Celebrating 20 years of positive system change.

The Next Us

Create positive system change

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We have worked extensively with health and human services organizations as advisor, long-term head of revenue, Development Chair, and Board President. We design revenue and operational systems, roll out brands and AI-augmented workflows, facilitate board projects, and build the internal capacity of staff and leadership. So much of our work across sectors is social-impact focused, and our experience in HHS specifically is among our deepest.

HHS organizations balance extraordinary demands—government compliance, layered funder relationships, distributed stakeholder power, thin margins—while doing work where the stakes are human lives. In this environment, maintaining clear vision across multiple constituencies, sustaining a culture oriented toward growth alongside stability, and building cross-functional coordination across programs, revenue, and operations are all genuinely hard. We serve as both a steady functional leader and a change agent—delivering the marketing, development, and systems work the organization needs today while pointing toward the operational and cultural evolution that compounds its capacity over time.

We bring the full range of our services to this sector: positioning, brand, strategic planning, marketing and development integration, campaign design, content systems, organizational cognition, AI strategy, CRM architecture, OKR implementation, board facilitation, and leadership development.

Clients: Community Youth Center of San Francisco, Small Magic, Community Vision, FACES SF

“Partnering with Mark has been transformative for our organization’s strategy and communications work. Not only has The Next Us done phenomenal work for us, but Mark has taught myself and our staff so much in the process. Our partnership has made a tremendous impact on both our internal operations and our impact in our community. And the cherry on top: Mark is just truly fun to work with.”

Ruth Ann MossExecutive Director, Small Magic

Case Studies

Community Youth Center San Francisco

Community Youth Center San Francisco

The Next Us has worked with CYC continuously since 2019 as strategic advisor and consulting Head of Development and Marketing. Over the past six years, our key responsibilities have included:

  • Leading the rebranding, repositioning, website redesign, and messaging development for the agency’s 50th anniversary
  • Leading the design and execution of the Richmond Community Hub capital campaign
  • Creating serial cornerstone content assets, including multiple annual reports, Executive Director and board speeches, annual gala materials, and major donor brochures
  • Leading the business requirements, design, and/or configuration of key development and marketing systems: Asana, WordPress, Classy, Slack, Constant Contact, Salesforce NPSP, ChatGPT, iWave



Small Magic

Small Magic

The Next Us worked with Small Magic (formerly Birmingham Talks) for a 4-year engagement on positioning, marketing and communications strategy, development strategy, internal capacity development, and brand. For the renaming and relaunch of the brand in January 2024, we led the content strategy and site map for the new website and referred Todd Schulte Design and CloudCatch, who led the exceptional design and WordPress development for the new site. The Next Us also assisted Small Magic with functional management of marketing and the optimization and integration of key operational systems including Asana, Salesforce, Slack, and ChatGPT.