Seeing Your Change Through Their Eyes
Issue #8: December, 2025
Welcome to Issue # 8 of RunTheNetwork, where I share ideas, tools and resources to build a fee-based funding model, reducing your dependency on grants.
Each month, we’ll dive deep into strategies and solutions to help you build a sustainable funding strategy!
This month, we explore strategies to communicate your new fee-for-service approach, recognizing that no one will be as invested in this change as you are.
Table of Contents
Article: Avoid Over‑Explaining Fees To Everyone
Quick Framework: Stakeholder Map
Trusted Resource: Why Some Communications Work and Others Don’t
Q&A: “How do I know if I’m over or under-communicating?”
Avoid Over‑Explaining Fees To Everyone
You are introducing your first fee‑for‑service offer. You’ve been thinking, overthinking, and planning this for weeks, months, or even years.
It’s a massive change for you.
So it must be a massive change for everyone around you. Right?
Maybe not.
And that’s a good thing.
Recognizing that not everyone cares as intensely as you do can be a relief.
It takes some of the pressure off, helps you target your communication efforts, and keeps your messages relevant to your audience.
Before you decide what to say, you need to know who you’re talking to, how this change touches their world, and when they actually need to hear from you.
Your communication planning starts with a stakeholder analysis.
Why Stakeholder Analysis Comes First
Adding fees for services doesn’t change your organization’s
mission
vision
values
commitment to sharing knowledge
approach to partnerships
research request support criteria
All the reasons your community chooses to support you remain intact.
What may change is how different groups experience your work day to day.
Boards and advisory groups care about governance and financial sustainability. Researchers worry about budgets and access. Staff will focus on procedures, system changes, and incoming questions. Partners may only need a short heads‑up, or no updates at all.
Without a stakeholder map, it is easy to treat these groups as if they all need the same message, at the same time, in the same level of detail.
That is where over‑ or under‑communication can happen.
From “Who Needs to Know?” to “Who Needs What, When, and How?”
A practical stakeholder analysis asks four simple questions for each audience:
Who are they?
Researchers, staff, institutional partners, funders, governance bodies, other relevant parties.
How are they affected?
Are they primarily interested (curious, lightly touched) or impacted (their work, budgets, or decisions change)?
What do they need to know?
Nothing, just the core “what/why/when,” or detailed pricing, timing, exceptions, and support?
How and when should they hear it?
Personal 1-1 briefing, written update, FAQ or website updates, live discussion, or a short email they can skim and file.
This is where your stakeholder map gives you direction.
Rather than one big announcement, you design a messaging sequence. Early, detailed, two‑way communication for the most impacted groups. Brief, matter‑of‑fact updates for everyone else.
Give clarity without noise
Under‑communicating this change is a risk. No one likes surprises, particularly surprises that involve money.
But over‑communicating the wrong level of detail, to the wrong people, at the wrong time, is an even bigger risk.
Using a stakeholder map keeps the change messages in proportion to their actual impact.
To your stakeholders, fees for service should feel like a thoughtful, well‑managed evolution, not a dramatic change in approach.
Your communication gives each audience the information they need.
No more. No less.
Quick Framework
Stakeholder Map
Start by listing every stakeholder group: active researchers, institutional partners, funding bodies, internal staff, governance boards, and others. Then put yourself in their shoes, and answer the four questions for each audience.
*Start Today: Download and save the pdf version of the Stakeholder Map.
Trusted Resource
Prosci’s blog article Why Some Communications Work and Others Don’t offers insight and suggestions for making your communications more effective.
The blog article focuses on internal communications (i.e. employees), but the principles also apply to external communications (i.e. researchers).
Read the blog article here.
Q&A
Let’s address a question you’ve been thinking about but haven’t dared to ask out loud.
“How do I know if I’m over or under-communicating?”
This question is hard because you’re so close to this change it’s almost impossible to be neutral. You’ve lived with it for months as a project, while some of your stakeholders will be hearing about it for the first time.
You’ve probably forgotten the concerns and questions you had when you started. And at the same time, you want to be transparent and share what you know.
Using a stakeholder map helps you to decide what the right level of communication for each audience looks like.
All audiences who need to know will start with the same 2–3 key points. This is your core information.
What is changing
Why this change is happening
When it takes effect
The difference between each audience is the level of supporting detail you provide.
Example
A staff member is sharing the new fee for service offer with a researcher, over a Zoom call. The researcher has received in-kind and cash support for previous projects; now needs to budget for fees in future grant applications.
The core message in this script would be the same for all stakeholders, but the Opening, Impact, and Support message would be different for each audience.
Opening:
“Thanks for taking the time to meet today. I wanted to walk you through an important update about how we’re structuring [service/program] going forward, and what that means for your work with us.”
Core Message:
“Starting [date], we’re introducing a fee of [amount] for [service]. This change supports our long-term sustainability and helps us continue delivering the quality support you’ve come to expect.”
Impact on Researcher:
“For your current project, nothing changes—you’re covered under the previous model until [end date]. For future grant applications, you’ll want to include [amount] in your budget under [suggested line item].”
Support Offered:
“We’ve prepared a sample budget justification and FAQ to help with your next application. I’ll send those right after this call, along with contact info if questions come up during your planning.”
Closing:
“I know this is a shift, and I’m here to make the transition as smooth as possible. Do you have any questions right now?”
The approach and strategy outlined in this issue can be implemented independently, but support is available.
Surge Advisory offers tailored services to help you develop and execute a sustainable funding plan that aligns with your mission.
Contact us at runthenetwork.ca to explore how we can support your transition!