This approach operates at the intersection of the government, grassroots nonprofits, and academic/research institutions. Together, their contribution helps in building consensus, identifying and addressing policy gaps, proving large-scale successes, forming necessary alliances, creating public resources, enhancing systems’ capabilities, shifting mindsets, and unlocking funding.

Yet, the systems change journey is neither straightforward nor simple. Practitioners often grapple with questions such as: What exactly is systems change? Which systems should I engage with? How can I navigate this complex process? What tools can I utilise? What internal skills do I need to develop? While there exists a wealth of global knowledge on systems change, there is a lack of contextually relevant Indian examples in this domain.

To bridge this gap, The Convergence Foundation (TCF) and India Impact Sherpas released a report titled Systemic Change Exemplars: Unique Approaches Towards Solving India’s Development Challenges. The report captures learnings from 20 organisations that have actively adopted a systems change lens in their work, and provides an in-depth analysis of the practices incorporated by these organisations as well as the internal development they had to undergo to drive systems change at scale.

This article draws from the report and identifies the combination of practices used by these organisations to create impact based on the context of their work. These practices are:

1. Involve communities in decision-making

Often when organisations design a programme, they focus on the ‘supply’ side—that is, they go in with a solution already in mind. But systems change means working with the communities first. The exemplars identified by TCF started their work on the ‘demand’ side by investing time in engaging deeply with the locals to understand their needs, challenges, and the problems they were keen to prioritise. They also sought these groups’ help with solution design and delivery.

Moreover, the power dynamic shifts subtly when people decide which problems and solutions to prioritise, instead of the organisation telling them what to do. This shift in power is an important characteristic of systems change.

SEARCH, a nonprofit whose stated mission is ‘Arogya Swaraj’ or placing people’s health in people’s hands, organised health fairs for people from 50–60 tribal villages to help them identify their health priorities. Some of the priorities—for example, malaria and infant mortality—were expected for the organisation, while others such as backache and vaginal discharge for women were unexpected. Further, its work involving community mobilisation in primary healthcare has resulted in innovations such as home-based newborn child care (HBNCC) and community health workers, which have since been adopted across India and multiple developing nations around the globe.

2. Use data, evidence, and research to develop solutions

Almost all organisations studied use data and evidence to develop the theory of change for their intervention. They conduct extensive research to identify the problem, understand the root causes, generate insights, and develop evidence-based solutions. All of this is necessary to establish credibility and build a robust case for the solutions. It also makes it easier for other stakeholders such as partner organisations to understand why a particular intervention has been developed, making them more willing to adopt it themselves. 

Vidhi Centre for Legal Policy is an independent think tank that carries out legal research to make better laws and improve governance for the public good. It uses evidence-based legal research to support the creation of new laws and the amendment of existing ones, and for generating favourable judgements in court or shaping public narratives—all of which holds for their work towards decriminalising drug consumption as well.

Vidhi studied the drug decriminalisation issue in Punjab for more than two years. Only then did it put out a point of view stating that it needs to be seen as less of a law issue and more of a public health one. The organisation collated a report based on district-wise data on people—primarily farmers smoking at the end of the day—being imprisoned for using poppy husk rather than ‘hard’ drugs. This meant that the solution to the problem was de-addiction centres and not jail.

3. Aim to influence policy

A key lever to bringing about systems change is focusing on policy advocacy and design. For instance, some organisations surveyed by TCF began by influencing policy and later moved towards ensuring that these policies could be effectively implemented. Others initially concentrated on delivering programmes. They then used the evidence and technical inputs they gathered to inform the drafting of better policies. Simultaneously, they also sought to create support for policy changes by raising awareness on relevant issues among government officials, the media, and civil society.

Central Square Foundation (CSF) began its work on foundational literacy and numeracy (FLN) by first highlighting the importance of the issue. It engaged with government officials in NITI Aayog, the Finance Commission, and the New Education Policy (NEP) drafting committee. At the state level, it interacted with senior bureaucrats to explain why FLN was crucial. In 2020, CSF worked with the Ministry of Education to design the NIPUN Bharat mission and flesh out operational documents. The organisation built an FLN microsite and published articles and blogs to spread the word about FLN, why it matters in the NEP, and the NIPUN Bharat mission. It also supports 11 state governments in designing and implementing FLN.

4. Build scalable solutions

Most of the organisations in the report adopted a two-pronged approach. They used their programmes to test and improve their solutions and then applied these learnings to identify the bottlenecks that need to be addressed. Using programme-level evidence to design policies and public goods is key to scaling programmes and driving systemic change.

One such example is SaveLIFE Foundation (SLF), which was set up with the aim of improving road safety and emergency care in India. It collected and analysed data on road accidents and fatalities. This helped the organisation come up with the ‘zero fatality corridor’ model, which they tested on the Mumbai–Pune expressway. This model led to a 58 percent decrease in fatalities despite increased traffic on the expressway. Having proven the efficacy of its approach, SLF is now working with the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways to address the problem in the 100 most dangerous highways in the country.

5. Leverage technology for scale

A few of the exemplars focused on building platforms that are open source, modular, and can be customised to work in different contexts. Such platforms enable multiple partners working in the same ecosystem to draw from it while also adding solutions to the platform. This allows for innovation to emerge from different partners, which in turn can be accessed by everyone.

EkStep Foundation, for example, wanted to address the urgency of accessing learning content for 200 million children during the pandemic. It developed the Sunbird platform as a digital public good that comprises several modular blocks such as translation tools and data analysis models. Another block is the QR codes that EkStep added to textbooks to provide students with immediate access to digital learning content.

All the innovations offered by the platform can be used either individually or in combination depending on the requirements of the organisation working with education and children. Given its reusable and replicable nature, Sunbird was adopted by the Government of India to create and expand DIKSHA—a platform for school education.

6. Help strengthen institutional capacity in government

Almost all the organisations studied engaged closely with the government at various levels—central, state, and district—to ensure that the population-scale impact is sustainable over time. They used learnings from the communities, knowledge of solutions that work, the use of technology, and the evidence generated over the years to create an environment that encouraged adoption within the government.

To achieve its goal of driving systems transformation in education, Piramal Foundation for Education Leadership (PFEL) works directly with the government to understand the latter’s needs and co-create solutions. It hand-holds the stakeholders through the legal and policy finalisation process, identifies the processes involved in getting policy approved and implemented, and garners support by building a narrative that reflects the benefits of the ideas. Finally, the organisation works towards administrative feasibility to make sure that red tape doesn’t obstruct the process of policy formulation. All of this is done through capability building, engagement, and ownership within the government setup.

7. Partner with organisations to scale

It is important to identify every stakeholder who will be involved in the process of systems change. These are entities that can help remove constraints and obstacles, and make the system more efficient, effective, and equitable. The organisations in the report understood the roles played by each stakeholder as well as their capabilities and identified how the two were complementary. Using this knowledge, they created a coalition of sorts and incentivised the stakeholders to ensure the sustainability of the system they were devising.

Building such coalitions is not easy; it requires energy and tenacity to convince other organisations to get on board and requires letting go of control and ceding space. However, once established, these alliances can then be used to implement solutions at the population level.

CHILDLINE, which works in child protection, has built collaborative relationships with more than 1,100 partner nonprofits to work on a national level. It started with identifying, selecting, training, and monitoring organisations and policy. The core team also collaborated with government stakeholders such as the police and hospitals to make them part of the solution. They engaged them in initiatives and campaigns like ‘Childline Se Dosti’ and ‘Police Chacha’, to create a strong connection between the organisation and frontline workers in law enforcement and healthcare. At the same time, they co-developed strategy and operational plans with partner organisations. This collaborative approach, which is at the core of CHILDLINE’s management model, saw local partners take pride in the initiative and have a sense of ownership.

8. Create viable markets for the under-privileged

The conversation around systems change is incomplete without addressing the needs of vulnerable and excluded populations. Some of the organisations focused specifically on creating products and solutions that not only worked on a certain problem, such as energy or finance, but also created opportunities for social and economic mobility of marginalised groups. They redesigned how a particular commercial process works, thereby making the market more accessible for underserved communities. Their innovative and low-cost commercial business models attract more players into the space, which leads to the creation of a large and thriving market.

MHFC was set up with the intent to solve home loan requirements for lower-income families that are usually unable to get a home loan based on the market’s criteria. Many Indians are excluded from the housing finance market because traditional credit assessment methods lack the tools to measure the incomes of those employed in the unorganised sector. MHFC addressed this by developing a new approach to credit assessment. It involved personal interaction with potential customers to understand their income sources and expenses. Their ability to pay was assessed based on their motivations which were documented by field officers through a tool developed by MHFC.

The easy-to-use tool for creditworthiness assessment not only enabled several people to become eligible for a loan but also eliminated the need for time-consuming paperwork. The profitable and proven business model along with a willingness to share learnings with key stakeholders such as National Housing Bank, HDFC, and other housing finance companies including competitors has helped bridge the housing loan need gap for the economically weaker sections.

A combination of these eight practices can be used by organisations to make large-scale systemic impact based on the aspirations and context of their work. Different regions in India have their own unique challenges that should be taken into account when thinking of system-level solutions.

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Know more

• Read more about what systems change looks like in practice.
• Learn more about navigating systems change through five approaches for impact.
• Listen to this podcast that answers key questions about systems change.

Scale is often viewed as an obvious aim for any nonprofit. However, when the focus is on growing an organisation—its budget, employees, programmes—and thus its impact, the conditions required to effectively enable scale are often overlooked. What happens if an organisation’s leadership is resistant to scale? Moreover, does scale look the same at every organisation? If not, what does it look like for grassroots organisations? This case study looks at the example of Quality Education Support Trust (QUEST) to explore these questions further.    

