Women Making A Difference - CEO Interview - Giselle Acevedo, CEO of Para Los Niños - June 6, 2010 - Segment Three

Interview with Giselle Acevedo, CEO of Para Los Niños and the Women Making A Difference Awards CEO of the Year

Betsy and Renee speak with Giselle about the philanthropic legacy of Para Los Niños and how the agency has evolved today into a powerful force for change. Para Los Niños was founded by Tanya Tull—a mentor of Giselle—in 1980, after reading about the plight of children on Skid Row in the Los Angeles Times. The organization was originally focused on child care for families in downtown Los Angeles, with Tanya pulling together some of her friends, $5,000, and a board of directors to open the first child care center right on 6th Street, an old warehouse that had been an eyelash factory but at the time catered to about 47 children. 30 years later, the agency has expanded to provide a range of what Giselle calls “fully integrated education and social services,” serving about 9,000 youth, children, and families each year. Currently, the agency operates 7 child development centers, a preschool, 3 charter schools, 12 elementary afterschool programs, a youth center for teens located on Skid Row, a mental health center, a work force investment program, a foster care program, and social services in the area of child abuse and prevention.

Giselle observes that people think of a non-profit almost pejoratively, and she very often reminds people that it’s really a business, but to be really successful, you have to be thinking about it as a business with a lot of heart leading to a mission. As a CEO, you have to always make sure that you’re aligning your intellectual beliefs with your actions, and you have to sleep every night knowing who you are and how you lead. In the nonprofit world, Giselle explains, there’s a greater amount of accountability, as your shareholders are your funders, your donors, the people in the community, and you have to make sure you’re not only managing with excellence, but that you understand the community you’re serving, who your population is, and that you’re measuring everything you’re doing. That’s why Para Los Niños has a program—Expectations To Outcomes—in which they measure when a child comes in, when they leave, what kind of services they’re getting, and what their success rates are across all their multidisciplinary approaches.

Giselle shares that the transition from running a for-profit business to directing a nonprofit was a humbling experience in many ways. She notes that, when you’re giving away the money, it’s very different than when you’re asking for it, mainly in that everyone responds to your phone calls. Nevertheless, Giselle has learned to ask for the money because she knows the children deserve it, and if she’s not doing that, then she’s not doing her job. This is a really hard time for nonprofits, Giselle notes, and many people have had to make tough business decisions, no matter what their heart said, because they knew it was the right business decision for the long term viability of the agency. To stand in the face of children and families and say “this program no longer exists” has been very painful, says Giselle, and her friends at other nonprofits have all experienced the 30% drop in giving the industry is currently suffering. For information on the work being done by Para Los Niños, visit the agency’s website at www.paralosninos.org.

2Minutes&More with Betsy Berkhemer and Renee Fraser airs every Sunday at 1pm on KFWB NEWS TALK 980. Tune in for a full hour of tips for business success.