The purpose of this paper is to explore narratives in a new nonprofit arts center. It includes the macro-, meso-, and personal narratives that keep the center organized in the midst of the chaotic everyday activities. It advocates the explanatory force of narrative as an alternative to organizational life cycle theory for understanding organizational startups. This narrative ethnography involved participant observation, full participation, and narrative interviews over a three-year period. Using grounded theory, narratives were examined to discover how they engendered and maintained order. This paper contributes to the understanding narratives as a constitutional organizing and sensemaking process, including the narratives of “do it yourself,” and economic production, family and home, and personal narratives that constitute community, community boundaries, and identity, adding to our knowledge of organizing. The research examined only one local nonprofit arts center, therefore the findings are specific to this site and the same types of narratives may not necessarily be found in other nonprofits. This paper examines a nonprofit during start-up. It validates support for the examination of organizations through narrative ethnography and narrative interviewing. It purports that narratives constitute social identity, rather than being the evidence of social identity.

Allt fler familjer lever med neuropsykiatriska funktionsnedsättningar. Tidigare forskning visar på att många föräldrar till barn med neuropsykiatrisk funktionsnedsättning upplever en hög stressnivå i vardagen på grund av diagnosen / diagnoserna. Detta kan leda till att föräldrar utvecklar tillstånd som depression, utmattningssyndrom och liknande problematik. Författarna till denna uppsats har haft ett intresse av att se vidare på den viktiga roll familjen har för att skapa en hög livskvalitet för personer med funktionsnedsättning. Syftet med denna studie var att undersöka ideella föreningars företrädares erfarenheter av det stöd som finns tillgängligt från den offentliga sektorn till medlemmarna i deras förening. Eftersom författarna har valt att intervjua ideella föreningars företrädare har det varit möjligt att uppnå en bred kunskap om ämnet då föreningarna når ut till personer med funktionsnedsättningar och deras släktingar. Syftet med denna uppsats var också att ta upp frågor om huruvida ett holistiskt tillvägagångssätt tillämpas i insatser riktade mot personer med funktionsnedsättning och deras familjer. Den teoretiska ramen för denna studie är baserad på Goffmans stigmatiska teori samt Hochschilds teori om emotionellt arbete. / An exceeding amount of families today are affected by neuropsychiatric disabilities. Previous research shows that many parents of children with neuropsychiatric disabilities experience a high stress level in everyday life due to the diagnosis / diagnoses. This can result in that parents develop conditions such as depression, chronic fatigue syndrome and similar problems. The authors of this study had an interest to look further into the important role the family has in creating a high quality of life for individuals with disability. The aim of this study was to investigate non- profit associate representatives experience of the support available from the public sector to the members of their organization. Since the authors have chosen to interview non-profit associate representatives, it has been possible to achieve a broad knowledge of the subject as the associations target people with disabilities and their relatives. The purpose of this study was also to raise questions concerning if a holistic approach is applied in interventions aimed at individuals with disability and their families. The theoretical framework for this study is based on Goffmans stigma theory as well as Hochschild's theory on emotional work.

The aim of this study was to explore employees attitudes within the social serviceand non-profit organizations, regarding difficulties and possibilities in a potentialcollaboration between these two sectors concerning individuals with gamblingproblems. The empirical material is based on qualitative methods, thus semistructured interviews were performed with social workers working with individualswith gambling problems in the social service and in one non-profit organization ina city in Sweden. When analyzing the empirical data we applied three theories;Danermark’s collaboration theory, Hasensfeld’s theories about Human ServiceOrganization, Scott’s and Abrahamson & Andersen’s systems theory. The mainresult indicates that difficulties in a collaboration are due to lack of insight into eachothers organizations, different organizational structures and conditions, and also animbalance in the interdependence relationship among the two organizations.Additionally, the study shows possibilities when it comes to exchange ofknowledge and operating as a complement with one and other when supporting thetarget group.

