Kat: Thanks for a great post! It's good to have your experience and thoughtfulness in this discussion.

Two comments or questions that I'd like to hear your reaction to...

First is the idea of hospice for our beloved organizations. It's been said that Americans don't deal very well with death... we have an unhealthy attitude toward it, and we don't face it very well when it comes. After having conversations with a number of nonprofit managers whose nonprofit organizations "closed", I'd say that we don't deal very well with the death of our nonprofits either. I suspect this has something to do with our competitive "win" culture, so we don't like to be associated with anything that is "failing." As a result, there's something like a mean, sticky ugliness that surrounds an organization in decline. That makes it hard to talk about celebration and parting ceremonies. What can we do?

Second, I'd like to hear you say more about life cycles and how you believe it applies here. Personally, I've stayed away from the life cycles concept because I think it implies too much about an inevitable series of events that organizations have to go through. But I think it's been a useful idea for you, so I'd like to hear more about it.

Mark