First up this morning is Allison Clarke of Flashes of Hope, an absolutely awesome non-profit organization.
Their mission is:
“Flashes of Hope is a non-profit organization dedicated to creating uplifting portraits of children fighting cancer and other life threatening illnesses. The portraits, taken by award-winning photographers, help children feel better about their changing appearance by celebrating it. For families of terminally ill children, it’s especially important to have a portrait that preserves forever the beauty, grace and dignity of their child.”
Allison has an amazing task in front of her. I got to speak to one of her colleagues before coming into the presentations and we talked about how it is so important to catch people in their moments of strength. Powerful stuff.
Victoria and Allison sit down on the couch on the stage (I love it) and start talking about Flashes of Hope. This organization works with professional photographers to capture beautiful moments of children who are terribly ill. She says that there is a lot of misconceptions around it. She mentions the St. Jude’s Telethon which I worked on for several years in my hometown.
She talks about the touching moments and the gifts of the program including the joy during the photo sessions and the images regardless of the outcome of the treatments. Allison’s son had cancer at 20 months old. He’s now 8 1/2 years old.
She started doing these during her son’s treatments (she also had a newborn). She started the photo shoots 3 weeks after she got the idea. Phenomenal.
She also talks about some of the people she’s worked with including teenagers who come out of their shells, parents who rarely smiled until the session. She says “have the idea, believe you can do it, and find people who can help you do it.”
Victoria asks about structuring the business as a non-profit. Allison says it’s harder work to have a for-profit than a non-profit. I been there. I relate. She talks about raising money (which she hates) but she loves the flexibility of her schedule. This year, she will provide free packages to 3,000 families in 30 cities. This year, 12,000 kids will be diagnosed with cancer.
Flashes of Hope started in 2001 and became a non-profit in 2002. It really took off in 2004. She was originally doing all the shoots herself even though she is not a photographer. She knew the difference between cookie cutter photographers and amazing photographers. That’s what she does.
They are 20 cities on their waiting list to launch programs. They are now going into camps. Which is brilliant. There are a lot of struggles in the non-profit world, including financing and management.
Victoria talks about getting to the point of having a lot of opportunities and resisting the temptation of jumping into all of them. Pick and choose carefully for long-term success.
Allison shares a bit of her experience including having board of directors for every chapter and finding administrative space. She talks about feeling overwhelmed and how she met others who volunteer to run and manage each city’s chapter. The national organization handles all the fundraising so that the chapter directors can focus on the kids.
Allison has a phenomenal story and even more phenomenal organization. Please visit Flashes of Hope and find out how you can help more.
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