budget cuts or block grants which
freeze
funding levels and therefore require states and nonprofit
agencies to do
more with less during recessions, natural disasters, or other
catastrophic
events that may cause an increase in the demand for social
services and
support. Furthermore, in an environment of scarce and
diminishing re-
sources (exacerbated by the War in Iraq and the reconstruction
of the
Gulf Coast), advocates for safety net programs often compete
with each
other for funding, and also compete with other interests with
greater
power, privilege, and resources. Consequently, social workers
must work
even harder to unify and mobilize themselves and their
constituents to
advance more equitable systems without being pitted against
each other.
Finally, the privatization and commercialization of social
services add
greater complexity to the policy advocacy process in two ways.
First,
agencies advocating to change policies of the implementing
agency
may be challenging peer agencies and thereby straining pre-
existing
inter-agency relationships. Second, privatization may add an
extra level
of bureaucracy to the policy advocacy process, as advocates
may need

to first meet with third-party contractor decision-makers prior
to gov-
ernment decision-makers in the process of achieving a desired
reform.
Despite these compelling reasons, it is unclear how many human
service agencies actually engage in advocacy activities. In
1998,
only 1.5% of public charities reported lobbying expenses (Boris
&
Krehely, 2002), but lobbying is just one among many types of
activities
28 ADMINISTRA TION IN SOCIAL WORK
included in advocacy practice. Advocacy also includes tasks
such as,
educating, skill-^building, mobilizing, organizing, researching,
analyzing,
letter-writing, protesting, petitioning, awakening power,
building relation-
ships, convening, facilitating, etc., and most of these tasks
never cross the
line to the legal definition of lobbying or grassroots lobbying
(Avner,
2004; Alliance for Justice, 2004), therefore, nonprofit agencies
have a lot
of opportunity to advance a social change agenda without
engaging in
lobbying. •
Another unresolved question in the literature that examines
nonprofit
advocacy is the extent to which agency advocacy behavior is

motivated
by self or agency-interest, for example, to protect funding
sources, or do
agencies have a broader purpose to their advocacy agenda that
includes
addressing structural and power inequities. The answer to these
questions
is usually not an either/or, and advocacy can certainly be done
to serve
both purposes. However, the answer to these questions might
influence
the strategies and tactics agencies use in their advocacy
practice, that is,
whether or not the agency engages in progressive advocacy, or
advocacy
that is mostly expert-driven and motivated primarily by agency-
interest.
The Policy Cycle as Rationale
for Institutionalized Advocacy Practice
Human services advocacy practice has been described as a
peripheral
function typically characterized as "ad hoc" and "inept. . .
lacking con-
tinuity and coherence" (Gibelman & Kraft, 1996, p. 49).
Howlett and
Ramesh (2003) present a five-stage model of the policy cycle
that includes:
(1) agenda-setting; (2) policy formulation; (3) policy decision-
making;
(4) policy implementation; and (5) policy evaluation.
Understanding the
tedious and complex nature of these five stages gives insight on
why ad
hoc approaches to advocacy simply will not make the systemic

changes
necessary for reforrn, and therefore provides some rationale for
struc-
turing a human services advocacy program with dedicated staff
and
resources.
For example, Kingdon (1995) and Jansson (2003) describe an
agenda-
setting process where three "streams" converge and push a
policy idea
through a window of opportunity, placing it on a shortlist for
policy
consideration. These streams include:
• a problem stream, where social issues come to the
consciousness
of policy makers through agitation by a constituent or
constituency
group, or by an event that focuses the nation's or a jurisdiction's
attention on a social concern. For example, Hurricane Katrina
has
focused the attention of the nation on the intersection of race,
class,
and poverty in a way that hasn't entered the consciousness of
the
dominant culture since the 1960s;
• a political stream, where the sentiment of the general public,
or
change in political actors through the election cycles generate a

shift in values and/or priorities that might support a particular
pol-
icy position;
• a policy stream, in which policy experts generate a series of
feasi-
ble options to address a recognized public problem.
In an effort to facilitate the flow of complementary issues and
policy
options down their respective streams, Kingdon (1995)
describes the
"policy entrepreneur" (p. 179) who is an important actor, or set
of actors
working together, to put an issue into the public consciousness,
often
through a media strategy, to shape or bend public opinion
toward their
view of the social problem and potential solutions. In addition,
policy
entrepreneurs should also be working with policy actors at think
tanks,
universities, government administrations, and within their own
coali-
tions to develop one or more policy solutions that are
technically feasi-
ble and that anticipate and respond to constraints that may be
raised by
policy decision-makers. Consequently, a policy entrepreneur's
job is to
facilitate the development of: problems into public issues;
policy ideas
into feasible policy solutions; and a fractured political climate
into one
that is disposed to one's policy position. All of these
simultaneous ef-

forts require an enormous amount of relationship-building with
many
and varied actors within and on the fringes of the public making
policy
process to get an issue on the short list of policy decision-
makers.
Furthermore, after getting the issue on the short list for
consideration,
the policy entrepreneur's work continues in the political stream.
For ex-
ample, in the case of legislation, the policy entrepreneur must
continue
to work the various in and out-flows in the legislative process
to ensure
that support for the bill'grows, that House and Senate
committees schedule
hearings for and votes on the bill, that it gets reported out of
committee, and
gets scheduled for a floor debate. While the bill is moving
through the
legislative branch, the policy entrepreneur needs to ensure that
it will
not get vetoed when and if it gets to the President or the
Governor. Be-
fore and once a bill is passed and signed, the policy
entrepreneur must
work with the administrative branch and the bill supporters to
ensure
that regulations are properly written, implemented, and enforced
while
monitoring unintended and potentially damaging consequences.
Even if

the law is implemented successfully, policy entrepreneurs and
their al-
lies must continue to ensure that programs created from the law
are
given proper funding and support each year.
These policy cycle activities do not even include the important
tasks of
constituent organizing or reflection activities that are integral to
progres-
sive advocacy practice. Therefore, this greater understanding of
what's
involved in policy change may give evidence to the need for
agencies to
invest in full-time staff and resources to support advocacy
practice. If
such agency activities are continued as an add-on responsibility
of Ex-
ecutive Directors or Development Directors advocacy will
continue to
result in ad hoc, reactive approaches which often serve to
maintain ex-
isting systems that perpetuate human suffering.
CORE PRACTICE PRINCIPLES
FOR DEVELOPING AN AD VOCACY PROGRAM
No single framework exists for institutionalizing a progressive
advo-
cacy program within a human services agency. Developing such
a pro-
gram depends on a variety of internal and external factors,
including:
the organization's lifecycle stage; the values and philosophies of

agency
stakeholders (board, staff, volunteer, community, constituents);
organi-
zational structure; agency mission; and the agency's external
political
and economic contexts. Therefore, different strategies will be
required
for moving an agency along the continuum from social service
to pro-
gressive advocacy practice based on those factors. For example,
the de-
velopmental issues described by Stevens (2001) in her seven-
stage
nonprofit hfecycle model is a useful tool for managers and
capacity-
builders to consider, in relation to other contextual factors,
when integrat-
ing and deepening building blocks for a progressive advocacy
program.
Similarly, different models of integrating social service and
social change
functions will also emerge. For example, social service agencies
may
wish to partner with a grassroots community organizing project
to en-
gage and mobilize their constituents rather than build internal
capacity
for organizing. However, some universal core practice
principles for de-
veloping a progressive advocacy program are:
• Start Where the Agency Is: In direct social work practice,
clinicians
stress the principle of "starting where the client is" (Hepworth,
Rooney, & Larsen, 2002, p. 49), based on research showing that

client readiness for change is an important consideration in the
helping process. This same principle holds true in efforts to
engage
organizations in change, particularly when introducing
programs
that seek social change which may challenge stakeholder
percep-
tions of the mission and puipose of human service agencies and
expose real or perceived vulnerabilities to funders.
A starting point for many human service agencies consider-
ing advocacy as a core function is one of providing direct
services
only, such as emergency services or mental health services. To
be-
gin moving further along the continuum toward a social service
agency with fully-integrated progressive advocacy program, one
must do a thorough assessment of the organization's readiness
for
change and develop a strategy according to a particular change
model. Appendix lists some characteristics of an ideal human
ser-
vices agency with a fully integrated progressive advocacy
program.
However, the view of what is ideal is subjective and that ideal
end-
point is part of the agency assessment process.
Leverage Knowledge and Expertise of Service Program Staff:
Good
advocacy is grounded in agency service and constituent experi-
ences. Therefore, it is incumbent on the advocacy staff to
ensure

that their advocacy is being done in support of and in
coordination
with the service programs by communicating regularly with ser-
vice staff through meetings or e-mail to share information and
to
engage them in advocacy activities.
Leverage the Knowledge and Expertise of Constituents: The
great-
est social change resource of any human service agency is its
constituents. Most agency constituents know more about social
prob-
lems than people with formal education but no experience living
with those issues. In addition, agency constituents also have
ideas
for solutions that are grounded in real community and life
experi-
ence and therefore have more meaning and practical application.
Work in Coalitions: In addition to being a building block for
devel-
oping an advocacy program, working in coalitions is an
important
principle to consider when developing an advocacy program.
Join-
ing a coalition is often a first step to agency engagement in
advo-
cacy. Agency leadership beginning to explore integrating
advocacy
as a core function often think of attending a monthly coalition
meet-
ing as a low-investment toward learning the policy issues.
Only Practice Advocacy in Agency's A rea of Expertise: As
agencies
become known for their advocacy work and policy positions,
they
may be asked to speak about areas that are related to but beyond

