Successes and Challenges on TAP

The Northwest Philadelphia Technical Assistance Program, or NW Philly TAP, is a human and equity centered design model program run by The Nonprofit Center at La Salle University, the Penn Injury Science Center, and the Center for Disease Control. The program brought together a coalition of nonprofit organizations, each dedicated to the safety and well-being of Northwest Philadelphia communities, to teach technical skills and capacity-building. 

The program, which ran between January and June, offered educational programming, including workshops and lectures by experts in impact tracking, data collection, and succession planning, to its 11 participating organizations. In addition, the program provided each organization 10 consulting hours for technical assistance, support, implementation, and targeted consulting on matters such as how to build a strong and effective board of directors and directory-building. Upon completion of the program, nonprofits are eligible to receive a $2,000 stipend.

Participants of the program and a coordinator of NW Philly TAP have pointed to some challenges that could be addressed by expanding the program, creating opportunities for relationship-building between participants, and increasing funding for consulting to provide greater support to participants in implementing new approaches. 

Sustaining and expanding this program to other nonprofits across the city is important. New Options More Opportunities (NOMO) Foundation, an anti-violence youth empowerment organization, is a participant of the program. Chief Operating Officer Chanice Smith says this would be a challenge because it’s something NW Philly TAP wants to do but it hasn’t happened yet.

One of the hurdles to expansion is the “lack of available opportunities to sustain [programs like NW Philly TAP]”, Smith explained over email to Generocity.

“NW Philly TAP has an amazing and intentional team, and I believe this program is something they are passionate about and would be able to make a larger and lasting impact, if it was allowed to become a staple in the nonprofit world,” Smith said.

Now that Philadelphia has money for training programs helping nonprofits manage money, it is the perfect time for the NW Philly TAP blueprint to become the training model across the city, Smith added.

Steve Ziegler, the Director of Advancement at Mercy Neighborhood Ministries, another NW Philly TAP participant, also said it would be better for NW Philly TAP to expand.

“What I see is maybe if they had more people involved they could have more frequent, robust sessions. Maybe you could go for a year as opposed to six months,” Ziegler added.

He thinks the reason why NW Philly TAP faces this challenge is because they need more funding and government recognition.

Ziegler would also like to see NW Philly TAP provide accelerated and beginner courses for different nonprofits based on their needs, he said.

“Even though it’s good we have a wide array of experiences and sizes of nonprofits, perhaps it’s a better categorization of those of like, tracking certain nonprofits together; like, ‘Okay, you’re on —  for the sake of conversation — you’re on an accelerated course, you’re in the beginner course,’” Ziegler added. “But also being able to come together and understanding each other’s needs with the accelerated giving some advice to the beginners.”

There is a very competitive dynamic between nonprofits, says the founder of Know Your Worth, Girls, Incorporated, Aqueelah Brown. Brown pointed out how Philly nonprofits have to compete to be awarded grants.

“How can we bridge that gap to be able to be more supportive of each other,” Brown asked.

“It’s like we’re all competing for funds, but that doesn’t mean that we have to compete with our organizations in general, and it’s kind of hard for that support,” Brown said. “If somebody has something going on, maybe programs or initiatives that’s going on, I think that it’s very important for other organizations to have the opportunity to be able to support them as well.”

While NW Philly TAP tried to foster a sense of community between her organization and the other participants – for example, the coalition, made up of the participating nonprofits, met in person regularly on LaSalle’s campus – she suggested the program would be even better with team-building workshops among nonprofits. 

“Us being able to come together as nonprofits as a whole and maybe doing either a project or two together, even if it’s like a mockup or something for us to be able to gain that sense of trust,”  Brown said. “I feel like it’s so important for other organizations to come together to partner. I feel like it takes a village to raise a child in general.”

In terms of the obstacles of limited funding, one presents itself clearly in the program.

“I would say that the greatest challenge or the greatest need for organizations is the implementation of the support that they receive,” Siani Butler, Community Program Developer at The Nonprofit Center, said.

This is affirmed by Brown, who says setting a clear expectation of what consulting will look like and the deliverable timeframe would make NW Philly TAP’s consulting a better experience for participating nonprofits.

But in order to supply more consulting hours to help participating organizations, NW Philly TAP requires more funding, Butler explained.

Fair Chance is a DC-based nonprofit organization working to strengthen community-based initiatives that focus on bettering education. They’ve dealt with similar problems and found solutions to them.

In terms of relationship-building, Fair Chance creates opportunities by beginning their programming with icebreaker activities designed to help people get to know each other. Gretchen Van der Veer, the Chief Executive Officer of Fair Chance, said that has helped ease the competition between nonprofits they work with.

As for the challenge of funding constraints and the need of participating nonprofits for greater consulting support, Fair Chance has found a solution in data tracking to show impact. Data tracking the nonprofits her organization works with has been able to get Fair Chance more funds to offer consulting to those nonprofits, Van der Veer explained.

“The challenge for coalitions who are trying to build the capacity of nonprofit organizations is proving that what you do actually has an impact,”  Van der Veer said.

To accomplish this, Fair Chance tracked the revenue and team growth of nonprofits it worked with within five years of their participation. Fair Chance utilizes a funding strategy in which it receives funds from a diverse range of sources like government, foundations and private donations. From private donor funds, Fair Chance was able to invest in building up data collection as part of their program. 

In spite of some challenges, Smith, Ziegler and Brown walked away with new knowledge and skills after NW Philly TAP.

“Through this training and another training that I was taking, I’ve been able to really enact a lot of different policies within my organization, and I think that’s what their goal was,” Smith said.

 

Ziegler learned more about how to better understand the needs of the clients Mercy serves.

“I was able to adjust the design of our program with some new funding,” Ziegler added.

Brown got everything she hoped for from the program.

“Understanding goal-setting, honing into strategic planning, even with grant management and grant resources, they’ve definitely helped us get a better view of what’s needed…” Brown said.

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