QUEST was set up in Maharashtra in 2007 by a group of individuals concerned about the quality of education in the state, especially in terms of teaching and learning practices. With the aim of improving the existing education system, they began to work on early childhood education, elementary education, and the professional development of teachers in the state.

By 2016, the organisation had developed several programmes and the demand for their offerings was growing. At that juncture, QUEST had an annual budget of INR 2.63 crore and a team of 55 individuals, 13 of whom were reporting to the director, Nilesh Nimkar. Impressed by QUEST’s impact on the ground, Y M Deosthalee—former chairman and managing director of L&T Finance—recommended that they scale their programmes beyond the three or four districts they were working in at the time.

Initially, Nilesh was against the idea for two reasons. First, acquiring the funding to scale up sustainably was a concern. “Our organisation was not established by a high networth individual (HNI) or business house, so fundraising was always a challenge for us,” he says. Second, Nilesh feared that scaling would result in the loss of his cherished connection to the field. “I never had the ambition to lead an organisation that had a multi-crore budget and worked across states. What I started with was a genuine interest in problem-solving, knowledge building, and making an impact. So I worried that if we grew the organisation, we might lose a good educator and gain a bad CEO.”

This compelled QUEST to revisit the problem it was looking to solve. Nilesh recalls, “We thought about what the real challenge [with respect to education] is in India. Is it quality alone, or is it quality at scale?” Thinking through this question consolidated their commitment to scale, as limiting their work to just a few districts wouldn’t meaningfully contribute to achieving their intended goals. 

Although the senior team at QUEST had significant field experience, their management experience was limited. In order to scale their impact, they would need to actively engage in capacity building. This would entail investing in multiple capabilities, including strategic clarity, organisational restructuring, financial planning, fundraising, and people development. The process began with Nilesh attending the Dasra Social Impact Leadership Program, which offered beneficial insights into leadership and management. However, he couldn’t envision what scale would look like in his own organisation based on the case studies presented in the programme. Given that QUEST was much smaller and operated in a completely different context, he felt that he would require tailored guidance to be convinced of the organisation’s scalability. It was the personalised coaching offered by J Rajagopal under Dasra’s ‘Coach4Good’ programme that really helped Nilesh. Through conversations with Rajagopal, Nilesh realised that QUEST needed to formulate a management team to serve as a second line of leadership. Additionally, the coaching enabled Nilesh to devise a systematic plan for the delegation of responsibilities within the organisation. Nilesh also attributes the organisation’s ability to reflect on and unpack the benefits of their capacity building journey to the thinking exercise that they engaged in as part of Rajagopal’s case study that documents QUEST’s growth.

Understanding the complexity of the situation and the lack of internal expertise, QUEST approached a capacity building funder to support this journey. With the funder’s help, they engaged Dasra to handhold them through the initial stages. Driven by their faith in the importance of a clear organisational vision and internal communication, QUEST began to re-articulate their vision, mission, and strategic priorities. The newly devised organisational strategy was documented and disseminated to the team to solicit their buy-in. The organisation also made a concerted effort to ensure that their programmes and strategic priorities were in alignment with each other.

Restructuring and its challenges

QUEST’s flat structure was a clear pain point, as it left Nilesh with the responsibility of directly managing many team members. Thus, an organisational restructuring was in order. This included decentralising decision-making and developing a second line of leadership to manage the needs of a growing organisation.

However, this was not without its challenges. First, akin to Nilesh, many senior members of the team were reluctant to take on managerial responsibilities. Having joined QUEST with a zeal for working on education, they felt that managerial work was a distraction. The incompatibility between their individual priorities and the needs of running an organisation, and the fear that the pursuit of scale would dilute QUEST’s impact, resulted in a few employees departing at this stage.

QUEST also deliberated on whether to hire laterally for these managerial positions or fill them by promoting talent from within the organisation. They tried both strategies, and quickly found that lateral hires were less likely to fit the organisation’s culture. According to Nilesh, while this recruitment was an aspect of a larger effort to formalise QUEST’s culture and enable its growth, the new recruits perhaps expected more things to be in place. “They came in with ready-made solutions that didn’t quite suit an organisation like ours that was still in the middle of a transition”, says Nilesh. This was met with resistance from the rest of the team, and as a grassroots nonprofit that works extensively in the field, they needed the relationship between the field team and senior management to be strong. Therefore, they committed to encouraging people within the organisation to step up and supported the development of their managerial capacities.

This support was facilitated by identifying key responsibility areas for the senior team and the functional responsibilities of each of its members. Aided by their newly devised internal communication plan, they helped key personnel understand their new roles. More importantly, they identified mentors for senior staff members to nurture their capabilities.  

As QUEST grew, so did its budget. The organisation thus set up a dedicated fundraising wing led by a senior resource. They initially recruited part-time personnel to support the fundraising director, but they felt that the time and investment taken to onboard and integrate part-time hires wasn’t commensurate to their eventual output. As they search for full-time fundraising personnel, the rest of the team is supporting the senior resource by devoting a portion of their time to fundraising activities. As a result of their improved focus on raising money, the organisation was able to meet its budget of INR 7.53 crore in 2022–23.

What is it like now?

QUEST’s capacity-building efforts provided them with a clear vision and direction. Contrary to Nilesh’s initial concerns, these efforts expanded the bandwidth of the leadership and allowed them to redirect their energies towards critical organisational needs that had previously been overlooked. He notes, “Building the organisation substantially freed up my schedule. Now, I can invest a lot more time into the core business than I was able to in 2016.” The establishment of a managerial cadre promoted their professional development as well. While the organisation did not have a second line of leadership before the intervention, it now has a six-member team that has been trained to assume leadership responsibilities.

The capacity building endeavour also helped the organisation become resilient enough to withstand the pandemic and its resultant setbacks. Before the intervention, the organisation had no system in place to collect, analyse, and report financial data. Moreover, their financial reserves amounted to approximately INR 30 lakh prior to hiring fundraising personnel in 2019. By creating a system to track the organisation’s finances across multiple programmes and locations in a single consolidated sheet, QUEST’s leadership were able to manoeuvre through the pandemic. Nilesh notes that he couldn’t envision the leadership team accomplishing this feat prior to their professional development through the capacity building effort. Additionally, their financial reserves expanded to INR 1.05 crore in 2023.

Back then, the organisation set ambitious goals of reaching approximately 7,000 teachers and 2.7 lakh children by 2022. Owing to the organisational development and budget growth they’ve witnessed since then, they’ve exceeded these targets and reached approximately 2.97 lakh children and 12,677 teachers as of early 2023. Importantly, QUEST has established its credibility in the field of education, which can often go unnoticed in the case of smaller organisations.   

Advice for nonprofits

1. Invest in capacity building to scale sustainably

As nonprofits grow, they need to build organisational capabilities along multiple dimensions to handle complexities and ensure impact at scale. QUEST was poised to scale quicker and more efficiently due to its emphasis on capacity building and the strategic clarity that emerged as a result.

2. Prioritise design before scale

Besides building capacities, nonprofits must also ensure their programmes are designed well. “We were able to maintain the quality of our programmes despite scaling considerably because we had set up and tested our programmes at a smaller scale in a very robust manner,” Nilesh says. Given that scaling impact underpins the need to scale an organisation, nonprofits should ensure that their mission is articulated well and their programmes are tested extensively. “Create a model that works, and then go for scale.”

3. Programme over-reliance can be dangerous

According to Nilesh, it is better for nonprofits with multiple programmes in place to scale them parallelly rather than disproportionately focus on one programme. In 2016, QUEST had six programmes in place. One of them was the Palvee programme, which focused on early childhood education in anganwadis. It was a programme that they found difficult to procure funding for, and which could have been abandoned to focus on their more ‘successful’ programmes. However, they fought hard to keep it alive as they scaled. Owing to the increased focus on early childhood education in the National Education Policy, Palvee now accounts for 50 percent of their budget. Emphasising the importance of avoiding an overreliance on a single programme, Nilesh notes, “Keep multiple programmes on, so you don’t find yourself thinking ‘What do I do if this programme fails?’ after you scale.”

Advice for funders

1. Grassroots organisations need long-term support        

Funders must adopt a long-term view, especially when supporting grassroots organisations. Nilesh echoes the sentiment that sustainable impact cannot be achieved immediately. “Support any organisation for at least three to five years because impact takes time,” he says. 

QUEST was able to get capacity building funds to focus on gaining strategic clarity. However, a lack of subsequent funding can lead to plateauing of impact if the organisation is unable to continue building the capabilities required for sustaining its scale-up. Hence, funders must increase capacity-building investments and commit to extended periods of financial assistance.

2. Bring experts on board and provide adaptable funding

In a survey of Indian nonprofits by Bridgespan, only 18 percent reported that they were able to adequately invest in organisational development. This was largely due to the dearth of funding for non-programme costs. Grassroots nonprofits may lack the expertise to build capacities independently and are unlikely to be able to afford the services of experts. However, funders can enable them to seek out and utilise such services.

Nilesh stresses that employing the services of a capacity-building agency to handhold them through the initial stages was transformational for QUEST, and this wouldn’t have been possible without the help of the committed funding they received for this purpose.

Adaptability is also a key feature of holistic funding. By virtue of having adaptable funders on board, QUEST was able to repackage its programmes during the pandemic to deliver them online. As a result, they were able to continue working with the communities they were already associated with, maintain their contact with the field throughout the lockdown, and quickly gear up their programmes post Covid.

3. Fund organisational development, not just programmes

According to Nilesh, the underfunding of non-programme costs remains a problem. He emphasises that capacity building is a critical prerequisite to effectively delivering a programme at scale. He thus recommends that a portion of the funds be earmarked specifically for capacity building efforts. Nilesh says, “There should be a larger discussion about how critical it (capacity building) is, and why it should not be addressed through separate grants alone.”