32 ADMINISTRATION IN SOCIAL WORK
their areas of expertise. In such cases, agencies should resist the
temptation to give visibility to their agency by responding affir-
matively to such requests. It is more important to be authentic
and
true to your area of competence and share opportunities for
visibil-
ity with complementary agencies.
These core principles form the foundation for the building
blocks
that comprise a progressive advocacy program within a human
services
agency. These building blocks are discussed in the next section.
BUILDING BLOCKS FOR DEVELOPING
AN ADVOCACY PROGRAM
WITHIN A HUMAN SERVICES AGENCY
The following framework describes the building blocks for a
pro-
gressive advocacy program within a human service agency. The
build-
ing blocks do not have to be put down in the order in which
they are
depicted in Figure 1. Consequently, they are not assigned
numbers to
help convey the idea that they can be swapped out and
rearranged based
on an agency's individual context. For example, the building
blocks, as
depicted, might convey that agency leadership that is supportive

of pro-
gressive advocacy is the foundation for a strong advocacy
program. In
fact, the literature shows that agency leadership is an important
predictor
of nonprofit advocacy practice. However, some agencies may
find that
meaningful opportunities to reflect on the structural causes that
bring
people in for services form the early foundation for an agency's
pro-
gressive advocacy practice.
Moreover, the building blocks should not infer that functions
should
be done internal to the agency. For example, an agency may
want to bring
in a consultant to facilitate reflections with staff and volunteers
or part-
ner with a grassroots community organizing group to engage
constitu-
ents in social change activities. What are important are the
functions,
not whether they are done internal to agency or in partnership
with an
external agency. Finally, Figure 1 shows the building blocks in
3-D
to convey the idea that there are degrees of depth or solidity to
each
block. For example, an agency whose constituent involvement
includes
a single seat on the Board and one opportunity per year to give
input on
agency priorities might reflect a thin or fairly hollow building
block, as
compared to an agency with a fully developed community

organizing
program.
Linda Pütt Donaldson 33
FIGURE 1. Building Blocks* for Developing a Progressive
Advocacy Program
in a Human Services Agency
Regular Opportunities for Reflection
* Institutionalized Practices for Meaningful Constituent
Involvement
Active and Meaningful Participation in Coalitions
Full-Time Staff Devoted to Advocacy
Diversified Funding Portfolio
Agency Leadership Fully Supportive of Progressive ,
Alvocacy Activities
*A core practice principle in developing a progressive
advocacy program is to meet the agency where it is.
Therefore:
• Building blocks can be developed in any order,
simultaneously, and to varying degrees;
• In reality, building blocks are always evolving
and getting stronger, deeper, and more solid over
time;

• Building blocks do not have to exist internal to
the agency, e.g., agencies may partner with an
organizing project to actively and meaningfully
engage constituents in social change rather than
have a CO program internal to the agency.
Description of Building Blocks
• Advocacy Leadership Fully Supportive of Progressive
Advocacy
Activities: Leadership is a critical factor for transforming
nonprofit
social service agencies into agents of social change
(OMBWatch,
2002; Cohen, 2001; Donaldson, 2004). Gibelman and Kraft
(1996)
stated that "leadership, vision, and commitment on the part of
the
social welfare managers, etc are critical ingredients for building
the necessary foundation for effective advocacy" (p. 57).
Salamon
(1995) suggested that another factor influencing agency
advocacy
behavior is "leadership that seeks to return agencies to their
advo-
cacy roots" (p. 15). Saidel and Harlan (1998) found that
leadership
was a key factor influencing the advocacy activities of an
organi-
zation, and De Vita et al. (2004) identiñed leadership as the link
between an organization's capacity and its policy activities.

• Leadership, whether it is the Board of Directors, the Executive
Di-
rector, and/or the senior management team, needs to believe in
the
importance of advocacy, partly because it is so difficult to see
its
effects in the short term. Support from agency leadership can be
demonstrated by having advocacy functions written into the
mis-
sion statement, vision statement, and goals ofthe agency,
structur-
ing them with dedicated staff, and having a Board public policy
to
enhance and support the advocacy functions of the agency.
• Diversified Funding Portfolio: As local governments continue
to
try to reduce costs through privatization and contracting out
social
service functions, human service agencies are becoming more
reliant
' on government funding. The literature is divided on whether or
not
government funding impedes or enhances advocacy. Some
research
shows that government funding enhances advocacy (Donaldson,
2004; Kramer, 1994, 1985; Salamon, 1995; OMBWatch, 2002;
McCarthy & Castelli, 1997; Sosin, 1986; Gronbjerg, 1993).
Other
scholars find that government funding curbs agency advocacy
be-
havior (Smith & Lipsky, 1993; Wolch, 1990; Alexander, Nank,
&
Stivers, 1999; O'Connell, 1994; Wong, 1993; Reinelt, 1994;
Hudson,

1998a; Epstein, 1981). A critique of these studies is that none
teases
out the motivation for the advocacy, that is, whether it is
motivated
by self-interest (organizational survival) or to create a more
inclusive
and just society (progressive advocacy). Either way, multiple
fund-
ing sources contribute to greater agency autonomy.
• Full-Time Staff Devoted to Advocacy: The activities
associated
with the policy cycle and constituency organizing offer a strong
rationale for agencies to dedicate full-time staff to such
activities.
As mentioned above, most human service agency advocacy
activi-
ties are done as an add-on and often unwritten functions of a
pre-existing staff position, for example, the Executive Director,
a
Program Officer, or Resource Developer. When an agency's
only
advocacy activities are embedded within another position, those
activities tend to be ad hoc and unsystematic, and can be
demoraliz-
ing and overwhelming to the staff person doing them. An
agency
can be stuck in this phase for many years as it educates board
mem-
bers about the importance of advocacy, and fundraises for an
advo-

cacy position. Some agencies may even feel sufficiently
satisfied at
this level of advocacy activity. However, to move agency
advocacy
practice beyond an ad hoc stage, agencies must hire at least one
full-time person experienced in advocacy and social change
practice
and may be more, depending on various factors including the
size of
the agency, the variety of service programs offered, and the
viability
of issue coalitions, and other internal and external conditions.
Until
the philanthropic community embraces their role in funding
advocacy
and other social change actiyities, agencies will most likely
need to
fund progressive advocacy practice through their general
operat-
ing budget. Activities complementary to progressive advocacy
that
may be more palatable to grant makers are those associated with
civic engagement, leadership development, and community
devel-
opment.
Active and Meaningful Participation in Coalitions: Human
service
agencies and their constituents are competing with special
interests
with much greater financial resources and therefore easier
access to
policy decision-makers. Human service agencies can
demonstrate
power by building coalitions, which can be a terrific means for
col-
lective strategizing and advocacy practice. Coalitions have the

benefit
of pooling the resources of its members to lessen the burden on
any
one; they provide cover from potential retribution by the
advocacy
target, and also filter the avalanche of information received
through
the growing mass of media sources. Numerous studies detail the
importance of coalitions for advocacy (Kaufman, 2001; Libby &
Austin, 2002; Mizrahi & Rosenthal, 2001 ; Nelson, 1994;
Roberts-
DeGennaro, 1997; Tefft, 1987). Mizrahi and Rosenthal (2001)
iden-
tified four key success factors for coalitions: competent
leadership,
commitment, contribution, and conditions. Consequently,
partici-
pation in coalitions should support the flourishing of these fo.ur
characteristics.
• Institutionalized Practices for Meaningful Constituent
Involvement:
More research is needed to assess the degree to which even
agen-
cies that value advocacy as a core function engage its
constituents
in those efforts. One typology of advocacy strategies
(Donaldson,
2004) categorizes them as elite, mass, or empowerment. Elite
strate-
gies are those in which agency staff visit elected officials,
partici-

