The Sprout Fund Strategic Vision


[PDF]The Sprout Fund Strategic Vision - Rackcdn.comhttps://3a04f4eb631d33b66d79-462c7899b9aa1841d03977fd6579cc51.ssl.cf1.rackc...

0 downloads 121 Views 75KB Size

 The Sprout Fund Strategic Vision Since its founding in 2001, The Sprout Fund has championed the creativity, capacity, and commitment of the citizens and communities of the Pittsburgh region. Through its programs, Sprout has empowered the people of Southwestern Pennsylvania to make positive contributions to their communities. In 2008, The Sprout Fund found itself at a unique position. Entering its first full year of operations as a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization after seven years of operating as a project of the Tides Center, Sprout needed to adjust its organizational structure and operations to suit its new independence. Additionally, Sprout’s leading role administering the Pittsburgh 250 Community Connections program resulted in a dramatic expansion of the organization’s geographic scope, target audience and operating budget. The board and staff leadership recognized the timing of these changes, along with other upcoming possibilities for programmatic expansion, as an opportunity to examine the full scope of Sprout’s work throughout its years of community service. The organization engaged Strategic Planning Consultant Pam Devereux to conduct this assessment and help the organization gain clarity on its entire suite of assets, accumulated experiences, strengths, and community impacts. At one time, Sprout was defined in whole by the Seed Award program, but in response to community interests, it has grown swiftly and significantly over the years in the number and scale of programs, staff, board, committees, and budget. Sprout launched in 2001 with a focus on engaging young people to produce small-scale, catalytic projects that showcased innovative approaches to addressing community issues, many of which were perceived to have an arts focus. However, over time, Sprout’s programs have expanded to reach a much broader demographic and to produce projects that are diverse in type and location yet share the common characteristics of being community-driven and community-decided.

Strategic Framework Much of Sprout’s growth took place under the Tides structure. Its spin-out from Tides presented an opportunity to reconsider its role in the community and build alignment around an ambitious new vision for community change. By engaging in a retrospective review of its full body of work, Sprout gained a better understanding of how to best leverage its assets, resources, and connections to create positive changes in the community. Examining itself through this Strategic Framework, Sprout has defined its Vision for the community it serves, its organizational Mission, the Ideals that represent its belief system, the Outcomes that it works to produce in the community, and the Roles that it assumes to provide its unique services to its target audiences.

Strategic Vision, November 2008 The Sprout Fund

Page 1 Board Adopted 11/05/2008

Vision Sprout defines its outlook for the Pittsburgh region in its Vision statement, which describes the highest-order end result that it desires in the community. The Pittsburgh region flourishes as a vibrant place to live, work, play, and raise a family. A vibrant place requires the contributions of many organizations in Southwestern Pennsylvania: “big arts” organizations, businesses, and established civic organizations, to name a few. However, institutional and traditional efforts need significant participation of an engaged citizenry to achieve the greatest possible social impact and sustainable success.

Mission Statement Drawing from its experience and energized by its Vision, Sprout aims to serve the Pittsburgh region by operating with the following Mission: The Sprout Fund enriches the Pittsburgh region’s vitality. We engage citizens, amplify voices, support creativity and innovation, and cultivate connected communities. In order to accomplish its Mission and achieve its Vision, Sprout has established five Ideals core to its organizational strategy.

Ideals Sprout’s Statement of Ideals expresses the values that define and drive its interactions with the community and its internal management practices. Sprout incorporates the following Ideals as tenets in all of its Roles:  

  

Creativity and Innovation. We catalyze innovative ideas and creative solutions to community challenges by cultivating imagination and energy. Community Engagement. We drive our community’s progress by engaging people in civic conversations, empowering them to make decisions, and connecting them to each other. Accessibility. We open doors to civic participation by welcoming diverse perspectives and supporting a broad base of activities across the community. Accountability. We promote responsible stewardship of the community’s interests by requiring thoughtful planning, clear reporting, and transparent decisionmaking. Responsiveness. We achieve meaningful and timely results by listening, planning, and responding to the needs of our citizens and supporters.

Sprout uses its Ideals to assess the appropriateness of new programs and initiative concepts and to examine and adapt its existing offerings.

Strategic Vision, November 2008 The Sprout Fund

Page 2 Board Adopted 11/05/2008

To advance these Ideals, Sprout positions itself to facilitate relationships between Treetop civic and cultural institutions and Grassroots communities and individuals.

