Bold Goal Strategy 2: Creating Pathways for Leaders at All Levels

By Kristen Lucas

ProInspire was founded with the idea that we need to expand career pathways into the social sector and increase diversity in the field. In order to achieve ProInspire’s Bold Goal that social sector organizations have high performing leaders at all levels in order to fulfill their missions, we must focus on career pathways to bring leaders into the sector and support their progression and movement within the sector. The second strategy to achieve our bold goal is to create pathways for leaders at all levels to achieve their potential.

What do we currently do?
Our flagship program, the ProInspire Fellowship, provides an opportunity for early career professionals to transition to the social sector where they apply their business skills for a Partner organization and participate in our complementary leadership development program to support their first year. We have been running the ProInspire Fellowship in Washington, DC since 2009, and in the San Francisco Bay Area since 2012. Each year, we receive about 800 applications, identify 100 finalists, and place 20 ProInspire Fellows with our partners.

Each year, we have incredible talent in our finalist pool — individuals who have deep passion for contributing their proven skills to organizations addressing the world’s greatest challenges. Our Partners deeply value the experience and diversity our Fellows bring to their organizations. However, the matching process is complex and time-consuming, and only 16% of finalists are hired by one of our Partners to become Fellows. We continue to be impressed by the commitment and contributions of our 20 Fellows every year, and we aim to provide broader career pathway support to the other 100 finalists who have the potential to create a similar impact in the sector.

What have we learned?

• Interest in working in the social sector remains strong, with individuals at various career stages seeking opportunities to enter the sector.
• Surveys of our alumni identify that lack of career pathways in the social sector is one of the top two barriers to success (lack of leadership development is the second top barrier).
• We need to reinvent how we create career pathways into the social sector. The ProInspire Fellowship shows us that there is a strong pool of individuals seeking to work in the sector, yet our current model is costly and intensive, limiting the number of individuals and organizations who can benefit from it.
• Career pathway challenges aren’t unique to early career professionals or sector-switchers. We’ve heard from alumni, partners, and others that they are looking for opportunities and direction as they rise in their careers. We’ve also heard of a desire from leaders at all levels who seek opportunities to make their career and grow within the social sector.

How will we implement this strategy?
Our research and experience has shown that we need to create pathways beyond the ProInspire Fellowship, to create new entry points into the sector from early career to senior positions, and to support individuals find their way as they seek to move within the sector. Given this, we are developing aligned initiatives to best accomplish our second strategy: creating pathways for leaders at all levels to achieve their potential.

• In 2017, we will pilot “social sector bootcamps,” a program for ProInspire Fellowship finalists to clarify their intentions and goals, identify best practices for their approach, and connect with organizations and potential opportunities.
• In 2017, we will launch a fellowship program that will place experienced professionals with skills and expertise in digital technology in U.S. government agencies to expand global financial inclusion, with support from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Stay tuned for more details on this exciting new initiative when it is officially announced in January.
• In 2018, we will identify opportunities to provide career pathways support and guides for our alumni.

We are eager to learn from these new initiatives in the coming year as we continue to build out this strategy, create new career pathways, and increase diversity in the social sector.

Kristen Lucas is the Senior Program Manager of the ProInspire Fellowship and Alumni Engagement.