MGMT 602 Week 6 DB Forum 3 Replies Example

Discussion Board Forum 3: Replies

MGMT 602 Non-Profit Management, Discussion Board Forum 3: Replies (two)

Thread by [Student Name]

The two classmates, their threads and the case are composites standing in for the forum's own; the articles, Worth's textbook and Scripture are real; the requirements follow Liberty's public course guide for MGMT 602.

Reply to Hannah

Hannah, of all the threads on this case, yours argued most persuasively for a fast merger. The funder's letter offers $350,000 over three years to a merged organization, both programs ran deficits last year, and you argued that waiting two years risks losing the money and perhaps the smaller program itself.

I would still slow the timeline. Benton and Austin (2010), reviewing research on mergers in both business and nonprofit settings, emphasize that successful mergers depend on the merger process and especially on its human element: how staff, culture and identity are handled. They note that a merger can be experienced as a loss of identity as well as a chance to survive. In our case, the smaller program's identity is its reading method and its founder. A six-month merger would leave little time to address what happens to either, and the case says three of its five tutors were hired because of the method.

Worth (2017) describes collaboration as a range of options, not a single choice. A merger agreement signed in six months but implemented in stages, starting with shared finance and payroll, might satisfy the funder while giving the staff time to work together before the programs become one. It would also let the two boards test the shared finances before they commit their reserves.

Do you think the funder would accept a signed agreement with a staged integration, or does the letter require a completed merger?

Reply to Jordan

Jordan, you argued that the two programs should refuse any collaboration and keep competing, because competition keeps both sharp. It is a fair instinct for markets, and you were right that the funder's pressure feels heavy-handed.

The case, though, suggests that competition here is mostly for grants, not for families. Parents choose a program by distance and by which school their children attend, and both programs have waiting lists. The children cannot reward the better program by switching. Gazley and Brudney (2007), comparing survey responses from local government and nonprofit executives in Georgia, found that nonprofits enter partnerships mainly to secure the resource they find scarcest, which is funding. Both programs in the case lack money far more than they lack ideas, so a partnership that cuts overhead answers their real constraint.

Paul urged the Philippians to stand firm in one spirit, striving side by side for the faith of the gospel (English Standard Version Bible, 2001/2016, Philippians 1:27). Two programs four blocks apart serving the same neighborhood's children are already on the same side. Sharing a back office does not end their independence; it frees money for tutors. If the two directors still cannot work together after two years of shared payroll and grant reports, they will have learned that cheaply, and each program will still exist.

What has competition between the programs actually produced so far, apart from two grant applications to the same foundations each year?

References

Benton, A. D., & Austin, M. J. (2010). Managing nonprofit mergers: The challenges facing human service organizations. Administration in Social Work, 34(5), 458-479. https://doi.org/10.1080/03643107.2010.518537

English Standard Version Bible. (2016). Crossway. (Original work published 2001)

Gazley, B., & Brudney, J. L. (2007). The purpose (and perils) of government-nonprofit partnership. Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly, 36(3), 389-415. https://doi.org/10.1177/0899764006295997

Worth, M. J. (2017). Nonprofit management: Principles and practice (4th ed.). SAGE Publications.