What lies ahead?

By designing detailed implementation plans and developing the capabilities of key personnel, QUEST has achieved the targets defined at outset of its capacity-building endeavour and is on track to further growth. However, capacity building never ends. As the organisation evolves, there’s always more that needs to be done. QUEST is looking to continue strengthening its communications vertical to match its current scale and increasing visibility among stakeholders. Additionally, Nilesh hopes to carry on building the second line of leadership at QUEST to further decentralise decision-making within the organisation. “With growing operations, it is necessary for the second line of leadership to take charge of more aspects,” he notes. Nilesh hopes to eventually appoint a successor who can dedicatedly lead the organisation as it grows even larger.

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About Nilesh

Nilesh Nimkar is a founder trustee and director of Quality Education Support Trust (QUEST). At QUEST, he has designed and implemented programmes on early childhood education, elementary education, and teacher professional development. Many of his research studies within QUEST programmes have been published in reputed journals. For his work in education, Nilesh has received the Maharashtra Foundation Award (2011) and the Extraordinary Early Childhood Education Leadership Award (2017).

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Know more

• Read this case study on how nonprofits can scale impact with the help of an external consultant.
• Read this article to learn whether your organisation is ready to scale.

Codification is not new. If we look at social sector organisations that have done this successfully in India, we can find great examples in the education and health sectors. For instance, Pratham Education Foundation codified the teaching module used to bridge learning gaps in students. It can be accessed by full-time, part-time, or remedial teachers to help students who are lagging behind. This method is now being used in other countries as well.

In the case of childbirth and prenatal and postnatal care, the health sector now has checklists and protocols that have led to drastic improvements in infant and maternal mortality rates. What these sectors have done is to codify the requirements for delivering results.

Codification can result in much-needed advantages for water conservation as well. For instance, frontline cadres are critical in driving behaviour change when it comes to better water use and agricultural practices. These cadres need not just technical know-how but also soft skills in leading by example. Similarly, when working with flagship government programmes to enhance water supply, nonprofits need to understand the state’s system, with its cycle of planning, approval, and budget allocation, as well as whom to engage with and when.

Typically, each new partner develops this knowledge for themselves. However, if they could refer to a ‘playbook’ based on the experiences and learnings of another organisation, the time for trial and error is reduced and they can become effective faster.

Funders should make the first move

As it turns out, nonprofits are busy doing what they need to do—executing programmes on the ground, working with communities, and driving social change. Their plates are full, and they often have limited resources to share their learnings with stakeholders beyond the programme.

As donors, we collaborate with diverse organisations implementing various programmes and can identify commonalities across them. We may be better positioned to see the ‘principles’ driving success and the challenges programmes and partners face. Over time, we amass substantial learnings on what works and what doesn’t in different contexts. For instance, at HUF, approximately 1,200 frontline workers drive behaviour change on water use across programmes. Thus, for us, codifying the most effective principles and orchestrating cross-learning between partners makes limited resources go a long way.

Communication design is crucial

It is not that the sector lacks knowledge or best practices. Almost all organisations we work with profile learnings in manuals, guidebooks, and programme documentation. However, accessing and using this wealth of information can be daunting. The material lacks navigability and often sits in documents or simply in the minds of people across the organisation.

Nonprofits do not always have the time, resources, or specialised communications expertise to compile and disseminate this knowledge effectively. This is why the development sector needs codification, led by expert communications partners who can design guides and do-it-yourself playbooks with specific building blocks in mind:

1. Multimedia and modular

For a codification playbook to be of real utility, it must be easy for end users to access, navigate, and understand. The format should be succinct, engaging, and user-friendly. A playbook can be made available online and can use a combination of multimedia tools—video, audio, text, and printable copies where required. Users should also be able to choose whether they want the entire module or just some parts. It should be possible for them to skip steps and dive into more material when needed. The material should be available as snippets as well as in detail. Similarly, these guides should be modular and offer opportunistic learning. People at different learning stages can use them to get updated on a specific theme or skill they need to know more about.

2. A strategic how-to guide

An impactful programme would typically have many moving parts. To ensure the replication of success, these parts would have to be unbundled so the core or essential component that accounts for most of the impact can be isolated. It could be a process, a routine, a principle, or a cultural mindset. Breaking it down into bite-sized sections or steps others can learn from becomes critical.

3. Descriptive, not prescriptive

A prototype being scaled to different contexts cannot resort to standardisation. Codification is not meant to tell our partners that there is only one way to achieve an objective. Instead, it is intended to be a directional guide. The idea is to take the learnings of an organisation that has done something well and share it with others who may need this learning. While the playbook acts as a guide, each person or team using it should also be able to customise and localise it after taking their cultural and regional nuances into account. It should allow different organisations to tweak it to serve their needs.

4. Iterative

All processes, toolkits, and playbooks risk becoming static and losing relevance over time. A good playbook should allow for the incorporation of new learnings from organisations or funders who test and use it. If something doesn’t work for them or if they’ve tried a different approach that does work, they should be able to add that learning into the playbook. The idea that there can be different ways of achieving similar impact is fundamental to scalability. A willingness to learn from success and failure is also vital for effective scaling.

We work in a dynamic ecosystem, and what works today may not work tomorrow. Therefore, codification cannot be a one-time effort and should keep getting updated collaboratively.

HUF’s vision is to use these codified playbooks as a platform where more and more partners add their own experiences or resources. The playbook should encourage transparency and openness and act as a document for the public good, ensuring funders and civil society organisations aggregate resources and combine capabilities while keeping solutions relevant to local contexts. These diverse layers, levels, and perspectives can help the development sector scale impact successfully.

Know more

• Dip into this playbook to learn how to build an effective frontline cadre.
• Read about what the social sector needs to do to scale scaling up.
• Read about whether an organisation’s size is the right metric to measure impact

The increased focus on scaling an organisation in the nonprofit world has tremendous implications on the breadth and depth of impact, as well as perceived and real obstacles. While capital and talent ultimately tend to be important, this article covers other challenges to scale. It is based on some of the observations I shared during a session at The Nudge Foundation’s celebration of their incubation of 100 non-profits.

Structural challenges that nonprofits face

To begin with, here are reflections on three structural challenges that nonprofits face when addressing questions of scale, along with potential solutions drawn from the world of impact investing and for-profit enterprises. This is not an exhaustive list, but one based on personal experience. 

1. Capital partners

The biggest challenge nonprofits face—and I believe this is one of the fundamental reasons for the paucity of scaled organisations in this sector—is the lack of long-term capital partners. By capital partners, I mean donors, funders, or funding organisations that provide grant support to an organisation, not just its programmatic work.

This situation is markedly different in the for-profit world, where a few key capital partners/investors tend to stay with an investee company for multiple rounds of funding. Elevar Equity has been the largest shareholder in various companies, starting with the Series A round and through subsequent financing rounds. Having access to this kind of long-term capital relationship disproportionately improves an organisation’s ability to make difficult decisions, build itself, and take appropriate risks. Nonprofits lack access to this kind of long-term, multi-year support. If available, it could help them grow their organisations, recruit senior talent, and make difficult decisions in the long-term interests of the individuals, households, and communities they seek to impact.

2. Currency of success

What constitutes ‘success’ for nonprofits and the metrics for impact are often not clear, and certainly not standard when it comes to internal and external stakeholders. This is complicated further as external stakeholders may seek different outcomes and benchmarks. In the for-profit world, there are straightforward indicators that are related to commercial returns as well as indicators that define success. Even in the world of impact investing and the companies they fund, there is a greater degree of clarity when it comes to communicating the impact of the organisation.

Funding agencies and nonprofits need to align on metrics of impact and access.

While the challenges of raising capital and identifying the currency of success exist for all entrepreneurs, nonprofit leaders face unique challenges independent of the issue of not having long-term capital sources. In the nonprofit world, because of capital constraints, different currencies of success are used, such as the perceived credibility of the organisation, general awareness regarding its work, the impact it seeks to create, and other such proxies. This holds true even for nonprofit leaders, who often feel compelled to maintain a high level of visibility and measure their success by how well-known they are. Funding agencies and nonprofits need to align on metrics of impact and access, which can help them attract differentiated sources of capital.

3. Finding talent

Recruiting and retaining talent is complicated. Attrition levels tend to be high in both for-profits and nonprofits, despite the perception that the key challenge facing nonprofits is compensation. Attrition rates in the commercial world are not very different, which shows that financial considerations and compensation don’t paint the full picture. The for-profit and nonprofit sectors are plagued with the same challenges, though perhaps for different reasons. Typically, the answer lies in finding the right talent rather than in remuneration. Every organisation needs to identify a unique currency that serves as a differentiating factor and convinces people to join and stay, regardless of how well the organisation pays compared to the market.

Personal lessons about scaling organisations

Now, let’s pivot to what works—and what does not—in the scaling journey. These are a few of the practical lessons from my own experience of helping organisations think through scale.

1. Scaling the bad with the good

One must remember that while scaling, you scale the ‘good’ and the ‘bad’ within the organisation. One can never scale only the good. Most entrepreneurs (myself included) have the hubris to believe that we can start by scaling the ‘good’ and will figure out and address the ‘bad’ in the process. Unfortunately, it doesn’t work that way.

Therefore, before embarking on the path to scale a programme and amplifying its impact, entrepreneurs need to ask themselves a few pointed questions:

1. Why do you want to scale?
2. What does scale mean for your organisation?
3. Why are you the right person or organisation to drive this scale? For example, it is possible that another organisation is engaged in similar work and is better positioned to scale this model. In such cases, you might need to consider a different approach.

