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While reading William Gibson's recent sci-fi novel, All Tomorrow's Parties, I came across a line that made me think of non-profit organizations. A character named Tessa is making a documentary about "interstitial communities," like the one that developed (in the book) on the Golden Gate bridge. "Interstitial" is a term that describes the physical space between two organs, or structures within a cell. It can also describe the state of being "in between" things, not clearly part of one or another but in contact with both. In our society, npo's often inhabit the interstices between the for-profit society and those it has left behind.
Apparently, these organizations suffer in the comparison. When npo's and their employees are measured against the for-profit sector and found lacking, it's often because their aims don't "fit" neatly into standard for-profit structures, not because they lack competence. But you could have fooled me. When I worked for a non-profit, I found that when asked, "What do you do?" at a party, my response often induced a pat ,"Isn't that interesting", followed by a hasty search for someone else to talk with. Now there's a measure of social cachet.
Perhaps my grooming standards are abysmal. Perhaps I am completely out of touch with my social "persona." Perhaps I am simply paranoid. But perhaps my questioner assumed: My work couldn't possibly be very interesting, since I worked with the "disadvantaged." I obviously couldn't earn very much money if I worked for a non-profit; and If I didn't make much money, I couldn't possibly be very interesting or intelligent.
Working for the greater good: noble or pathetic?
Before you simply send me an email counseling me to get help for my self-esteem problem, consider this. In an interview with Klaus Schwab, founder of the World Economic Forum, Orville Schell of Wired Magazine posed a startling yet revealing sequence of questions. Keep in mind that the Forum, held each year in Davos, Switzerland, has become a "must" invite for the world's movers and shakers such as Tony Blair, Bill Gates, etc. Schell's questions follow.
"And personally, what is the payoff for you in this work?"
"Wouldn't you also like to make a lot of money?"
"But nonetheless, you like knowing that the opportunity exists."
"You're not interested in having yachts or houses around the world?"
"Running a nonprofit, you don't feel out of the action?"
"It sounds to me like you might actually yearn to be a businessman."
If you know anything about the World Economic Forum, you also know that Mr. Schwab must be an ambitious and accomplished person to organize this conference at all. You might also infer that he has a grand vision for his organization and high hopes for its impact on our world. But apparently, Schell finds it hard to grasp that Schwab could possibly be fulfilled by a career running a "lowly" non-profit organization. Instead, he must try to pry from Schwab his inner feelings of worthlessness, isolation, and material deprivation due to being "out of the action." Somehow I sense that Schell's world view is shared.
The case for non-profit competence
Are NPO's really so pathetic? Or are they simply being measured against the wrong criteria?
These organizations provide services for people in every segment of our society, typically at a very reasonable cost. Corporations trying to enter the non-profit sector have struggled, and ultimately failed to achieve the level of "returns" (tangible or intangible) produced by non-profits. Whittle Communications, which launched a for-profit effort to compete with public and private schools, ultimately tanked. "Target" marketers, who search demographic data to identify potential customers, have limited interest in serving the needs of those with little or no disposable income.
NPO's provide essential services, often to people who can't afford to pay for them. Most provide these services well on a very tight budget. If non-profits adopted a "business model," would they continue to provide these essential services? Or, would they only "target" clients likely to produce attractive outcomes or "returns?" While discipline is a good thing, excessive discipline could result in their failing to serve the very people who most need their help; who are floundering in our "boom" economy. My question is: could a for-profit duplicate the effort, resourcefulness, intelligence, creativity, and time we provide to our "customers," while controlling costs? I doubt it. Perhaps for-profits aren't any more efficient than non-profits; perhaps they just have more cash. So says one executive I know.
In-betweenness as a source of vitality and power
Victor Turner, an anthropologist who spent a lifetime studying rites of passage, used the terms liminality and communitas to describe the quality of "in betweenness" and the social latitude it provides. Liminality, which comes from the Latin limen or "threshold," occurs when a person or group is "betwixt and between, not part of one group or another." NPO's are neither part of the business world nor of the government. But it would be a mistake to look only at what they are not.
In a state of liminality, suggests Turner, communitas or the "liberation of human capacities of cognition, affect, volition , creativity, etc. form the normative constraints incumbent upon occupying a sequence of social statuses" may occur. People from all levels of society and walks of life may form strong bonds, free of the structures that normally separate them. Not only can a state of liminality free one from the confines of one's designated role, it can contain the seeds of the future. According to Turner, liminal people or groups are a "kind of institutional capsule or pocket which contains the germ of future social developments, or social change."
Indeed, npo's are places where one may find wealthy volunteers working in partnership with the least privileged in our society, guided by employees who must work for a living but are drawn more to the mission of the organization than to a paycheck. At npo's we frequently encounter trends at the margins of society, which will ultimately work their way into the mainstream. Fifty years ago, the blues were the province of the poorest and least educated citizens. They also spawned rock and roll. Fashion designers don't look for inspiration on Park Avenue; "street" fashion is their source. Perhaps if you want to learn what popular culture will look like in the year 2050, you should check out the (non-profit) Philadelphia Folklore Project. If you want to hear about the coming era of "big citizenship" read the interview with Todd Bernstein, who organized the Martin Luther King Day of Service. This is exciting stuff.
A call for re-framing non-profit organizations
Enough of these cocktail party snubs. I believe it is time for those of us who work in npo's to stand up and be proud of who we are. Let's stop looking "up" at the top of the economic pyramid to gauge our self-worth. Let us measure our value not in terms of the dollars we generate, but in the real contributions we make to our clients and our communities. Recognizing the richness and the creative potential of our "interstitial" status, let us think of ourselves as frontrunners, not also-rans. Sure, we can learn something from the world of business. But the world of business can learn from us, too. 4npo is dedicated to articulating our models, our best practices, and to the joy of service. Our glass is more than half full. Let's drink!
by Michael Feagans
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