The Stanford Alumni Consulting Team (ACT) matches management consultant volunteers with non-profit organizations facing strategic challenges. Each year, the program provides ~$5 million in pro bono consulting services. To date, over 1,750 graduates of the Stanford Graduate School of Business (GSB) have impACTed 1,000+ nonprofit and social benefit organizations.
ACT engagements have focused on general management, growth strategies, financial analysis, brand building, and more. Our alumni teams develop a deep understanding of organizational dynamics, including the complexities of planning, decision-making, and change implementation, before making recommendations that ultimately help clients achieve their most ambitious goals.
Stanford ACT is committed to completing 50 consulting projects by the end of 2025 for organizations dedicated to fostering inclusion and racial equity. As of early 2024, we are 75% of the way to the goal.
Alumni Consulting Team Service Offerings
ACT scales its engagements to meet the magnitude of the challenges identified by our clients as well as the bandwidth and appetite at their current stage:
- Springboard Sessions: 2 hour, facilitated brainstorming session with a team of ~6 alumni focused on enumerating and expanding the options that a client has. Held in the Spring
- Fast Track Project: Ongoing engagement (~3 months) with a team of 3-4 alumni to dive into a specific challenge or decision facing the organization
- Full Project: Ongoing engagement (~6 months) with a team of 5-6 alumni to understand a complex strategic challenge for the organization
Traditional ACT Consulting Projects
Traditional ACT consulting projects bring a GSB alumni team together to address critical strategic issues over a 3 to 6-month time frame. Consulting Projects are conducted annually in the fall. Each project is staffed with an ACT Project Leader (or co-Leaders), and fits the size and resources of the client organization, sometimes providing a single consultant and other times a team of up to six.
Springboard Sessions
Springboard Sessions are two-hour brainstorming sessions with a GSB alumni team that is pre-briefed on the client’s specific strategic issue. Sessions are held annually in the spring. Each Springboard Session includes 4-6 volunteers who generate ideas for addressing a specific, focused challenge facing an organization.
| June 30, 2024 | Fast Track and Full Projects: Nonprofit Deadline to Express Interest |
|---|---|
| July 17, 2024 | Fast Track and Full Projects: Application deadline for nonprofits invited to submit project proposals |
| September 15, 2024 | Volunteer Application deadline |
Our Impact
Created by Stanford GSB alumni in 1987, ACT is now one of the largest pro bono resource providers in the San Francisco Bay Area. Since its inception, ACT has served nearly 1,000 clients for an estimated consulting value of over $100 million. For nonprofits advancing racial equity, ACT has broadened its geographic scope to all regions of the US. In a typical year, ACT works with about 30 nonprofits, providing roughly $5 million in value annually.
Our Clients
ACT clients range from small, community-based nonprofits to university and hospital departments, government agencies, and programs. Regardless of size, clients are drawn to ACT because they recognize the tremendous value of partnering with Stanford GSB’s talent network. Our alumni consultants bring expertise in various domains, such as general management, corporate strategy/planning, financial management, and resource planning. Stanford ACT often cultivates multi-year relationships with our clients through phased engagements. In order to ensure impactful partnerships, prospective clients must meet eligibility requirements and qualify through a screening process so that we can identify organizations that can most benefit from the unique collaboration with Stanford ACT.
Stories of Impact
Browse the articles below to see some of the ways that ACT volunteers have helped Bay Area nonprofits increase their impact.
