Nonprofit Application Process and Project Schedule
Our volunteers are eager to help our nonprofit community with strategic projects that may or may not be Covid-19 related. We understand that the current situation makes things very unpredictable, and we want to be responsive to that in our project planning and delivery. We surveyed past clients regarding their needs for the coming project cycle, and we found that for the coming cycle, clients would prefer a later application date, less time between application and selection, as well as a shortened cycle overall. Therefore, we plan to condense the 2020-2021 application deadline and project cycle. An expected timeline follows:
Open Call for CCT Project Applications: August 16, 2020
Application Deadline: October 16, 2020
Site Visits (virtual or in-person): November 2020
Clients Selected: Early January 2021
Projects Begin: Early February 2021
Projects Finish: End of May 2021
As always, the client development team welcomes the opportunity to speak with you and your colleagues about potential project ideas. We find many of our strongest applications come from organizations with whom we’ve had the chance to discuss how our volunteer strengths can best serve clients’ needs. We can be reached at client@cctboston.org.
Looking forward to working with you over the coming months, and wishing you good health…
Kindly,
Amy Casher & Sarah Schott
Community Consulting Teams Boston
Client Development Co-chairs
Clarity for Clarendon Early Education Services (CEES)
This spring, CCT presented its analysis of the feasibility of adding online courses to CEES’s portfolio of training and education services. Afterwards, CEES shared kind remarks about the process and their eagerness to leverage the findings to make investment decisions:
“Your support of our mission is inspiring to us, and we look forward to moving ahead (expediently!) with our online learning curriculum. Not only did you provide superb, useful information and recommendations, you also offered a rewarding interpersonal experience. Your kind and supportive approach made us feel that you authentically appreciate the work we do. We were touched that you expressed disappointment when you were unable to recommend our project as a great revenue stream; we were not at all disappointed but rather excited to continue!
Throughout the project, your team maintained an organized and timely workflow that was very helpful to us. The wealth of data collection, analysis and cost-benefit analysis you performed provide a solid foundation for our next steps, and our team learned a great deal from the process. We also appreciate that the team used their wisdom to adjust recommendations quickly based on the rapidly changing landscape.”
Volunteer Profile: David Wong
Current CCT Role: Project Manager, The Eliot School
Volunteer Since: 2016
MBA: Yale SOM
How Did You Discover CCT? Yale SOM alumni newsletter
Describe Your CCT Experience: I was co-project manager for a growth strategy project for Neurofibromatosis Northeast (NFNE), a rare disease non-profit based in Burlington, MA. The key question facing the organization was whether to expand geographically to the mid-Atlantic states, with the closure of the local NF branch. Our project approach included several workstreams of primary and secondary research, including: board and staff interviews; NFNE member database analysis; patient surveys and interviews; clinician and researcher interviews; peer organization research and interviews. Ultimately, based on our analysis, we recommended that NFNE not expand geographically since there was existing opportunity to serve more patients and expand services in their existing northeast geography. We also specifically identified a need to emphasize greater clinician engagement and invest in further development of patient support capabilities, a key NFNE differentiator. What does CCT offer that all the other activities which vie for your limited free time do not?I was looking for an opportunity to give back to organizations that serve a broader social mission but do so in a manner that could have greater impact and achieve greater strategic leverage than could be accomplished via individual volunteerism. I was also looking for an opportunity to utilize the management consulting skills that I have developed professionally since graduating from Yale SOM.
What Don’t We Know About You?I have particular personal interest in addressing social inequity, including the application of ESG principles in corporate direction and governance. At a personal level, I am an advocate of life hacks, particularly related to health and nutrition, including HIIT and intermittent fasting.