2. Elevar’s frameworks for scaling organisations

Based on our work at Elevar Equity, we have identified two frameworks that help us build the pathways for scale. Tweaked a little, they may be useful for organisations in the development sector as well.

Framework One: The three stages of an organisation’s journey

Organisations undergo three stages of growth. The first is the ‘proof of concept’ stage, where the organisation must focus on creating an effective and replicable model that works in the context of its impact and success. Do not think about scale at this point in time. Instead, focus on getting the model absolutely right. The second stage involves building the organisational platform, which includes developing the team, processes, governance, systems, technology, and risk management—all necessary to scale up.

Too many founders and entrepreneurs are advised to start the scaling journey after the completion of the first phase (figuring out the model). But the most important phase starts after developing the model. During the second stage, take the time needed to strengthen the organisation. In my view, this—and not the first stage—is the riskiest phase. In the third stage, with a working model and a well-oiled organisational machinery in place, the key focus shifts to scaling the organisation (built in the second phase) and the model (built in the first phase).

Framework Two: Twin flywheels

Most strategy tends to be inward-looking and organisation-focused, that is, it hinges around the question of “What is it that we want to do?” In the impact space, a scaling strategy must be outward-looking, focusing on the individuals, households, or communities one seeks to impact.

The twin flywheels framework developed at Elevar helps break this inward-focused approach and encourages entrepreneurs to think of both the organisation and the people they serve. Metaphorically, there are two invisible flywheels: one driving the organisation’s performance and the other driving the success of the people that the organisation works with. Often, these two flywheels operate at different speeds and are not necessarily aligned. But if the strategy can be premised on the needs of the community or customer, and if their success is aligned with the organisation’s, the twin flywheels accelerate and the foundation for scale is established. This requires patience, discipline, thought, and replicable execution.

3. Choose whom you talk to

There are far too many people willing to give advice. Based on my experience, building a great board—one that can challenge and listen—goes a long way. Beyond that, seek two to three generalists who may or may not be on your board. In addition, find a specialist to assist in understanding and addressing the specific issue or problem area that the organisation seeks to solve. In essence, I suggest shrinking—instead of increasing—the number of people to talk to. Engage with people who have experienced the challenges of scaling, as the scaling journey is messy.

More importantly, think of all advisors as equals. For example, I am uncomfortable with the idea of mentorship, given the inherent power dynamic. An entrepreneur takes the risk to solve the problem; a mentor does not. All your conversations as entrepreneurs must be conversations between equals.

In conclusion, one should always remember that scale is not elegant; it is not beautiful. It is very ugly. Scale is a question of execution, not vision. It has to come from within you as an individual and as an entrepreneur, and then go outward into the world. Many people speak of innovation, but innovation is an execution challenge, not an idea challenge. Contextualise the idea in the situation that you’re dealing with and move forward to find that path of execution, always keeping the person you want to impact at the centre.  

There are far too many visionaries who are unable to build anything worthwhile. Scaling is a step-by-step process that requires discipline , and it is surrounded by all the chaos that happens within an organisation. There’s no such thing as a perfect organisation; ultimately, the goal is to strive to do what is right. But the reality is that scaling will always be complex.

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Know more

• Read this article to learn why we must question how we think about scale.
• Read this article to learn more about how scaling a nonprofit can go wrong.

When executed strategically, the digitisation of core processes is the first step towards a nonprofit’s digital transformation. For nonprofits, this can improve not only operations but also programme outcomes. Digital transformation has a significant impact on organisational culture as well: It can make the nonprofit more data-driven, fostering greater transparency, accountability, and numerical integrity. Since donors view digitisation in a positive light, it’s also advantageous when trying to raise money.

While the benefits of implementing the right digital tools are immense, the path to transformation is not easy. Koita Foundation has worked with more than 20 nonprofits on building tech solutions, such as digitising front-end field operations and building management applications as well as business analytics platforms.

Based on our learnings, here are six essential factors for a successful digital transformation.

1. The CEO should be committed to digital transformation

For technology to be effectively deployed in a nonprofit, the CEO must have a vision for the organisation’s digital transformation. This is important for motivating the entire team, particularly the programme personnel, and ensures that everyone works towards the same goals.

In addition, the CEO’s ongoing and visible commitment is essential—there is no substitute for this. This involves being part of key decisions during the design phase and driving or actively reviewing the initiative during the implementation phase and beyond. Most technology projects fail when teams don’t comply with new business processes—a problem that only the CEO can address.

One important thing we have learned is that the CEO should insist on reviewing only system-generated data and reports after the new processes are live. This is only possible when all the team members use the system in the right way.

Uma Kogekar, CEO of CEQUE, took this approach during the organisation’s digitisation journey. Besides reviewing only system-generated reports, Uma would call on team members to do a show-and-tell—this got them to reflect on what the data was showing them, and what insights they could gain from it. It also created a higher degree of awareness among the team members and ensured that they used the system effectively.

2. Identify the right areas for the first phase of the transformation

Digital transformation is a multi-year, multi-step journey. Therefore, picking the right area for executing the first phase is critical to achieving the desired results and creating momentum for the subsequent phases of transformation. The first phase of digitisation should be big enough to yield tangible results, but not so large that it takes too long to deliver any results.

Based on our learnings, we believe that this initial stage should focus on digitising ‘front-end’ processes—that is, those involving frontline workers and the communities being targeted—in areas where technology can have a visible and tangible impact. Also, this phase should be scoped such that the results are delivered within six to nine months.  

Antarang Foundation’s CareerAware programme is a case in point. Antarang conducts psychometric testing with students from grades 10 and 12 to help them figure out a suitable career path based on their aptitude and aspirations. Since the entire process was manual, they were able to conduct this exercise with only 3,000 students per year.

By using technology for collecting student information and developing an algorithm for generating career recommendations and reports, Antarang was able to scale its programme by 10X to serve more than 30,000 young people in just over a year.

3. Refine existing processes before digitisation

Organisations often have certain inefficient processes that evolve and become embedded over time. It is important to identify and revamp these processes before building new tools. For example, in one of the nonprofits we worked with, the field team would scan handwritten forms and send them to the head office for data entry on a monthly basis. While the new system was being developed, this process was reworked such that data uploads started happening daily or weekly. This change required working with the field team and changing the approach to data even before the new system was ready.

Similarly, we worked with Vipla Foundation on introducing a new scoring mechanism for evaluating the performance of students enrolled in balwadis. This new mechanism also helps the Vipla team monitor the success of their programmes.

Streamlining processes is, therefore, as much about simplifying existing methods as it is about introducing new, tech-enabled ones. Without this step, you would just be digitising a clunky process, which in turn could render the digital process inefficient.

4. Actively involve end users in the design and development phase

New technology products usually face significant adoption issues when they do not adequately meet user requirements. Often this inadequacy is due to a lack of engagement with end users during the design phase. So, it is essential for the team to articulate their technology-related requirements clearly. Since end users closely experience these issues, their feedback should be incorporated into the design during the initial stages. In addition, the project team should ensure that mock-up screens of the application are shared with and vetted by the end users. This approach not only enables the development of a better application, but also creates positive expectations and excitement in end users even before the application is built.

5. Build ownership across the organisation

Putting together a strong cross-functional team is crucial for digital transformation. The team should be headed by a strong leader who has a deep understanding of business and operations and is forward-thinking. Other members of the core team should be drawn from other parts of the organisation to drive different aspects of the project: getting the requirements right, end-to-end design, interacting with vendors, and implementation and user support.

6. Plan for a phased implementation and post-implementation support

Once your tech solution has been developed and tested, it is time to roll it out. A detailed implementation plan—one that factors in the needs of different user groups working across programmes and geographies—is important at this stage. The implementation plan should include user training, data migration, procurement and setting up of relevant hardware, and so on.  

Post-implementation engagement through regular Zoom calls or WhatsApp groups is also necessary and should include both technology team members and end users. This enables the former to learn about and resolve end-user issues in a direct and timely manner.

Another best practice is tracking the usage of apps and giving due recognition to team members who are driving initial usage. At Vipla Foundation, for instance, team members who were using the apps the most enthusiastically were rewarded in a felicitation ceremony that celebrated the collective success of all users. Identifying ‘strong’ users who can champion the app or digital product is also a good practice—these ‘champions’ can spread the message among their peers and boost adoption.

Digital transformation is a vital strategic lever for driving performance and scale and should be a priority for the CEO and leadership team. Solutions that are thoughtfully designed, developed, and implemented can create genuine, long-term impact for a nonprofit.

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Know more

• Read this article to learn about a step-by-step approach to building your nonprofit’s tech capacity.
• Read this article to learn more about the role of nonprofit leaders in an organisation’s digital transformation.

Like us, quite a few researchers and practitioners interested in evidence-based policy implementation may have needed help with this question. Although evidence-based policymaking is widely backed, many of the tested solutions may not have the potential to be implemented at scale.

Why do solutions fail to scale?

Policy researchers often apply a scalability lens only after testing their proposed solution to establish causality. Unfortunately, evidence-based solutions are not frequently tested in real-life conditions. Therefore, an effective solution’s ability to yield consistent results upon scaling up remains unclear. The lack of a scalability lens might mean changes in the solution’s design or delivery at a later stage, which may compromise its expected impact. The Philadelphia government faced a similar issue during its attempt to scale up tested behavioural solutions to increase the enrolment of low-income senior citizens into a water discount programme. The solutions could not be scaled up as they were later concluded to be too expensive for the government. Although obvious in hindsight, the budget (or lack thereof) was not so obvious when the solution was being designed and tested as it was a factor that was controlled to establish causality between the intervention and the desired outcome.

