Kathleen Kelly Janus is the author of Social Startup Success: How the Best Nonprofits Launch, Scale Up and Make a Difference.
Note: We have been counting down the top twelve popular podcast interviews of 2018. This interview with Kathleen Kelly Janus was the most downloaded episode of 2018. It like is a people’s choice award. The interview originally aired on January 8, 2018.
Kathleen Kelly Janus grew up in a family that cared about social causes. “My family cared about volunteering, and spent our weekends volunteering at soup kitchens,” she explains. “But they also cared about the organizations and supporting the conditions so that nonprofits can not only survive but can thrive.”
Kathleen studied the law at UC Berkley. After graduating, she worked as an attorney. In 2004, she co-founded a nonprofit, Spark. Spark makes it easy for young people to give to women’s causes. At their first fundraising event, Kathleen and her cofounders watched in amazement as attendees formed a line around the block. That first night, they raised $5,000 for an organization in Rwanda. As word spread about Spark, their revenues doubled every few months. By the third year, they were ready to hire their first Executive Director. But that is where their fundraising plateaued.
“Just at the point when we were poised to take the organization to the next level, we hit a wall,” Kathleen says. “We couldn’t get over this hump of $300,000 – $500,000 in revenue.” As a lecturer at Stanford University’s Program on Social Entrepreneurship, Kathleen heard stories of organizations that had overcome the plateau in fundraising. She saw examples of success among her friends.
“That is the question I’ve been studying for the past five years,” Kathleen explains. “What does it take for nonprofits to succeed, and particularly in those early stages? What does it take to get over that hump?”
Kathleen used what she knew from her own startup experience. She worked with her students to research hundreds of articles on best practices. She surveyed thought leaders and interviewed hundreds of successful social entrepreneurs. Based on what she’s learned, Kathleen has written a new book, Social Startup Success: How the Best Nonprofits Launch, Scale Up and Make a Difference.
She lays out five key strategies of successful nonprofits:
- Testing Ideas
- Measuring Impact
- Funding Experimentation
- Leading Collaboratively
- Telling Compelling Stories
Social Startup Success describes specific methods for executing each of these key strategies.
Social Entrepreneurship Quotes from Kathleen Kelly Janus
Social Entrepreneurship Resources:
- Book: Social Startup Success: How the BestNonprofits Launch, Scale
Up, and Make a Difference: http://amzn.to/2ETqk8F - Kathleen Kelly Janus website: http://www.kathleenjanus.com/
- Kathleen Kelly Janus on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/KathleenKJanus/
- Kathleen Kelly Janus on Twitter: https://twitter.com/kkellyjanus
- Kathleen Kelly Janus on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kathleenkellyjanus
- Spark: http://www.sparksf.org/
- Book: Crazy Good Advice: 10 Lessons Learned from 150 Leading Social Entrepreneurs: https://tonyloyd.com/book