pate in policy working groups, and represent agency at
coalitions.
Mass strategies involve things like petitioning, protesting,
rallying,
letter-writing, and civil disobedience. Empowerment strategies
in-
clude skill-building and educating agency constituents;
engaging
them in building agency advocacy agenda; providing
transportation
for advocacy activities, and so on. In this study of 43 human
service
agencies, even agencies that engaged in advocacy seldom used
empowerment strategies in their practice. The choice of elite
over
empowerment strategies may be rooted in a variety of pragmatic
considerations. Use of all strategies is important, but
meaningful
constituent engagement is a crucial component of progressive
ad-
vocacy practice.
• Regular Opportunities for Reflection: Reflective practice is a
term
used by multiple disciplines to describe a process where
practitioners
meet together regularly to critically examine the theories,
values,
norms, and current contexts underlying their practice and how
they
inform the practice models and techniques they use. Although
more research is needed which examines the role of reflection
in
transforming agency cultures from social service to social
change,
regular opportunities for staff, volunteers, and constituents to

re-
flect together on the structural inequities and -isms at the root
of
human needs may raise consciousness about the need for institu-
tionalized progressive advocacy practice at the agency.
MOVING FROM SOCIAL SERVICE TO SOCIAL JUSTICE:
A CASE STUDY
The road toward building on social service to affect social
change is
different for every agency depending on a variety of internal
and exter-
nal factors. This case study of how an agency developed an
advocacy
program does not end with an agency that meets the ideal, but
one that
reached its peak advocacy capacity in terms of its internal and
external
constraints and is still evolving today. Despite the constraints,
the agency
grew from one with an ad hoc advocacy program to one with an
institu-
tionalized program that included constituent involvement.
Agency Context and Birth of Advocacy Program
In 1993, Hope for the Homeless (HH)^ was a 23-year-old
community-
based homeless services agency located in an eastern urban
center with

a population of roughly 500,000 people. Between 1970 and
1993, the
agency's services expanded to address a range of needs for
people who
were homeless, including substance abuse treatment, housing,
medical
and dental services, socialization programs for the elderly, and
services
for people with mental illness. By 1993, the agency operated
more than
20 programs, employed more than 100 full-time staff, benefited
from
thousands of volunteers, and was supported by a multi-million
dollar
budget from diverse sources. In 1993, more than 80% of its
budget was
supported through private sources, including individual
donations, church
contributions, and private foundations.
In 1978, although HH is a secular organization, not associated
with
the local Catholic archdiocese, the founding Executive Director
was re-
placed by a Catholic priest with a Master's in Social Work,
years of ex-
perience running social service programs, and deeply held
values for
social justice. Moreover, he was a very savvy fund-raiser and
was able
to leverage his non-secular persona to raise money and
volunteer sup-
port. Under his leadership, the agency grew from a soup kitchen
with one
full-time staff person and two volunteers to a comprehensive,
multi-

million dollar social services agency for people who are
homeless.
In November 1993, a social worker with an advocacy/organizing
in-
terest was hired to provide direct services to residents in one of
HH's
long-term single room occupancy (SRO) housing programs. The
SRO
rents were subsidized through a local Section 8 program called
the Ten-
ant Assistance program (TAP). Within six months, the residents
began
receiving notices that the TAP program was being cut, so rent
subsidies
would no longer be available, and consequently all 93 residents
of the
program were at risk of returning to homelessness. The story of
how the
residents organized and successfully saved the TAP program is
docu-
mented elsewhere (Donaldson, 2004). However, an outcome
ofthe Save
TAP campaign was the formation of a grassroots organizing
group called
Citizens About Real Empowerment. Through the rest of her
employ-
ment in the SRO, the social worker met weekly with CARE, and
with the
help of HH's legislative aide, conducted a series of political
education
workshops. Following the political education workshops, CARE
took

on several other grassroots organizing activities, including
establishing
an orange hat patrol, saving a bus line, and testifying on
numerous other
issues associated with homelessness and poverty. The formation
of
,CARE was one way in which HH institutionalized constituent
involve-
ment in advocacy.
In the summer of 1995, the SRO social worker moved into the
legis-
lative aid position and negotiated new responsibilities for the
position
that were solely related to advocacy practice, and the position
was re-ti-
tled. Advocacy Coordinator (AC). The Executive Director fully
sup-
ported more sustained advocacy efforts and gave the AC a great
deal of
autonomy in selecting the issues in which the agency would
engage.
Furthermore, he supported her continued work with CARE.
Conse-
quently, the advocacy program at HH was born out of the
confluence of
four key factors:
1. Agency leadership (embodied in the ED) valuing and
supporting
the role of advocacy as a core function;
2. An experienced and passionate staff person dedicated full-
time to

advocacy and empowerment practice;
3. A growing rate of homelessness and undeniable needs that
required
systemic change only affected through advocacy and
organizing;
4. Documentation of need through the service experiences of the
agency enabling the AC to leverage the knowledge, expertise,
and
statistics of the various agency programs to support advocacy
ar-
guments.
Elynn (1992) writes that "advocacy capability must be
developed over
time," and leadership that valued advocacy and investment in a
full-
time position were essential to the birth ofthe advocacy
program. How-
ever, the AC had a lot to do to begin growing the program, and
her steps
in growing the capacity of the program are detailed below.
Developing the Advocaey Program
Developing organizational capacity can include hiring staff,
raising
money, finding volunteers, buying technology, organizing
constituents,
and developing knowledge and skills. The initial focus of
developing
the advocacy program centered around gaining knowledge about
the
political landscape to better understand the key elected and
appointed

city officials, and the personalities in and history ofthe key
stakeholder
groups engaged in advocacy around homelessness and poverty.
To gain
this knowledge, the AC engaged in a series of activities over the
first 3-6
months.
• Surveyed Political Landscape
o Met with seasoned advocates who had years of experience
engag-
ing elected and appointed leaders and working in coalitions.
These advocates educated her about the personalities and idio-
syncrasies of the key players. Knowing more about the
personali-
ties of elected and appointed officials was very important in
tailoring advocacy messages; understanding the formal and
infor-
mal communications channels associated with particular offices
or positions; coordinating the right composition of an advocacy
team for office visits, and so on. In addition, their knowledge of
coalition politics was helpful to avoid getting caught in political
confiicts rooted in coalition history and personality differences.
° Met with all Council members and/or their human services
legis-
lative aides, and some Executive agency staff. The primary and
stated purpose of these meetings was to reintroduce key
political
actors to HH and its new advocacy staff person. The secondary

and unstated purpose of these meetings was to build
relationships
and to gain first-hand experience with the government officials
working with issues of homelessness and poverty.
o Regularly Attended and Became Active in Key Coalition
Meet-
ings. The AC immediately began to attend key coalition meet-
ings, and was careful to mostly listen to ideas and initiatives to
get a sense of the coalition dynamics. In the end, tasks support-
ing the agenda of the key coalitions became the focus of much
of
the work of the AC, particularly as they converged with the
priori-
ties of CARE and the work of the agency.
• Surveyed Media Landscape. The AC began to pay careful
attention
to stories and editorials related to homelessness and poverty
that ap-
peared in the primary print media. She created a filing system to
clip
and save relevant news articles, and stored in her rolodex the
names
and contact information of various reporters who covered home-
lessness and poverty issues. These contacts were useful when
trying
to engage media in coalition or agency-planned actions.
• The AC also planned to listen (and sometimes call in) to a
weekly
local radio show specifically geared toward local politics where
de-
cision-makers were often guests and they or their staff were
known
to be part of the listening audience. Coalition partners were

useful
in monitoring numerous media outlets, including community
and
ethnic newspapers, and local TV news stations.
• Negotiated Investment in Technology. In 1995, Internet and e-
mail
• capacity was limited to one or two staff people who needed
this
technology to transfer funds or do fund-raising. Arguing that e-
mail
and Internet access would increase productivity and
effectiveness of
advocacy efforts, the AC was able to secure the installation of a
line
to her computer and split the cost of her personal e-mail account
with the agency to use it for advocacy activities. A few years
later,
the agency invested in this technology for the entire agency.
Modest Expansion of the Advocacy Program
The above activities describe the initial steps taken as HH's
advocacy
program emerged. In 1998, the AC assumed additional
responsibilities
related to direct services, but was able to negotiate hiring
another full-
time staff person in the Advocacy Department to work with
CARE and

