2027 Operating Goals
Advanced Power Math Dashboard
A goal requires numbers and a deadline.
In 2027, we are building the institutional capacity to grow, sustain, deepen, and deploy our base.
Our goals therefore measure more than activity. We will measure whether the base itself is becoming larger, more financially invested, more engaged, more organized, more concentrated, and more capable of reproducing leadership.
Our goal is to end 2027 withnet new members,percent retention,percent of our base meeting minimum baseline annual membership, measurable growth in priority geographies, and measurable growth in leadership capacity.
The measurable transformation in 2027 is this:
We will move from treating base growth primarily as a product of campaigns, events, and individual organizing relationships to operating an intentional Base Architecture in which acquisition, membership conversion, retention, reactivation, participation, organizing, leadership development, and financial investment work as connected systems.
People will enter through different doors. They will participate at different depths. Their relationships will change over time. Our responsibility is to build an institution capable of recognizing those differences, creating meaningful pathways for participation, and ensuring that every significant segment has a defined opportunity and an accountable owner.
Power requires both scale and depth.
Scale without relationship produces an audience.
Relationship without scale produces a small community.
Scale without leadership creates staff dependency.
Leadership without replenishment creates stagnation.
Engagement without financial investment can leave collective capacity dependent on outside resources.
A durable base requires all of these dimensions to grow together.
Our North Star is to become 90 percent member-funded by 2031. Member funding is therefore one dimension of Base Architecture. Financial participation builds collective institutional capacity and makes it possible for members to sustain the institution through which they act together.
In 2027, minimum baseline annual membership — the institution's basic standard of financial membership — becomes an explicit institutional outcome.
No meaningful segment of the base should be organizationally invisible. Every segment must have a defined relationship opportunity, a measurable membership outcome, and an accountable owner.
That does not mean every person follows the same pathway. A new supporter, an active nonmember, a lapsed member, an inactive current member, a committee participant, and a Super Leader represent fundamentally different relationships with the institution. Base Architecture makes those differences visible and actionable.
Organizing and Base Operations therefore perform distinct functions within one architecture. Organizing develops deeper relationships, collective action, leadership, and leadership multiplication. Base Operations operates the systems for acquisition, conversion, retention, reactivation, and scaled participation. Relationship Governance connects the two by making segments, opportunities, transitions, and accountability visible.
We will change our practices to align with this architecture. We will change how we measure success. We will change how we assign responsibility. And we will build the systems required to ensure that growth does not depend exclusively on major events, campaign moments, or individual staff capacity.
The throughline is no longer simply activity → outcome. It is relationship → movement → power.
Our architecture must be capable of producing and governing these movements:
Contacts → Relationships
Relationships → Membership
Membership → Retention
Inactivity → Reactivation
Participation → Deeper Relationship
Participation → Organizing
Organizing → Leadership
Leadership → Multiplication
Individual Giving → Collective Investment
Collective Investment → Institutional Capacity
It is a network of movements, not a ladder.
Power compounds when the base expands, relationships endure, participation deepens, leadership multiplies, and deployment creates new opportunities for growth.