by Dr. Kevin Dean, President & CEO, Tennessee Nonprofit Network
In family therapy circles, there’s a well-worn tale about the “Family System.” It’s a complex, often bizarre, contraption of emotions, unspoken rules, and deeply ingrained habits. In this system, one child, the scapegoat, is unknowingly designated to carry the burden of the family’s unaddressed problems. Instead of confronting the simmering tension between Mom and Dad, the passive-aggression of a sibling, or the family’s collective refusal to discuss money, all that negativity is neatly packaged and assigned to one unfortunate soul. This child becomes the walking, talking embodiment of everything that’s wrong. They’re the one who “acts out,” “causes trouble,” or just “has a bad attitude,” and their behavior becomes the perfect distraction from the real, systemic dysfunction. This phenomenon is so common it’s a staple of sitcoms and therapy sessions alike.
The long-term effects on this child can be profound and incredibly unfair. They learn to associate themselves with blame, often developing a subconscious expectation that they will be singled out for any failure. This can lead to deep-seated issues with self-worth, a constant feeling of being misunderstood, and an internal alarm system that’s always on alert for the next accusation. They might grow into adults who either fight every perceived criticism with ferocity or, conversely, become overly apologetic and unable to defend themselves. This early training in “being the problem” becomes a part of their identity, a psychological baggage they carry into every new environment—especially the workplace.
From Family to Office: The Transference of Blame
This brilliant, yet devastating, psychological magic trick works in the office, especially in the noble, often chaotic, world of nonprofits. When a big initiative crashes and burns, a grant application is rejected, or the coffee machine mysteriously breaks for the seventh time this month, the blame doesn’t float around in the air like a benevolent ghost. Oh no. It lands squarely on one person, the newly appointed workplace scapegoat. This individual is then saddled with a burden of blame so heavy it could serve as a paperweight for all the office’s bad decisions. The feeling is a cosmic joke without a punchline.
This dynamic isn’t limited to individuals. It often scales up, leading to the organizational scapegoat. In collaborations, especially in the nonprofit sector where resources and reputations are tightly intertwined, one partner organization can become the designated fall guy. When a joint project fails, a funder pulls out, or one organization simply isn’t living up to its promises, it’s easier to find a single, external point of failure than to admit to a flawed partnership. For example, if two organizations are working on a grant and one fails to hit its metrics while the other succeeds, the failing organization or the grant funders might point to the successful organization’s high performance and say, “They set unrealistic expectations and didn’t share their methodology,” effectively blaming their partner’s success for their own failure. It’s a masterful move of projection that shifts the focus from internal shortcomings to an external, and often bafflingly innocent, source.
Why Your Nonprofit Is Looking for a New Scapegoat
The nonprofit sector, for all its good work, can be a particularly fertile ground for scapegoating. After all, if your organization is saving the world, who wants to admit that your internal communication is held together with duct tape and wishful thinking?
- The Hero Complex: When your mission is “to heal the world,” it’s easy to believe your organization is flawless. A flaw isn’t a systemic issue; it’s just a rogue variable—like you! You, with your slightly different opinion and your data-driven PowerPoint, are clearly the problem.
- Budgeting Like a House of Cards: Nonprofits often operate on shoestring budgets and a whole lot of hope. When a project fizzles out because it was laughably underfunded, it’s a hard pill to swallow. So, instead of admitting you’re running on fumes, you find the nearest employee and make them the face of the “failure.” It’s so much tidier than having to explain that your entire financial model is a prayer.
- The High Stakes, Low Pay-Off: You are working 60-hour weeks for a fraction of a corporate salary, and a major initiative fails. The emotional backlash is intense. It’s easier to find one person to be mad at than to confront the deep, existential dread that your hard work might have been for nothing.
The Collaborative Scapegoat: When One Nonprofit Takes the Fall
This dynamic isn’t just an internal office issue; it’s a show-stopping performance in nonprofit collaborations. In these partnerships, the stakes are even higher. You’ve brought your reputation, your team, and your mission to the table, and suddenly, you’re not just a collaborator—you’re the designated fall guy.
Imagine you’re partnering with an organization that promises the moon but can barely get a rocket into orbit. They’re a marketing powerhouse, but their on-the-ground work is, shall we say, “aspirational.” The joint project is a spectacular flop. Rather than admit their part in the chaos, they point at your organization and say, “Well, they lacked the capacity to execute the plan.” The problem, of course, was never capacity; it was that their “plan” was a fever dream based on zero data. But to the funders, the board, and the public, your organization becomes the easily digestible reason for a complex failure. You’re not just a partner anymore; you’re the narrative’s tragic villain, the organization that single-handedly ruined a great idea.
