Tenisha Gist, after 20+ years of work at Partners for Better Housing, you've built something real — and the fact that you're here, asking hard questions about what's holding you back, says a lot about the kind of leader you are. You named it directly: lack of sustainable revenue. That's not a vague problem — it's a structural one, and it's the right thing to be focused on. What follows is an honest look at the three forces most likely keeping Partners for Better Housing from the growth and stability it's earned.
Jesse Lane founder of goodmakerU, has a message to walk you through your report to let you know whats here, and how to use it.
When more than half your revenue flows from a single source — and you've confirmed that's the reality at Partners for Better Housing — you're not running an organization so much as managing a dependency. Foundations and grants are a legitimate, even strong funding strategy, but when one funder can effectively shut your doors by declining a renewal, every other decision you make gets distorted by that risk. You said yourself that fundraising isn't producing enough to fund the vision, and that you rely too heavily on one major funder. That's not a fundraising execution problem — it's a portfolio problem. The work is good; the financial architecture underneath it is fragile. Before you can grow with confidence, you need to build a revenue base that can absorb a loss without triggering a crisis.
You were refreshingly honest when you said everything would struggle if you stepped back — and that kind of candor is exactly what makes this worth naming clearly. After two decades, it's natural for an organization to become shaped around its founder or longest-serving leader. But when fundraising, operations, staff morale, and external communications all route through one person, you've created a ceiling. Every dollar you raise, every partnership you build, every grant you write is capped by what one person can hold. With a team of 2–5 full-time staff and 3–5 departures in recent years, the weight is real. Building delegation, documentation, and distributed leadership isn't about stepping back from the work — it's about making sure the work survives and scales beyond any single person's bandwidth.
Your one-sentence description of your board — 'Supports staff and wants to help!' — is genuinely warm, and it tells me your board members aren't disengaged in spirit. But wanting to help and actively helping are two different things, especially when it comes to fundraising and revenue diversification. Given that your top stated priority is diversifying revenue streams, your board is one of the most underutilized assets you have. Board members who are willing but not yet activated around fundraising, donor relationships, or network introductions represent significant untapped capacity. Partners for Better Housing doesn't need a board overhaul — it needs a clear ask, a simple structure, and leadership that channels that goodwill into specific revenue-generating action.
These three blockers aren't independent — they form a cycle that keeps reinforcing itself. Because everything runs through you, there's no bandwidth to build the individual donor relationships and diversified revenue streams that would break the concentration risk. And because revenue is so concentrated, there's constant pressure to keep the existing funder happy, which consumes exactly the time and energy that should go toward building something more stable. Meanwhile, a board that wants to help but hasn't been activated sits on the sidelines — full of connections and capacity that could open new doors — while you carry the load alone. The good news: these blockers share a solution. Activating your board and distributing leadership creates the capacity to diversify revenue. Diversifying revenue reduces the pressure that keeps you trapped in the cycle.
Get your team and your board in on this conversation. Reports like this one work best when the whole organization can tackle issues together.