Target Audiences The success and lasting impact of Sprout’s contributions to Southwestern Pennsylvania communities depends on the participation and cooperation of two distinct audiences: Grassroots and Treetops. Sprout serves as an intermediary for these two groups. 



The Grassroots community includes innovators, artists, groups, organizations, and businesses with a community focus. Groups can be seen as small or start-up, ad hoc, or ones formed around geographic places or interest areas. The Treetops community includes grantmakers and philanthropies, business leaders, government agencies and established cultural institutions.

Each side is equally important; Sprout asserts that one group cannot make sustainable gains without the other. Sprout serves to “bridge the gap” between traditional leaders and grassroots interests. Keeping in mind its stated Ideals and recognizing its unique organizational positioning, Sprout has the potential to achieve significant Outcomes in the communities it serves.

Outcomes Sprout has defined the following Outcomes as clear definitions of the change that it wants to see in the community. Sprout will know that its work has succeeded when these conditions exist. Sprout recognizes that these goals are ambitious, and their achievement requires a long-term commitment from both the organization and its supporters. The Pittsburgh region cultivates people and activities from within to strengthen civic life and enrich its cultural community. Sprout strongly believes in the talent and potential of the Pittsburgh region’s people. Further, Sprout asserts that a thriving local culture supports a community’s prosperity by making a place distinctive and desirable to outsiders and instilling pride among existing community members. Likewise, a strong civic life facilitates the empowerment of engaged citizen leaders—people who believe that they have an opportunity and a duty to contribute to their community’s future. These are the Grassroots citizens who can make connections with Treetop leadership. Southwestern Pennsylvania harnesses the ingenuity of diverse citizens to address pressing issues of regional concern. Sprout believes that the entire region can benefit when the voices, ideas, innovations, and contributions of diverse citizens are included in efforts to address regional and community issues. Civically engaged people understand the direct and indirect benefits of contributing to something larger in service to their community. Sprout envisions a region that regularly turns to its citizens for solutions to persistent problems or pressing issues. Strategic Vision, November 2008 The Sprout Fund

Page 3 Board Adopted 11/05/2008

The Sprout Fund is a national leader in innovative approaches to civic engagement. Sprout sets a high standard for its own achievements within the community. Sprout leads by example: to effectively draw out the creativity and innovation of the region’s citizens, Sprout must think creatively and develop innovative approaches to addressing important issues. When Sprout’s work is recognized by the Treetops, as well as organizations that lie beyond regional borders, both The Sprout Fund—and in turn, the community it serves—can experience benefits. The sum of these Outcomes is the achievement of Sprout’s Vision for the Pittsburgh region to flourish as a vibrant place to live, work, play, and raise a family. To produce the desired Outcomes, Sprout takes on specific Roles in serving the community.

Roles Sprout has adopted four core Roles to create the social impacts described in its Outcomes. Each Role represents Sprout’s beliefs and declared modes of intervention for creating societal change in accordance with its Vision and Mission. Sprout executes on these Roles by developing and delivering Programs to the community. Provide Catalytic Support By providing catalytic support, Sprout helps people and groups become active contributors to their community through creative, innovative, and meaningful projects. By cultivating new ideas, Sprout creates and manages programs that serve as mechanisms for unleashing new projects into the community. Sprout provides the Grassroots community with opportunities to contribute their ideas, talents and passion to strengthening the region’s culture and civic life. Sprout offers this audience a unique source of funding, as well as guidance and assistance in successful implementing new community projects. Through this Role, Sprout helps the Treetops gain an appreciation for Grassroots ingenuity and provides a means for these regional leaders to invest in the most creative and meaningful ideas of innovators and groups at the Grassroots level. With strong Grassroots connections, Sprout can also introduce the Treetops to new talent and strategies for addressing pressing regional issues. Engage Citizens and Communities Sprout encourages people to contribute to the community’s civic and cultural life by sharing ideas, discussing pressing community issues, and participating in consensusdriven decisions. Through forums for meaningful community dialogue as well as equitable, transparent decisionmaking processes, Sprout creates and manages programs that serve as mechanisms for producing new community assets and ideas. By creating ways for people to come together around a common interest, Sprout provides the Grassroots community with diverse participation opportunities, diverse leadership and decisionmaking opportunities, and a means of building social capital Strategic Vision, November 2008 The Sprout Fund

