What we help with, and what you walk away with.

“We've outgrown how we operate.”

We look at how the organization actually runs: the plan, the roles, the systems, and the board's part in all three. The work ends with decisions someone owns, not a document that waits for a champion.

You may be here because the strategic plan is three years old, roles have drifted, and the board and staff no longer agree on who decides what.

What this includes

• Strategic planning
• Organizational alignment and efficiency
• Leadership capacity assessments
• Board development and staff development
• Organizational culture support, at the level of systems, norms, and structure

What a successful engagement can produce

A plan the board can own, roles that make sense on paper and in practice, and systems that do not depend on heroics.

“I need to lead this better, and I'd like someone in my corner.”

Confidential coaching for executives and senior fundraisers, from people who have held those jobs. It is practical work on the things that actually consume an executive's week.

You may be here because you are carrying a hard personnel call, a strained board relationship, or a job that has grown faster than the support around it.

What this includes

• C-suite and executive coaching
• Development-staff coaching
• Culture coaching for individual leaders and their teams
• Interim leadership, considered selectively

What a successful engagement can produce

A leader with a clearer read on the job, better habits around the hardest parts of it, and a team that can feel the difference.

“We need to raise more, or decide whether we can.”

An honest read on your fundraising engine, and a real answer before you launch a campaign. We have raised the money and we have been the funder deciding who receives it.

You may be here because giving is flat, a campaign is being discussed, and nobody can say plainly whether the development function could carry one.

What this includes

• Development audits
• Financial resource development support
• Capital campaign assessments
• Special-event fundraising support

What a successful engagement can produce

A clear view of what your development function can carry today, and a decision about the next campaign you can defend to the board.

“People don't understand what we do, or why it matters.”

Strong organizations often explain themselves in language assembled over years, one appeal and one annual report at a time. We help you find the clear, honest version of your story — the case for support your staff, board, and donors can all tell the same way.

You may be here because your case for support has grown by accretion, and staff, board, and donors each describe the work differently.

What this includes

• Messaging and communications strategy
• Storytelling
• Marketing support

What a successful engagement can produce

Language your staff, your board, and your donors can all use the same way, and a case for support that reads like people wrote it.

Significant giving raises questions most families have never had to answer together: what you are trying to change, how much structure you want around the giving, and how decisions get made — this year and in the next generation.

We work with private family foundations and with families new to significant giving on exactly those questions, and on the administration that follows from the answers. The same seats apply here: we have advised the family and we have sat on the funder side of the table.

Family philanthropy can involve sensitive decisions. Before an engagement begins, the proposal will state how information and confidentiality will be handled.

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Every engagement begins with a conversation about the outcome you need. If there is a fit, we will propose a clear scope, timeline, and fee before any work begins.

Clear advice is only useful if it can be put into practice. When the work calls for implementation support, we can stay alongside your team to help carry it through.