expand coverage on issues. In August 2000, the Advocacy
Department
started a social justice program to conduct facilitated exchanges
with
agency volunteers who served meals in the dining room. The
objective
of the Social Justice Program was to help volunteers reflect on
the struc-
tural inequities at the core of the condition of the homelessness
they
witnessed in the dining room. The Social Justice Coordinator
(SJC) de-
veloped a series of reflections around various topics related to
homeless
and the agency experience. The advocacy staff hoped that
volunteers
could be mobilized to support the social change activities of the
Advo-
cacy Department, but these hopes did not materialize for a
variety of
reasons discussed later in the paper. In addition to engaging
dining room
volunteers in reflections, the SJC conducted educational
workshops out-
side the agency and with new staff as part of their employee
orientation.
The social worker who developed HH's advocacy program left
the
agency in August 2003, but the department continued to be led
by a
committed and competent social worker. In a subsequent
strategic plan-
ning process, advocacy emerged as a top priority for agency
investment
and support. The growth of the advocacy department at HH is a

testament
to the agency's commitment to supporting advocacy as a core
agency
function. By 2003, the staff included 2.5 full-time staff,
including one
person working part-time with CARE. This staff enabled the
active in-
volvement and often leadership in a number of coalitions across
the city
and facilitated the work of CARE to effect change in local
housing
authority policies. In addition, the SJC was able to conduct
hundreds of
facilitated reflections with volunteer and community groups on
issues of
poverty and homelessness. The positive evaluations from those
work-
shops demonstrated that they provoked critical thinking on the
issues
among the participants, although the long-term and
transformative out-
comes of those reflection opportunities are not known. In spite
of the
overall success of the department, advocacy practice had not yet
reached
an ideal model, and some of the limitations in achieving that
ideal are
described below.
LIMITATIONS ON ACHIEVING
PROGRESSIVE ADVOCACY PROGRAM

The case study shows how a homeless services agency
integrated ad-
vocacy practice as a core departmental function. However,
although it
contained the six building blocks of a progressive advocacy
program,
several factors prevented the building blocks from reaching
their full
depth, thereby limiting the extent to which the department fully
represented
a progressive advocacy program. Each of these factors is
described below.
Need for Greater Leadership Commitment
The existence of an advocacy program reflects the support of
the Ex-
ecutive Director and the senior management team. From 1993 to
2003,
the Board never appeared interested in the agency's advocacy
activities
and staff perceived this to be positive given the Board
composition. For
example, some perceived the Board as fully embracing HH's
charity role,
but much less comfortable with a social change role. The
Board's faith
and trust in the ED allowed him to give resources to this
function with
very little explanation. While the lack of Board involvement
helped to
stave off objections to the advocacy work, it also prevented the
leverag-
ing of the contacts and resources of individual Board members.
Prior to

2003, advocacy was never reflected in the agency mission,
vision, or
value statements. However, after a 2003-2004 strategic planning
pro-
cess, "advocacy on behalf of the poor" and "empowering the
people we
serve" were listed as agency values. One might observe that the
phrase
"advocacy on behalf of the poor" reflects a paternalistic lens
toward cli-
ents rather than a lens equal partnership and responsibility for
social
change.
More Investment in Constituency Engagement
Over the years, a general hesitancy by the leadership to fully
embrace,
support, and unleash the power of agency constituency was
demon-
strated in the low resources given to develop CARE membership
(half-
time staff), and the degree of internal advocacy required to
maintain
agency support for CARE as a mechanism to develop
constituent lead-
ership and political involvement. Efforts to expand and
institutionalize
constituent involvement agency-wide throughout all programs
was con-
tinually not supported by agency leadership. For example, the
AC sub-

mitted a concept paper for an agency-wide program where each
agency
program would run a political education group where program
partici-
pants could gather to share grievances and work collectively to
address
them. The concept paper included a timeline for implementation
and de-
scribed the power that such an effort could yield, but the
Executive Di-
rector did not see the value it would bring to the agency for the
required
investment. Despite repeated efforts to phase in an integrated
constituent
engagement program throughout agency programs, those efforts
failed
in the face of competing agency priorities and limited resources.
Vulnerability to Eunders
In addition, although agency leadership gave the advocacy
department
tremendous autonomy in selecting and framing the issues it
worked on,
leadership also asked the department to engage in advocacy to
address
agency interests, for example, protecting funding or adverse
effects
from proposed legislation or regulations. Over the years, the
advocacy
department would come under closer scrutiny and tighter
control by.
agency leadership when the advocacy department targeted its
efforts
against potential funding sources. Even though the agency had
highly

diverse funding sources, it still felt hesitant about "biting the
hand that
fed it," even if the portions were quite small.
Small Department Relative to Agency Size
and Diversity of Constituent Needs
By the time the founding advocacy director left, the department
had
grown to include 21/2 full-time staff, and a program budget of
roughly
$150,000, approximately 1.5% of the agency's $10 million
operating
budget. Only one of the staff was doing advocacy full-time, the
other full-
time staff person split her time between CARE and the Social
Justice
program. The Advocacy Director worked half-time doing
advocacy
while supervising other programs, including an emerging
housing de-
velopment department. Consequently, for a large agency with
more than
30 programs, additional staff were needed to adequately address
all of
the issues experienced by the entire agency's Constituency. For
example,
although the agency was active in numerous coalitions or
working groups
related to homelessness, housing, health care, substance abuse
treatment,

and income security, it was not active in coalitions for the
elderly, men-
tal health, workforce development, and many other iireas that
intersect
with homelessness. Additional staff were needed to actively
participate
and drive other advocacy priorities, and to also spend time
meaningfully
engaging constituents seeking services in all agency programs.
Minimal Opportunities for Reflection
The Advocacy Department envisioned offering social justice
reflec-
tions as a regular package of development workshops extended
to agency
staff. However, although new staff were asked to participate in
one re-
flection as part of their orientation, additional opportunities to
reflect
more deeply on homelessness were not provided as a regular
option for
staff based on a cost-benefit perception.
CONCLUSION
Developing an advocacy program in a human services program
re-
quires strong leadership, diverse funding sources, and full-time
staff
dedicated to advocacy. Achieving a progressive advocacy
program re-
quires agency commitment to awakening the power in the
constituency
it serves, strengthening it through leadership development,
allowing con-

stituent priorities to drive the agency's advocacy agenda, and
building
power through coalitions. Providing opportunities for staff,
volunteers,
and constituents to reflect on the advocacy practice and/or the
conditions
which bring about human need may re-energize movements,
deepen
understanding, and renew energy and creativity for the ongoing
work of
social change.
More research on each one of these factors as it relates to
human ser-
vice agency advocacy is needed. Possible research questions
include:
What leadership styles and characteristics lend themselves to
integrating
a progressive advocacy program at human service agencies?
What meth-
ods can be used to cultivate and nurture social change leaders?
Does
funding from local governments affect nonproflt human service
advocacy
directed toward local policy decisions? Does funding source
change the
shape, motivation behind, and purpose of nonprofit human
service
advocacy? How do you integrate participatory decision-making
models
into social service and social change organizations in a way that

advances
task-centered goals? What is the best way to link community
organizing
and social service activities for social change? How do we
evaluate advo-
cacy and constituent development activities? Does reflection on
under-
lying causes of human needs truly create a commitment to social
change
practice within participants, and what are the factors that create
that
change? What are the stages in the organizational
transformation process
from social service to social change, and what does it take to
move agen-
cies along that continuum?
Research findings on organizational characteristics related to
advocacy
could be applied to developing social work and nonprofit
management
curricula that advance advocacy practices and inform the
development
of institutional models that support a mission of social justice.
For ex-
amples, social work curricula should include content on
participatory
decision-making, popular education, and other tools to help
students
learn how to meaningfully engage constituents in policy
processes.
Foundation year social work should include a course on policy
practice
that includes analyzing policies, developing an advocacy
strategy, en-
gaging in various tactics, and using media to advance advocacy

mes-
sages. The dual focus of the social work profession to service
and
justice should be stressed and infused throughout the foundation
year.
Social work students should learn about how racism and other
forms of
oppression have been constructed and discuss strategies to
begin to de-
construct these inequities through policy and organizational
structures.
Management courses should include content on transformational
lead-
ership (Burns, 1978) or other leadership styles that go beyond
manage-
ment and embrace leadership for a shared purpose. Implications
for
social work practice include the importance of nonprofit human
service
agency leadership to integrate and strengthen the building
blocks for
progressive advocacy practice. Social workers at entry and mid-
levels
should be prepared to advocate for and support efforts within
their own
agency to develop these building blocks.
Gibelman and Kraft (1996) stated that in light of government's
ever-
decreasing investment in social welfare programs, "advocacy
needs to be
institutionalized and strengthened as a program of service" (p.
43) more
than ever. Social workers make up a large share ofthe staff
employed by
human service agencies. Consequently, social work educators

have a
responsibility to develop within social work students an
appreciation
for integrating direct service and macro practice functions. As
the na-
tion continues to shift its priorities and dollars away from
domestic is-
sues and toward global threats, the devolutionary trend of
government
service programs will only worsen. Social work educators and
others
who care about social justice must act now to prepare those
working
with disenfranchised populations how to argue for policies and
pro-
grams that uplift and empower people.
NOTES
1. Direct lobbying involves communicating directly with a
policy decision-maker to
express an opinion about specific or proposed legislation.
Grassroots lobbying in-
volves communicating the agency's opinion about specific or
proposed legislation to
the general public, including a call to action.
2. The agency name has been changed.
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doi: 10.1300/J147v32n02_03
APPENDIX
Ideal Characteristics of a Human Service Agency
with a Fully Integrated Progressive Advocacy Program
1. Advocacy/social change activities are written into the
mission statement,
vision statement, and core values of the agency;
2. The agency budget has a line-item supporting at least one or
more full-
time staff people to carry out activities of the advocacy
department.
3. The advocacy department has the support of a
communications officer
to help frame media messages, plan and implement a
communications
strategy to support advocacy goals, and develop relationships
with print
media reporters and TV/radio personalities.
4. The advocacy program is valued equally to service functions
(as dem-
onstrated on organizational chart and in resource allocation
practices);

