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What Do We Mean By CAPACITY-BUILDING?  

Unity Foundation defines "capacity-building" as a three-part, continuous process of:

Attracting and managing finite Board-ensured resources (both human and capital) on a rapidly changing landscape in order to produce projects, programs, services and activities that are demonstrably appropriate to the nonprofit's mission.

Who bears primary responsibility for ensuring that capacity building actually happens in a nonprofit organization?

Capacity-building is the special purview - in law and in practice -- of the Board of Directors or Trustees of a nonprofit organization working in tandem with the Executive Staff (CEO/Executive Director, Chief Development Officer and Chief Financial Officer). For the Board, a higher order of duties and responsibilities is required for their role in guarding the public trust (as delineated by the Revised Model Nonprofit Corporations Acts, State law and by the organization's own Articles of Incorporation and Bylaws) as well as the statements made to the IRS in the process of obtaining official recognition of tax-exempt status:  

• Directors share in the Duty of Care by which they are legally obliged to exercise the degree of care and skill that a "prudent person" would exercise under similar circumstances in a like situation.  

• The Duty of Loyalty stipulates that Directors may not use their positions to further conflicting interests - personal, family, corporate or in favor of another nonprofit organization.  

• Directors are legally compelled by the Duty of Obedience to ensure that the nonprofit not deviate in any substantial way from the legal obligation to fulfill the particular purposes for which the organization is lawfully incorporated.

In short, Board Directors and Officers have a fiduciary responsibility - an obligation of public trust to serve the best interests of the community - to ensure the nonprofit's survival, financial viability and program performance. Breach of any of these duties may result in liability for Directors and Officers of the Board.

Capacity-building, then, is the team goal of all constituents:  Board, paid staff and volunteers. But the Board is duty-bound to ensure that the Corporate Purpose statement contained in the Articles of Incorporation as legally amended and disclosed to the IRS in the Organization's annual 990 return filings is carried out in a financially responsible manner.

Therefore, when it comes to capacity building in a nonprofit organization:   "It's the BOARD!"

C.Q.® Registration      

The C.Q.® Process

How to C.Q.® Your Organization ~ A step-by-step guide

A Brief History of C.Q.®

C.Q. ® was initially created to assist Unity Foundation in fulfilling its mission to assist sustainable, high-performance nonprofits, or those with the willingness to be so. Unity Foundation's staff believed that such an instrument already existed - but this was not the case. There are many instruments currently available to nonprofits; however, few, if any, define capacity-building and measure it quantitatively.

Over a period of 30 months, Unity Foundation staff designed the C.Q.® instrument relying on input from nonprofit expertise and scholarship in finance, fundraising, law, accounting, technology, marketing, communications, program management and human resources. The instrument has a Board-driven focus working in conjunction with Executive Staff.  

Unity Foundation has worked with several other national funders and facilitated C.Q.® Initiatives around the country. In response to the needs of these funders, the Readiness Section was added to the instrument and the Benchmarks Analysis Report was created to assist in the review process.

Who Has Taken C.Q.®? A quick look at the numbers (PDF)

C.Q.® Participant Statistics