Page 4 Board Adopted 11/05/2008

that they can apply to community change. This social capital—whether it emerges as a natural by-product or is thoughtfully brokered—serves as a new resource for catalyzing ongoing community change. Sprout provides the Treetops a means to better understand the ideas, opinions, and capabilities of the Grassroots in the Pittsburgh region. This approach provides Treetops with insights and connections to new Grassroots leaders and ideas. With access to these resources, Treetops may uncover new ways to use Grassroots ingenuity to improve the region’s economic, artistic, social, or environmental quality of life. Showcase Creativity and Innovation Sprout promotes creative, innovative, and community-minded people by showcasing their talents, capabilities and impacts. Through events and other forms of promotion, Sprout provides the Grassroots community with opportunities to gain exposure for their work, organization, or interests, particularly among the Treetops and General Public audiences. In this role, Sprout offers opportunities to expose the General Public to “homegrown” cultural and community assets, demonstrate the innovative activities emerging from the Grassroots, and encourage participation in the region’s thriving civic and cultural life. Some projects may directly affect participants’ quality of life; others promote a positive perception about the community. Reaching this audience is also essential to Sprout’s fundraising efforts through this Role. Sprout showcases the region’s local talent base and emerging ideas to the Treetops so they can gain a better understanding of the region’s assets. With increased awareness of local capabilities, they may identify new resources or partners for producing community change. Sprout also demonstrates its own approaches so Treetops and other key audiences can appreciate Sprout’s mechanisms for stimulating civic and cultural life—and consider new ways to engage the Grassroots in producing community change. Develop Leading Solutions for Community Change Sprout supports fresh ideas, new leadership, and civic innovation by developing unique funding and community engagement programs and initiatives. Through this Role, Sprout provides all of its target audiences with customized solutions for tackling community challenges and improving quality of life by bringing the voices, talents, and commitment of citizens to the table. To advance its own goals and create new opportunities for community members, Sprout invests resources into researching and developing approaches to catalyzing community change, managing programs on behalf of or in partnership with other organizations, and advancing practices that engage people in contributing to a community’s cultural and civic life. With further research, development, and customization, Sprout gains the potential to produce greater impact in the community.

Strategic Vision, November 2008 The Sprout Fund

Page 5 Board Adopted 11/05/2008

Lastly, this Role represents a potential growth trajectory for the organization as Sprout is challenged to research and develop customized, effective solutions to addressing community issues within and beyond the borders of Southwestern Pennsylvania.

Role Evolution & Emerging Sources of Value Although the formal description of these Roles emerged during the 2008 visioning process, the beliefs and efforts that define each Role can be traced back to Sprout’s origins. Moreover, these Roles remain relevant as Sprout pursues its recently defined Outcomes. The first three Roles (Provide Catalytic Support, Engage Citizens & Communities, and Showcase Creativity & Innovation) described above will be easily recognizable to those who are familiar with Sprout’s programs. They describe Sprout’s direct service to the community and beliefs about what is required to create social impact in Southwestern Pennsylvania. These Roles directly address regional needs. The fourth Role (Develop Leading Solutions) has been an inherent and essential function of Sprout’s work but has not been clearly defined as a discrete Role. The work of developing new ideas, programs, and solutions has always been thought of as “part and parcel” of each program offering; but, to date, there has been more emphasis on the finished program, its outputs and impact than on the process or underlying mechanisms that facilitate results. These process and program development activities create value for Sprout—and in turn, create value for the community. By recognizing the value of these process and program development activities and gaining clarity on the resources required to execute them successfully, Sprout can continue to consider new approaches to create social impact thoughtfully and in a strategic context.

A Distinctive Set of Roles It is important to note that Sprout’s combination of the four Roles described above is unique in the Pittsburgh region, with no precisely comparable model. Although there are several examples of organizations that act as an “intermediary,” Sprout appears to be distinctive for its approach to creating social impact through a blend of grantmaking, community engagement strategies, and other forms of support. As a result, Sprout must continue to blaze its own trails in organizational development. Further research may reveal examples of how to effectively measure impact in discrete areas of intervention, but it is unlikely that Sprout will find an existing organization’s evaluation model to replicate. However, the exclusive ownership of this distinctive niche should not be confused with a lack of competition for funding and other forms of support. A scan of the regional nonprofit environment reveals other organizations with interests in improving the region’s quality of life and vitality, but each organization suggests a different set of intervention strategies. As Sprout moves forward, it should acknowledge this competition and plan strategies that capture long-term support of its unique vision for change and its innovative intervention strategies.

