30 October 2025
Authors: Marco Francesco Mazzù, in cooperation with Riccardo Masetti and Ludovica Serafini
Abstract:
When Professor Riccardo Masetti pronounced the above-mentioned quote, Susan G. Komen Italia was among the most authoritative NGOs in Italy. After 20 years of strong growth both in B2B and in B2C market, in 2020 Professor Masetti and his team had to confront with a never-experienced situation: due to Coronavirus outbreak, the spearhead of Komen Italia’s events, the “Race for the Cure”, was in danger.
This matter triggered Komen Italia’s President and members, requiring everybody’s full dedication: how to keep the attention high on a topic this severe and on fundraising in a moment in which it is not possible nor allowed to hold the core initiative impacting on the association’s revenues?
The Covid-19 outbreak is profoundly reshaping organizations, forcing them to adapt to a new normality and impacting heavily also on NPOs like Komen Italia that need to keep on operating to support communities. This has forced NPOs supporting patients and convalescents to either suspend their activities or to find new solutions. On top of this, the economic aftermath of the pandemic is impacting fundraisings, threatening sustainability. The opportunity that comes from this situation is to experiment new ways to serve stakeholders that can help NPOs not only to survive as an entity but also to generate long term benefits. Professor Masetti and his team had to deep dive into the “in distance” transformation of the event and channelling the most awareness cross-country to the association’s mission and vision but, importantly, great emotional connection, also thanks to the resonance of the many ambassadors and influencers involved in it. How to maintain the emotional bonding with the community? And how to ensure sustainability of a NGO that relies mostly on donation for its broad range of activities?
Download Case Study
Request Teaching Notes
