The typical nonprofit can't go it alone.

To achieve its mission, it depends on partnerships with other organizations and those relationships can be quite complex.  This means that when it comes to strategic planning, a nonprofit also can't go it alone.  It can only plot a future direction by taking into account its interdependencies.

CALICO especially epitomizes this need.  The agency facilitates a coordinated response to suspected child abuse cases in Alameda County.  CALICO interacts with dozens of local police agencies, prosecutors, child welfare workers, crisis counselors, and more.  When CALICO sought strategic planning services from CWR, we knew that the key was engaging all the right parties.  By the time we're finished, we will have conducted thorough interviews with about 30 individuals and surveyed another 70.

Integrating external parties so intensely is crucial to producing the right analysis and plan.  We've also found that this kind of process strengthens those partnerships regardless.  The leaders of other agencies come to own the future of our client and also understand it better via the interview process.  In CALICO's case, we have frequently heard police, prosecutors, and social workers end their sessions with us by saying, "We need CALICO - let me know how I can help."

Strategic planning reminds everybody that none of us can go it alone.