415. From $275k to $51M: How to Become a High Growth Nonprofit - Matt Scott

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Meet Matt. This fundraiser, author and CEO, once helped take an org from $275,000 raised to $51 million in seven years🤯 He’s now the CEO and Co-Founder of CauseMic, a consultancy that helps nonprofits grow their organizations using the best for-profit methods. In his new 🆓book, The High-Growth Nonprofit, he shares the lessons learned from more than a decade spent helping nonprofit leaders fully fund their missions, including numerous stints inside the walls of high-growth nonprofits. He’s diving into the insights he covers in the book with the We Are For Good Community. Tune in and grab your notepad because this is an episode to apply to your org today📝

💡Learn

The importance of shifting your mindset
Strategic planning + building the right systems for high-growth
How to activate + grow your revenue using these concepts

Today's Guest
Matt Scott, CEO and Co-founder, CauseMic

“Have a bias for action over a bias for documentation.”

— Matt Scott, CEO and Co-founder, CauseMic

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Episode Highlights

Matt’s story and journey to where he is today (3:30)
How Team Rubicon increased annual revenue from $275K to $51M in 7 years (6:45)
Becoming a High Growth Nonprofit (11:00)
Mindsets needed to become high growth + high revenue (11:00)
Strategic Planning + Building the Right Systems for High Growth (22:00)
How the strategic planning process is broken (22:00)
Activation + Growing (28:00)
Magic happens at 10K (28:00)
How we can cultivate cultures where people can thrive (35:00)
A powerful moment of philanthropy in Matt’s life (39:00)
Matt’s One Good Thing: Ruthless prioritization. What will have the highest impact at the lowest cost? (44:00)

Powerful Quotes

“It was this opportunity to take bold, calculated risk.” -Matt

“We had this mandate to go out there and be the best disaster relief organization in the world. I think back on it, and I was able to experiment and try new things.” -Matt

“I just got to play the role of somebody who had a lot more experience and therefore was able to learn and grow, test things out. It was the perfect environment for a builder and a doer.” -Matt

“It all starts with a growth mindset.” -Matt

“What if you had no choice, but to double your revenue with half the resources over the next three years? How would you do that?” -Matt

“We had very little so it was easy to operate in a resource-constrained environment, but as we got bigger and bigger, and we had more and more money and more and more people, we always kept that mindset.” -Matt

“Have a bias for action over a bias for documentation.” -Matt

“I think a strategic plan should be developed for every single year. It should be captured on a single page.” -Matt

“I worked at Team Rubicon and culture was our secret weapon.” -Matt

“At CauseMic the culture is s incredible. So much about our success has come down to our culture and it's not just our cultural principles, but it's how we treat each other. It's how we show up for each other.” -Matt

“What is uniquely you as an organization and a team? Write those things down. Then you can finesse them, you can make them fun.” -Matt

“You have to be deliberate. You have to repeat those things over and over and over and you have to call out actions when you see them. That will really help reinforce the culture.” -Matt

“Ruthless prioritization. If you could focus on just one thing, just think about what's going to have the highest impact at the lowest cost to drive my, impact forward and our organization’s impact forward.” -Matt

“If do that every day, every month, every year, every decade, you're going to be totally shocked by how fast you build up momentum for your cause.” -Matt