Insights

The not-for-profit (NFP) sector in Australia is undergoing seismic change. Boards, CEOs and senior executives in NFPs need new tools and skills to manage this significant shift. Endgame is one of the tools that can help Boards, CEOs and senior executives to plan for the future and sharpen strategic thinking. Here we outline a development in the Endgame tool for the Australian context.

Seismic sector change

‘No sh#& Sherlock’, would be the response of most NFP CEOs to the statement that the sector is undergoing a seismic shift. There is growing consensus that the NFP sector is being transformed by trends including financial pressures, funding shifts, digital transformation, changing community expectations or new policy imperatives. These make running a NFP organisation far more complicated than it was 10 years ago.

Within this context I’m hearing the word ‘merger’ mentioned more frequently when catching up with senior sector leaders. I wrote an article on mergers eight years ago. We’ve recently supported another organisation to go through their journey to merging, and case studied the merger of six entities that became Asthma Australia. A decade ago, talk of mergers in the sector was rare and possibly even seen as a sign of failure. At a recent conference I estimate that a quarter of the conversations I had were predicated on merger being one of the key strategies that NFP leaders or board members were considering.

This caused me to reflect on one of the key strategic planning tools that we use at Think Impact when taking an impact-led design approach to strategy development – the tool is Endgame.

Why use the Endgame tool?

I first came across the concept of Endgame in 2015 in this excellent article in the Stanford Social Innovation Review.

Over the past decade I’ve frequently used the tool when supporting organisations to develop their strategic direction. It leads to a different type of facilitated discussion with boards, CEOs and senior leaders around where they want the organisation to go.

The tool has lots of applications. I’ve used it with start-up NFPs and small to medium-sized NFPs who have great ideas but are struggling to break into competitive funding markets. There have also been scenarios where NFPs have started in service delivery but realised that to achieve their intended impact they need to be advocacy organisations. In addition, I’ve also frequently seen the challenge of a start-up CEO with innovative idea/approach who is achieving impact but is struggling to grow an organisation to scale. Conversely I’ve also seen many approaches where larger NFPs have innovation ‘units’ that have failed to get ideas/new approaches up because they lack the adaptability for innovation or social enterprise development, they struggle to know what to do with initiatives that weren’t succeeding. One of my previous CEOs often remarked (and I paraphrase) that the NFP sector didn’t have the ‘right mechanisms to support scaling’.

Using the Engame tool to guide conversations

Within this context, the Endgame tool is particularly useful for conversations about:

• Mission achievement – When do you think the problem will be solved or your organisation will no longer be needed?
• Changing systems or policy – What policies or laws need to be changed to fix the root problem?
• Sharing tools or ideas – How open source do you want to be re others using your approach, tools or ideas to drive change in their own settings?
• Building a movement – What do you do when you recognise the need to grow into a larger movement, that works with people, communities and groups to advocate for change?
• Ongoing service – What are the options when you recognise there will be an ongoing need for the service your organisation is providing?

Whilst these conversations are not always comfortable, getting clarity on the intended Endgame helps with strategic focus, resource allocation, scaling decisions, fundraising approaches, partnership decisions and crucially mission drift.

Endgame in the Australian context

As I’ve used the Endgame tool it has been gradually evolved and adapted for the Australian context, where a different NFP ecosystem exists than from the USA where it originated.

Within Australia, our interpretation of the Endgame tool now has 10 Endgames we see NFPs pursuing when thinking about long-term strategy. These are illustrated below and include the addition of new Endgames since the initial article. Key amongst these are the concepts of ‘dominion’ where we’ve seen organisations aiming for large-scale, multi-faceted service delivery that leads them to be the key player within their sector, the concept of ‘reinvention’ where organisations move through different phases of delivering different services and ‘supernova’ where some organisations bravely set a course for time-limited, high-impact achievement to shift the dial on a social issue.

Endgame key characteristics

The key characteristics of each Endgame are:

• Achievement – The issue being tackled has been resolved through your work, so your organisation is no longer needed.
• Sustained need – There is an ongoing demand for your service due to the deep, persistent nature of the social issue. You need to build a sustainable revenue stream.
• Commercialisation – The approach has the potential to generate revenue while delivering social impact, making it financially self-sustaining rather than reliant on grants.
• Replication – The approach is simple and effective, allowing others to easily adopt it. Or where more complex, it can be delivered by others under licence with your technical support.
• Adoption – A promising but still-developing approach is taken up and scaled by a larger or better-placed organisation.
• Dominion – You aim to continue growing and scaling your organisation within your area/s of expertise or service. Scale is the ultimate aim.
• Merger/acquisition – A proven approach is absorbed by another organisation through merger or acquisition to continue service delivery or expand its reach and impact.
• Orchestration – The approach relies on building a broader movement and sustained advocacy to achieve the intended impact. There is a shift away from service delivery towards mobilisation.
• Reinvention – You want the organisation to remain viable and are prepared to adapt services to meet emerging or changing needs.
• Supernova – A short-to-medium term, high-intensity effort designed to rapidly test and learn, without plans to scale or sustain. The aim is to shift the dial on a social issue then sunset.

Sitting behind each of these high-level characteristics is more detail on how to apply the strategy in order to have deeper quality conversations during your strategic planning.

It is important to note that there isn’t one Endgame that is the better option, it is about having the strategic conversations to identify what Endgame is best for your organisation. Also, for larger NFPs with a range of initiatives there may be different Endgames that are pursued for different initiatives.

Using the tool

If you want to know more or talk through how to use the Endgame tool within your strategic planning, don’t hesitate to get in touch with us via hello@thinkimpact.com.au.