In the short run, one tends to get consumed by the research question and may overlook the implementation aspects. This might increase the likelihood of failure when scaling up the solution, leaving one with wasted resources. In their paper on a behavioural design approach to public policy, Saugato Datta and Sendhil Mullainathan suggest that we need to move away from ‘boutique pilots’ that aim to test a specific insight and refocus efforts towards insights ‘built around the objective of achieving impact at scale’. Similarly, John List mentions that impact evaluation methodologies typically only focus on establishing causal relationships; however, one must also dissect why and how something is happening to assess whether the given solution can be scaled up.

Not only do we need to ensure the impact of the solution but we must also guarantee its sustainability.

Nonetheless, acknowledging that not all development research should focus solely on solving policy challenges is essential. Not all research questions are compatible with scale or are policy priorities. Scalability is a complex and dynamic puzzle to solve. Not only do we need to ensure the impact of the solution but we must also guarantee its sustainability. Adopting the scalability perspective throughout the solution’s life cycle—conceptualisation, design, testing, and implementation—is crucial. We must factor in the ground realities—the policy ecosystem, delivery system, and the contexts of the user and the delivery agent. How can this be done? Based on our lessons from the field, we present the following recommendations.

Solving for scale

1. Distilling the problem statement

At this stage, you want to take measures to ensure the sustainability of your solution. The first step is to distil and refine the problem statement based on policy priorities, focusing on what is a problem at scale so that you do not end up working on a solution that does not necessarily need to be scaled up. For example, we started with anaemia as a broad problem and narrowed it down to targeting anaemia in pregnant women, as more than 50 percent of them are anaemic in India.

Selecting the implementation pathway will provide you with a well-established ecosystem

Next, think about the implementation pathway. Will your solution be implemented by the government, by a nonprofit, or by the private sector? Selecting the implementation pathway will provide you with a well-established ecosystem to make the implementation process smoother. It also changes how you approach the problem. For example, we identified the government as our potential implementation partner and consequently had to figure out how our solutions could fit into this system. Had we chosen a nonprofit or a private organisation, our implementation pathway and delivery agents may have differed—changing the entire context of the solution.

After identifying the right partner, you may want to start aligning and collaborating with the relevant stakeholders on their priorities at the outset. This will not only ensure the sustainability of your solution but will also make the testing process more robust by enabling you to test in a realistic environment. For example, our solutions aimed to increase the uptake of IFA tablets among pregnant women were aligned with the government’s focus on the Anaemia Mukt Bharat strategy. Close alignment with key stakeholders ensures that your solution’s design speaks to the context, and that you are not reinventing the wheel.

All in all, you want to identify if your solution can be bundled with an existing ecosystem to give it some grounding and effectively utilise the implementation partner’s resources.

2. Creating a journey map

The next step will be to map the journey of your user within the chosen ecosystem to understand existing services and gaps. This involves identifying all the stakeholders—decision-makers, implementers, and delivery agents. As you design your solution and iterate on the prototype, the map will help you identify the expected barriers at every stage and resolve them ex-ante. In our project, we identified that capacity building for service delivery under large health and nutrition government programmes generally cascades from the national level down to the delivery agent, with each state leveraging its own training infrastructure and rules. These trainings may be conducted in large groups covering multiple topics or in smaller groups. Therefore, we anticipated that the training we recommend for implementing the solutions may be diluted due to the cognitive overload that the attendees of the training sessions may experience. To solve for the same, we printed delivery instructions at the back of the solutions for quick and easy reference.

Designing for scale

1. Leaving room for context

Scaling up successfully requires sustained effectiveness and generalisability across diverse populations. This means recognising the non-modifiable and modifiable features for the design and delivery of your solutions to suit the context (includingsociocultural and systemic differences) in which they will be applied. In our project, our visits to Jharkhand and Maharashtra helped us identify systemic differences in how their health departments function. As a result, we were able to distinguish aspects of our solutions that could be modified by the implementers to facilitate the implementation process. One such aspect was the language on the counselling card and calendar. Given the vast language diversity within and across Indian states, our final scale-up toolkit included open design files that allowed district or state officials to alter the language of the solutions as per local dialects.

2. Designing for the user and delivery system

The delivery of the solution is as important as the solution itself. The delivery agents’ motivations, mental bandwidth, and capabilities play a critical role in ensuring that interventions are delivered as planned. Similarly, budget availability, political priorities, and geographical variations also influence how the solution is delivered. We recognised that one of our solutions may be too expensive to be printed. We addressed this gap by allowing room for modifications in the way the solutions may be printed while retaining the behavioural features of the solutions.

Therefore, it is essential to be cognizant of the delivery ecosystem in order to identify and address potential pitfalls. For example, if you design a physical intervention such as a booklet, you must consider who will transport the booklets and how that would happen through the existing machinery.

Testing for scale

Lastly, it is important to test for scale and ensure the generalisability of the solution. Methods to ensure generalisability, such as testing on heterogeneous populations, are well documented. Most importantly, the solution must be tested realistically or within the identified ecosystem’s structure. For example, if you have identified anganwadi workers as the delivery agents, then they should deliver the solution during the testing phase as well. It would also be helpful to add a qualitative element to the study to capture details that quantitative instruments may not always record.

Scalability is not easy to account for. What works in one Indian state might not work in another. However, co-creating with the actual users—delivery agents, end users, and government agencies—can ensure that the final solution is more real-life compatible.

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Know more

• Read this article on the factors that prevent programmes from scaling effectively.

• Learn about the insights acquired during the implementation of a livelihoods programme in Uttar Pradesh.

To help illustrate this point, I often use the metaphor of a 300-pound gorilla versus a herd of 300 deer. The gorilla represents a central entity that is slow to move and expensive to feed, whereas the deer are agile, responsive, and independent, both as individuals and as a group. While it may be easier to manage the gorilla, there are ways to manage the herd of deer–by creating a watering hole where they can gather. This watering hole represents a safe place of trust and resources where the community can share knowledge, ideas, and solutions. By building such a watering hole (a platform), nonprofits can create value throughout the ecosystem.

Platforms are the best way to engage what Seth Godin calls ‘tribes’—a group of people or a community that has a shared interest. The platform then becomes a way for people to communicate and organise. 

However, when platforms focus only on their scale, or the number of users they have, they can inadvertently fracture communities. This is because the sheer size can make it difficult for users to connect in meaningful ways, leading to a fragmentation of the community. It is, therefore, crucial for platforms to prioritise building depth and trust within communities.

Building deeper connections can help a platform create value for their users, and foster loyalty and retention.

Depth refers to the quality of connections and interactions among community members, while trust is the sense of safety and reliability people feel within the community. Fostering deeper connections and trust could mean offering features, services, or content that cater to the specific needs and interests of the community members. Doing this can help a platform create value for their users, and foster loyalty and retention—both of which are key to long-term success.

To achieve any of this, however, it is important to first nurture a community around shared values—essentially beliefs, goals, and principles that unite a group of people and guide their interactions. This is the foundation on which platforms can then build a thriving community that can grow and evolve over time.

Building a community

I worked at Pratham Books from 2007 to 2014 when it chose the Creative Commons model and gave up its position as a content gatekeeper in the children’s publishing space—a bold move at that time. They openly licensed their content to spur discussion, and had regular interactions with the community. This enabled entrepreneurs to experiment with creating new formats for content, enabled organisations to make this content accessible for differently abled people, and encouraged everyone to localise the material in ways relevant to their contexts.

This approach allowed Pratham Books to harness the power of this vibrant community and the breadth of these external resources to achieve its larger goal of helping all children discover the joy of reading.

While Pratham Books is one of the first ones I know of that adopted this agile, community-centric platform model, I now see others in the nonprofit ecosystem such as Agami, Civis, Reap Benefit, and EdelGive Foundation’s GROW Fund that have developed innovative models to expand their impact using technology, capacity building, and social engagement.

Creating community-centric platform models

Agami seeks to elevate other innovators in the space to create a network of problem solvers rather than doing it alone. Civis is a platform that works under their umbrella. It creates a participatory structure for citizens to engage with draft policies and laws. Its open-source technology interface makes room for citizens to be active participants through public consultations on urban development, environment, social justice, information technology, and health. Civis then collates this data and shares it with the government to build accountability.

A similar initiative is Reap Benefit, dedicated to collective action around civic and environmental problems at a hyperlocal level in cities. Through a platform called Solve Ninjas, Reap Benefit gives agency to communities to solve the issues and propose solutions at the local level, whether it is designing better dustbins, waterless urinals, or community waste and garbage disposal methods. The information collected on the platform is then shared with stakeholders and governance to push for impact. Reap Benefit’s community-driven approach has allowed it to build a platform that empowers young people to become changemakers within their communities.

Platforms that serve communities can look very different while serving similar purposes.

An important realisation is that platforms that serve communities can look very different while serving similar purposes. EdelGive Foundation’s GROW Fund, which supports 100 nonprofits, is an example of a platform that goes beyond mere collaboration. It has effectively evolved into a transformative platform, fostering knowledge sharing, capacity building, and continuous improvement for its partner organisations. By implementing a platform model based on trust and community engagement, the GROW Fund has demonstrated the potential for such platforms to create sustainable social impact.

The reasons for the importance of these platforms are many:

• They provide a way to scale without scaling the organisation proportionally.
• They provide a way to bind and engage communities even without continuous engagement.
• They help build sustainability and reliability by creating many community audiences and voices.
• They are a force multiplier, offering the possibility of leveraging the power of networks. As the web grows, its value increases exponentially.
• They offer some protection against failure. Once stable, a platform needs far less overhead to function than an organisation.

While existing platforms such as LinkedIn, Facebook, and Instagram are good, they cannot be the primary platforms since their agenda is their own. They are beachheads in the digital world, but these companies hold the development, messaging, and purpose and seek to build their own communities on their platforms.

