Accepting Engagements · Nonprofits · Associations · Cooperatives

The governance architecture
your board should already have —
engineered, not improvised.

Structural & governance advisory for nonprofits, associations, and cooperatives. Multi-model AI analysis. Senior human validation. Written deliverables your board can adopt at the next meeting.

Begin with a $500 Structural Snapshot
or request a private engagement → · Fixed fee · Written scope · 5 business days
5 days
From kickoff to a
written brief your
board can act on
Fixed
Scope and fee agreed
in writing before
any work begins
Free
990 Health Score —
full result on screen,
no signup
$500
Rapid Structural
Snapshot —
5 business days
Scroll
What We Do

Structural clarity for organizations
that can't afford ambiguity.

Most governance failures don't begin with a crisis. They begin with bylaws that don't match practice, financial reserves that don't reflect reality, and leadership structures that were never built to scale.

ECONSTART applies structured analysis — combining multi-model AI with senior human review — to map where your organization is exposed, and to build the systems that protect it. Our work is structural and strategic. Not legal or tax advice.

Governance Review

We map bylaws, board structures, and operational practice against one another — identifying misalignments before they become liabilities.

Form 990 & Financial Analysis

Our team reads your 990s as strategic documents — surfacing reserve ratios, program efficiency patterns, and sustainability indicators.

Institutional Systems Design

We build the frameworks — decision matrices, succession protocols, financial sustainability models — that allow organizations to operate without depending on any single person.

Executive Advisory

Built for operators who need
clarity, speed, and leverage.

Strategic Clarity

Clean frameworks that cut through ambiguity. We map what your organization is actually doing against what it's structured to do — and show you exactly where the gap is.

Intelligent Systems

Multi-model AI analysis paired with senior human review. We use automation where it accelerates precision — never where it compromises judgment.

Execution Support

Written deliverables your board can adopt at the next meeting. Not decks. Not frameworks to interpret. Documents engineered to be implemented.

Track Record

Defined scope. Fixed fee. Written every time.

4
Financial pillars scored from
public IRS filings, free
6
Written deliverables, each
defined before you buy
0
Hourly billing.
Fixed fees only
100%
Engagements delivered under
written fixed-fee scope
Our Services

Four engagement types.
One standard of precision.

01 — Diagnostic

Structural Diagnostic

A comprehensive structural review of your organization's governance, financial health, and operational systems. We identify gaps, misalignments, and risk exposure — and deliver a written findings report with prioritized recommendations.

From $1,500 — Fixed fee, written scope
02 — Architecture

Governance Architecture

We design or redesign your governance framework — board structure, committee charters, decision-making authorities, conflict policies, and bylaw alignment. Built to the scale and complexity of your organization.

Custom scope — Contact for pricing
03 — Sustainability

Financial Sustainability Model

We build forward-looking financial models that stress-test your organization's reserves, revenue mix, and cost structure. Includes scenario analysis and a written sustainability roadmap for board-level use.

Custom scope — Contact for pricing
04 — Transition

Succession & Transition System

We design leadership transition protocols that protect institutional continuity — including role documentation, knowledge transfer frameworks, interim governance structures, and board communication templates.

Custom scope — Contact for pricing
Book Directly

Fixed-scope assessments.
Pay once. Start this week.

Five defined engagements with written scope and fixed pricing. Secure payment via Stripe. Not sure yet? Try our free 990 Health Score first. For custom advisory or ongoing retainers, see our plans or submit an inquiry.

Rapid Snapshot

Rapid Structural Snapshot

$500

A focused review of one governance or financial dimension. Delivered as a written brief with prioritized observations. Ideal for boards testing our approach before a fuller engagement.

Pay & Book — $500
Governance · Tier 1

Governance Assessment

$1,500

Structured review of bylaws, board composition, committee charters, and operational alignment. Written findings with prioritized recommendations. Fixed scope, fixed fee.

Pay & Book — $1,500
Governance · Tier 2

Governance Assessment — Full

$2,500

Extended governance review including deeper financial sustainability context, stakeholder mapping, and a board-ready presentation of findings. For organizations preparing for growth or transition.

Pay & Book — $2,500
Filing Review · Tier 1

Institutional Filing Review

$1,500

Strategic analysis of your Form 990 and related institutional filings. Reserve ratios, program efficiency patterns, and sustainability indicators translated into a written brief your board can act on.

Pay & Book — $1,500
Filing Review · Tier 2

Institutional Filing Review — Extended

$5,000

Multi-year 990 analysis plus benchmarking against comparable organizations, reserve stress-testing, and a written sustainability roadmap. For organizations addressing board or funder concerns about financial trajectory.

