Tip #1: Sometimes big is just big.

We’ve all heard the expression: “go big or go home.”

It’s a motivating call-to-action to do something inspiring. To push yourself and your ideas. To avoid settling for the safe choice.

It’s also sometimes wrong. At least when it comes to social change consulting.

For more than sixteen years, I moved up the ranks in traditional PR and consulting firms. During my various tenures, I built and launched successful campaigns for nonprofits and foundations that moved the needle of public opinion, influenced media coverage, engaged decision-makers, and had a real and positive effect on various people and causes. I loved it and am extremely grateful for what I learned.

Over time, however, I also became more and more aware of and concerned by some critical gaps within the social change space created by traditional communications and communications firms.

Many nonprofits and foundations want and deserve more personal attention from the most experienced strategists but rarely get it because of the firms’ prohibitive cost and staffing models. And the experienced strategists who joined and stayed at those firms to make a difference become more removed – because of those same prohibitive models – from the actual work of social change the more senior they become.

We’ve all heard the expression: “go big or go home.” It’s motivating, it’s inspiring. It’s also sometimes wrong. At least when it comes to social change consulting.

I recently started 1235 Strategies to do my part to fill those critical gaps and offer nonprofits, foundations, and socially conscious brands something different: Senior attention. Minimum overhead. Maximum integration.  

This is the future of social change consulting.

And I’m excited to join the ranks of entrepreneurs who came before me—communications, campaigns, and marketing strategists at the top of their games, who decided that their day-to-day, as well as their professional gains and satisfaction, could and should be more about helping the people and causes they care about.

A healthy bottom line is nice, but even better is the joy that comes from your opportunity being seamlessly and genuinely intertwined with your client’s success.

Now, I’m not audacious enough to predict that the end of the big firm is near. But sometimes big is just big, and traditions are merely the status quo. And when that happens, you find yourself working to just keep up. That may be okay when you’re in the business of widgets (or the metaphorical equivalent), but advancing social change? Certainly, you want and deserve better.

So if you work for a nonprofit, foundation, or socially conscious brand, the next time you’re looking for a consultant, instead of simply relying on the old “go big or go home” concept, consider whether small is the new big.