NFI Revises Its Mission & Launches Improved Website

National Fatherhood Initiative^® (NFI) has revised its mission:

National Fatherhood Initiative^® transforms organizations and communities by equipping them to intentionally and proactively engage fathers in their children’s lives.

We’ve also launched a much improved website, one that reflects our clearer, more focused mission. 

Why did we revise our mission and improve our website? In a word, “simplicity.”

The Reason

It’s easy for any organization, let alone a nonprofit that’s served organizations and communities for more than two decades, to get lost in the weeds—or, if you prefer, to not see the forest for the trees. An idiomatic phrase aside, NFI has undergone a significant, rapid change during the last five years. (Click here to link to a new infographic that provides details on our history.) While five years might not seem rapid to you, it is for an organization that has changed its business model as dramatically we have.

• Our Infancy: We began as a public advocacy organization focused on raising Americans’ awareness of the vital role that fathers play in child well-being. We cut our teeth on a highly successful, long-running public service announcement (PSA) campaign that brought the issue of father absence into the consciousness of the nation, and on creating bipartisan task forces of national legislators that laid the foundation for fatherhood funding. We explored our surroundings by convening the annual National Summit on Fatherhood. We learned how to interact with others to become sensitive to their needs and to learn what they needed from us.
• Our Adolescence: Nevertheless, we held on much too hard and long to goals, objectives, activities, and even funding sources that we no longer needed to do the hard, in-depth work at the community level to connect dads and children, and to improve relationships between dads and moms for the sake of their children. Like an adolescent, we tried to be everything to everyone. We experimented with a lot of things before we figured out what kind of organization we needed to become: a trusted partner that comes along side you to transform your organization or community.
• Our Adulthood: That’s why, just as an adult should do, we’ve matured by narrowing our business model to focus on what organizations and communities need most to effectively engage dads: ready-made and customized resources, training, technical assistance, and planning that help engage dads at different levels of intensity. This narrower focus means we’ve kept providing what organizations and communities have always needed and continue to need from us—such as our flagship research publication Father Facts—and implemented processes and systems to ensure we develop the resources they need now and will need in the future.

Our Improved Website

Our improved website, like our new mission, is simple, clear, and focused. It:

• Includes only what you need to partner with us. Gone is wasted space and content.
• Is easier to navigate and find our resources (on FatherSource™), training, and technical assistance. It’s also easier than ever to find help planning fatherhood initiatives, programs, and other efforts to engage dads. You only have to look at the links in the top navigation menu to access what you need. Just click on a link to learn more about each area: no more annoying drop-down menus!
• Has far fewer pages. When you click on a link in the navigation menu, our website takes you to a single page. From there, you can click on direct links to resources, training, technical assistance, planning assistance, statistics/research, etc.
• Brought to the forefront how to get started in this work. So many individuals, organizations, communities, and states simply don’t know where to start. The “Getting Started” page provides free resources and guidance that illuminate the path.

So, what are you waiting for? Check out our new website as you continue to partner with us or decide how to partner with us for the first time. Together, we will create a world in which every child has a 24/7 Dad.^SM

Stay tuned for a major announcement that will benefit our partners’ work in many ways!

Are you a dad looking for help? Please visit our Fatherhood Program Locator™ and enter your city and state on the map to find programs and resources in your community.