Strategic Vision, November 2008 The Sprout Fund

Page 6 Board Adopted 11/05/2008

Programs Sprout’s Programs are the means by which it carries out its Roles. They serve as the interface with the community and the front-line mechanisms for producing the organization’s desired social impact. As such, Sprout may add or refine Programs in response to community needs and interests. Throughout Sprout’s history, the organization has often combined multiple Roles into a singular program for a more effective approach. For example, the Seed Award program provides catalytic support for projects through direct grants and engages citizens through the Seed Award Committee, the grant decisionmaking body. This approach to program development often results in similarities in goals, overlaps in target audiences, and trajectories that “cross paths” as the organization moves towards achieving its Outcomes or vision for community change. These crossovers should not be viewed as redundancies; in fact, they increase the potential to produce sustainable change.

Targets Sprout will measure the efficacy of its Strategies and Programs by setting Targets— measurable, time-sensitive goals that track changes in selected performance Indicators. This approach encourages a continual, evolutionary process for strategic planning and eliminates the need to start from scratch as a portion of the plan sunsets. In 2009, Sprout will set Targets that focus on strengthening the organization. Sprout’s work will include tasks that lead to the selection of meaningful Indicators and Targets for community change. As each Target is achieved, Sprout can add new Targets that represent further progress towards its selected Outcomes.

Conclusions Through the 2008 Strategic Visioning Process, The Sprout Fund has defined the positive social impacts it will create in the Pittsburgh region. Sprout’s investment of resources into building Board and Staff alignment around its driving beliefs has yielded a bold Vision for the Pittsburgh region, a compelling Mission that articulates its service to this community, and ambitious Outcomes of the change it seeks, both within and outside of the region. Although the 2008 election and economic crisis introduce uncertainty, Sprout is launching its new, expanded agenda under several favorable conditions. On a national level, there are strong signs of interest in civic engagement issues—ranging from youth-focused “effective citizenry” programs, to university-based research centers, to the “participatory philanthropy” models that bring citizen voices into investment decisions at national foundations. Sprout can conclude its strategic visioning process with a belief that Grassroots citizens engagement is worthy of Treetops support. In fact, the challenges faced by many Grassroots citizens—here, and nationally—may actually serve as a catalyst of Grassroots creativity, innovation, and engagement that benefits our communities.

Strategic Vision, November 2008 The Sprout Fund

Page 7 Board Adopted 11/05/2008

From a regional perspective, Sprout also has a unique opportunity to build upon the successful implementation of the Pittsburgh 250 Community Connections program, which sunsets in early 2009. As leaders of this first-of-its-kind initiative, Sprout cultivated an abundance of “connections” with Grassroots individuals and groups throughout the region. Sprout helped these citizens successfully develop and implement meaningful projects to commemorate Pittsburgh’s 250th anniversary, and by doing so, it introduced many people to its Ideals and distinctive approach. Furthermore, Sprout demonstrated to Treetops that its expertise can be used to reach this audience and harness their creativity and ingenuity to address pressing regional issues. As a result, Sprout built valuable “organizational social capital” that can support future initiatives. Perhaps most importantly, Sprout’s movement forward is supported by strong, aligned leadership. Sprout’s Co-Founders and Board were dedicated, active participants in the 2008 strategic visioning process and included the voices of long-time Board supporters as well as new members. Together, they achieved consensus on a Vision, Mission, Outcomes, and Roles. Although the process was not rapid or always straight-forward, Sprout’s ability to achieve this alignment without dissent is indicative of a core strength in the organization’s people; and, moreover, was entirely appropriate as it continued its evolution as an independent 501(c)3 organization following spin-out from The Tides Center. Collectively, these conditions poise Sprout to achieve significantly greater scale of social impact. Yet much is still required for the organization to fully capitalize on the national trends, programmatic successes, and internal strengths. Throughout 2009, Sprout will engage in several initiatives to prepare for achieving scale in a strategic and fiscally responsible manner. Leveraging the strength of its Strategic Planning Committee, Sprout will thoughtfully consider the various aspects of its organizational structure and develop strategic alternatives that best position it to fulfill its Roles and produce its chosen Outcomes. It will assess its existing programs for opportunities to optimize and measure impact within the clearly defined theories of change for each Role. Finally, Sprout will analyze approaches to prepare the organization’s finances to support long-term growth and health. The Sprout Fund stands ready to assume these challenges.

Strategic Vision, November 2008 The Sprout Fund

Page 8 Board Adopted 11/05/2008