Case Studies: Look, It’s You!
- The Event Planning Disaster: The annual charity auction brought in a fraction of what was expected. The executive director points out that the new event coordinator had “too many abstract ideas.” The coordinator, meanwhile, had simply proposed using a digital silent auction app instead of a thousand tiny pens and paper slips. Now, they are “the reason” the organization can’t afford a new shredder, and everyone looks at them with a silent, resentful glare.
- The Collaboration From Heck: Your small, scrappy organization partners with a large, bureaucratic institution. You spend months trying to schedule a meeting with their team, who operate at the speed of a tranquilized snail. The project deadline is missed. The large organization writes a scathing report claiming you “lacked the resources and professionalism to deliver on time.” You have been successfully scapegoated. Your organization is now the official villain in a story that was doomed from the start.
- The Failing Organization Blames the Impactful Organization: Two organizations who, after years of trying to collaborate, realize it’s never going to work. For whatever reason, whether the problematic board chair or the executive director who is stuck in a silo, they’re failing. They lack impact and they lack vision. Somehow your organization, despite being impactful and successful in your efforts, suddenly become the reason they are failing. You steal their resources. You supposedly have turned the funders against them. Whatever it is, it’s somehow your fault.
Your Guide to Not Being the Scapegoat, or at Least Not Feeling Like One
Being the workplace scapegoat feels terrible, but you don’t have to just lie down and accept your fate. Think of this as your guide to reclaiming your narrative and possibly your sanity.
- Detach with a Vengeance: The blame isn’t about you, so don’t take it personally. Treat it like a weather forecast—you can acknowledge the rain, but you don’t have to believe the clouds are mad at you specifically. This is a system-level problem.
- Document Your Life: Become a professional note-taker. Log emails, meeting outcomes, and conversations. Your documentation isn’t a weapon; it’s your shield. When someone tries to blame you, you can calmly present the facts. “Ah, yes, according to the meeting notes from April 15, we all decided to move forward with the plan you’re now blaming me for. Good times.”
- Find Your People: Not everyone is part of the toxic blame vortex. Find a sane colleague. An ally can not only confirm that you’re not crazy but can also provide a second voice to help counter the narrative.
- Master the Art of the “We”: When someone tries to corner you with a “Why did you…?” question, deflect gracefully. “Why did you miss the deadline?” can be met with, “That’s a great question. Let’s look at our process and see where we could improve.” The collective pronoun is a powerful tool. It’s like a tiny shield that says, “I’m not in this alone, and neither are you.”
- Know When to Run: Sometimes, you can’t fix a broken system. If the scapegoating is a consistent theme, it’s time to realize that this office is a bad therapist and a worse employer. It’s okay to leave a system that is designed to project its problems onto you. Your resume is your liberation document. Update it.
f You’re the Organizational Scapegoat
- Control Your Narrative: Don’t let the other organization’s story be the only one. Proactively and professionally communicate with funders, board members, and key stakeholders. Share your side of the story, backed up with clear data, metrics, and documentation from the project. Don’t throw your collaborator under the bus, but do set the record straight – with receipts, not opinions.
- Highlight Your Successes: If you successfully delivered on your part of the collaborative project, shout it from the rooftops. Create case studies, reports, or blog posts that highlight your organization’s contributions and the impact you achieved. This proves your competence and shows that your organization is not the “problem.”
- Conduct a Professional Post-Mortem: Internally, have a candid, non-blaming conversation with your team. Analyze what went wrong and identify any red flags you missed. This is not for public consumption but for your organization’s benefit. It allows you to learn from the experience and create a checklist of what to avoid in future partnerships.
- Avoid a Public Blame War: Resist the temptation to get into a mudslinging contest with your former collaborator. A public feud looks unprofessional and distracts from your mission. Stick to your facts, your successes, and your plans for the future. The high road is the one with the best view.
You can protect yourself from scapegoating’s emotional and professional fallout by better understanding the mechanics of scapegoating. After all, the only person who should be the fall guy is the one who actually caused the problem, and that person is rarely ever the person who is publicly blamed.
And sometimes, it’s not even a person who is the problem. Sometimes, it’s a systemic problem and requires a big, vulnerable conversation between everyone. In systemic failures, everyone is accountable.