For profit business

Jemmott Rollins Group

As a management consulting firm, Jemmott Rollins Group has built a reputation for developing innovative concepts and providing leadership in working with marginalized communities. Relevant achievements to this effort include:

- Facilitated an 18 month planning process for South Los Angeles Building Healthy Communities, a ten-year, comprehensive community initiative of the California Endowment to revolutionize the way Californians think about and support health in their communities.

- Conceptualized and currently serves as lead coordinator of Strong Field Project, a four-year effort by the Blue Shield of California Foundation aimed at building a strong, coordinated network of domestic violence service providers in California.

Provided a space for Black, Latino and Southeast Asian boys and men of color to connect with local and state officials on issues affecting young men in South LA, East LA and Long Beach through the Brothers, Sons, Selves campaign, a project funded by the Liberty Hill Foundation and the California Endowment.

- Provided consulting services to over 30 nonprofits and foundations in California, garnering testimonials that include the following:

"JRG is uniquely qualified to facilitate and support the complex process of community change. They 'get it' in a way that few others do." —Tom David, Tides Network, San Franscisco

"JRG helped diversify our funding base, increase capacity and manage growth. Every time we've worked with JRG over the past five years, CoCo has taken a leap in organizational development."—Aurea Montes-Rodriguez, Community Coalition, Los Angeles

"JRG helped us realize that we all need to step back and look at the big picture every so often so that we make sure we keep on the right track." —Ben Schirmer, Rainbow Services, San Pedro

For additional background information, please visit our website at jemmottrollinsgroup.net.

1 Submitted Idea

  • 2013 Grants Challenge

    The South LA Hub: Strengthening Nonprofits in South Los Angeles

    Imagine a stronger, more connected South LA. This vision means more resident participation, deeper connections between community members, and greater collaboration amongst community organizations. The road to this vision of Los Angeles relies on strengthening and supporting the entities that are designed to bring people together.

    We are working with a group of non-profits to create a hub for capacity building using the talents and strengths of nine veteran organizations who have worked in the field. By finding new roles for these veteran leaders and managers in South LA, we create pathways for emerging leaders, increase earned income for the nonprofits by providing consulting and technical assistance to their peers and strengthen social connection through these interactions. Our goal is to fortify the nonprofit infrastructure in a part of LA that is underserved in order to see a stronger movement towards civic engagement.

    Capacity building and technical assistance support is a $2billion industry in the US led by consultants and for-profit management service agencies (Foundation Center). By coalescing nonprofit organizations in South LA and establishing a physical space for these leaders and managers to crowdsource, our model will increase collaborative efforts and result in healthier nonprofit organizations. The hub model conserves resources by promoting strategic partnerships and assist organizations in developing business plans, exchanging skills and knowledge, breaking their isolation and adding more focus to their individual efforts.

    Envision a place in South LA bustling with small groups of nonprofit leaders collaborating to share ideas and spark innovation. Imagine a hub for peer learning that is available to members in Spanish and English, with sessions led not by external experts, but by people in the community that leaders can relate to. Here nonprofit managers can bring their questions on the difficult to navigate financial statements, for example, and receive one-on-one support from a peer organization trained and verified as having skill within this topic of interest. This mentor organization will serve as an ongoing point of contact for resource sharing between the two agencies. Both organizations participate in peer-led sessions on community mobilization strategies while gaining partners in day-to-day challenges of managing an organization as well as allies in the movement to engage communities.

    Different than other collaborative models already at work in South LA and Boyle Heights, this effort works specifically build capacity within organizations versus creating a campaign or agenda. Our goal is to provide tools to organizations so that they might be more effective and connected to others when engaging in work of their own.

    With the support of LA2050, we will take the first step in creating this environment. By December 31, 2013 we will design this buh-like model and launch a series of ‘Peer-led Consulting Convenings’ to engage at least 100 South LA organizations in peer-led capacity building support around their pressing management challenges. This effort requires the identification and training of nine veteran nonprofits with demonstrated skill in civic engagement work and internal management. At least 30 participating organizations will benefit from one-one-one consulting support from the veteran leaders. Through the convenings, these trained veterans will offer free, high-quality consulting to their peers, building a stronger network of capable community engagement organizations within the nonprofit landscape. In turn, these organizations will be more resilient and better equipped to lead Los Angeles towards a new era of greater connectedness.