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M
y first time inside a corporate board-
room was a disaster.
Susan G. Komen, now the world’s largest
nonprofit source of funding for the fight
against breast cancer, was the quintessential
start-up. I started in my living room with
total capital of $200. So I went to New
York City to recruit corporate partners and
convince makers of women’s intimate apparel
and cosmetics to include labels reminding
women to get mammograms. I thought it
was brilliant. Everyone else thought it was
negative marketing, and they showed me the
door.
Twenty-five years later, Komen has more
than 130 corporate partners whose creative
cause-related marketing programs help us
raise and invest more than $150 million a year
for breast cancer research and community
outreach programs to women in need. By the
end of this year, Komen will have invested
nearly $1 billion in breast cancer research and
community outreach programs, making us
the world’s largest source of nonprofit funds
dedicated to fighting breast cancer.
How did we do it? Building a nonprofit is
much like building a business, with social
entrepreneurship demanding many of the
same skills as any other venture.
Seeing the Invisible
Great undertakings, whether building a
business or curing a disease, inspire people
with a bold vision. Ever since my sister,
Susan G. Komen, made me promise in her
final moments that I’d eradicate this disease,
Komen has been driven by a single vision - a
world without breast cancer.
Successful entrepreneurs excel at what
Jonathan Swift called the art of seeing the
invisible. To others, the cure to breast cancer
may be invisible. To us, it’s inevitable. To
paraphrase the Proverbs, where there is no
vision, the organization perishes.
Connecting, Not Marketing
It’s one of the biggest mistakes in business
and nonprofits: marketing a product instead
of connecting with people on an emotional
level. Everything we do at Komen, especially
the Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure
Series©, allows people to support the cause
in a personal, meaningful way.
People don’t donate to organizations or
simply buy products. They believe in ideas
and dreams. Become the idea, the dream,
that people want.
Dare to be Different
For businesses and nonprofits, the challenge
is the same: standing out from the crowd.
Komen has always distinguished itself by
funding the unfunded - funding programs
Seeing the Invisible
NANCy G. BriNkEr
that have been overlooked by others. Find
your niche.Then do it better than anyone else.
Evolve or Perish
What Darwin said of organisms is true of
organizations. It’s not the strongest that
survive; it’s the ones that are most adaptable
to change. Had we never created Komen’s
innovative affiliate model, in which 75%
of funds raised by our local affiliates stays
in those communities while 25% supports
research, we wouldn’t have grown to 125
affiliates with more than 100,000 survivors
and activists. As a result, we’re the world’s
largest grassroots network fighting breast
cancer.
The return on our investment? When caught
early before it spreads beyond the breast,
the survival rate for breast cancer is now 98
percent, and there are more than 2 million
breast cancer survivors alive today. That’s not
bad for a living-room start-up.
Yet our vision remains. And until there’s
a world without breast cancer, we’ll keep
minding our business.
Nancy G. Brinker grew up in a household of caregivers
and fundraisers. In addition to creating Susan G. Komen
for the Cure (now known as Susan G. Komen) in her
sister’s memory, she has served in public relations
and broadcasting, as Ambassador to Hungary, and as
White House Chief of Protocol. She is the recipient of
numerous awards, including the Presidential Medal of
Freedom.
ww5.komen.org