ProInspire’s Growth Strategy: Defining the Hedgehog

Earlier this year, we decided it was time to develop ProInspire’s growth strategy. I started ProInspire in 2009 with a hypothesis – that one way to address the nonprofit leadership deficit is to expand talent pools in the sector. We launched the Inspire Fellowship to do just that by recruiting young business professionals to work in analyst and strategy roles for leading nonprofits.

The Fellowship has grown over the past three years, and we have achieved some great results:
– Over 700 candidates have applied to be an Inspire Fellow over the past three years
– 30 Fellows have been selected
– 60% of Fellows over the program’s history are persons of color
– 50% of Fellows have stayed on at their organization after the Fellowship ends
– 80% of our nonprofit partners keep their current Fellow or hire a new Fellow each year (and some do both!)

What’s Next for ProInpire?
Now that we have launched our third class of Inspire Fellows, we are confident that our hypothesis makes sense. The Fellowship is an important tool to expand talent pools, skill sets, and diversity in the sector.

We have also broadened our mission to develop the next generation of nonprofit leaders because we believe that new talent pools are only one piece towards driving systemic change. We are now focusing on how to grow our impact.

Back in May, we started a process to develop our growth strategy. Lucila Crena, our Program Manager and a 2009 Fellow, and I sat down to think about how to approach the process. We decided to use the Hedgehog Concept from Good to Great as a framework for our strategy.

ProInspire’s Hedgehog
Why did we decide to use the Hedgehog Concept as a framework? Two reasons:

1) As Nikita mentioned, we think very highly of Jim Collins’ work and use his book as part of our training for Inspire Fellows. Applying and testing his framework within ProInspire is simply “practicing what we preach.”

2) Last Fall, I spoke with Michael Brown, Co-Founder and CEO of City Year, at Teach for America’s 25th Anniversary Celebration. I asked Michael how City Year had evolved its focus from being a service program for young people to work in their communities, to wholly focusing on fighting the national dropout crisis. Michael said they spent a lot of time thinking about their Hedgehog, and that is what helped them realize where they should focus.

The Hedgehog Concept asks organizations to identify three things, and then focus where they all meet:

Throughout this summer, we have thought about the three circles and asked these questions of our staff, Board members, Fellows, nonprofit partners, and funders. Here is where we are now in defining our Hedgehog:

We are deeply passionate about…
– Accelerating social impact by providing high quality talent and professional development to the nonprofit sector
– Helping organizations and individuals achieve their potential for social impact
– Leveraging best practices in recruiting, talent development, and adult learning to catalyze outstanding performance

We can be the best in the world at…
– Understanding how young business professionals and business tools can benefit nonprofits in various sectors and across organization of various sizes (they both require adaptation!)
– Providing simple, cost effective talent solutions for nonprofits
– Creating nonprofit opportunities that attract a large pool of diverse candidates

Our economic engine includes…
– Earned income from nonprofit partners
– Grants from funders that support capacity building, leadership development, or diversity in the nonprofit sector
– Individual donations from alumni and the community

The Hedgehog is not a static concept, and we expect to keep refining it as we grow and learn from our experience. However, in thinking about how to grow our impact, this clarity help us understand what we can uniquely do well and allow us to shift our focus to find where we are most needed.

Using our Hedgehog, we are now analyzing needs in the sector to evaluate the most effective ways that ProInspire can grow our impact. Stay tuned for more!