It’s been about 10 months since I moved into the role of President & CEO at NEW, and over the course of this past year, I’ve had the privilege of having a lot of conversations I wasn’t part of before. I’ve been invited into rooms full of Executive Directors, CEOs, and funders from across SE Michigan – some more intimate gatherings and some with dozens of my peers at once. Beyond that, I’ve made it a priority to meet one-on-one with a number of other leaders, some emerging and some established, to strengthen relationships and keep a finger on the pulse of our sector. And one question has been coming up again and again:
“How do we do more with less, without burning our people out?”
This question came up at the start of 2025, as the new administration came into power and began making unprecedented and devastating cuts to federal budgets, many of which impacted the funding of nonprofits across the country. It came up again as tariffs destabilized the economy and kept people guessing how the cost of goods, services, and programs they relied upon were going to impact their daily lives. It came up again as benefits for programs like SNAP and WIC were halted and threatened, leaving millions of Americans without a clear source of food for themselves and their families. It came up again as ICE began rampaging through communities, kidnapping people off the streets, and even ending the lives of some of the people they were allegedly sworn to protect. And it’s coming up now, as our country has begun a war that’s disrupting global supply chains (once again) and increasing the cost of living in drastic and unpredictable ways. (Note: I’m writing this post after gas prices in my Detroit neighborhood shot up by a whole dollar (!!!) in less than 24 hours).
With every one of these manufactured crises and sweeping changes, people in our communities have been left hanging. And it’s nonprofits and grassroots organizations that are left scrambling to widen our safety nets, catch them, and make sure no one slips through the gaps. All while feeling the same impacts as the communities we serve. Because it’s not like we live in an isolated reality, a pocket dimension from which we get to sit back and observe these issues from comfort and safety. We don’t fly in to do our work, and then leave all the problems in a desk drawer at the office when it’s time to go home. ICE is in our neighborhoods. The price of eggs went up and down and up and down in our grocery stores. It’s our funding that has been cut when the federal budgets are eliminated in the name of “efficiency.” It’s our staff and volunteers who are also waiting in line for food assistance, as they themselves are chronically underpaid.
So many of us are living the problems while trying to serve them at the same time, burning the candle at both ends at once. And if things continue like this, sooner rather than later, the flames will meet. And the candle won’t be a candle anymore, just a charred and dried up wick.
And yet, the work still needs to be done. And each of us, for whatever reasons, has been called to do it. So the question remains…
How do we do more with less, without burning our people out?
Unfortunately, I don’t have a real answer to that. I’ve been in the sector for almost a decade now, but I’m too new at leading this organization while supporting yours, to feel like I have it (or most things, really) figured out.
What I do know for sure, is that we can’t figure out the answer without asking ourselves the question. And asking it at every moment and opportunity where we feel it gnawing in the back of our minds.
And so, I introduce to you, the “Triple-Bottom-Line.”
This is a “new” thing at NEW – formally brought to the team at our Winter Summit, a day-long meeting in early February, in which we began our goal-setting and planning process for the year, and years, ahead. It’s a reference to the way we measure our success, a critical consideration for decision-making.
If you’re not familiar with the terminology, “the bottom line” is a reference to an organization’s Profit & Loss or Income Statement, in which the bottom line represents Net Income (or profit). And in the for-profit world, generally, the more money you’ve made, the better you’ve done. There are often other factors for consideration, too, but at the end of the day, companies that have high net income are generally thought to be “more successful.”
We’re not a for-profit company, we’re a nonprofit (still a company, but that’s another blog post) and as such we hold ourselves accountable to our impact (Mission), in theory, over profit (Margin). So nonprofits and social enterprises are often referred to as “double-bottom-line” organizations. However, understandably, the money often is where folks focus, because it powers the work – if you’ve heard the phrase “no money, no mission” you get it.
In bringing forth this triple-bottom-line, I assert there’s also a third component, and it’s absolutely vital to our ability to make good on the other two: Morale. More specifically, the extent to which we honor and support the people within our organizations – staff, volunteers, and board members – and the culture we collectively create. It’s my opinion that every organization should not just be doing good work, but also striving to make their organization the best place in the world to work. After all, it’s the people who really power the work – what’s the point of having a big pile of cash if no one’s there to put it to good use?
We say it all the time: no one can do this work alone. That’s true for all of us, at every level of the work, within and across organizations. So if community and collaboration are so important and vitally existential, why don’t we measure against them more seriously?
That’s the triple-bottom-line: Mission, Margin, Morale – all interdependent. I’m evaluating NEW’s success on each of those dimensions, side-by-side. And aiming to do so all the time. Please, help hold me accountable to that.
This all feels important to name for my team, because if I tell everyone this is how we’re determining our success, they’ll focus on it.
Over the past couple of years, as the funding landscape and our economy have changed in significant ways, I’ve felt folks on our team – myself included – focusing almost too singularly on the financial bottom-line. It is absolutely undeniably incredibly important, and I’ve made some hard decisions to get the financials to balance out for us. AND I’ve also witnessed how that singular focus has hampered creativity and innovation, our ability to adapt to a changing environment, and the mentality from which folks approach their work. So rounding out the financial bottom-line with the other two is not just important, it’s imperative.
Which brings us back to the question that keeps coming up: how do we do more with less, without burning our people out?
It seems to me that the only way to answer that question is to consider every challenge, decision or opportunity from the perspectives of its impact on Mission, Margin, and Morale. Not in isolation, but as facets of the whole result.
What will this mean for the impact we’re able to make for clients? What will it mean for our finances? What will it mean for the people who are doing this work and part of this team? How does all that come together to create a Net Impact for the organization?
I can say with conviction that every decision we’ve made after taking a beat to ask these questions has had a better outcome than the previously proposed alternative. Please don’t get it twisted, everything is not sunshine and rainbows over here. Like all of you, we’re having our ups and downs, too. I’m less afraid about how to move forward, though, because we’re committed to holding meaningful impact, financial resiliency, and people and culture, together at the center. And while it’s in no way easy, it does feel right.
