"It is our mission to make sure people have food, and we’re going to keep letting people know food is a human right." For every one meal the emergency food system provides, SNAP provides nine, and there is triple the number of visits at food shelves in Minnesota than there were five years ago. Learn more about how The Food Group is responding.
"We were in a time of great flux – and still are – when we decided to apply for a Recovery Capital Loan. We wanted to be able to create an environment where we could do our complex and often difficult work well and support our staff doing it."
"We can scale up if more funding becomes available, but I need to know we can remain stable if something falls through or an income generator underperforms."
"I was getting bogged down in very technical things and forgetting the bigger decision making and thinking about how our finances align with our mission."
"I think for many women in leadership roles, there can be a sense of imposter syndrome when it comes to finances. This has been both a good affirmation of ‘you really do know what you’re talking about’ while at the same time giving me some good tools in terms of communicating."
"The cohort experience of the program has been incredibly valuable in that it allows me and encourages me to connect with peers that otherwise I almost never have a chance to."
"The chance to be with leaders of organizations of similar-sized budgets and working from a similar place has been really nice. As an ED, you’re in the middle of everything and also all alone."
"Sometimes being an executive director – and how I imagine it’s like being an artistic director – feels very lonely, especially in a small organization."
