Nonprofit Performance 360 Magazine Vol 3 No 2

A.J. ROuNDS

Soaring to New Heights

G oogle. Tesla. Amazon. Under Armour. What do these companies do that makes them so awesome? Their management, business models, and attention to customer appeal all make a critical difference to their success. They embody the same philosophies we, as nonprofits, should be upholding as well. For the Responsibility Foundation, this was not always the case. In the 1990s, our mission found its beginnings when Holocaust survivor Viktor Frankl, the author of Man’s Search for Meaning , met with Dr. James Newman, Dr. Stephen R. Covey and several other individuals, to discuss a seemingly impossible dream: Frankl’s vision of supplementing the Statue of Liberty on the U.S. East Coast with a Statue of Responsibility on the West Coast. In 1997, sculptor Gary Lee Price was commissioned to create the design. In 2004, he and an entourage travelled to Vienna, Austria, to show the prototype, which depicted two clasped hands, to Frankl’s widow, Elly. She could not contain her emotion as she showed the group a wood carving Frankl had obtained shortly after his release from the concentration camps in Germany, which held great meaning for him. It was a carving of a kneeling man reaching upwards to Heaven. Frankl had often used the carving as a symbol of responsibility, as he wondered, “Where is the hand reaching back?” And Price had taken a sculpture to Elly that answered that question.

The Mission Began The team behind the Statue of Responsibility has increased its momentum in many ways in the years that have passed since that magnificent day. This is more than a monument...it’s a MOVEMENT! We repeat this slogan many times each day. For the individuals behind the Statue of Responsibility, this mission has become a way of life. But our fervent commitment was far from enough to bring this goal to life. We needed to create a great organization, like the strongest commercial companies have done, in order to accomplish our ultimate goal: within the next ten years we intend to construct a 300-foot structure, The Statue of Responsibility, on the U.S. West Coast to stand as a beacon of hope for generations to come. The Responsibility Foundation was Created The Responsibility Foundation has become the organization that leads this movement.The team has a governing board of 17 (aWho’s Who team led by Dr. Nancy D. O’Reilly, a renowned philanthropist and a trailblazer for women’s empowerment). However, the team needed to do something big and immediate to surmount the giant gap between their admirable mission and the seemingly insurmountable goal of bringing the Statue to life.

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