2015 Small Business Award Finalist: Community Partnership of the Ozarks Inc.

Community Partnership of the Ozarks is the go-to organization the community expects to solve problems.

Driven by the hard work of Executive Director Janet Dankert, CPO has gone from a single-focus nonprofit organization with a small annual budget to managing more than 30 grants and contracts with an annual budget of over $2.6 million.

“Our business management philosophy is defined by our organization’s adopted values: integrity, compassion, teamwork, creativity, collaboration and excellence,” Dankert said. “We believe that our success can be attributed to our philosophy and values because we are an open, team-oriented organization that is family-friendly.”

The growth at CPO has not come without challenges; namely in some funding obstacles.

“To overcome funding obstacles, we had to further increase our focus on relationship building and collaboration, increase efforts to raise unrestricted local dollars and not rely so heavily on grants and take risks to develop creative ways to generate revenue,” Dankert said.

In the organization’s 23-year history, CPO has been on the cutting edge of innovation by creating new community programs.

“Some of the important initiatives that we helped launch include Jordan Valley Community Health Center, Rare Breed homeless youth drop-in shelter and the Tooth Truck,” said Dankert. “We were also instrumental in bringing school nurses into the Springfield Public School district.”

CPO didn’t stop there.

“More than a decade ago, there were no organized efforts to address child abuse and neglect in Greene County. The governor contacted us and requested we respond to the issue,” Dankert said. “We collaborated with the Greene County Prosecutor’s Office, Children’s Division and Child Advocacy Center to create a comprehensive, systemwide mandated reporter training that has trained thousands in the community on this topic.”

On the child abuse and neglect issue, CPO kept going.

“Two years ago, we organized the child abuse and neglect collaborative, which included 25 organizations to help develop a plan to decrease child abuse and neglect,” Dankert said. “Most recently, this collaborative started a campaign to recruit 400 new foster families to allow more than 800 Greene County children in foster care to remain in the county rather than being forced to live sometimes hundreds of miles away.”

CPO has high expectations for performance and customer service, riding entirely on teamwork.

“Our team and leadership is the best,” Dankert said. “It’s the reason we’ve been so successful and the reason we are a finalist for this award.”