David La Piana

Founder and President, La Piana Consulting

Strategic Restructuring for Nonprofit Organizations
72 minutes, 33mb, recorded 2009-10-07
David La Piana

The current economic climate may be leaving nonprofit management leaders at a point where they find merging with another organization as a strategy for survival. However, consultant David La Piana offers a broader array of collaborative options, which he has coined strategic restructuring, as a way to strengthen effectiveness, spread best practices, and expand reach. Incorporating case studies as a practitioner and consultant, he reviews the motivations and inhibitions that come with these options. In tough economic times or not, nonprofit management leaders may find that they may benefit from strategic restructuring as a way to build sustainable, long-term relationships that further the impact of the cause. He spoke at the 2009 Nonprofit Management Institute, an event convened by the Stanford Social Innovation Review, a publication of the Center for Social Innovation.




David La Piana is founder and president of La Piana Consulting, a consulting firm specializing in solutions to the strategic issues faced by nonprofit organizations and their funders. He has facilitated over 100 nonprofit partnerships and has worked extensively with funders and nonprofits across sub-sectors. A popular speaker and teacher, La Piana is a regular contributor to the national dialogue on nonprofit and foundation effectiveness. Since 1979, he has worked in the nonprofit sector as a staff member, executive director, trainer, consultant, and board member. He has taught at the University of San Francisco’s Institute for Nonprofit Organization Management and at the Haas School of Business at the University of California, Berkeley.

La Piana has written articles and op-eds for major newspapers and is frequently interviewed by the media for his opinions on trends in the sector. His latest book is The Nonprofit Strategy Revolution: Real-Time Strategic Planning in a Rapid-Response World (2008).

Resources:

This free podcast is from our Stanford Social Innovation Review series.

For The Conversations Network:

  • Post-production audio engineer: Steven Ng
  • Website editor: Cindy Yee
  • Series producer: Ash Jafari