The CNCS

Pretty soon, the initials "CNCS" will roll off your tongue like you've been speaking them all your life! "CNCS" will be like a cattle brand burned into your brain--or perhaps a tatoo on your bicep--it's something you can't avoid.

CNCS stands for Corporation for National & Community Service. CNCS is a gubmint agency. It's a strange one as far as gubmint entities go. It's loosely aligned with the executive branch of gubmint, at least at far as I know. It's not under a Cabinet Secretary like most gubmint agencies. It's a GIANT bureaucracy and it behaves like you'd expect a typical bureaucracy to behave.

For perspective it's important to know that CNCS itself is roughly a billion dollar gubmint operation. Of that, all of the RSVP's in American get (collectively) about $60,000,000. I'd guess the RSVP's are about 5% of the overall CNCS budget. Naturally, the RSVP's don't get as much attention as we think they should simply because CNCS always has bigger fish to fry like Americorps, etc.

I have attached a JPG of the CNCS organization chart with this blog post. The names may change but the fundamental skeletal structure will remain largely the same. You can see right off that's it's not the most intelligent ORG chart you've ever seen. Some of those little bubbles are kind of hanging out in space, if you get my drift. (Click the chart for a large version.)

You'll note that in one of the bubbles it says there are 47 Field Offices. You will also note that bubble is truly a dangling participle! What that number represents is what's called the CNCS State Office. Some states are too small to have a CNCS State Office, hence the number 47 instead of 50 like you would expect. Basically, all RSVP's are managed out of one of those 47 CNCS State Offices.

Pretty much everything that you do on a day-to-day basis is something that might or could fall under the purview on your CNCS State Office. In this case, it's in Boise.

Now, another thing you need to understand is the "cluster" affect. What's that? Well, each of the CNCS State Offices are administered as part of a cluster. The Idaho office is part of the Pacific Cluster. The Cluster then answer to a higher authority. We've never bothered to determine who the Cluster answer to as the farther we can stay away from the Cluster level, the better off we are. Luckily, you have a most excellent Idaho State Office and they keep you totally insulated from the Cluster Level.

In effect, everything you need to know about CNCS can be summed up by your relationship with the State Office in Boise. It's good to know enough about CNCS to know how to avoid any interaction with higher levels of the ORG. My advice is DON'T GO THERE. Resist any and all urges to communicate with anyone except your State Office Staff. There is no point in communicating with anyone higher than the Boise office. Also, to do so runs the risk of invoking The Law of Unintended Consequences.
If you stay under the Cluster and National radar, that is a very good thing. Remember the old adage people used to apply to children in the early Baby Boom Days? "Better seen and not heard?" Well, that applies to this and (we assume) every RSVP. If you have a fitting Norman Rockwell success story to tell, by all means, tell it. However, don't make waves with CNCS and you will be OK. Your State Office Staff is composed of two truly great people and they can help you through almost anything maybe even including mid-life crisis. They are simply awesome people and you can trust them to do the right thing on your behalf. The fewer other CNCS people you know about or contact, the better off everyone is. Remember this simple advice: EMBRACE YOUR STATE OFFICE, AVOID THE CLUSTER!.