What Does the Future Hold for Open Hand?
Upcoming 20th Anniversary Finds Executive Director Stephen Woods Looking Ahead

Open Hand will soon commemorate 20 years of serving this community. While researching how we might best celebrate this very important milestone, we discovered that the trend seems to be—at least in the nonprofit world—to take a retrospective approach. The theme is a stroll down memory lane, revisiting accomplishments in the form of oral histories and bound memory books.

Well, I like that idea very much.  And those of you who attended our annual Party in the Kitchen event commemorating this historic milestone experienced our past through the wonders of technology. 

But even as we look back, my focus is on using our 20th anniversary as an opportunity to frame a snapshot of our next 20 years.

What I care about are the lessons learned during the last 20 years, since they will provide the very foundation for our future development.  Having been here for all of that 20-year history, I can condense those lessons learned into a few bullet points.

• Know and UNDERSTAND the needs of the people you serve – right now and 5 years from now.

• Clean the slate often – disregard how things are done now and create new solutions by inventing new products and processes that better meet client needs.

• Commit to the right plan for launching those products/services to best serve your clients (not the easy plan – your peers will be using that one), and never quit when the going gets tough.

• Pay attention to what is happening around you, hone your risk assessment skills, and do not be afraid to seize emerging opportunities. By the time opportunity knocks loud enough for you to hear it, it’s too late!

• Understand the meaning and importance of values, both organizational and personal – and never compromise them.

This is the foundation on which we will build our future. So, what exactly does the future hold for Open Hand? Change, change and more change.

Now you folks from the profit sector are probably saying “Well of course, the future of business is about nothing but change.” Be that as it may, change is happening in the nonprofit world also—the only difference is that, until recently, the nonprofit sector was somewhat insulated from real world influences.

Current and future change initiatives:

• Our Mission. Take a look at the new mission; it’s really a significant change from the previous one. It means that Open Hand is going to provide Comprehensive Nutrition Care™, which combines nutrition therapy and education with balanced, home-delivered meals.  These services are specifically focused on the concept of preventing or better managing chronic disease through personal empowerment.

• Our Brand. We really went out on a limb here. But we felt that refreshing our brand was necessary to communicate who we are and what we do today.  Our new brand, which launched the first of June, has a fresh, contemporary look that suggests health, wellness, compassion and empowerment, and to me it perfectly complements our new purpose.

Supported by our first concerted media effort in many years (thanks to some of our engaged and incredibly generous stakeholders), our new brand has infused energy into our organization, helped enhance Open Hand's awareness in the community, and spurred a tremendous increase in the number of new volunteers and donors.

• Client and Nutrition Services. Our Client Services team has taken on more of an active role in support of our community referral sources, since our Comprehensive Nutrition Care™ model requires increased interaction between clients, physicians, and other support services. In addition, they will work much more closely with Nutrition Services on scheduling issues and overall communication between our clients, their primary care physicians and support services.

Our new direction also requires change initiatives in Development, Food Service, Distribution, Administration and Volunteer Services. Look for future electronic updates on our progress throughout the year.

There will be much to celebrate during our 20th anniversary year thanks to your support and the guidance from so many of the talented advisors on our board and in the community.  So be prepared to take your place at the table, and take a bow for helping provide 20 years of service to our community. It is a big deal—and you won’t want to miss it!

Executive Director, Open Hand