Pay & Book — $5,000

All assessments include a written deliverable and one review call. Larger institutional engagements (blueprints, custom architecture) are handled via written inquiry so we can scope them properly. Payments are processed securely by Stripe.

How It Works

Three steps.
Complete structural clarity.

01 — Submit

You Submit

Complete our inquiry form with your organization's context and primary challenge. We'll confirm scope, timeline, and fixed fee within 48 hours — before any engagement begins.

02 — Analyze

We Analyze

A senior advisor reads your governance documents, filings, and operational patterns, then decides what actually puts your organization at risk. Structured analysis and AI tooling speed up the reading. The judgment about what matters, and what your board should do about it, is human.

03 — Receive

You Receive

A written deliverable package built for your leadership and board — clear, actionable, and ready to present. Not a template. A system designed for your organization specifically.

What this is not

Not a rating

Charity Navigator and Candid rate organizations for donors. Useful, and a different job. We diagnose your organization for the people responsible for governing it, and tell you what to do next.

Not a chatbot answer

A general AI assistant will read a Form 990 and give you an opinion in seconds. It will not put its name on a document, agree a scope in writing, or stand behind the finding when your board asks who decided this.

Not a score

The number is where the conversation starts, not the product. What you buy is a written, sourced judgment about what puts your organization at risk and the sequence to fix it.

Deliverables

Written documents your
board can actually use.

Structural Findings Report

A plain-language diagnostic document mapping every identified gap, misalignment, and risk — with severity ratings and recommended next steps.

Financial Analysis Summary

A board-ready financial health review drawn from your Form 990s — including reserve analysis, trend flags, and sustainability indicators.

Governance Framework Document

A complete governance architecture — board responsibilities, committee charters, decision authority matrix, and conflict of interest protocol.

90-Day Implementation Roadmap

A sequenced action plan that maps findings to solutions — with ownership assignments, milestone markers, and board approval checkpoints.

Succession Protocol Template

A leadership transition framework with role documentation, knowledge transfer procedures, interim governance guidelines, and communication templates.

Financial Sustainability Model

Scenario-based projections that stress-test revenue, reserve levels, and cost structure — with written commentary and board-presentation format.

Our Analysis System

AI-powered analysis.
Human-validated at every step.

We don't use AI to replace judgment. We use it to extend the range of what's possible to analyze — at depth and speed that manual review can't match. Every output is reviewed, interpreted, and validated by our team before it reaches you.

Multi-model · Human-validated · Written deliverables
Layer 01
Document Ingestion & Parsing

Bylaws, Form 990s, board minutes, financial statements, and policy documents are ingested and structured for cross-reference analysis.

Layer 02
Multi-Model Cross-Analysis

Multiple AI models analyze the same material from different angles — governance, financial, operational — surfacing patterns and contradictions no single pass would catch.

Layer 03
Senior Human Review

Our team reviews every AI output for accuracy, relevance, and contextual fit. No finding is included in a deliverable without human validation.

Layer 04
Written Deliverable Production

Validated findings are translated into board-ready documents — clear, structured, and specific to your organization's circumstances.

Client Experience

A smarter client experience,
end to end.

AI helps us move faster and see more. Senior humans decide what matters. You get a process that feels precise at every step — not automated for its own sake.

Smart Intake

Structured questions capture exactly what's needed — no back-and-forth before we can start.

AI-Assisted Analysis

Multi-model review of governance, financials, and filings surfaces patterns a single pair of eyes would miss.

Clear Recommendations

Findings are written as decisions, not options. Prioritized, sequenced, board-ready.

Automated Follow-Up

Delivery, status, and next-step communications are handled seamlessly — nothing falls through.

Human-Reviewed Strategy

Every deliverable is validated by senior advisory review before it reaches your board.

Who This Is For

Built for organizations with
real structural complexity.

501(c)(3) Nonprofits

Organizations navigating board transitions, IRS compliance exposure, or financial sustainability questions that require structured analysis — not guesswork.

Associations

Member-driven organizations with complex governance needs — bylaws that haven't kept pace with growth, committee structures that need redesign, or leadership structures under strain.

Cooperatives

Worker, consumer, and producer cooperatives that need formal governance documentation, financial sustainability frameworks, or structural alignment across membership layers.

Worker Organizations

Unions, worker centers, and labor-aligned organizations building institutional capacity — from governance documentation to succession planning to financial resilience frameworks.

Why ECONSTART

Credibility built through
substantive work.

