Less than three years ago, Steve Mariotti created NFTE, a nonprofit organization for teaching entrepreneurship to disadvantaged youths. The organization has gained national recognition, and offers a variety of programs on a budget of nearly half a million dollars. It is still run out of Mariotti’s apartment. Mariotti is beginning to feel the stress of rapid growth and is concerned that further expansion will require significant organizational change. Students are presented with the challenge of advising Mariotti on this change process. The case is about the challenge of taking an organization beyond the founder-dependent, informal start-up stage of development.
Harvard Business Publishing, 1991
By Gregory J Dees and Alice Oberfield