Author name: TNN

by Dr. Kevin Dean, President & CEO, Tennessee Nonprofit Network The history of transformative success is rarely a story of ideological purity. Instead, it is often a messy, pragmatic narrative where mutual contempt is temporarily shelved in the face of a greater, more immediate threat. To understand why collaboration in the modern nonprofit sector must […]

by Dr. Kevin Dean, President & CEO, Tennessee Nonprofit Network If you’ve spent five minutes in the Volunteer State—or really, anywhere below the Mason-Dixon—you know one thing for certain: Tennesseans are just so syrupy nice. Bless your heart. Honestly. We’re so sweet, we’d apologize to the wall if we bumped into it. We’ll hold the

by Dr. Kevin Dean, President & CEO, Tennessee Nonprofit Network Let’s just get this out of the way: I am a massive, room-clearing, hide-in-the-janitor’s-closet-during-a-fire-drill introvert. I know, I know. You’re probably skeptical. “But you’re always so talkative and friendly at TNN events!” It’s not that I don’t like people. In fact, I love people (a

Tennessee Nonprofit Network is writing to make you aware of a critical issue impacting nonprofits in our state and around the country. Recently, GoFundMe – the crowdfunding platform – created on its website donation pages for 1.4 million nonprofit organizations without their knowledge or consent.  This initiative creates significant concerns for nonprofits: Too many nonprofits

by Dr. Kevin Dean, President & CEO, Tennessee Nonprofit Network You’ve probably heard about the GoFundMe fiasco happening right now that has set the nonprofit sector ablaze, but there’s a very good reason for how outraged the nonprofit sector has been: GoFundMe violated a basic nonprofit tenet: anything you build for a community should be

by Dr. Kevin Dean, President & CEO, Tennessee Nonprofit Network We need to talk. The nonprofit sector isn’t just navigating choppy waters; we are in a full-blown, Category 5 hurricane. This isn’t your grandma’s gentle squall; this is the perfect, terrifying trifecta of organizational doom. We’re being slammed by anti-nonprofit rhetoric and political polarization that

by Andrea Hill, Chief Development and Partnerships Officer, Tennessee Nonprofit Network In our last chapter, the impossible had happened: we had successfully convinced our board of directors to vote in favor of a monumental statewide expansion. Our ambitious plan, which was nearly a year in the making, was officially approved. But that vote wasn’t the

by Dr. Kevin Dean, President & CEO, Tennessee Nonprofit Network In our last chapter, a crucial meeting with a mentor reignited my faith in our mission. After the previous collapse of a statewide coalition, the plan to pivot Momentum Nonprofit Partners into the state’s first nonprofit association felt like a fragile, high-stakes gamble. We had

by Dr. Kevin Dean, President & CEO, Tennessee Nonprofit Network In our last chapter, we were at a pivotal moment. The grand plan for a statewide association had seemingly fallen apart with the collapse of our original coalition. But a new, radical idea emerged: to transition Momentum Nonprofit Partners into the state’s first nonprofit association.