WHEN A PLAN MUST PIVOT
In November, DO Philanthropy wrapped up the formal part of our relationship with our friends at The MAC. As anyone working for a non-profit knows, there is always an element of elusiveness to fundraising. Strategy and structure provides a necessary foundation, but no matter the wisdom of the plan, things going pear-shaped is an occupational hazard. Grants and gifts can be impacted by events as seismic as war or a local Taylor Swift concert, and as small as an Amazon shopping trend.
This is why we will emphasize to our last breath the importance of knowing your purpose so you can persist when the plan looks about as effective as a chocolate teapot.
Our friends at The MAC are among the most purpose-full we have ever met. Raising funds for a multi-million dollar sporting facility in a small community in rural Ontario takes a large dose of chutzpah, closely accompanied by a deliberate plan and dogged determination. In their mission of building community through the creation of a sporting hub, they accumulated funds, friends, grants, partners and press …. however when the fundraising seemed to plateau, rather than panic, put off the plan or over-invest in it, our friends at The MAC pivoted.
So convinced were they of the need for kids to have a place to go, instead of revising the timeline, they pooled their community ingenuity and developed a temporary sporting facility in a local barn. With images in our heads of an old, tumble-down barn sheltering slap-together plywood basketball courts, this month we stopped in for a visit.
We were speechless.
A barn, certainly. But there was nothing rustic about it. Inside a walled-off area of a modern metal farm facility, they have fashioned a professional-sized basketball court with re-usable, professional flooring; a fully-outfitted gym, baseball batting practise cages; washrooms; and all stocked with balls, nets and equipment that can be reused when their enlarged vision of a domed sporting facility comes to life. As it inevitably will.
After just one month up and running, the barn is used seven days a week by some 350 kids and adults in at least 14 different community teams seeking somewhere to go, something to do and people to love in grey winter months. On top of this, the fitness area is in use at all hours, daily, and local youth groups have reserved the space every Friday night.
The MAC team’s mastery of working out a way of achieving their ultimate goal of helping kids despite altered - and even disappointing - schematics, is an extraordinary example for every hard working non-profit facing obstacles.
“In our endeavours, we will face complex problems,” counsels author and philosopher Ryan Holiday in his book ‘Ego Is The Enemy’. “Opportunities are not usually deep, virgin pools that require courage and boldness to dive into, but are instead obscured, dusted over, blocked by various forms of resistance. What is really called for in these circumstances is clarity, deliberateness and methodological determination.”
Purposeful people, says Holiday, don’t tout bold manifestos or passionate epiphanies. Instead, they “hire professionals and use them. They ask questions… they plan for contingencies….they lock in gains, often leveraging those gains to grow exponentially rather than arithmetically…. Passion is form over function. Purpose is function, function, function.”
Our friends at The MAC have never wavered and never stopped working. They are utilizing gains to fulfill their purpose of building community, even as they have embraced the need to pivot as a necessary part of the journey. Their goal remains crystal clear. We couldn’t be prouder of them.