This study explores the phenomenon of new power as a framework for empowerment for non-profit organizations. The concept is coined by social entrepreneurs Henry Timms and Jeremy Heimans in their book New Power (2018), and the aim is to investigate the effects of new media today through analysis of twelve media actors experiences of working in the creative industries. Through a flexible study based on the paradigm of phenomenology, this thesis researched by examining new power as a 'black box’—an object of human perception—to arrive at new understandings of the workings of media environments today. The qualitative data is backed by a case study of a niche community in the form of digital scrapings that reveal characteristics of spreadable mechanisms in a networked community. Drawing on dominating theories about participatory cultures, convergence media, and mediatization, the study found tendencies of new media leading to the subordination to the power of prevailing media actors. It concludes by considering future implications for the evolution of Web 3.0, where digital platforms will evolve into a co-constitutive digital sphere where media actors and individuals alike will take action in shaping the digital culture of media, as in the cases of leading digital companies BuzzFeed and Reddit.Keywords:Media Transformation, Non-profit organization, Web 2.0, Media Transformation, New Media, Participatory Cultures, New Power, Social Mobilization, Digital Promise

Social media has several advantages over more traditional forms of mass communication, but many non-profit organizations (NPOs) are underutilizing social media as a communication platform. There is limited research on social media use among NPOs in rural Appalachia. The current study fills this gap in the literature by examining social media use among NPOs in rural Appalachian Tennessee. We conducted 20 semi-structured phone interviews with NPO representatives (President, CEO, Executive Directors) in an 8-county region of Appalachian Tennessee. The interviews were transcribed and analyzed using Braun and Clarke’s thematic analysis. Thematic analysis indicated that rurality, organizational capacity, messaging, and social media as a secondary communication strategy were important themes. Fiscal, personnel, and time constraints were limiting factors in terms of NPOs ability to use social media. NPOs used social media primarily to share information with their target audience. While acknowledged as an important feature of social media, NPOs were less likely to use social media to advocate, engage, or mobilize community support. Further data collection is ongoing to confirm these findings and to identify best practices. NPOs in rural Appalachia can use these findings to enhance their communication strategies.

Thesis (Ed.D.)--Boston University / PLEASE NOTE: Boston University Libraries did not receive an Authorization To Manage form for this thesis or dissertation. It is therefore not openly accessible, though it may be available by request. If you are the author or principal advisor of this work and would like to request open access for it, please contact us at open-help@bu.edu. Thank you. / This research focused on understanding the process of nonprofit growth through geographic expansion, including challenges, opportunities, and critical decision points. A qualitative case study design was used. City Year and Citizen Schools, two Boston based, youth-serving organizations, served as the subjects of this study. Data collection included interviews with founders/leaders, board members, staff members, and other key informants; observation; and a review of internal and external documents. Using the principles of grounded theory, a Preliminary Nonprofit Geographic Expansion Model was developed through analysis of the two cases. Several major themes that emerged from the analysis were explored. This discussion of themes led to a Revised Nonprofit Geographic Expansion Model. Further study is required to test the generalizability of the Revised Nonprofit Expansion Model and relevant insights. / 2031-01-02

In 2015, Swedish Non-Profit Organizations (NPOs) served as the backbone of society, assisting 162.877 immigrant refugees escaping conflict zones throughout the world. As the thrive to include newcomer refugees in the Swedish society continues, non-profits are facing numerous of challenges such as operating in highly competitive environments marked by shrinking grant budgets and increased pressure to provide long-term impact. To achieve optimal NPO organizational sustainability, the non-profit sector must therefore interact and learn how to address the aforementioned difficulties collectively. Furthermore, existing studies emphasizes the scarcity of research on learning through non-profit collaboration, as the knowledge management and organizational learning field has mostly concentrated on the for-profit sector rather than the non-profit sector. To fill this research gap, this study uses a qualitative approach to investigate NPO perceptions of interorganizational learning through collaboration, conducting ten semi-structured interviews with NPO employees working with newcomer refugees in Sweden. The results indicated that the NPOs’ learning outcomes connected to the need for collective sensemaking of the Swedish government’s new migration policies, which had a significant influence on the target groups prospects of remaining in Sweden. Moreover, the NPOs learned from unsuccessful collaborations, resulting in changes to the organizations’ routines and processes aimed at improving future collaborations. As a consequence, learning outcomes were incorporated into their organizational memory through digital Knowledge Management Systems such as Google Drive and Rise-Up. They were, however, heavily reliant on people’s willingness to share tacit and explicit knowledge, as well as an organizational culture that encouraged them to knowledge share. As a result, most non-profits either did not upgrade these systems at all or did not have the technological infrastructure to do so in the first place.

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