Voices of the nonprofit sector

For our 27th annual fall conference in Phoenix, we wanted to try something new, something collaborative, something that leveraged the energy and ideas of the hundreds of nonprofit professionals gathered in one ballroom.

And so we conceived The UnConference: CommYOUnity Solutions, a space to give voice to the key issues in our nonprofit and philanthropic community and to collectively find real solutions to these shared challenges.

During the morning-long Solutions Collaboratory, Jeff Snell, the Sr. Fellow for Social Innovation at the ASU Lodestar Center, guided the UnConference participants through an interactive exercise designed to surface the major, shared issues in the sector – and, critically, to talk through ideas for solutions. Snell posed six big-picture questions, handed out sticky notes and tasked everyone with writing down responses. Student volunteers at each station then grouped the notes into categories that guided the discussion; afterwards, participants used brightly colored stickers to vote for the answers that most resonated.

All of the responses that received votes have been reproduced below, a snapshot of our sector's hopes and fears, triumphs and failures, opportunities and challenges.

To close the Collaboratory, David Bornstein of the Solutions Journalism Network and The New York Times shared his thoughts on the day's key themes. Bornstein's work looks at how people and organizations respond to social problems, providing insights and evidence of results that others can use. He encouraged attendees to continue this process – of confronting problems and seeking solutions – at their organizations. "The last thing we need is more leaders who are not self-reflective," he said.

And now, here are the results of the ASU Lodestar Center's 2019 Solutions Collaboratory.