Starting a non-profit is just one of dozens or hundreds of possible ways to make a positive
social impact in the world. Maybe you feel inspired to take action on a particular cause
or issue that you care about but you're not quite sure if the process of starting a formal
non-profit organization is truly necessary to accomplish your goals. So in this video I'm
going to talk through how to think through whether going through the process the paperwork the steps
in order to create a formal nonprofit organization is going to be worth it depending on what your
objectives are. I'll talk through some scenarios in which starting a formal nonprofit would be the
right fit and those in which it might not be well there's a lot of nuance and differences in various
scenarios that you might encounter i'm hoping that at the very least this will give you a framework
to think about whether or not it would be a good fit for what you're trying to accomplish based on
your unique situation welcome or welcome back to my channel my name is Amber Melanie Smith! I'm a
non-profit founder and executive director of the nonprofit that i started i started this youtube
channel a couple of years ago to help others who wanted to get out there and make a difference and
just needed some guidance on how to get started whether that's through starting a non-profit
volunteering taking on a leadership position for a cause you care about and
more if you're in the process of starting a non-profit or developing a sustainable fundraising
plan for a non-profit i hope you'll check out my website FounderToFullTime.com. I provide some
trainings and resources there for folks who are going on that journey and as always i hope that
you find this video helpful and useful and please don't forget to give it a like and subscribe to
my channel for more content like this alright so let's get into this when you are starting to think
about whether or not you should go through the formal process of starting a non-profit
organization in order to meet your social impact goals it's important to get clarity on the answers
to a few questions first the first question is what is your ultimate goal for creating a
social impact now knowing where you're going where your destination lies what your ultimate outcomes
are these are important questions no matter what type of endeavor or project that you're taking on
so really think about this in terms of your social impact goals is your goal to meet an immediate
need in your local community is it to raise money for a cause or issue that you care about is it to
create an impact on a larger scale social issue so you're thinking about your goals for social impact
and the second question is what are your goals for yourself personally is your personal goal to
be able to see that you're making an impact on a specific issue in the community right now is it to
make this type of work work in non-profits work and social impact your full-time career and very
importantly are you interested in or able to make your work on this a long-term commitment or would
you prefer that it's a short-term commitment and by short term i'm usually referring to something
that would be less than a year or two worth of commitment for your life and third question is do
you have others around you who are also interested in supporting this initiative or is it just you at
this time and if it is just you are you willing to go rally some others to help out it's really
important to know what your goals are not just for social impact but as i said for yourself
personally because starting a non-profit is essentially like starting a business it's
going to be a long-term commitment and a big investment of your time and possibly resources
it requires strategy and planning and research and financial resources and skilled leadership
in some cases it can take multiple years to be able to raise funds gain some traction and start
seeing results and that can be okay social change takes a lot of time it's just something you need
to know that you are comfortable with making the commitment for with that in mind let's talk
about a few situations in which you might consider going through the process of formally registering
as a non-profit organization so if one or more of these is true that might be a sign that starting
a non-profit officially is something you're going to want to consider seriously the first
sign is that your goal is to make a sustained impact on a larger scale social issue over time
for example decreasing the rates of poverty in your city or increasing the number of kids who
graduate high school each year these are things that are going to take a long-term
investment to accomplish the second sign is that the outcome that you're looking to achieve
is probably going to require a significant amount of financial or other types of resources some
projects or programs are going to require some solid infrastructure in order to be effective and
in order to build that infrastructure you're going to need to be able to raise money and develop that
infrastructure and those systems and processes with a team of people all with varying skills
over a probably significant period of time the third sign is that your efforts whatever project
or initiative you're planning on undertaking would benefit from the protection of a legal status or
protection from personal liability if some of the activities that you are looking at taking
on in order to make your social impact are going to require some kind of physical or legal risk
then doing so without the legal infrastructure the protection of the nonprofit status could mean
that you are held personally responsible for anything that goes wrong of course i'm not a
lawyer so please consult an attorney if you have specific questions on whether your activities
might carry some personal risk and the fourth sign is something i alluded to before and that
is that you have the ability to and the interest in recruiting others to help you over time this
is something that i've learned with with much chagrin that it's very hard to do by yourself
you need people with lots of different skills um and lots of different levels of experience to
participate and of course when you're starting a non-profit you're also typically required by
law to have a board of directors which means you literally legally can't do it by yourself anyway
so if you can sustain the operations of a non-profit for at least a couple of years
and you are willing to work with others to get it off the ground that might be a good sign that this
endeavor that you're going to take on would fit the non-profit structure okay so now let's talk
about a couple of scenarios in which you might not have to start a nonprofit or might not need to or
desire to start a non-profit the first is that you just need to complete a short-term project
or initiative for example if you have community service hours for your college or your high school
you do not need to start a non-profit for that you can lend your time and your talents to a cause
that you care about simply by volunteering for an existing organization another scenario in which
you might not need to start a nonprofit is that there's already another organization serving your
target area your community that is tackling the same issue the issue that you care about
and they just need a little extra help if your goal is to make an impact on an issue that you
care about in some cases it is more time savings and more cost-effective to simply
serve or even apply for a job with a non-profit that already has that infrastructure set up and
that could look like a lot of different things it could look like volunteering for this organization
it could look like offering to take on a special project for them doing a fundraiser for them or
as i mentioned before even applying for an open paid staff position the third scenario in which
you might not need to start a non-profit is if you are trying to start a club or an affiliate
organization of a larger organization that can grant you its non-profit status because you are
a chapter of that existing organization an example of this might be a club like Kiwanis international
so here's a question i sometimes get what if your project or initiative would greatly benefit from
the tax-exempt status of a non-profit or the reputation of the non-profit world but isn't
particularly well suited to going off and forming your own official nonprofit what do you do then
in that case you might consider trying to find a fiscal sponsor or finding a non-profit who is
willing to partner with you on the project that you're looking to do fiscal sponsorship is when
an existing nonprofit essentially lends you its tax-exempt status because whatever you're doing
will further their mission as well and you have a mutual understanding as to how the project will be
mutually beneficial and to determine how to get a fiscal sponsorship you need to find organizations
who have the same mission that you have and make sure that your values align with one another and
that you have the capacity to work with each other at that point it's just about determining
what the partnership looks like and getting it in writing to have a formal partnership finally you
might determine as you're thinking through all of this that you do need some kind of formal or legal
structure in order to do what you are looking to do but perhaps the non-profit structure is not the
right fit for you in that case forming a private business or a B corporation might be a better fit
i do have a couple of other videos that talk about the pros and cons of forming a non-profit versus
forming a business or what a b corporation does so be sure to check those out too i'd love to hear
what's on your mind at this point do you feel like after hearing all this or after reflecting on some
of these questions that going the non-profit route is the best fit for you or perhaps going some
other route is a better fit be sure to share your thoughts in the comments below and as i mentioned
before if you are starting a non-profit or trying to figure out how to start a non-profit or
develop a fundraising plan for your nonprofit check out my trainings at FounderToFullTime.com. I
also have a newsletter for non-profit leaders and change makers i'll leave the link to subscribe to
that in the description below as well but i send out regular updates and articles on all things
going on in the social impact world funding opportunities and more one last thing i have a
facebook group called Change The World or Bust. We've got a couple thousand people in there from
all around the world at this point all looking to make an impact all sharing their stories and
what they're working on i hope that you can join us there just look up the group in facebook and
come on by that's all i got for today once again i'm Amber Melanie Smith and i hope to see you next
time don't forget to give this video a like and subscribe to my channel for more and see you later