Public
Scoring rubric published
in full — you can check
our arithmetic
Written
Every finding documented
and sourced — nothing
delivered verbally only
5 days
Standard turnaround for
a fixed-scope
assessment
$1,500
Entry-level diagnostic
fixed fee — no
ambiguity in scope

Fixed pricing, written scope

Every engagement — project or retainer — begins with a written scope and a fixed fee. No hourly billing, no scope creep, no surprises.

Multi-model AI + human validation

Our analysis system extends the depth and speed of what's possible — while keeping human judgment at the center of every finding and recommendation.

Board-ready written deliverables

Our outputs are designed to be presented directly to boards — structured, clear, and professionally formatted for institutional use.

Transparent method

Our 990 Health Score publishes its full scoring rubric — every threshold, every weight. You can reproduce the result yourself from the same public IRS data. We would rather be checked than believed.

Structural and strategic advisory only

We do one thing, precisely. This is structural and strategic advisory. Not legal or tax advice. That clarity protects you and allows us to deliver exceptional work within our scope.

Featured Engagement

What a structural engagement
actually changes.

Cooperative · Independent Workforce

A 5-year growth plan with no sustainability architecture underneath it.

A worker cooperative had a funded growth ambition, an engaged board, and a respected executive team — but no reserve framework, no stress-tested cost structure, and no scenario model. Strategic decisions were being approved on optimism, not evidence.

EngagementInstitutional Blueprint
Timeline6 weeks
Review Cycles3 drafts
Board AdoptionUnanimous

Structural Gap

The cooperative faced funder questions it could not answer with evidence: What reserve threshold protects members through a downturn? What revenue concentration is too much? What does the 5-year plan look like if the top two revenue streams contract 20%?

What We Delivered

A multi-model financial sustainability framework — reserve policy grounded in sector benchmarks, stress-tested cost structure, three-scenario revenue model, and a written sustainability roadmap formatted for board adoption and funder presentation.

Outcomes After Adoption

  • Board ratified the sustainability framework at the next scheduled meeting.
  • Reserve target formalized into the operating budget cycle.
  • Funders accepted the stress-tested model in subsequent renewal conversations.
  • Ad-hoc projections replaced by a standing quarterly financial review.

Composite engagement. Identifying details withheld under confidentiality. Additional references available on request under NDA.

Advisory Retainer Plans

Governance on retainer.
Written-first advisory. No unnecessary meetings.

A senior governance advisor in your corner — delivered entirely by email and written reports. Every month. No ambiguity, no surprises. You ask, we analyze, you receive a board-ready written response.

All plans require a completed Structural Diagnostic ($1,500) before onboarding.
Governance Essentials
$1,997/mo

For organizations formalizing governance that need consistent expert oversight — without the cost of a full-time advisor.

  • Up to 3 governance advisory questions per month
  • Written response within 48 business hours
  • 1 document review per month
  • Monthly compliance alert memo
  • Access to policy & bylaw templates library
  • Written-first cadence. No unnecessary meetings.
Apply for This Plan
Most Requested
Institutional Partner
$3,497/mo

For established organizations requiring continuous institutional oversight and board-ready documentation delivered every month.

  • Unlimited governance advisory questions
  • Written response within 24 business hours
  • 2 document reviews per month
  • Monthly institutional health report (PDF, board-ready)
  • Quarterly governance audit memo
  • Custom policy drafting on request
  • Written-first cadence. No unnecessary meetings.
Apply for This Plan
Structural Executive
$5,997/mo

For complex multi-entity organizations or those under regulatory pressure requiring institutional-grade advisory at the highest level.

  • Unlimited governance advisory questions
  • Priority response within 12 business hours
  • Unlimited document reviews
  • Monthly board readiness report
  • Bi-annual full governance architecture review
  • Named ECONSTART advisor on institutional correspondence
  • Annual succession planning review
  • Written-first cadence. No unnecessary meetings.
Apply for This Plan

Month-to-month. Cancel anytime with 30 days written notice. Rates are fixed for the first 12 months of engagement.
One governance crisis costs more than years of this retainer.

Structural Diagnostic — From $1,500

Start with a complete
structural diagnostic.

We review your governance framework, financial health, and operational systems — and deliver a written findings report with prioritized recommendations. Fixed fee. Written scope. Delivered within an agreed timeline.

Begin Your Diagnostic

Most organizations complete the intake process in under 20 minutes.

Start Here

Request a Private
Growth Review.

Share your current priorities. We'll review your situation and recommend the most effective next step. Written response with proposed scope and fixed fee within 48 hours — before any engagement begins.

info@econstart.com
+1 800-200-3368
Tampa, FL — 100 South Ashley Drive, Suite 600-2555
LinkedIn — German Marcelino

This is structural and strategic advisory. Not legal or tax advice. Submitting this form does not create an engagement or any professional obligation.