By Peter Spear, Partner and Board Chair
You may have seen the recent emails about attending an information session regarding SVP Boulder County’s upcoming Membership Campaign. And you may have wondered why you need to come to a meeting and what the Campaign is all about. SVP Boulder County’s Sustainability Advisory Committee and Board of Directors are sponsoring the membership drive to increase the number of Partners in SVP Boulder County. There are several reasons for doing this. We often hear that few people in Boulder County know what SVP is or does. A membership drive can help spread the word. Also, over the past couple of years we have expanded our services to Boulder County non-profits. In addition to the traditional in-depth consulting with a small number of non-profits, we now offer governance best-practice education (Boards with Brains), individual non-profit executive coaching (Execs Evolve), leadership groups for Executive Directors (Invested EDs), and others. These new programs allow us to broaden our reach and serve a much larger number of Boulder County non-profit professionals and volunteers than ever before. In order to continue and to grow these programs, we need more people (Partners) and resources.
All of our programs require staff in addition to our Executive Director, and funds for space and materials. Over the past two years, our expanded programs have been funded primarily by several generous donations from our Partners. The goal of these donations was to help kick-start the new programs to see how they would be received by the Boulder County non-profit community and whether they would work. They have been a resounding success!
In order to continue and grow our programs, we need more sustainable funding. One potential source of such funding is the annual dues paid by new Partners. And, of course, new Partners bring new ideas and energy, in addition to the person-power required to carry out our mission to serve and strengthen Boulder County non-profits.
We know from many other SVPs around the country that a focused membership drive with active Partner involvement is the most effective way to increase the number of Partners. We need your participation to make our first Membership Drive a success. If you haven’t registered to attend one of the information sessions, I encourage you to do so now. We look forward to having a conversation with you about increasing our impact, growing the Partnership, and how you can help.
