Hey Yoni! Darryl Holliday here from the JSX team. I could hardly agree more—and would appreciate your take on a plan the JSX team is workshopping alongside others mentioned here. I think it gets right to your point, and is exactly the kind of coordinated effort I see you calling for. I'd love to connect.
I wrote this piece hoping it would resonate with the right people. It makes me optimistic to know you are already workshopping a plan. That is exactly the move the field needs right now.
I would love to connect. I am eager to see what you are building. I would be happy to offer any perspective I can.
I will follow up with you directly so we can find a time to walk through it.
Note 1: I’m coaching a newsroom that is in start up mode and has - at last count - contracts with 5 JSOs, each one assigned to a different element of the work (tech, strategy, product launch, foundations, major gifts). I think the rollout would’ve been way more effective for each if someone - either a rep at one of the JSOs, or one of teh startup staffers, or your idea of a dispatcher — had convened all of us right at the start so that we could take advantage of the tremendous knowledge base this one newsroom has gathered around it. Hasn’t happened. No one is responsible for “bridging.” It would not be hard to make this happen. I guess I would say that in all the years I’ve worked in the nonprofit space, it’s the genuine exception and not the rule that someone - either a smart funder/program officer, or some staffer that needs a new project or recognizes the loss of efficiency - takes the lead.
Note 2: my wife works for a county mental health department; they’re dealing with incoming queries/calls either from social service or law enforcement, or from potential clients or their families. Intake is crucial to get them pointed to the right starting place for help. Your observation that there is a practice of trained intake specialists is on point, in this field as in disaster relief.
That five JSO situation troubles me because it's almost a perfect example of friction created by nothing more than the lack of a bridge/dispatcher to coordinate those vast resources. As you said, that should be the anomaly, but we are just not structurally built that way...yet.
I also liked reading the affirmation from the mental health side. As you point out, intake is key in that world as well. Funny you should mention that. It reminded me of something Jessica Durkin commented on in a previous post about legal aid. She was making the point that catch-all referral agencies like 211 don't always help with legal problems because they lack legal expertise to assess the root problem.
I hesitate when folks want to give this function over to an AI agent because, for the dispatcher to be effective, it needs that diagnostic expertise that your wife's team has. There needs to be a human element to understand the nuance of the problem, not just run a database query.
Hey Yoni! Darryl Holliday here from the JSX team. I could hardly agree more—and would appreciate your take on a plan the JSX team is workshopping alongside others mentioned here. I think it gets right to your point, and is exactly the kind of coordinated effort I see you calling for. I'd love to connect.
Hey Darryl. This is fantastic to hear.
I wrote this piece hoping it would resonate with the right people. It makes me optimistic to know you are already workshopping a plan. That is exactly the move the field needs right now.
I would love to connect. I am eager to see what you are building. I would be happy to offer any perspective I can.
I will follow up with you directly so we can find a time to walk through it.
Yoni - 2 notes from personal experience.
Note 1: I’m coaching a newsroom that is in start up mode and has - at last count - contracts with 5 JSOs, each one assigned to a different element of the work (tech, strategy, product launch, foundations, major gifts). I think the rollout would’ve been way more effective for each if someone - either a rep at one of the JSOs, or one of teh startup staffers, or your idea of a dispatcher — had convened all of us right at the start so that we could take advantage of the tremendous knowledge base this one newsroom has gathered around it. Hasn’t happened. No one is responsible for “bridging.” It would not be hard to make this happen. I guess I would say that in all the years I’ve worked in the nonprofit space, it’s the genuine exception and not the rule that someone - either a smart funder/program officer, or some staffer that needs a new project or recognizes the loss of efficiency - takes the lead.
Note 2: my wife works for a county mental health department; they’re dealing with incoming queries/calls either from social service or law enforcement, or from potential clients or their families. Intake is crucial to get them pointed to the right starting place for help. Your observation that there is a practice of trained intake specialists is on point, in this field as in disaster relief.
Steve, these are excellent field notes. Thanks.
That five JSO situation troubles me because it's almost a perfect example of friction created by nothing more than the lack of a bridge/dispatcher to coordinate those vast resources. As you said, that should be the anomaly, but we are just not structurally built that way...yet.
I also liked reading the affirmation from the mental health side. As you point out, intake is key in that world as well. Funny you should mention that. It reminded me of something Jessica Durkin commented on in a previous post about legal aid. She was making the point that catch-all referral agencies like 211 don't always help with legal problems because they lack legal expertise to assess the root problem.
I hesitate when folks want to give this function over to an AI agent because, for the dispatcher to be effective, it needs that diagnostic expertise that your wife's team has. There needs to be a human element to understand the nuance of the problem, not just run a database query.