Play to win: the nonprofit guide to competitive strategy

As in the for-profit world, competitive strategies are essential keys to nonprofit organizational success. Driven by an affinity for collaboration, nonprofit organizations often adopt inter-organizational strategies that can actuallyinhibit social change. David La Piana's Play to Win both explains the para-market forces affecting nonprofits and helps readers understand the full continuum of productive relationships that can and should exist among nonprofits. While acknowledging the considerable value collaboration can bring an organization, this guide primarily focuses on identifying concrete, practical strategies that help nonprofit organizations compete more aggressively in order to achieve sustainability, maximize resources and, ultimately, promote social change more effectively. Nonprofit workers' dedication to social change, coupled with arelative freedom from direct market feedback, leads the sector to an ethos ofcooperation. While foundations, academics and consultants frequently laud themerits of collaboration, few in the nonprofit community acknowledge the ways such approaches can actually undermine organizational effectiveness: perceivedcommon interests drive mistaken alliances; redundant programs squander resources and under-serve clients; multiple agendas diffuse media attention. Collaboration can be a judicious choice that offers many benefits; however, competitive strategies are also essential to success. Play to Win helps nonprofit leaders better understand the pros and cons of collaboration, encouraging them to opt for competition when a more aggressive stance will better serve the organization's mission and client-community. La Piana helps readers develop a strategic approach to inter-organizational relationships grounded in direct market feedback, and he provides concrete steps readers can take to compete effectivelyfor resources. Chapters devoted to funding, personnel recruitment and retention, clients and media attention show readers how to assess the relative meritsof collaboration and competition, guiding them to a customized, optimal mix of collaborative and competitive relationships with for-profits and government,as well as with other social change organizations.

• ISBN: 978-0-470-88967-1
• Editorial: John Wiley & Sons
• Encuadernacion: Rústica
• Páginas: 240
• Fecha Publicación: 18/05/2010
• Nº Volúmenes: 1
• Idioma: Inglés