5. Institutionalized practices exist to build the agency advocacy
agenda
from constituent experiences and priorities. For example,
service pro-
grams could run weekly popular education and current affairs
groups
that could be a vehicle for airing and building a strategy to
address col-
lective grievances. This strategy could inform and drive the
overall
agency advocacy agenda.
6. Regular opportunities for staff and volunteers to reflect on
structural in-
equities and "isms" which underlie the reasons their
constituents seek
services.
7. The agency has mechanisms to mobilize donors, volunteers,
constitu-
ents, and other key stakeholders to advance a social change
agenda.
8. The agency board has a policy or advocacy committee which
gives sup-
port to advocacy activities, including giving solicited advice,
making
strategic phone calls, visiting elected officials, and mobilizing
their own
well-placed contacts.
9. A strategic planning process that meaningfully includes
constituents
and staff at all levels where building an advocacy agenda and
action

' plan are one of the focus areas.
10. A diversified funding portfolio to minimize dependency on
one or two
funders.
b y H E AT H E R M C L E O D G R A N T & L E S L I E R
. C R U T C H F I E L D
P
H
O
T
O
G
R
A
P
H
S
B
Y
©

M
IC
H
A
E
L
B
E
N
S
O
N
P
H
O
T
O
G
R
A
P
H
Y
IN FEWER THAN TWO DECADES, TEACH FOR AMERICA
has gone from a struggling start-up to a powerful force for

educa-
tion reform in the United States. Launched in 1989 by college
senior Wendy Kopp on a shoestring budget in a borrowed
office,
the organization now attracts many of the country’s best and
brightest college graduates, who spend two years teaching in
America’s neediest public schools in exchange for a modest
salary.
In the last decade alone, Teach for America has more than quin-
tupled in size, growing its budget from $10 million to $70
million
and its number of teachers from 500 to 4,400. And it aims to
dou-
ble in size again in the next few years.1
But rapid growth is only part of New York-based Teach for
America’s story. Although its success can be measured by such
tan-
gibles as the number of teachers it places or the amount of
money
it raises, perhaps the organization’s most significant
accomplish-
ment is the movement for education reform it has created.
Although
some education leaders are critical of the nonprofit’s teacher-
train-
CREATING
HIGH-IM PACT
NONPROFITS
Conventional wisdom says that scaling social innovation starts
with strengthening
internal management capabilities. This study of 12 high-impact
nonprofits,
however, shows that real social change happens when

organizations go outside
their own walls and find creative ways to enlist the help of
others.
32 S TA N F O R D S O C I A L I N N O VAT I O N R E V I
E W / f a l l 2 0 0 7 www.ssireview.org
{ }
{This photograph of a boy wearing a Share Our Strength cap,
and the other photographs that follow, were taken
during the Hinges of Hope Tour in the Rio Grande Valley. The
February 2004 tour brought public and private sector
leaders to Texas to visit and learn about these impoverished
communities. Share Our Strength, a high-impact
nonprofit that combats childhood hunger in the United States,
hosted the tour.}
}
ing program, and how long these teachers stay in the classroom,
using such measures misses the larger, intangible impact the
organization has had. Teach for America has challenged how
many Americans think about teacher credentialing, shaken up
the education establishment, and, most important, created a
committed vanguard of education reformers.
Teach for America has been so effective that it is now the
recruiter of choice on many Ivy League campuses, often out-
competing elite firms like McKinsey & Company.2 Graduates
who went through the program in the 1990s are now launch-

ing charter schools, running for political office, managing foun-
dations, and working as school principals across the country. In
these capacities, they can effect change at the systemic level –
not just child by child or classroom by classroom, but at the
school, district, and state levels.
How has Teach for America accomplished so much in such
a relatively short period of time? And how have other similarly
successful nonprofits had such significant social impact? Our
answers to this second question are the subject of this article
and the focus of our forthcoming book, Forces for Good: The
Six
Practices of High-Impact Nonprofits ( Jossey-Bass, October
2007).
We grounded our findings in several years of research on
12 of the most successful nonprofits in recent U.S. history,
including the well-known (Habitat for Humanity), the less well-
known (Self-Help), and the surprising (the Exploratorium).
One nonprofit, Environmental Defense, has helped reduce
acid rain in the northeastern United States and created new
solu-
tions to global warming. Another, City Year, has
helped thousands of young people serve their coun-
try and changed how we think about volunteerism.
Collectively, these high-impact nonprofits have
pressed corporations to adopt sustainable business
practices and mobilized citizens to act on such issues
as hunger, education reform, and the environment.
(See p. 36 for names and descriptions of all 12 orga-
nizations.)
What we discovered after closely examining
these 12 high-impact nonprofits came as a bit of a
surprise. We had assumed that there was some-

thing inherent in these organizations that helped
them have great impact – and that their success was directly tied
to their growth or management approach. Instead, we learned
that becoming a high-impact nonprofit is not just about build-
ing a great organization and then expanding it to reach more
people. Rather, high-impact nonprofits work with and through
organizations and individuals outside themselves to create more
impact than they ever could have achieved alone. They build
social movements and fields; they transform business, gov-
ernment, other nonprofits, and individuals; and they change
the world around them.
Myths of Nonprofit Management
We first examined the 12 organizations through the lens of tra-
ditional nonprofit management, studying their leadership, gov-
ernance, strategies, programs, fundraising, and marketing. (See
p. 40 for details on how we selected and studied these
nonprofits.)
We thought we would find that their success was due to time-
tested management habits like brilliant marketing, well-tuned
operations, or rigorously developed strategic plans.
But instead what we found flew in the face of conventional
wisdom. Achieving high impact is not just about building a
great
organization and then scaling it up site by site, or dollar by dol-
lar. As we got further into our research, we saw that many com-
monly held beliefs about what makes nonprofits successful
were falling by the wayside. In fact, the vast majority of non-
profit literature focuses on issues that, although important,
don’t determine whether an organization has impact, such as:
Myth #1: Perfect Management. Some of the organiza-
tions we studied are not exemplary models of generally

accepted
management principles. Although adequate management is
necessary, it is not sufficient for creating significant social
impact.
Myth #2: Brand-Name Awareness. A handful of groups
we studied are household names, but a few hardly focus on mar-
keting at all. For some, traditional mass marketing is a critical
part of their impact strategy; for others, it’s unimportant.
HEATHER MCLEOD GRANT is an adviser to the Center for
the
Advancement of Social Entrepreneurship at Duke University’s
Fuqua
School of Business and the Center for Social Innovation at
Stanford Uni-
versity’s Graduate School of Business.
LESLIE R. CRUTCHFIELD is managing director of the Ashoka
Global
Academy and a research grantee of the Aspen Institute’s
Nonprofit Sector
and Philanthropy Program. Their book, Forces for Good: The
Six
Practices of High-Impact Nonprofits, was a project of the
Center for

the Advancement of Social Entrepreneurship and will be
published by
Jossey-Bass in October 2007.
www.ssireview.org f a l l 2 0 0 7 / S TA N F O R D S O C I
A L I N N O VAT I O N R E V I E W 35
Myth #3: A Breakthrough New Idea. Although some
groups come up with radical innovations, others take old ideas
and tweak them until they achieve success.
Myth #4: Textbook Mission Statements. All of these
nonprofits look to compelling missions, visions, and shared
values. But only a few of these groups spend time fine-tuning
their mission statement on paper; most of them are too busy
living it.
Myth #5: High Ratings on Conventional Metrics. When
we looked at traditional measures of nonprofit efficiency, many
of these groups didn’t score well, because they don’t adhere to
misleading metrics such as overhead ratios.
Myth #6: Large Budgets. We discovered that size does-
n’t correlate with impact. Some of these nonprofits have made
a big impact with large budgets; others have achieved similar
impact with much smaller budgets.
As we dismissed the conventional wisdom about what
makes high-impact nonprofits successful, we realized we had
discovered a new way of understanding this sector – and what
enables the best nonprofits to create lasting social change.3
Six Practices of High-Impact Nonprofits

