The Struggles of Small Non-Profits

By Patricia Thangaraj

As a small non-profit, the struggle is real. We are called to develop and implement the same programs and services for Canadians as medium and large sized charities, but with less than 10% of the resources, financial, in-kind and human.

These are just some of the numerous and unique challenges that we face. To add fuel to the fire, most corporate organizations prefer to donate to these medium and large sized charities, who already have a vast network of funders who already have and will continue to donate to them.

This is understandable to a point, After all, these medium and larger sized non-profits have established themselves with multimillion dollar and well publicized campaigns, content and other communications, public relations and marketing materials promoting their programs and support for their clients. Therefore, funders want to donate to an organization that they have seen has already worked on numerous projects because they can see the causes that their money is going towards.

Likewise, most people prefer to work or volunteer with those more well know charities because they want their name to be associated with a brand name charity. And who can blame them. It certainly looks good on a resume.

Furthermore, whether employers want to admit it or not, there is a bias, be it unconscious, sub-conscious or conscious, that somehow a candidate is more qualified for a job and therefore, worthy of their time for an interview, if they have worked for or volunteered for a medium or large and more well-known non-profit.

What these employers fail to realize when they see these bullet points on their resumes is that they often had a very small part in putting together this campaign because the organization has many departments of several staff who collaborated on developing and executing those communications products and campaigns.

Likewise, their network of corporations is already there. So they just need to reach out to them every year or whenever they are planning to launch a product or campaign or introduce a new service.

This does not mean that the work that small non-profits do is any less significant. We’re just at a disadvantage because we are still expected to develop and deliver programs for our clients in the same way that those medium and larger sized charities do, but with not even 10-20% of their resources.

Therefore, while the communications, PR and marketing content and campaigns that these well known organizations produce are indeed commendable, they have no idea of the challenges that small, but growing teams face such as what it takes to start from the ground up, working with limited resources and developing partnerships with other organizations to achieve patient-centred goals, all with an organizational name that is not brand name.

Nevertheless, we will continue with our advocacy and public affairs work in support of breast, ovarian, prostate, pancreatic and other hereditary cancer patients, survivors and patients because we want to give a voice to this community.

This is why we are calling on all of our key stakeholders to help us envision a brighter future for the hereditary cancer community. By partnering with us, we can improve patient care and health outcomes and promote health equity for these people and their families.

Some of the ways you can help:

Government Officials and Stakeholders

1. The move you made in lowering the age of self-referrals from 50 to 40 in Ontario is a huge step forward. We need you to continue to enact policies, legislation, and regulations that would promote the health and wellbeing of the hereditary cancer community.
2. Partner with your stakeholders to fulfill all of the promises you made in the “Your Health: A Plan for Connected and Convenient Care.”
3. Increase the number of government grants that are available for smaller non-profits and make those grants already in place more accessible for smaller non-profits such as ours.

Doctors:

1. Parter with us in hosting educational sessions, both in-person and online, where we can successfully advocate for health equity for underrepresented populations such as IRER populations, with policy makers.
2. Be the feature speaker at one of these sessions, where we inform people with the BRCA gene and other hereditary cancer patients, survivors and previvors on the importance of genetic testing, the need for more access to research and treatment for residents of Northern, rural and remote parts of Canada and other areas.
3. Consider joining our Medical Advisory Board (MAB), where sharing your medical expertise would help save the lives of Canadians, immigrants and newcomers.

Corporate Organizations

1. Donate to our organization, sponsor one of our educational sessions or host a fundraising event for us.

The Public

1. Come and volunteer for our organization and/or at one or more of our educational sessions.
2. Donate to our organization or organize a fundraising event for us.

We hope you will join with us in this cause. Together we can tackle Canada’s healthcare crisis.