Country: United States

Organization: New Sector Alliance

3) Strategy Summary:
New Sector addresses two systemic impediments to social change: (1) a shortage of sustainable nonprofits; (2) a crisis in leadership development for the social sector. In our innovative model, we partner with leading academic institutions and businesses to deliver high quality, affordable consulting services to nonprofit organizations, while simultaneously creating socially responsible future leaders. Through high impact consulting engagements, students and volunteer professional consultants provide immediate solutions to critical management challenges, enabling nonprofits to serve their beneficiaries more efficiently. Concurrently, these engagements provide students and professionals with unmatched experiential learning opportunities.

4) How the Strategy Works:
Behind New Sector s mission are several interrelated beliefs which guide our work. We believe that the best way to resolve social problems on a meaningfully large scale is to: (1) unlock the potential of people and institutions across sectors to share resources, learn from each other, and work collaboratively in pursuit of social change; (2) strengthen the ability of today s best social enterprises to solve the world s most pressing social challenges; and (3) create a new generation of socially engaged leaders who bridge the private, academic, and social sectors and who are committed to solving pressing social problems throughout their lives. New Sector s programs allow the organization to work toward these three goals simultaneously.

New Sector is in its fifth year of programs and fourth year of independent operation. We work in partnership with leading academic institutions and corporations in Boston, the San Francisco Bay Area, and London, including Harvard University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, University of California at Berkeley, Stanford Graduate School of Business, London Business School, McKinsey & Co. and Accenture Ltd. to (i) deliver high-impact, capacity- building consulting services to nonprofit clients and (ii) provide graduate students, undergraduate students, and professionals with training and leadership development in the nonprofit sector.

New Sector Alliance offers two core programs an Academic Year Program and a Summer Program. Our Academic Year Program runs for 12-14 weeks during the academic year. MBA (or other graduate student) Associates and undergraduate Analysts work in teams of 2-6 and are supported by a professional Advisor and Coach(es). Students each spend 8-12 hours per week on the engagement, and receive academic credit for their work. In our Summer Program, Associates and Analysts work full-time for 8-12 weeks at the nonprofit client site to address key organizational issues. New Sector Alliance s consulting teams provide clients with strategy consulting expertise with specific focus on several key challenges common to many nonprofits: Growth and Scaling, Performance Management, Marketing, and Strategy and Operations. The staffing structure of New Sector Alliance consulting teams draws upon the intellectual capital of top-tier academic institutions as well as the professional strategy consulting knowledge capital and resources of leading for- profit consulting firms. This model enables nonprofit clients to direct these valuable human resources toward addressing one or more of their key organizational challenges. For both types of programs, New Sector staff source nonprofit organizations to receive consulting services, vet and match student and professional participants, coordinate training, provide project management support, and perform quality assurance and evaluation.

Our strategy for achieving results at a larger scale consists of the following elements:

1) Scaling our programs: Firstly, we are interested in growing our programs and organization to their full potential. This includes building our infrastructure, broadening our reach in each of our existing markets, and rolling out in new markets. This means developing out our Boston, Bay Area and London programs considerably, expanding into a next round of North American cities with high concentrations of high potential students and business professionals (New York, Chicago, Philadelphia), and determining if we can optimally scale to international markets in developed and developing countries.

2) Replicating through partnerships: We plan to broaden our reach through partnerships. Our approach is highly scalable, as our model heavily utilizes partnerships with universities and corporations; furthermore, we are skilled at developing these relationships at the local level. For instance, this year, we will be experimenting with our first attempt to spread to a new market through partnership. We launched a pilot in London last year, and are now partnering with the Net Impact club at London Business School (LBS) to roll out a partnership that will institutionalize New Sector s programs at LBS, add substantially to the opportunities Net Impact affords the LBS community, and help New Sector realize its full potential in the UK. We plan to build additional partnerships as we replicate our model both in the U.S. and internationally.

