Celebrating the Tries Along With The Triumphs
The Beauty in the Battle: Why Nonprofits Must Celebrate Tries as Much as Triumphs
Why Nonprofits Should Share Both Successes and Failures: Building Trust Through the Whole Story
Everyone loves a happy ending. My family knows better than to come between me and my Hallmark Christmas movies! I love that feel-good glow, the lights shining in the darkest part of the year, the promise that everything will work out in the end.
But real life doesn’t always follow a Hallmark script. We get to live with triumphs and setbacks. Nonprofits know this better than anyone. And yet, in my many years working in the sector, I’ve been asked countless times to share success stories… but almost never the stories of the families or individuals who didn’t meet their goals, who slipped back, who struggled despite every effort.
I understand why. No organization wants donors or the community to think their dollars, and their hopes, are being wasted. Success stories feel good, they uplift, and they encourage support.
But what if we’re missing an opportunity?
What if telling the whole story, the successes and the stumbles create even deeper trust, transparency, and connection?
Growth Isn’t Linear: Why “Failure Stories” Matter
In nonprofit work, growth forward is rarely one-and-done. No agency meets with someone once and sends them on their way to transformation. That’s not how humans work. Real change takes many tries, many steps backward, and often many fresh starts.
Motivation, discipline, and what I call stubborn persistence are learned skills. If a child doesn’t get the chance to learn these skills during those critical years from 0–13, they are not going to develop them overnight. Learning takes repetition. It takes falling down and getting up again, sometimes dozens of times. We accept this easily when watching a child learn to walk or read or ride a bike. Yet for adults, we often forget that the same learning curve applies.
This is the heart of nonprofit work:
Showing up
Trying again
Rebuilding trust
Holding hope
Creating structure
Helping someone try just one more time
Some clients will succeed this week, or maybe this year. Others will return later and succeed the next time. And some face barriers, addiction, trauma, mental illness, generational poverty...that may never be fully overcome.
Even When There Isn’t a Happy Ending, There Is Still a Story Worth Telling
I speak as someone who has lived this personally: addiction, mental health challenges, and immense barriers don’t always resolve neatly. My child struggles with methamphetamine addiction and has chosen drugs over family. Anxiety and depression are daily battles for many. Some people simply cannot see the path forward yet. But they are human beings, deserving compassion, deserving support, and deserving dignity.
Nonprofits are often the ones standing in that gap; providing basics, building relationships, keeping the door open for the moment when someone might be ready.
That is heart work, and it deserves to be told every bit as much as the success stories.
Transparency Builds Trust and Funders Appreciate It
Sharing the full spectrum of stories doesn’t weaken your credibility. It strengthens it.
When organizations openly share what worked, what didn’t, and what they learned along the way, they demonstrate:
A culture of learning and continuous improvement
Honesty and transparency
Dedication to long-term, human-centered work
Realistic expectations of progress and outcomes
Funders appreciate this more than we sometimes realize. They are investing not only in results but in process, innovation, and the commitment to keep trying.
When your agency shares the struggles as well as the wins, you send a powerful message:
We haven’t given up. We are here for the journey, whatever it looks like. Your support helps us walk beside people who are fighting to change their lives, whether they are halfway to a happy ending or still trying to write their first chapter.
Don’t Stop Sharing Success! Just Make Room for the Stories in Progress
Am I suggesting we stop telling feel-good stories? Absolutely not! The world still needs hope and Hallmark endings. We should not be discouraged from telling the stories of those who are still in process, those who may not have success markers yet, but who are trying. They deserve acknowledgment. Effort matters. Trying is brave. Seeing that someone values their effort can spark confidence and growth, not just for that individual but for others watching from the sidelines.
The Whole Truth Inspires More Than Just Donations, it Inspires Hope
By sharing the full picture of your work including the successes, the setbacks, the lessons, and the heart, you are showing the dedication your team brings every single day. You are giving your donors a deeper understanding of the complexity of change.
You are giving your community permission to see people as whole, not just as before-and-after photos. You are giving the world a more honest, courageous narrative; one where even the imperfect stories have value.
In nonprofit work, and in life, the story isn’t just about the ending.
It’s about the journey.
And that story deserves to be told.