MC TIMELINE
2001-2005
In 2001, our journey began as Austin Nonprofit Resource network which then became Greenlights for Nonprofit Success (Greenlights) in 2003, led by Founding Executive Director, Deborah Edward and serving Travis, Williamson, Hays, Bastrop, and Caldwell counties. In our early years, Greenlights offered an array of services including consulting, education, networking, and information services. In 2004, we launched the Greenlights Back Office program, offering in-house financial management/human resource services to nonprofits.
MC Board Chairs during this period were: Libby Malone, Cindy Kozmetsky, Dave Wenger, and Anna Sanchez.
2006-2010
2006: As Greenlights began to grow as an organization, so did our programming, which included a nonprofit membership program of 350+ nonprofits coming together as peer nonprofit leaders to learn and strategize.
We also began offering leadership and training opportunities for volunteer board members and launched the first Crossroads Conference for nonprofit partners to share ideas and best practices. In 2006, our founding director Deborah Edward passed the torch of leadership to Matt Kouri, who joined as CEO in 2007.
MC Board Chairs during this period were: Bryan Campbell, Rob Bridges, Suzanna Caballero, and David Shaw.
2011-2015
2011: Almost a decade into our work, Greenlights continued to scale our programmatic offerings in consulting and training, including nonprofit executive director gatherings and our annual Board Summit. We also provided support to OneStar Foundation and Texas partners organizing the Texas Nonprofit Summit.
In 2013, we began serving as a collaborative backbone for the emerging collaboration of the Travis County Collaborative for Children (TCCC), focused on reducing childhood trauma within the child welfare system, while achieving dramatic healing that nurtures families and permanency. Following the 2008 recession, we supported nonprofits through strategy and sustainability offerings, and in 2015, we published a seminal research report, On the Verge: Value & Vulnerability of Austin’s Nonprofit Sector.
In 2015, Greenlights merged with Innovation Plus, a local philanthropic group of skills-based volunteers connected to Social Venture Partners International (SVPI) – a global network of engaged philanthropists. Greenlights for Nonprofit Success and Innovation Plus rebranded as Mission Capital.
Our combined work included innovative programming and partnerships with SVP supporting nonprofits with earned revenue modeling, scaling for impact, and social enterprise expertise.
In 2015, Mission Capital also began to backbone a collective of funders dedicated to supporting data, evaluation, and learning for social impact (for funders and nonprofits alike). Known as Good Measure, this collective group co-created signature program offerings such as Data Leaders Academy, Measuring What Matters, and the biannual Data Institute.
MC Board Chairs during this period were: John Grimes, Manuel Azuara, Josh Galatzan, Steve Aycock, and Dennis Cavner.
2016-2021
In 2017, CEO Matt Kouri concluded a decade of service with Mission Capital, as he passed the baton of leadership to Madge Vásquez as CEO in 2018. The Mission Capital board and staff signaled their dedication to adopting an explicit racial equity commitment, and thus an era of internal capacity building, learning, and unlearning began.
Also in 2018, Mission Capital’s Aligned Impact team worked with Partnerships for Children to transition the role of backbone support for Foster Community.
In 2019, Mission Capital adopted a strategic plan to center racial equity and continued deep work to transform our staff and internal operations in service of new goals and strategies.
In 2020, our world was halted by the pandemic of COVID-19. Since March 2020, Mission Capital has sought to strengthen relationships and rapidly respond to the needs of our community partners, funders, and neighbors. Our team has expanded collaborative efforts (COVID-19 Pulse Surveys, Mental Health, and Digital Equity & Inclusion convenings) as we continue to navigate the pandemic of COVID-19, national racial reckoning, and economic instability. Mission Capital also joined a collective group of community partners to advocate for the City of Austin’s ANCHOR Relief Fund, which provided $6 Million in COVID-19 relief funds to area nonprofits.
Moreover, we seized this moment of disruption to intentionally revamp external program offerings, while still engaging in personal learning and transformation. This included new offerings such as Race to Lead - Central Texas Brief, Implicit Bias Learning Circles, Austin’s Compounding Structural Racism, WeThrive BIPOC CEO/ED Coaching Circles, and Nonprofit Mentorship programs. It also included the collaborative spin-off of SVP Austin, as an independent nonprofit organization in 2020.
In 2021, we continued to respond to our changing world and workplace. Our staff went fully remote in April as we made a strategic decision to conclude our Mission Capital lease at the UFCU plaza. We also continued to clarify who and how we serve and defined four pillars for equipping and connecting with our community.
We hosted over 100 community events and trainings with over 3,500 people. We partnered with several organizations to create conversations around mental health and digital equity, worked closely with our data leaders for our Good Measure convening, and strengthened relationships through our Child Welfare convening. We refreshed member benefits and resources, like our jobs board, to build more meaningful connections. We also learned tough lessons around caring for ourselves and each other by grappling with what it looks like to combat burnout and reinforce mental wellness.
MC Board Chairs during this period were: Jennifer Vickers, John Thornborrow, Anna Robinson, Thomas Miranda, Ashley Thompson, and Denise Davis.