Investing in the community and nurturing it

Communities provide us with a sense of identity and belonging and can offer support during difficult times. However, communities don’t just happen; they need to be built and maintained through the investment of care. This can take many forms, from simply being friendly and welcoming to new members to organising shared events and forums. But whatever form it takes, the care we invest in our community helps to create a stronger, more resilient place for all of us.

J P Rangaswami, in his blog titled ‘The Plural of Personal Is Social,’ writes: “You need to start thinking of the customer as someone to have a relationship with, to get to know, to invest in, to trust, to respect. And you need to get everyone in the company to think that way, to act that way, in everything they do. And you need to do this everywhere, not just with your customers. Not just with your supply web or your trading partners. Not just with your staff and your consultants. Everyone. Everywhere.”

What organisations need then is an internal culture that enables this. They need to learn how to work with crowds and govern through the network rather than controlling the network itself, understanding the community by working with insights from learning and feedback loops. This can only be done if the tone is set at the top of the organisation and demonstrated in practice. 

My time at Pratham Books taught me valuable lessons about communities and platforms and their role in creating positive social impact. Witnessing the power of building and nurturing a community to create value throughout an ecosystem has impacted my work—it has instilled in me the desire to cultivate care, trust, and value for users in any community-building endeavour. I have understood that nonprofits can achieve scale and catalyse infinite good with finite time and resources through engaging networks, creating platforms, and fostering communities.

I now approach platform and community building with a focus on deepening connections and building trust, and understanding that scale only happens at the speed of trust. Because only when we view the community as an investment are we more likely to work together towards common goals and create a stronger sense of connection. This is the mindset I now carry with me in all my work.

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Know more

• Read this blog on the importance of community engagement.
• Read this article to learn how a nonprofit navigated engaging with the communities they were working with.

This case study explores how Antarang Foundation was able to develop their organisational strategy with the help of an external consultant. It outlines the challenges and successes they experienced during the process and the long-term impact of this strategic exercise.

Antarang works with youth between the ages of 14 and 25 through their CareerAware and CareeReady programmes. The organisation primarily aims to encourage students to stay in formal education for as long as possible, and assists youth from disadvantaged backgrounds to bridge the gap between education and employability in order to set them on the path to a fulfilling career.

Strategic planning was core to Antarang

Ever since its inception, Antarang has conducted an annual review and strategic planning exercise in November/December. As part of the exercise, the organisation’s senior leadership collectively reflect on what they have achieved in the year gone by to identify what has worked and where they can do better. This exercise is steered by the organisation’s guiding principle of helping realise a world where every young adult is productively, positively, and passionately engaged in a career of their choice. The ideas and reflections generated through the exercise are then presented to the rest of the team and the board. Through subsequent deliberation with the internal team, the organisation arrives at its goal for the following year.

In 2019, a conversation with a long-time supporter (Rizwan Koita of Koita Foundation) prompted Antarang’s leadership team to look into bringing on external help to establish a durable strategy. They wanted someone to provide them with a sense of direction and a pathway for scaling their impact. To help them do so, they decided to bring a consultant on board.

The organisation set three broad criteria that they wanted their consultant to fulfil. First, they wanted them to factor in the organisation’s philosophy, processes, and strengths and ask the right questions that would guide Antarang in deciding next steps. Although the organisation was aware of their broader objectives, and the factors that influenced the fulfilment of these objectives, they needed help unearthing their hidden competencies. Therefore, the right consultant was one who had the strategic and analytical abilities to help them move beyond using a myopic lens to see the bigger picture.

Second, Antarang wanted to realise their place in the larger ecosystem. This was important for them to understand the gaps they were filling and what they needed to do to have greater impact. This would enable them to deliver on their promise of enabling young people to successfully transition to a career.

Lastly, Antarang wanted their external consultant to be a go-to resource who could identify emerging trends in the ecosystem. This third aspect was especially important because it would help the organisation come up with a long-term vision based on how the ecosystem was evolving.

Getting the money and the consultant was easier than they thought

Initially, the organisation did not have the funds to bring a consultant on board. Antarang’s founder, Priya Agrawal, says that they have not been great at fundraising for organisational development. “I feel, at some level, we are almost shy about asking for some of that funding. It feels a lot more justified when you’re asking for programmatic funding or support.” The organisation spoke to a few nonprofit peers to understand the benefits of bringing a strategy consultant on board and what it would cost to do so. Then, they approached a few donors who have historically been invested in the organisation’s growth.

Priya also mentions that once they actually approached these donors with their plan, they realised that the donors were far more receptive than they would have imagined. “We didn’t ask for one donor to fund the whole thing. We approached several and said, ‘If you can support X amount, I’m going to go out and ask somebody else to support another X amount on the back of this.’ And to our surprise, nobody said no.”

To identify consultants that they could approach, the organisation first invited recommendations from their donors and other organisations that had conducted similar exercises. Based on these recommendations, they reached out to Dasra, Dalberg, Bridgespan, and Sattva to potentially come on board as an external consultant.

Some organisations were out of the running fairly quickly as they were prohibitively expensive. Antarang was ultimately left with two options, and they picked Dasra because they met all three of the organisation’s requirements: They had the strategic insight the organisation required, they were familiar with the ecosystem Antarang operated within, and they had a strong understanding of donor requirements.

Alignment within the organisation was harder

The Antarang team realised that going back to the drawing board was something they were comfortable with, which made the initial period of reflection quite exciting and seamless. However, the first hurdles arose in the process of ensuring value alignment. Priya notes that the importance they place on collaborative decision-making “may almost come across as [us] being indecisive or dragging our feet”. Allowing enough space for everyone involved to be aligned on a certain way of thinking, even if it means retracing their steps, is something that the organisation has always been committed to.

Although they were told by Dasra that strategic planning exercises should involve a group of two to three people at most, Antarang brought in a steering committee that consisted of three internal members and three board members. The multiplicity of perspectives often resulted in them revisiting questions or moving in circles. The emphasis on getting everyone on board and in alignment with each other was a point of friction (for both Dasra and Antarang team members), as it resulted in the exercise taking far longer than it typically should.

Priya also notes that some of the processes needed for alignment should have been handled internally as it would have helped move the needle a lot faster. “For example, the process entailed going through all our data to figure out our most critical stakeholders and identify what worked and what didn’t. This took Dasra a long time to arrive at, but it is something we knew already. I think that if we had expedited some of those processes for Dasra, it could have gone a little bit faster.”

Managing the team’s emotions during the process is critical

According to Venil Ali, senior director of programme operations and scale at Antarang, bringing on an external consultant helped the team navigate the emotions that arose as a result of deciding to no longer pursue programmes that certain members of the team were quite invested in. For instance, the organisation decided to stop working with communities. However, this was quite an emotional decision for team members who had been working with communities over the years, as they felt their effort and investment had been rendered futile. Having Dasra act as a neutral facilitator during the process and ensuring that the team reached a consensus was critical in preventing these emotions from bubbling over.

The fact that numerous people from the organisation were involved in the decision-making and implementation was also beneficial. Although the steering committee put together by Antarang was small, they made a concerted effort to involve their alumni and other team members as well. By gathering their inputs before each steering committee meeting, the organisation ensured that the opinions of all who would be impacted by the committee’s decisions were accounted for. 

From strategy to action

The strategic decisions made by the steering committee were passed on to a small group of managers who then attempted to formalise how these decisions would play out. Based on learnings from external surveys and feedback from the rest of the team, this group would outline the areas to focus on.

In addition, the organisation created ‘working groups’ that would present the structure put together by the steering committee to the alumni, staff, and other relevant stakeholders. Approximately 50 percent of the organisation was part of at least one of the working groups, and having them be intrinsic to the process played a critical role in building ownership, clarity, and excitement for the process. The feedback provided by these stakeholders was then conveyed to the small group of managers mentioned above. This was an iterative process that took four to five months. Dasra was present through this process to provide feedback.

A director and three-member team from Dasra had been assigned to work with Antarang. In addition to fortnightly meetings with the Dasra team to provide updates on their progress, Venil also consulted with a manager from Dasra twice a week after the initial operationalisation was complete.

What did it lead to?

1. Clarity of vision and goals

One of the most important benefits of the strategic planning exercise was that it enabled Antarang to understand how they wanted to scale their impact. Priya says, “I feel that we are now certain we don’t want to become this mammoth organisation with thousands of people. We want to be able to scale our impact in a non-linear and leaner fashion.” This vision now serves as the guiding principle for the four-year intervention that they have planned.

2. Consistent messaging

Antarang now has greater faith in the ability of their team to approach and involve a large variety of stakeholders, including its alumni, non-core team, and funders. Priya notes that a recent visit from one of their largest donors reinforced this. “A comment from the donor that stands out is, ‘Whoever you speak to in the team speaks the same language and is really clear about why you’re doing what you’re doing.’ I think that statement bears evidence to the fact that it pays to take people through the entire process.” 

3. Ability to think about scale

The organisation’s orientation to scale also underwent a significant transformation. Venil says, “I think that now it’s so much easier for people at every level of the organisation, whether it’s an intern, assistant, or associate, to think of solutions from the lens of scale.” The team is now able to ask themselves: Will this work at scale? If not, how do we need to change this to retain the impact? “Scale doesn’t scare us, and I think designing for scale just comes more easily now,” Priya adds. The confidence that the external partner instilled in the team by highlighting their strengths and capacities also played a major role in reorienting their outlook on scale.

Advice for other nonprofits

1. Know why you’re undertaking this exercise

It is important for nonprofits to understand whether or not they can embark on this endeavour internally. They must also think about whether they are at the appropriate stage in their life cycle to bring on an external consultant. Priya says, “We believed that one of our programmes clearly had potential to scale rapidly, and we were pretty certain about the impact that we were making with the other programme. Therefore, the time was right for us to think about next steps.” A strategic rethink should thus be one that is warranted.