3) Developing an engine for innovative knowledge sharing: In addition to spreading our existing programs, we plan to develop new initiatives that link people and knowledge across sectors. One way that we will do this is by developing a function that will capture and market the knowledge capital we create through our work. We also believe that we can drive research and development of new programs, some of which New Sector itself may roll out, but some of which might be best picked up by other entities.

5) Key Strategy Elements:

ii. Generating Financial and Nonfinancial Resources:
We have delivered services to address client issues which on a scale of 1-10 (10 = critical, life or death ) average 8.8. Simultaneously, we are developing future leadership for the nonprofit sector. Our research indicates that New Sector Alliance will be able to generate substantial revenue from our consulting services. Nonprofit clients pay $6,000 - $12,000 for our Academic Year consulting service, based on ability to pay, for approximately 500 hours of consultant work. The estimated market value of this service is $96,000. When asked to quantify replacement costs (how much the client would have paid to resolve their problem without New Sector Alliance) client responses averaged approximately $25,000, but reached as high as $200,000

iii. Establishing Relationships with Strategic Partnerships:
The New Sector model like most effective models in the social sector relies on leverage and strategic partnerships. Creatively, we find resources that are undervalued and high-potential such as the intellectual capital of MBA students and we utilize them in uniquely powerful ways. The market value of resources we have leveraged to date is almost $8 million approximately $5.6 million in consulting services from students and professional consultants, and about $2.3 million in operational support to our organization. We generate significant in kind contributions. For example, to date, four of our six staff members have been Americorps*VISTA Entrepreneur Corps Fellows, to whom New Sector has paid only a housing allowance.

iv. Engaging and Managing Volunteers:
Since our inception, New Sector Alliance has: a) executed 60 engagements with 42 different clients; b) served 210 different students; and c) involved 69 business professionals (on average for 2.5 engagements each). We complete a rigorous recruitment and screening process for student consultants, requiring potential Associates and Analysts to submit applications, resumes, and go through a case interview. Many of our consultants have previously worked in the nonprofit sector, and therefore can add their expertise in the field. At the same time, our partnerships with leading strategy consulting firms provide students with unmatched coaching and mentoring from seasoned professionals, who volunteer their time as team coaches and advisors.

6) Increasing Self-sufficiency and Social Impact:
Since consulting is a knowledge business, it requires very little upfront investment to execute our program model. Our academic affiliates and consulting partners supply student consultants, faculty advisors, and professional consultants who staff our teams. These partners also provide in kind donations of high quality facilities/work space and other essential equipment. Our current staff costs are low, due to our leveraging funding from AmeriCorps*VISTA to partially compensate 10 FTEs, all of whom will be partially funded by AmeriCorps*VISTA and partially funded by New Sector Alliance.

By beginning to charge minimal fees, we have learned that (1) clients are willing to pay fees, and (2) clients are more likely to invest in our engagements and thereby generate greater social benefits than if they do not pay. These fees sustain our organization and subsidize our ability to serve a greater number of deserving nonprofit organizations whose programs achieve high social impact.

8) Organization Mission and Vision:
New Sector Alliance s vision is to accelerate social change by strengthening organizations today, while developing leaders for tomorrow. Our mission is to operate a sustainable business that delivers high quality, affordable consulting services to address critical challenges facing nonprofits.

Looking Forward to the Next Three Years:
We intend to achieve a 12% profit margin and at least $75,000 in net profit in 3 years, to reinvest in programmatic activities such as nonprofit sector support. In addition, earned income will enable New Sector Alliance to enhance our knowledge sharing about the nonprofit sector, improve training, education and leadership development capabilities, and improve performance measurement and quality of programs. Finally, we intend to eventually replicate our model, both nationally and worldwide.

Contact Information:
Carlin B.  Janson
President & Founder
New Sector Alliance
99 Chauncy St., Suite 914, Boston, MA 02111
United States
Tel: 617 454 4646
Fax: 617-507-5369
Email: cjanson@newsector.org
Website: www.newsector.org