Although United Way Silicon Valley had begun to come back from its darkest hour—in 1999, the agency announced an $11 million shortfall—United Way was just barely treading water compared to the stature it had once held in the community.

The crisis came when it was discovered that then-CEO Eleanor Jacobs had been overstating the organization's finances and using reserves to keep the agency afloat. She was fired; a group of corporate executives, individuals and foundations covered United Way's commitments; the board was disbanded, an oversight committee stepped in and an interim executive was named.

If this weren't enough, United Ways across the country were still feeling the fallout from the firing in 1992 of national executive William Aramony, who later served time for a variety of charges ranging from fraud and embezzlement to mail fraud and filing false tax returns.

In other words, the top job at United Way Silicon Valley wasn't exactly a plum position two years ago. But Mark Walker was a believer—he believed in United Way, and he believed taking on an important challenge was worth the risks that came with the job.

In some 20 years with SBC and its predecessor companies, Walker had run United Way employee campaigns; he had even served on United Way boards. When he came to San Jose, and once again found himself running company United Way campaigns as part of his job, he began to worry. "I've always worked in cities where the Chamber of Commerce and the United Way were important to the community. It pained me to see the lack of prominence the local United Way had in this community," he says, sitting in his office on the fourth floor of the United Way building on The Alameda near Highway 880.

His wife, Mary, knew this, so when she saw a news story two years ago announcing that the United Way president/CEO had resigned, she told her husband it was the perfect job for him. That's because she knew nonprofits were his passion and that he was feeling it was time to make a move. And she knew very well that he enjoyed a challenge.

"I told him I'd be happy to have him apply, but I also told him not to quit his job while he was going through the application process!" The process took two months and included 11 interviews.

There was another reason the Walkers were interested in the position. Upward mobility at SBC meant a move to a new community. Already they had lived in five communities; they were tired of moving. And frankly, they loved living in Almaden, where they enjoyed block parties and progressive dinners with neighbors. Their three children were active in school and sports activities.

The children were an important reason for taking the job. And not just so the Walkers could avoid another move. "I wanted to be a role model to them," Walker says. "I wanted to show them it's important to stretch for something."

Although Walker had only been in San Jose since 1997, he knew how to immerse himself in the community. By the time he was applying for the United Way position two years ago—much to the surprise of many who knew him—he was chairman of the San Jose Silicon Valley Chamber of Commerce and was serving on the Junior Achievement board. He was also active in Almaden youth sports programs and was serving on educational foundation boards at both Lincoln High School, where his son Andrew is now a senior, and at Castillero Middle School, where his daughter Catherine is now a sixth-grader.

One person who learned early on that Walker was interested in the United Way position was Jim Cunneen, another Almaden resident. The two knew each other, and when the president/CEO position came open at the Chamber, Walker, who was then chairman of the board, encouraged Cunneen to apply.

Cunneen can speak to Walker's willingness to take on a challenge. "When Mark became chairman, the Chamber had significant challenges, including diminished political impact, membership decline and financial problems. It took courage for him to take that on," Cunneen says.

Because of Walker's willingness to chair the Chamber board at a difficult time, and because of the conversations they had when Walker was encouraging Cunneen to apply, Cunneen says he knows that Walker understands the importance of making changes when they are needed. "Mark was chairman when we began our new direction," Cunneen says, "and he gave me a very long leash. He knew I needed to be able to step on some toes."

Now Walker is poised to lead United Way in a new direction.

United Way's current board chairman, Don Watters, a retired director of McKinsey & Company, the worldwide management consulting company, recalls when the board first met with Walker. "We were intrigued by this guy who wanted to change careers because he wanted to make a difference."

Clearly one of the major weaknesses of United Way in 1999 was that the CEO, a paid staff person, and the volunteer board, charged with oversight and policy-setting, were not communicating with each other.

Watters says that's not a problem with Walker at the helm. "Having been a United Way board member himself, Mark knows how to work with the board. He's really good at figuring out who's good at what and then getting us to put our energy where our mouths are."

At the time Walker took the helm at United Way, staff was less than half of what it had once been; the board was almost completely brand new; and fundraising, which had once been conducted in large part by corporate, business and community volunteers, had been relegated to a staff function only.

