Non-profits outside U.S: A reflection

When I visited Bangalore, India, during the summer, I got an opportunity to visit 3 different non-profits and spend considerable time with the leaders of the organizations. Each of these organizations was founded by very passionate people who in all cases could relate very closely with the issues that the organizations’ constituents were facing and have grown considerably since their inception. I found many similarities between the challenges that these organizations faced and the ones that I commonly see within non-profits in the U.S. But I also saw a very important difference between what I saw in India and what I see in the U.S, which I hope to uncover in this blog.
Of the three organizations that I visited, one of them is Janodaya, which mainly focuses on women empowerment and providing them sustainable livelihoods. The leader of this organization, is one of the most visionary and dynamic women that you will ever come across who has made many sacrifices in her life for the betterment of the women that she serves. The organization has about 200 employees and has enough revenues to be called as a mid-sized organization. The organization’s leader is now also a trusted government ally and is involved in accelerating many policy changes.
The second organization that I visited is Samarthanam, which mainly focuses on providing services to the visually impaired. It was founded by 3 visually impaired men who dreamed of giving a sustainable and fulfilling life to other visually impaired teenagers and adults. They have many programs such as hostel facilities, homework help, sports and arts classes, vocational computer training and so on. The organization is headed by one of the founders while the other two founders are on the Board of Directors. Considering it’s revenues the size of the organization and programs, it can be called as a mid-sized organization.
The third organization that I visited is Association for the Physically Disabled (APD), which mainly focuses on providing services to physically disabled children, teens and adults, such as primary and secondary education, vocational training and therapeutic services. The organization was founded 50 years ago by a woman who was physically disabled herself. She now sits on the Board of Directors. APD has scaled programmatically and organizationally and is now working with the government to make appropriate policy changes. Considering the size of the organization and programs, this organization could be called as a large organization.
Of these three organizations, APD seemed to have built the organizational capacity considerably so that it’s programs can scale and reach more constituents. While the other two organizations are doing extraordinary work within the resources that they have, I do wonder whether they are spending any time on organizational capacity building and whether they have the resources to do so. By focusing a part of their effort on capacity building, they could do strategic planning, hone their focus, find efficiencies in their programs and organization, scale their programs and expand their operations so that they can reach even more constituents. Capacity building becomes ever more important for mid-sized organizations. Having grown to this level means that they have been fairly successful with their program models, served many constituents and are able to see the effect (both short and long-term) of their programs on these constituents. Not being able to build their capacity and scale their programs beyond what they are, almost seems unfair.
Reflecting back on my conversations, I’m not even sure that “capacity building” or a similar term is within their jargon as an organization. Programming seems to be the main and the only focus of these organizations and the leaders are usually stretched pretty thin on time and may not have the time to think of a long-term plan for the organization. I also wondered how much the local foundations in India understand the need to build capacity of an organization. For if they did understand this, they would be urging the organizations to do capacity building and funding such efforts.
This is one of the most significant differences that I saw between non-profits in India and U.S - the awareness about the need for capacity building and the support from the foundations for this effort. I do feel that there is a much better awareness in the U.S about the need for capacity-building. I would love to hear about your experiences with any non-profits that you may have worked with outside U.S and your thoughts on what kind of capacity building they do.