2. Understand your roles

It is important for a nonprofit to know what role they expect the external party to play and what aspects will be handled internally. For example, working on value alignment and how to break strategy into implementation milestones are best done internally.

In addition, consultants can help organisations clearly identify what work they need to continue doing and what work needs to stop. For nonprofits, deliberation and alignment on what not to do is integral to building for scale.

3. Use data well

It is essential to point the consultant to the data and information that you already possess. Mapping this data out in a manner that highlights the gaps allows for the subsequent strategising to be precise and effective.

4. Involve multiple stakeholders

Antarang greatly benefitted from involving numerous stakeholders across all levels right from the start of the process. Priya notes that knowing when to bring in certain stakeholders ensured that the process was smooth and had buy-in, and prevented any unpleasant surprises. Strongly echoing this sentiment, Venil highlights that involving diverse stakeholders in their committees and working groups got them to be more invested in the processes and their outcomes. Including multiple voices also enabled the team to receive inputs from those closest to the ground, who were able to provide detailed and practical feedback on what would work and what would not.

5. Internal capacity is key

Venil mentions that at least two members of the team should be able to dedicate approximately 50 percent of their time to the process. This is because the capacity of the external facilitator cannot compensate for the context and in-depth insights that the internal team can provide. Since the external facilitator will need to keep coming back to the internal team, it is integral for the team to possess the internal capacity to effectively anchor a strategic overhaul.

Advice for funders

1. Make space for honesty and openness

A donor’s commitment to the organisation’s success must go beyond simple financial transactions. Maintaining an open line of communication with the grantees fosters greater honesty and clarity. By being transparent with their donors about the roadblocks to their growth, Antarang leveraged their donor’s capabilities and strengths to collaboratively tackle the organisational issues they faced.

2. Let nonprofits decide their scale approach

In this instance, Antarang chose scale using a non-linear approach. This was possible because their donors helped provide the resources they needed to understand their readiness and capacity for scale and the different scale models available, and accordingly choose what would work best.

3. Invest in organisational development

The team emphasised the importance of investing in organisational capacity, noting that it is critical for an organisation to have a clear sense of direction and an ambitious vision. Antarang’s strategy, for example, gave them a focused implementation plan (including the capacities they needed to build), a non-linear scaling plan that leveraged partnerships and existing investments, a sharp understanding of what they could and could not do, and a clear picture of what support they needed from donors.

These aspects of an organisation’s work and plan can be fostered through holistic support that does not solely target the organisation’s programmes. “Either you can keep giving money only for programmes, or help build capacity so that we can deliver them more efficiently,” Venil says.

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About Priya and Venil

Priya Agrawal is the founder-director of Antarang Foundation. An Ashoka fellow and a former advertising professional, Priya has now spent two decades leading organisations in the development sector.

Venil Ali started her work in the development sector in 2004, volunteering while pursuing her graduation. She started an after-school centre called LEAP in 2008 that catered to approximately 60 students at Matunga Labour Camp, Mumbai. In 2009, Venil joined the first cohort of the Teach For India Fellowship. Post her fellowship, she joined Teach For India as a staff member and played different programmatic roles before becoming the city director of Mumbai. She also built out all tutor operations at an EdTech start-up. Currently, Venil is the senior director of programmes and scale at Antarang Foundation. She hosts a podcast called A New Kind of Celebrity, which highlights the work of different changemakers.

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Know more

• Go through this checklist of what to consider when hiring nonprofit consultants
• Want to know if you’re ready to scale? Read this piece by SSIR and this one by IDR

One important measure of success in the social impact space is when a pilot designed, conceptualised, and executed by a civil society organisation is adopted by the government and taken to scale. There have been examples in the past of such pilots—the 108 Emergency Response Service, self-help groups, and ASHA workers. The Elder Line service is the most recent example of this ‘adoption and scale up by government’ model. And though the obstacles to any endeavour to scale may differ based on the programme being scaled and the team in charge of it, we believe there are learnings from this initiative that might be valuable to the sector.

1. Make the case

Convincing the government of the need for collaboration can often be the primary hurdle for organisations looking to scale their programme. We had to field questions regarding the need for the service and how it was different from any other call centre. Additionally, we had to establish the larger purpose, beyond providing assistance to callers, that the helpline would serve. Highlighting how we had a field team in place to respond to issues on the ground and work with the communities across the state helped convince government officials about the robustness of the model.

Additionally, the calls themselves can be viewed as microcosms of the larger issues that most commonly plague the elderly. They help us identify the areas in need of intervention, and these areas can be worked upon with the help of the government, development sector partners, or the community. For example, during the Ratha Yatra in the month of July 2022, the Odisha state government popularised the Elder Line number and its services. The Odisha Connect Centre, Elder Line’s call centre in the state, saw a surge in call volumes pertaining to the social security pension issued by the state government of Odisha. As per the state government’s policy, an eligible senior citizen should get their social security pension within a fixed duration of submitting an online application. However, those who called in mentioned that they had applied for the pension—some as long as three years ago—but the portal showed that their application was still being processed. The team then began to investigate where these applications were getting stuck, and realised that the first-level approval for the pension comes from the panchayat executive officer, who often did not open the portal to conduct the required verification as it was not one of their core responsibilities. The team identified a range of issues and presented some recommendations to the pension-disbursing authority. The suggested changes included a monitoring mechanism to make the stakeholders accountable and increased transparency to make the process more suitable to senior citizens in the state.

The expansion of the project was also aided substantially by the COVID-19 pandemic. In our initial meetings with the Ministry of Social Justice in 2019, we were told that it was too soon for them to decide to come on board to scale it up. However, the onset of the pandemic and the simultaneous successful piloting of Elder Line in Telangana enabled the government to understand how critical such a service could be for senior citizens all over the country. Soon after, we were working with the ministry to create the infrastructure for the service across all states and union territories.

2. Use public sector infrastructure

Managing to convince the government of the importance of the helpline and getting them on board to facilitate its scaling resulted in the emergence of new challenges. We were instructed to utilise existing government infrastructure to execute our vision. This included utilising the cloud server of the National Informatics Centre (NIC) rather than any private entity, as we would be dealing with sensitive data pertaining to the senior citizens of the country. They also mandated that we use BSNL for all of Elder Line’s telephone/internet requirements. These mandates resulted in some delays in the nationwide launch of the helpline, as institutions such as the NIC and BSNL had several other priorities. Additionally, specific protocols had to be followed to use the cloud of the NIC since the security of the server was of prime importance.

To elaborate on the same, let’s consider the role of private cloud service providers. They typically appoint an account manager, who ensures that the requirements of clients are met and performs troubleshooting tasks if necessary. However, at the NIC, different people are responsible for different aspects of the cloud service due to security reasons. Therefore, reaching out to the NIC officials and receiving approvals was a time-consuming process for us as an external entity.

Another instance of delay was when we were trying to ensure uninterrupted service. The helpline is connected with backups for all the critical services such as electricity, telephone, and internet connections. The primary telephone connection is from BSNL, but there is also a secondary connection from another service provider in place, and calls are automatically routed through it in case the primary connection is down. It took us a while to find out whether it would be possible for us to establish such a system and whom we could approach to enable it. Once we did, the same had to be repeated to every state/union territory, and explaining the process to the staff at each centre took a great amount of time and effort. 

Although we faced challenges and delays initially, using public sector infrastructure worked out in our favour in the long run as union territories such as Dadra and Nagar Haveli, Daman and Diu, and Ladakh have no service providers for internet and telephone connectivity other than BSNL. Additionally, the strict protocols that were followed to ensure the security of the server have protected it against any breaches.

Other nonprofits seeking to scale their programmes through the government must therefore factor in the mechanics of working with existing public sector infrastructure. Even though this can be time-consuming, it is beneficial in the long run.

3. Allow for localisation

While the uniformity offered by scale is alluring, the challenges to the implementation of an intervention and those experienced by the group it targets can often differ across geographies. Hence, Elder Line took the conscious decision of having a decentralised approach, where each state has its own implementing partner, instead of a single, centralised implementing agency. So while the helpline number, broad guidelines for processes, and ethos are common across states, each state ensures that local differences are taken into account while serving the elderly. Today, our challenges concern how we can standardise the service across the country while maintaining our connection with state assets. Elder Line is still fine-tuning its processes based on the issues that emerge from state to state.

When a programme achieves scale, it may encounter challenges that were never envisaged. Once Elder Line was implemented in Hyderabad, we rescued almost 200 unhoused elderly and reunited 70 of them with family members within the state itself. However, upon scaling up, we encountered many cases where the elderly persons were rescued in one state but belonged to another state. After handling a few such cases, we established a comprehensive process for handling the interstate rescue and reunion of the unhoused elderly.  

Similarly, any organisation looking to scale their programme must account for the fact that the same approach may not work for all regions. However, strengthening processes while simultaneously empowering state partners to apply a localised approach can be beneficial.

4. Adopt a hands-on approach

It is essential for core personnel to be involved in both the design and execution of the interventions. You have to be ready to spend time working on operations at a day-to-day level. Keep in mind that doing so will help when you decide to scale, as you will be able to communicate better with your programme managers or field teams. A hands-on approach also enables the team to understand what the barriers to implementation could be, and offer structured guidance to those who will take the work forward once the programme is scaled.

5. Understand your target

While designing Elder Line, we comprehensively studied existing helplines in the country, especially the 108 Emergency Response Service and 1098 Childline—a helpline for children in distress. Based on our learnings from examining these helplines, we worked towards ensuring that the helpline was designed with due consideration for the preferences of the elderly. Programme implementers should spend time learning about the preferences of their target groups, since this is key to adoption, regular usage, and growth of the service.

