This month we are talking about something many founders and leaders struggle in working with their teams. Read and share your thoughts with us or share with someone who would benefit from this.
As a Founder or a Leader, you have a track record of excellence. You have a skilled team, an engaged community and the impact is obvious. But you wonder why those pitches aren’t converting. Is it the timing? The wrong proposal?
It could be these reasons, or it could be something completely different – your leadership. Funders aren’t just looking at what we do but how we do it. Alongside our programmes and team, they are also evaluating how we deliver our work and if our organisation and efforts will sustain themselves long term. And whether this sustainability is built into the organisaition or is it dependent on you as the Founder or Leader.
What funders are actually looking for
When a funder reviews your application or starts a due diligence of your organisation, they are looking at – what you do well, what are your goals and what support you are seeking to help you achieve those goals.
However, when a funder asks you questions such as –
• Who is in your leadership team?
• When you are unavailable who takes charge?
• How do you train your Managers and Heads?
• Do you have a risk register?
They are trying to gauge how you do the work i.e. do you have a team in place to help you achieve your mission and goals. They want to understand what happens when you as a Founder are unavailable. For instance, when you are at an event, or taking a holiday or simply focused on another project, does work still continue to happen and to the quality expected?
This is your real ‘organisational structure’.
Organisational structure is not just a chart about the various teams and reporting matrix, but also what your team is responsible and accountable for, and you and your leadership help them achieve that. It just describes whether your organisation has systems and people in place that keep things running when you are not in the room.
How does organisational structure look like in the day to day? Its who can approve payments, the roles and responsibilities of your advisory board and your board members, its weekly team meetings, its team members with clear job descriptions and performance reviews. None of this requires a big team or a big budget. It requires clarity, documentation, and the right structure.
What changes when you get this right
When your organisational structure is in place and being followed, you stop asking for funders and partners to invest in your faith or the mission. Instead, you are showing them evidence of a successful organisation who is creating and sustaining impact effectively over time. That’s a different ask and funders respond to it differently.
For funders who are looking to minimise risk, evidence of structure is a positive sign. Nonprofits that attract consistent funding aren’t always doing the most innovative work but are often the one doing consistent work and are able to show systems and processes in place. Let it be an annually updated risk register, a succession plan or organisational policies. They want to know your work keeps going through staff changes, leadership transitions, and emergencies.
Most of the founders we work with don’t need a major restructure. They need someone to sit with them for an hour and help them see what’s already there and what’s missing. That’s where we start.