The secret to their success lies in how high-impact nonprofits
mobilize every sector of society – government, business, non-
profits, and the public – to be a force for good. In other words,
greatness has more to do with how nonprofits work outside the
boundaries of their organizations than with how they manage
their own internal operations. The high-impact nonprofits we
studied are satisfied with building a “good enough” organiza-
tion and then focusing their energy externally to catalyze large-
scale change.
To paraphrase Archimedes, “Give me a lever long enough
and I alone can move the world.” These groups use the power
of leverage to create change. In physics, leverage is defined as
the mechanical advantage gained from using a lever. In
business,
it means using a proportionately small initial investment to
gain a high return. The concept of leverage captures exactly
what
high-impact nonprofits do. Like a man lifting a boulder three
times his weight with a lever and fulcrum, these nonprofits are
able to achieve greater social change than their mere size or
struc-
ture would suggest.
After a long process of studying these 12 nonprofits, we
began to see patterns in the ways they work. In the end, six pat-
terns crystallized into the form presented here – the six
practices
that high-impact nonprofits use to achieve extraordinary impact:
1. Serve and Advocate: High-impact organizations may
start out providing great programs, but they eventually realize
that they cannot achieve large-scale social change through ser-
vice delivery alone. So they add policy advocacy to acquire

government resources and to change legislation. Other non-
profits start out by doing advocacy and later add grassroots pro-
grams to supercharge their strategy.
Ultimately, all high-impact organizations bridge the divide
between service and advocacy. They become good at both.
And the more they serve and advocate, the more they achieve
impact. A nonprofit’s grassroots work helps inform its policy
advocacy, making legislation more relevant. And advocacy at
the
national level can help a nonprofit replicate its model, gain
credibility, and acquire funding for expansion.4
The nonprofit Self-Help, based in Durham, N.C., presents
an excellent example of how combining advocacy with service
can result in greater impact. Self-Help began by giving home
loans to clients – often poor, minority single mothers – who
did not qualify for traditional mortgages. Although its services
helped thousands of low-income families purchase a house,
Self-Help’s work was soon undermined by predatory lenders,
which took advantage of vulnerable borrowers by adding
excessive fees or charging exorbitant mortgage rates, virtually
ensuring that the borrower would default.
Eventually, Self-Help organized a statewide coalition in
North Carolina and lobbied to pass the first anti-predatory lend-
ing law in the country. Later, the organization established the
subsidiary Center for Self-Help to help local nonprofits pass
similar legislation in 22 additional states. Through its direct
ser-
vices, Self-Help has given more than $4.5 billion in home
loans to low-income families in the United States. But through
its advocacy efforts, it has created far more value for the coun-
try’s most vulnerable populations by protecting them from
predatory lenders.

In nearly every case we studied, the nonprofit combined
direct service programs and advocacy to enhance its impact
over time. Some groups, like America’s Second Harvest and
Habitat for Humanity, began by providing services, such as
feeding the hungry or housing the poor, and added advocacy
only after a decade or more. Other groups, like the Center on
Budget and Policy Priorities, the Heritage Foundation, and
Environmental Defense, began with advocacy and later added
grassroots programs or services to expand their impact to
the local and state level. Some groups, like City Year and the
National Council of La Raza, did both from the outset, despite
pressure to specialize, and recognized early that advocacy and
service reinforce each other.
2. Make Markets Work: High-impact nonprofits have
learned that tapping into the power of self-interest and the laws
of economics is far more effective than appealing to pure altru-
ism. No longer content to rely on traditional notions of charity,
TWELVE HIGH-IMPACT NONPROFITS
Organization Revenue How the organization works What the
organization has accomplished
Year founded, Fiscal year ’05
headquarters ($ millions)
America’s Second Harvest 543* Distributes donated food and
grocery Distributed 2 billion pounds of food each year
1979, Chicago products to grassroots nonprofits; through more
than 200 food banks to more

advocates for antihunger policy than 50,000 local nonprofits,
feeding 25 million
hungry Americans
Center on Budget and 13 Researches and analyzes state and
Protected billions of dollars in federal benefits
Policy Priorities federal budgets and fiscal policies; and
allocations to programs for the poor by
1981, Washington, D.C. advocates on behalf of the poor
working with 26 state affiliates and 6,000 local
nonprofits; established state and international
budget projects
City Year 42 Builds democracy through citizen Created youth
volunteer service corps that
1988, Boston service, leadership, and social operates in 17 U.S.
cities and South Africa, with
entrepreneurship; advocates for 8,000 alumni; influenced
adoption of AmeriCorps,
national service policy which enlists 70,000 volunteers
annually;
helped build fields of youth service and social
entrepreneurship
Environmental Defense 69 Addresses environmental problems
Influenced critical environmental policies,
1967, New York with research, advocacy, market tools,
including Clean Air Act and Kyoto Protocol;
and corporate partnerships helped companies like McDonald’s,
FedEx, and
Wal-Mart Stores become more environmentally
sustainable

The Exploratorium 44 Operates museum of science, art, and
Influenced global movement for interactive
1969, San Francisco human perception that is a model for
science centers and museums, reaching 20
new forms of education million people through exhibits at 124
partner
museums and a Web site; museum attracts
500,000 visitors each year
Habitat for Humanity 1,000* Seeks to eliminate poverty housing
Created 2,100 global affiliates in 100 countries
International and homelessness by building homes, and built
275,000 homes, which now house
1976, Americus, Ga. raising awareness, and advocating 1
million people
for change
The Heritage Foundation 40 Formulates and promotes
conservative Crafted policy agenda for the Reagan adminis-
1973, Washington, D.C. policy through research and by tration;
helped lead conservative revolution
creating affiliate organizations in Congress in 1990s; now
works with 2,500
state affiliates and 200,000 individual members
National Council of 29 Works to improve opportunities for
Helped create more than 300 local grassroots
La Raza all Latinos through national network affiliates that are
involved in education, health,
1968, Washington, D.C. of affiliated civil rights and advocacy
and civil rights for Hispanics; influenced critical

organizations legislation on immigration
Self-Help 75 Fosters economic development in low- Created
corporate partnerships that allowed it
1980, Durham, N.C. income communities through lending, to
provide more than $4.5 billion in loans to
asset building, research, and advocacy 50,000 small businesses
and low-income people;
led national anti-predatory lending campaign
and legal reform in 22 states
Share Our Strength 24 Inspires and leads individuals and Raised
$200 million for hunger-relief groups
1984, Washington, D.C. businesses to end childhood hunger
through events in 60 cities; involved 1 million
volunteers in the Great American Bake Sale
Teach for America 41 Recruits recent college graduates to
Trained 12,000 college graduates to teach
1990, New York spend two years teaching in needy 2.5 million
students, creating a vanguard for
schools and to lead education reform education reform;
influenced teacher training
and credentialing practices
YouthBuild USA 18 Helps low-income youths learn job and
Recruited more than 60,000 youths and 226
1988, Boston leadership skills by building affordable affiliates
to help build 15,000 units of housing;
community housing influenced national legislation to create
$645
million in federal funding