According to Walker, the oversight committee appointed to analyze United Way's crisis after the Eleanor Jacobs debacle and to make recommendations for the organization's survival had suggested United Way focus on fundraising only and do it at the staff level.

By the time Walker joined the staff, the board knew that United Way had to do more than survive; it had to regain its former stature—and more. United Way not only had to restore the credibility it had lost, the organization needed to set itself on a course to become a vital force in the community.

A down economy and the growing popularity of donor designations—donors specifying which agency they want to receive their dollars rather than allowing United Way to allocate the dollars from a general fund to specific agencies and services—were just two of the major threats to the organization's long-term viability.

"Because of the severe cutback in staffing and the recommendation that we concentrate only on fundraising, our ability to do community planning and research had been dramatically reduced," Walker says. The last time the United Way had done a needs assessment had been 1997.

Without a periodic needs assessment to learn community needs and how they are being met, the job of allocating donated dollars to health and human care agencies is more art than science.

But now, thanks to a pro bono management study by McKinsey & Company, the United Way board now has a roadmap for the future—the Strategic Framework. And assessing the health and social service needs of the community is at the heart of the plan.

"We're now a community-impact organization," says Chief Financial Officer and Vice President of Operations Gary Rummelhoff, another Almaden Valley resident who Walker hired as soon as he was on the job. The two had known each other through youth activities, but particularly through school activities. Rummelhoff, who is in his second term as a member of the San Jose Unified School district, met Walker when the then-SBC executive was new to town and found himself participating in he Chambers Leadership San Jose course wit Rummelhoff's wife, Jean.

Rummelhoff, who previously worked at high-level finance positions in the corporate world, says United Way is looking to the Silicon Valley Manufacturers Group and Joint Venture Silicon Valley as models for what United Way should be doing in the health and social services area. In the same way the community looks to the manufacturers group for credible information in such areas as housing and transportation and to joint venture for its annual report with its broad demographic information, United Way is positioning itself as the organization that knows the human care needs of the community and how well they are being met.

Walker says that in the past United Way assessed how well its dollars were being used by reporting, for instance, how many children were helped or how many homeless were helped. The new model, he says, will measure its effectiveness by asking: Of those who find themselves homeless, how many have gotten themselves back into society or how many children are entering school prepared?

Recently, Walker hired New Almaden resident Ron Soto, who previously headed up the Mayor's Gang Prevention Task Force, to serve as community-impact director, and the needs-assessment process is beginning.

Rummelhoff says the United Way has its team pretty much in place and the organization is prepared to go forward as a community-impact organization. But to say that they are ready to go forward may gloss over what it took to get the organization to that point.

"When I got here," Rummelhoff recalls, "I found checks that had been sitting around for months." Customer service, he says, was close to nonexistent. These days, the person responsible for customer service reports directly to Rummelhoff. Checks are deposited the same day they arrive, and donors can look online to verify that their designations have been paid.

Although United Way hopes to earn a reputation as the organization that knows how best to allocate donated dollars for the most community impact, Rummelhoff says, "I don't want to discourage designations by doing a bad job of handling the designations. The community-impact model is the reason people should trust the United Way process."

A part of getting the most bang for the buck will likely be merging and consolidating of social service agencies, and United Way recently moved to head up such an effort by asking corporations and foundations to contribute to a strategic restructuring fund for nonprofits. "There is a feeling in the fundraising community that there are too many agencies with overlapping services," Walker says. "Our role might be to suggest mergers. In the past we haven't been proactive in this."

Although those in the nonprofit world know very well that they will have to become less dependent on tax dollars than in the past, the suggestion of mergers is likely to be met with resistance. Downsizing is never easy, whether in the for-profit or the nonprofit world.

How well United Way is perceived in the future depends a lot on the organization's ability to convince the community it is the agency with the best handle on the health and human care needs of the community and the best insight into how to get the best results for the dollars spent.

With a volunteer campaign cabinet of 80 corporate and community leaders—up from no volunteers at all when Walker took over two years ago—now wrapping up a campaign expected to raise some $16 million, there is a new sense of optimism in the community about United Way's future.

Those who've been observing Mark Walker believe he's the right person at the right time for the job.

Board President Don Watters says, "Mark is a joy to work with; he's so positive and optimistic. He gives direction."