Social Impact Strategies for Nonprofit Leaders (Jacob Harold)
Many nonprofit leaders have social impact amongst their chief objectives, but do you know what social impact truly means and how to measure the impact you're having? In episode #193 of Your Path to Nonprofit Leadership, social change strategist Jacob Harold shares his tools to help you transform your corner of the world. A former GuideStar and Candid executive, Jacob talks about the importance of collaboration, transparency, communication and comprehensive storytelling to assure a nonprofit's success. He discusses his two laws of nonprofit communication: no story without numbers and no numbers without stories. Jacob shares his book, The Toolbox: Strategies for Crafting Social Impact where he identifies 9 different ways of thinking about social change and the essential lessons of each.
"Social impact is the difference between what actually happened and what would have happened without you. Asking "what happens if we don't exist" is an important question for nonprofit strategy."
ABOUT JACOB
Jacob Harold is a social change strategist, author, and executive. His story parallels the intellectual arc of The Toolbox: he's traveled from farm to monastery to jail to laboratory to boardroom, all in search of the best ways to do good. From 2012 to 2021, Harold served as President & CEO of GuideStar and co-founder of Candid. Fast Company called Candid "the definitive nonprofit transparency organization." Each year, over 20 million people use its data on nonprofits, grants, and social sector practice. The merger of GuideStar and Foundation Center formed candid in 2019. Harold co-led the $45 million capital campaign to launch Candid, wrote Candid's guiding strategy document, Candid 2030, and served as EVP during post-merger integration. During his tenure leading GuideStar, Harold oversaw a financial turnaround, a tripling of GuideStar's reach, and major partnerships with organizations ranging from Google to the Gates Foundation. In 2013, Harold launched the Overhead Myth campaign to shift attention from nonprofits' financial ratios to their programmatic results. Since then, over 200,000 nonprofits have used GuideStar's Profile Program to tell their full story to the world.
EPISODE TOPICS & RESOURCES
- The Ministry for the Future: A Novel by Kim Stanley Robinson
- Learn more about Jacob, his book, and related Field Guide here
- Check out Patton's new book Your Path to Nonprofit Leadership: Seven Keys to Advancing Your Career in the Philanthropic Sector
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