First, the helpline’s number is 14567 across the country. The number is a short code that does not require the addition of an STD code and is easy for a senior citizen to remember. All the calls originating from a particular state/union territory are directed to the connect centre within the same state/union territory, and this is determined based on the cell tower from which the call originates. Further, calling the helpline connects the caller directly to their local connect centre officer rather than an interactive voice response (IVR) system. This was done with the understanding that the elderly might find an IVR system to be overly tedious and confusing to navigate. Lastly, the connect centre staff are trained to be compassionate and patient with the callers and build the conversation with them in the local language(s). Unlike a regular call centre, there is no fixed upper time limit to close a call.

6. Design for scale

The successful transition of Elder Line to the government and its subsequent expansion can be attributed to the fact that it was conceptualised and constructed with the intention to scale. While other helplines for the elderly may rely on a very small team with one person often handling both the calls and the on-ground resolution of issues, Elder Line has a separate connect centre and field teams, who are trained to carry out their respective functions effectively.

Both sets of teams underwent seven days of domain-related training, which helped them understand why the helpline is required, what the issues of the elderly are, the various schemes and policies that cater to the elderly, the possible questions they may ask, and how they can empathise with the elderly when speaking to them.

Additionally, we used a uniform central software that the teams from all states connected to. The software contains separate ‘rooms’ for each state, which ensures that a particular state’s team can only access the data related to that state. The aim was to set up the model in a manner that allows it to be scalable and repeatable across the country, thereby making it easy for the government to take over and run it as is.  

7. Work with government machinery right from the start

In addition to ensuring that the programme was designed for scale, we approached the government early into the programme’s conceptualisation in order to collaborate with them. Receiving the backing of the government early on helped us implement our plan in a more effective manner than if we were to go at it alone. Our operations in the field are proceeding smoothly in various states because we have the support of relevant state departments. This support makes local authorities such as the police more responsive to the requests of our team and those we seek to aid. The team was also able to draw on the help of institutions such as government hospitals/dispensaries, district legal service authorities and legal aid clinics, old-age homes, and shelter homes, as well as day-care centres operated by the government and civil society organisations. 

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Know more

• Learn more about government policies and plans for senior citizens in India.
• Read this article on strategies for nonprofits looking to work with the government.
• Learn about elder abuse and how we might be doing the same with the elderly around us.

Do more

• Report cases of elder abuse or unhoused elderly on Elder Line’s toll-free number (14567).
• If you know any senior citizen who is feeling lonely, talk to them or connect them to Elder Line’s toll-free number (14567).

In 2012, he incubated and supported the development of LetzChange, one of India’s first retail giving platforms, which later merged with GiveIndia to become the country’s largest giving platform. Vikrant is also the chairman of Founders Pledge, an organisation that encourages entrepreneurs to pledge a portion of their exit proceeds to philanthropy.

In this interview with IDR, Vikrant talks about the need for evidence-led giving, why philanthropy must work in tandem with governments, and how the ecosystem needs to change if we want people to give more.

Compared to many of your peers, your philanthropic journey started relatively early on, in your early thirties. Could you tell us a bit about what the early days were like and how it influenced your thinking?

You may say it was early, but one of the regrets I have is that I started working on my philanthropy much later than I started thinking about it. I grew up in a family where my father would always help anyone who came to him, even when he was not financially secure. And so the idea of giving was very much a part of my life from very early on. By the time I left school, I knew I wanted to do something to fix the problems around me, but didn’t know how I could have an impact on the scale that was required. For a brief period of time, I toyed with the idea of becoming an IAS officer or joining the public development sector, but I felt that neither was compatible with my desire to be financially secure and be able to effect change at scale.

Fast-forward a few years, I went into the business world and I was fortunate to make a fair amount of money at a fairly young age. After I exited PartyGaming, I realised that I had the time, money, and ability to do something impactful, but I didn’t know how. At the time I was living in Gibraltar, but once a year I would come to India and meet people running large nonprofits to understand more about the space. These conversations opened my eyes to the fact that organisations spent significant sums of money on fundraising—which sometimes reached 50 to 60 percent of their total budgets. At that moment, I realised that India desperately needed a tech platform to help nonprofits raise money from individual donors.

Around that time, I had also come across JustGiving, a global fundraising platform, which became the inspiration for LetzChange. We wanted nonprofits—who on their own did not have the ability to hire good fundraisers—to be able to tap into their existing employees and supporters and leverage their social networks to go out and help raise money. And so LetzChange was launched in early 2014 and we ran it independently till 2018, when it merged with GiveIndia.

And how did this shape your approach to philanthropy?

A pivotal moment that sharpened my thinking was reading the book Doing Good Better by Oxford academic William MacAskill, who was one of the early proponents of the effective altruism movement. While I don’t fully subscribe to the direction the movement has taken now, at its core, effective altruism is about making the best use of money by maximising impact with every dollar you give. For instance, if you want to improve learning outcomes in an area, it might be cheaper and more impactful to provide deworming medication to students, which will improve attendance, rather than building a new school building.

The way I thought about giving is twofold: retail and wholesale. Our investments in LetzChange helped build an effective retail giving ecosystem. But wholesale giving, by which I mean direct, large-ticket funding to nonprofits doing impactful work, was something I was still trying to learn more about and figure out.

In the philanthropic world, storytelling often trumps hard numbers.

And what I was seeing was that the wholesale giving space was entirely driven by storytelling. And don’t get me wrong, storytelling is important in the world; it’s the reason we’re alive and why we live the way we do. But in the philanthropic world, storytelling often trumps hard numbers. I would often come across large organisations with very good reputations just because of how they tell their stories. I always understand things better with numbers as opposed to purely through stories. And so what we’re trying to do on the wholesale giving front with the Veddis Foundation is actually trying to have a quantifiable impact through the organisations we support. Of course not everything will always be quantifiable, but our focus is on writing larger cheques to fewer organisations while trying to have the maximum impact.

Your foundation has worked with state governments in Rajasthan and Haryana. Where does the idea of partnering with the government fit into philanthropy?

Early on in our work I don’t think working with the government was even on our radar, but our experience over a period of time has taken us to a place which is very different to what I had envisaged. In 2013, we wanted to take a more hands-on approach to generating evidence and understanding what worked and what didn’t, and so we partnered with SPECTRA, a grassroots organisation working in Rata Khurd, a socio-economically disadvantaged village in Alwar district, Rajasthan. Together we experimented with a variety of initiatives to create and improve livelihoods holistically, from providing loans to technical support on what to grow and where to sell their goods. And what we saw there was that the annual income increase of the households was a multiple of what we had spent, on a sustained basis.

With our proof of concept ready, the next step that was suggested to me was to take the project to another state—Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Chhattisgarh—and scale it up to 15,000 households. As an early-stage investor, this didn’t make sense to me. If we’ve invested in building a prototype of what works in one state, the focus should be on leveraging it and scaling it up in the same state—not investing in seeing what works and what doesn’t in the context of another state. And so we partnered with Rajeevika, the Rajasthan government’s rural livelihoods mission, to scale the work across the state.

At the time Rajeevika also had a multimillion dollar grant from the World Bank, in addition to its own budgets, to spend on improving livelihoods. Our investments in comparison were extremely small. But I realised that the leverage we could get on our money was massive. And that led me to actively consider working with the government. As philanthropists, even if our money can help the government improve the efficiency of their spending by a marginal percentage, the impact we can have is far greater than setting up our own schools or funding hospitals directly, which is why as a foundation we now focus on improving governance.

No individual foundation will ever have the resources needed to fix problems in a country as large as India.

If you can help improve the quality of policy formulation, help policymakers improve the quality of their decisions, or work on improving the implementation of government schemes, you’re maximising the good you can do with your money. It’s the only way we can really solve problems at scale—no individual foundation will ever have the resources needed to fix problems in a country as large as India.

Looking back on your giving journey, what are some of the factors that you think would encourage more wealthy people to give both early and generously?

There are a lot of people who want to give and care about social issues, and the goal should be to make it easier for them to give. I would say that having more organisations like Founders Pledge, an organisation I chair in the UK, would be helpful. The idea behind it is simple: Every entrepreneur who signs up makes a binding pledge to donate a percentage of their proceeds when they exit their business. By making it an automatic action—they have to give away the money when they get bought out or sell their shares or go IPO—it pushes them to start giving much earlier than they would have on their own. More importantly, it helps individuals give more impactfully. Founders Pledge has an advisory team that works with each of the entrepreneurs to support them on their philanthropic journey. Given the size of India’s start-up ecosystem, I see a huge potential in India for this model of giving. We’re seeing loose networks being formed around the idea, and I hope that trend accelerates.

Networks where people learn from each other, cooperate, and brainstorm together would also be good for the ecosystem.

Networks where people learn from each other, cooperate, and brainstorm together would also be good for the ecosystem, because we’ve often seen people have a very fixed idea of what they want to do or how they want to do things. But that may not be the most effective use of capital. So hearing from others on alternative approaches to giving that are perhaps more impactful is something that I see can unlock philanthropic capital.

Regulatory changes that incentivise giving can be a big boost to the sector as a whole. We have seen how the 2 percent CSR mandate has had a huge impact on the quantum of money in the sector in India. In the UK, for example, a company can claim a full tax deduction on any amount it gives to charity. That is a huge incentive. Not only does this lower the cost of donations, it can also move money faster. Perhaps there could be more such targeted incentives created in partnership with the ecosystem to increase the quantum of resources coming into the social sector.

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Know more

• Read this study on bringing foundations and governments closer in India.
• Use this interactive microsite to learn more about the ease of doing good in India.
• Read this profile of William MacAskill and the effective philanthropy movement.
• Read this article about how understanding behaviours of everyday givers can be crucial for nonprofits.