It’s Time for Bigger Conversations in the Nonprofit Sector
The Problems Are Bigger. Our Solutions Should Be Too.
The nonprofit sector has always been about solving problems - deep, persistent, often overwhelming problems. But lately, I’ve been sitting with a hard truth: the tools we’ve been using aren’t keeping up with the scale of the challenges we’re facing.
Climate crisis. Racial injustice. Widening wealth gaps. Global displacement. Rising mental health needs. These aren’t small problems. They’re systems-level, generational issues. And yet, too often, we’re still approaching them with piecemeal fixes, siloed strategies, and outdated metrics of success.
It’s not that people don’t care. If anything, nonprofit leaders and staff are some of the most mission-driven, passionate, and resilient people I’ve ever met. But we’re working in a system that wasn’t built for boldness. It was built for maintenance. And maintenance is no longer enough.
We need space to evolve.
That means giving ourselves permission to:
Ask better questions. What would happen if we stopped optimizing for short-term outputs and started designing for long-term impact?
Redesign how we measure success. What if success wasn’t just dollars raised or services delivered, but community power built or systems shifted?
Rethink who gets to lead. What if we truly centered lived experience, equity, and collaboration in our leadership pipelines?
Let go of what no longer serves. What if legacy programs or structures are actually holding us back from what’s possible?
It’s uncomfortable to question the status quo, especially in a field that’s already stretched thin. But we owe it to our missions - and to the communities we serve - to do just that.
The nonprofit sector has always been a source of innovation and moral clarity. But we can’t innovate if we don’t make room to evolve.
Let’s start having the bigger conversations. Let’s ask more radical questions. Let’s get curious about what’s possible.
Because if we want better solutions, we need to start by imagining something better.