Programming Change Among Nonprofit Human Service Organizations During the COVID-19 Pandemic

ABSTRACT

Research shows that nonprofit human service organizations are nimble in times of crisis. The surprising nature of the pandemic posed unique challenges to both the supply and demand sides of the human service sector. One way that nonprofit human service organizations responded to the pandemic environment was through programming change, including adding new programs, serving new populations, and discontinuing previous programs. Drawing from a two-wave statewide survey, our results indicate that a sizable proportion of nonprofit human service organizations engaged in these changes within the first five months of the pandemic. Such decisions were associated with both resource and mission considerations. Extant research shows how strategic change made in response to environmental shifts often leaves an imprint on organizations. As such, pandemic-era programming change may have a lasting impact on the human service sector, further evidenced by leaders’ intentions to sustain them in the years to come.

PRACTICE POINTS

1. The COVID-19 pandemic has forced a number of nonprofit human service organizations (NHSOs) to change their programming. Many NHSOs added programs, added new service populations, and discontinued programs.

2. NHSOs seem to have balanced resource and client needs as they enacted programming change, but as pandemic resources wane NHSOs will need to change further.

3. Programming change enacted during the pandemic was intended to persist after the pandemic ends. This may exert a toll as NHSOs recognize that the pandemic has required them to increase their programming load.

KEYWORDS:

• COVID-19 pandemic
• programming change
• strategic change

Acknowledgments

The authors gratefully acknowledge the research assistance of Glenn College graduate, Elizabeth Colchin, and the active support and involvement of Beth Short at the Ohio Attorney General’s Office.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

¹ We take the term “substantial” in the definition of strategic change to mean sufficiently important due to the change’s proximity to the core of the organization (as opposed to the size of the change). Programming is always important regardless of the size of the change because it is core to reaching organizational goals/mission. By way of corollary, much of the research on strategic change comes from the management literature and any changes to products would be considered strategic in nature. NHSOs are service-providing organizations, and programs are the equivalent of products in such a setting.

² We used a $1 overlap instead of using 99 cents at the end of each category due to practitioners’ recommendations during survey testing.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by The Ohio State University Office of Outreach and Engagement.