New Directions

Fund Raising vs Earned Income

Sustainability

Earned Income Venturing

Risks

Barriers

Why Others Did It

Bibliography

Links

What are the Barriers to Developing an Earned-Income Venture?

There are several noted barriers to developing an earned-income venture. There are basically five assumptions that underlie these barriers. We offer these barriers, their underlying assumptions and suggest some counterpoints.

1. Old Patterns of Thinking: Simply stated, nonprofits tend to think of themselves as charities or wards of community generosity. They too often undervalue their wealth.
    
2. Traditional Prejudices: Even if they admit to delivering an important community service or product, nonprofits tend to discount their power to shift paradigms internally and externally. They are locked into a self-prejudice too often mirrored by their own constituencies.
    
3. Subjective Distortions: Nonprofits too often believe that adoption of for-profit techniques is a betrayal of their mission and philosophy. The have an "us versus them" mentality that immediately limits their potential and capabilities.
    
4. Verbal Confusion: There is a translation problem between nonprofit and for-profit language and behavior. There is a difference, for example, between a "business plan" and a "strategic plan" or a "grant to a charity" and an "investment in a venture."
    
5. Vested Interests: Many boards, administrators and fund managers have vested themselves in the traditional methods of nonprofit fund development. Regardless of trends, it is a world they know and refuse to give up despite its sometimes confining and tedious nature.

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