* Budget includes value of in-kind donations
{ }
or to see business as an enemy,
these nonprofits find ways to
work with markets and help
companies “do good while doing
well.” They influence business
practices, build corporate part-
nerships, and develop earned-
income ventures to achieve social
change on a grander scale.5
Environmental Defense was
one of the first nonprofits to
realize the power of harnessing
market forces for social change.
The New York-based organiza-
tion was founded in the late
1960s by a group of scientists
who lobbied to ban the use of
DDT, and its informal motto for
years was “sue the bastards.”
Over time, however, the non-
profit became known for a dif-
ferent – and initially more radi-
cal – approach: working with corporations to change their
business processes and become more sustainable.
For example, even though other green groups criticized
Environmental Defense for “selling out” at the time, the non-
profit worked with McDonald’s in the 1980s to make the fast-
food giant’s packaging more environmentally sound. Since

then, Environmental Defense has worked with hundreds of
companies – from FedEx to Wal-Mart Stores – often scaling
its innovations to change practices in an entire industry.
Although these partnerships are becoming more common
among environmental groups, Environmental Defense was an
early pioneer in this area.
But Environmental Defense didn’t just set out to change busi-
nesses’ behavior. It went a step further, harnessing market
forces to help solve larger environmental problems. Environ-
mental Defense has been a strong proponent of market-based
systems to control pollution, such as “cap and trade,” which
establishes overall emission limits (on carbon, for example),
and then creates economic incentives for companies to comply
and reduce their emissions. Cap and trade systems helped
reduce acid rain in the northeast United States and have become
an important tool in the effort to fight global warming. In fact,
this approach led to the passage of California’s Global Warm-
ing
Solution
s Act of 2006, the first statewide legislation of its
kind and a model for more stringent federal emissions controls.
We found three primary ways in which high-impact non-
profits use markets. They help change business behavior on a
large scale, as did Environmental Defense. Self-Help also
followed
this path, creating a secondary loan market and expanding its

innovative lending models
through mainstream financial
players such as Wachovia and
Fannie Mae, thereby changing
the industry’s practices and help-
ing large companies reach his-
torically underserved markets.
Nonprofits also leverage
markets by partnering with cor-
porations to garner additional
resources for their cause, as have
America’s Second Harvest, City
Year, and Habitat for Humanity.
All three have established large
corporate partnerships through
which they obtain funding,
media relations, marketing sup-
port, and in-kind donations.
Some nonprofits run their
own small businesses, generat-
ing income that helps fund their
programs. Share Our Strength,

for instance, runs a nonprofit consulting business called Com-
munity Wealth Ventures, whose revenue it redeploys toward
its social mission.
3. Inspire Evangelists: High-impact nonprofits build
strong communities of supporters who help them achieve their
larger goals. They value volunteers, donors, and advisers not
only
for their time, money, and guidance, but also for their evange-
lism. To inspire supporters’ commitment, these nonprofits cre-
ate emotional experiences that help connect supporters to the
group’s mission and core values. These experiences convert out-
siders to evangelists, who in turn recruit others in viral
marketing
at its finest. High-impact nonprofits then nurture and sustain
these communities of supporters over time, recognizing that
they are not just means, but ends in themselves.6
Habitat for Humanity, located in Americus, Ga., exem-
plifies this ability to create a larger community and inspire
evangelists for its cause. As founder Millard Fuller has said,
he didn’t set out to create an organization so much as a social
movement. From the outset, the nonprofit spread its model
through local church congregations and word of mouth,

building its brand from the grassroots up. That model includes
enlisting supporters in the very core of its work: building
homes for the poor. Participants work alongside the future
residents of the home, and in the process live out their val-
ues while becoming advocates for the housing cause. These
evangelists, in turn, recruit their friends and colleagues,
expanding the circle of supporters outward.
In addition, Habitat for Humanity attracts what we call
}
“super-evangelists” like former President Jimmy Carter – peo-
ple who by virtue of their personal accomplishments, famous
names, and vast social networks can help take a nonprofit to the
next level. By serving on the board and as a spokesperson for
the organization, Carter helped propel it from a grassroots
nonprofit to a global force for change.

Not all of the high-impact nonprofits we studied had an orga-
nizational model that makes involving supporters easy. Yet
almost all of them found creative ways to convert core
supporters
to evangelists and to mobilize super-evangelists.
4. Nurture Nonprofit Networks: Although most non-
profits pay lip service to collaboration, many of them really see
other groups as competition for scarce resources. But high-
impact organizations help their peers succeed, building
networks
of nonprofit allies and devoting remarkable time and energy to
advancing their fields. They freely share wealth, expertise, tal-
ent, and power with other nonprofits not because they are
saints, but because it’s in their self-interest to do so.7
The Heritage Foundation exemplifies this network mind-set.
From its founding, this Washington, D.C.-based organization
defied the traditional notion of a think tank. The foundation
sought not only to cultivate a broad membership base, but
also to infuse conservativism into mainstream thought. To
achieve its goals, Heritage realized that it needed to build a
move-

ment, not just an organization. And so the foundation helped
to seed and galvanize a vast network of conservative organi-
zations at the local, state, and national levels.
Today, Heritage’s Resource Bank – a network of state and
local nonprofits – includes more than 2,000 member organi-
zations. The Heritage Foundation helps leaders of these state
and local nonprofits raise money and freely shares its donor list
with like-minded groups. It also offers extensive programs to
train non-Heritage policy analysts on everything from conser-
vative strategies to public speaking skills. And Heritage
cultivates
talent – not only for its own organization, but also for other
lead-
ing conservative groups – by offering a prestigious internship
program and job-placement service for its young acolytes. The
nonprofit also frequently works in coalitions to promote con-
servative policy and to pass legislation. Rather than seeing
other conservative organizations as competitors, Heritage has
helped build a much larger conservative movement over the last
two decades, serving as a critical connector in this growing
network of like-minded peers.
Other high-impact nonprofits harness the power of net-
works. In some cases, they formalize their networks through

an affiliation structure, such as YouthBuild USA or America’s
Second Harvest. In other cases, they keep their networks less
formal and operate without official brand or funding ties,
such as the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities or the
Exploratorium.
Regardless of whether they have formal or informal affiliates,
all of these nonprofits help build their respective fields through
collaboration rather than competition. They share financial
resources and help other nonprofits succeed at fundraising.
They give away their model and proprietary information in an
open-source approach. They cultivate leadership and talent for
their larger network, rather than hoarding the best people. And
they work in coalitions to influence legislation or conduct
grass-
roots advocacy campaigns, without worrying too much about
which organization gets the credit. These nonprofits recognize
that they are more powerful together than alone, and that large-
scale social change often requires collaborative, collective
action.
5. Master the Art of Adaptation: High-impact non-
profits are exceptionally adaptive, modifying their tactics as
needed to increase their success. They have responded to chang-
ing circumstances with one innovation after another. Along the

way, they’ve made mistakes and have even produced some
flops.
But unlike many nonprofits, they have also mastered the abil-
ity to listen, learn, and modify their approach on the basis of
exter-
nal cues. Adaptability has allowed them to sustain their
impact.8
{
Too many nonprofits are highly innovative but can’t execute
new ideas. Other nonprofits are so mired in bureaucracy that
they lack creativity. But high-impact nonprofits combine cre-
ativity with disciplined systems for evaluating, executing, and
adapting ideas over time.
Share Our Strength has been exceptionally adaptive. Bill
Shore started the Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit by mail-
ing letters to food industry celebrities to raise money for
hunger relief. Although he received a few checks, he found that
professional chefs were much more enthusiastic about donat-

ing their time and talent to a local tasting event. After the suc-
cess of a single event in Denver, Share Our Strength abandoned
its direct mail campaign and launched the Taste of the Nation
series – now a national success in more than 70 cities. It has
raised millions of dollars for hunger relief, and many other non-
profits have copied it.
Over time, Share Our Strength has experimented with a
number of different innovations, from participatory events to
cause-marketing campaigns. Not all of these events have been
successful. One failed experiment was its attempt to extend the
Taste concept into the sports arena, through a program called
“Taste of the Game.” Share Our Strength solicited celebrity ath-
letes to coach young people in a sport and asked parents to buy
tickets to demonstration games – with all proceeds going to
hunger relief. But the passion for antihunger issues wasn’t as
strong among athletes and coaches as it was among the restau-
rant community. After several less successful initiatives cost
the nonprofit time and money, Share Our Strength developed
a more rigorous approach to managing innovation. Today, the
nonprofit’s staff develops business plans and conducts more
research before diving into new programs.
All of the nonprofits in our sample have mastered what we
call the cycle of adaptation, which involves four critical steps.

First,
they listen to feedback from their external environments and
seek opportunities for improvement or change. Next, they
innovate and experiment, developing new ideas or improving
upon older programs. Then they evaluate and learn what works
with the innovation, sharing information and best practices
across their networks. They modify their plans and programs
in a process of ongoing learning. It’s a never-ending cycle that
helps these nonprofits increase and sustain their impact.
6. Share Leadership: The leaders of these 12 organizations
all exhibit charisma, but they don’t have oversized egos. They
know that they must share power in order to be stronger forces
for good. They distribute leadership within their organizations
and throughout their external nonprofit networks, empower-
ing others to lead. Leaders of high-impact nonprofits cultivate
a strong second-in-command, build enduring executive teams
with long tenure, and develop large and powerful boards.9
The National Council of La Raza (NCLR) is a great exam-
ple of collective leadership in action. The Washington, D.C.-
based nonprofit was founded in 1968 by a group of Hispanic
leaders, and within its first decade it appointed Raul Yzaguirre
as CEO. Yzaguirre led the nonprofit for more than 30 years of

extraordinary growth. He quickly developed a cadre of strong
and empowered senior executives, many of whom have been
with the organization for decades and who have played critical
leadership roles. Yzaguirre always had a second-in-command,
or COO, who helped him with internal management while he
focused on external leadership. And the NCLR board has
learned to share power with the executive director. Even when
Yzaguirre retired and was replaced by Janet Murguía, the orga-
nization maintained its leadership practices.
Habitat for Humanity is one organization that went
through a difficult leadership transition when Fuller left and
started a competing housing organization. But almost all of
the nonprofits we studied, like NCLR, exemplify a shared
leadership model. They have strong leadership at the top, led
by either a founder or a growth leader who has learned to share
power. They all have long-tenured executive teams with sig-
nificant responsibilities. And their boards are larger than aver-
age – with sizes ranging from 20 to more than 40 members –
and share power with the executives.
Sustaining Impact Through Organization
The 12 high-impact nonprofits that we studied use a majority
of these six practices. But they didn’t always, and they don’t all

employ them in the same ways. Some initially incorporated only
a few practices and added others gradually. Others focus more
on pulling certain levers and apply them to different degrees.
Yet they all converge on using more of these practices, not
fewer. Rather than doing what they’ve always done, high-impact
nonprofits continuously move in new directions. And by work-
ing with and through others, they find levers long enough to
increase their impact.
In addition to employing these six practices, these 12 high-
impact nonprofits have also mastered several basic management
principles that are necessary to sustain their impact. They have
all developed enduring, somewhat diversified sources of finan-
cial support, including large individual donor bases, government
contracts, corporate donations, and foundation grants. Typi-
cally, they have aligned their fundraising strategy with their
impact strategy. Those that are the savviest about inspiring
evan-
gelists are also able to build a broad individual donor base.
These nonprofits have also learned that they need to invest
in their human resources, and so the majority of them com-

pensate their executives very well compared to organizations
of similar size. And these nonprofits have all figured out how
to build reliable internal infrastructure, including sophisticated
information technology systems. They aren’t afraid to invest in
their own capacity – despite the countervailing public pressure
to keep administrative ratios low.10 Although none of these
basic management practices alone leads to breakthrough impact,
a solid organizational foundation is essential to sustaining
impact over time.
When a nonprofit applies all these forces simultaneously –
the six high-impact practices coupled with basic management
skills – it creates momentum that fuels further success. “It’s
like
pushing a snowball down a hill,” says one Habitat for Human-
ity volunteer. “At first you have to work at it and it takes a lot
of energy. But once it gets going, momentum builds and it starts
rolling on its own.”
Using Leverage to Advance Social Change
Why do these nonprofits harness multiple external forces,
when it would be easier to focus only on growing their own
organizations? It’s because of their unwavering commitment
to creating real impact. These organizations and the people who

lead them want to solve many of the biggest problems plagu-
ing our world: hunger, poverty, failing education, climate
change. They aspire to change the world. They don’t want to
apply social Band-Aids. They seek to attack and eliminate the
root causes of social ills.
It’s not enough for Teach for America to raise the test
scores of students in its classrooms; the organization also
wants to transform the entire educational system in America.
It’s not enough for Habitat for Humanity to build houses; the
organization also aspires to eliminate poverty housing and
homelessness from the face of the earth. It’s not enough for
Research Methods
B
ecause we wanted to identify and understand
the common characteristics of high-impact
nonprofits, our first challenge was to develop

a working definition of “impact.” We first con-
sidered concrete outputs: Did the organization
achieve substantial and sustained results at the
national or international level? The second part of our defin-
ition was more abstract: Did the organization have an
impact on an entire system or field?
We then needed to decide which organizations we would
include in our research. We wanted to study 501(c)(3) non-
profits that exist primarily to serve the larger public good, so
we eliminated membership groups such as fraternities. We
wanted to understand how nonprofits scale up their impact
relatively quickly, so we studied only organizations founded
in the late 1960s and beyond. (We also eliminated nonprofits

less than 10 years old because they hadn’t yet sustained their
impact.) Last, we wanted to study nonprofits that faced simi-
lar social, political, and economic circumstances, so we
excluded nonprofits founded abroad, as well as grantmak-
ing foundations with large endowments.
We used a four-phase process to select and study organi-
zations that met these criteria. Because there is no objective
measurement of impact (such as “total return to sharehold-
ers”),we had to use more subjective criteria for evaluating
these nonprofits. So we borrowed methods used in manage-
ment books such as Built to Last.
First, we surveyed 2,790 executive directors of nonprofits

that were broadly representative of the entire sector, asking
them to nominate up to five nonprofits in their field that
they believed had the most significant impact in the last 30
years and asking them to explain their choices.
We then enlisted 60 experts in nine different fields (e.g.,
arts, environment, youth development) to help us analyze
the survey results, to suggest other groups, and, finally, to
narrow our list to about 35 nonprofits that met all of our
baseline criteria. Working with our research advisers and
additional data – such as annual reports and publicly avail-
able information on their impact – we selected a final sam-
ple of 12 high-impact organizations that represented, as
much as possible, the sector’s range of issue areas, business

models, budgets, geographic distribution, and leadership.
We spent almost two years studying these 12 organiza-
tions. We compiled articles, case studies, and books about
the nonprofits; visited their headquarters; conducted 10 to
15 interviews with their senior executives, board members,
and other leaders; and analyzed internal information includ-
ing budget data, compensation rates, turnover rates, and
organization charts.
Finally, we looked at all the data for patterns revealing
how these nonprofits made their impact and tested them
with the 12 organizations themselves and with a group of
advisers. The most significant themes became the six prac-

tices. –H.M.G. & L.C.
{ }
{
City Year to build a few suc-
cessful youth corps; the orga-
nization also wants all young
people to spend a year serving
their community.
But for each of these 12
organizations, audacious ide-
alism is grounded in real prag-
matism. These nonprofits are
not so much ideological as
they are focused on achieving
greater impact. As Self-Help
founder Martin Eakes says, “I

need to have impact more
than I need to be right.” If that
means checking their egos at
the door, or even putting their
individual or organizational
needs second at times, these social entrepreneurs will do what-
ever it takes – within reason.
“We are extremely pragmatic,” says Gwen Ruta, program
director of alliances at Environmental Defense. “We’re all about
results. It doesn’t matter who we work with if we can get cred-
ible results. And we’ll use whatever tool it takes to make
progress: We will sue people, we will partner with business, we
will lobby on the Hill or educate the public. Every one of these
tools is in our tool kit, and we deploy the one most likely to get
us to our goal.”
Even if nonprofits master and use all six practices, they still
won’t be able to solve the world’s largest problems. Other sec-
tors must also follow suit. For real change to occur, government
and for-profit business leaders must learn from high-impact
non-
profits and the six practices that they follow. Government lead-
ers can begin to see nonprofits not just as a convenient place to
outsource social services, but also as a valuable source of social

innovation and policy ideas. Business leaders can partner with
leading nonprofits to devise innovative systems that harness
mar-
ket forces for the greater good. And individual donors and vol-
unteers can increase the social return on their investments by
supporting those nonprofits that have the most impact, rather
than those that adhere to conventional, and misguided, ideas
of efficiency.
We believe that without more nonprofits, businesses, and
government agencies following these six practices to achieve
maximum impact, we are doomed to plod along with slow,
incre-
mental change. We’ll barely make a dent in global warming.
We’ll meagerly fund programs that only perpetuate the cycle
of poverty. We’ll continue to allow millions of children to grow
up without healthcare. And we’ll continue to make one of the
biggest mistakes of all: focusing too much on process rather
than
on impact.
1 All facts and quotes presented in this case – and other cases
summarized in this
article – are taken from interviews with organizational staff or
from internal or

publicly available information such as annual reports. Budget
and other data gen-
erally reflect the FY ’05 reporting period, when the research
was conducted.
2 Patricia Sellers. “Schooling Corporate Giants on Recruiting.”
Fortune, 27 Novem-
ber 2006.
3 A number of articles published in the Stanford Social
Innovation Review and books
in the nonprofit sector have focused on organizational
effectiveness and efficiency
– or on growing the organization as a means of increasing
impact. See Jeffrey L.
Bradach. “Going to Scale.” Stanford Social Innovation Review
(Spring 2003): 19-25;
William Foster and Gail Fine. “How Nonprofits Get Really
Big.” Stanford Social
Innovation Review (Spring 2007): 46-55; and Christine W.
Letts, William P. Ryan,
and Allen Grossman. High Performance Nonprofit
Organizations. New York: John
Wiley & Sons, 1999.
4 See Shirley Sagawa. “Fulfilling the Promise: Social
Entrepreneurs and Action
Tanking in a New Era of Entrepreneurship,” developed for New

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