The 5 Ingredients You'll Need to Succeed in 2026
December 18, 2025
By: Peter Panepento
You’ve (almost) made it!
If you’re like most social-good leaders, the past 12 months have been challenging at best.
You’ve likely been pushed to the limit during a year marked by significant change — a year that has forced you to adapt to an unfamiliar world order, massive technological transformation, and persistent fears about what’s lurking around the corner.
Thankfully, the holidays beckon — and with them come an opportunity to unwind, recharge, and gear up for another lap around the sun.
Of course, these same forces will still be there in the new year.
But you now have a clearer sense of what to expect. You’re also better prepared to turn challenges into opportunities that will position you — and your organization — to thrive in 2026.
As we’ve been working with organizations to prepare for the year ahead, we’ve developed a recipe for success that includes five key ingredients:
1. Use AI as a strategic multiplier
If you’re like most leaders, you’ve already embraced artificial intelligence as a tool to help streamline your creative process.
According to Turn Two’s first-ever fieldwide community foundation communications survey, more than 8 in 10 organizations are using AI to help with infographics and video creation, while nearly 9 in 10 are using it for creating initial drafts of written content — a trend that extends across the social good sector.
As we look ahead to 2026, we’re advancing efforts to use AI as a strategic tool — one that leverages AI agents to game plan responses to threats and capture opportunities to raise more money and make smarter grantmaking decisions. We’re also exploring partnerships that can help organizations work more closely with each other and their grantees to achieve more in their communities.
As you build your strategies for the year ahead, prepare to be flexible — and to be ready to use AI in ways that go beyond the tactical.
2. Focus on purpose
Many organizations are adept at talking about their mission, vision, and values (MVV).
We’re finding the organizations that are best at building emotional connections go beyond MVV and focus their messaging on their purpose — namely why they do what they do.
By deliberately articulating your why — and weaving it thoughtfully into your message — you’ll have an opportunity to rise above the noise and inspire more people to support your work.
3. Be prepared
It’s likely your organization faced an array of unexpected events in 2025 that required you to communicate quickly.
How did you do?
If you’re like most social good organizations, you likely could have done much better. This is especially true if you lack a crisis communications plan that can guide your response during fast-moving events.
Our survey of community foundations found more than 4 in 10 don’t have policies to govern their response to natural disasters and roughly one-half don’t have communications protocols for addressing internal crises.
Organizations that are prepared to communicate in rapid-response situations are more likely to limit risks and even turn crises into opportunities. Put more simply, they are more resilient.
Make 2026 the year you commit to creating — or revisiting — your crisis communications protocol.
And if you need help, check out our Crisis Communications Bootcamp series, which provides guided training on how to create your plan.
4. Tell Your Story
The growth of AI and emerging communications channels have pushed many organizations to move away from more traditional PR and content strategies in favor of other approaches.
For most organizations, this is a mistake — especially in the era of AI search.
Recent research by Muckrack found more than 95% of links cited by AI chatbots come from non-paid, organic content – with nearly 90% of those being earned media coverage.
In other words, if you want to get noticed by the bots, you need to be leaning into tactics that may seem old-school — earned media, press releases, and authoritative thought leadership published in reputable outlets.
Traditional PR may have fallen out of favor in recent years. But it’s far from dead. In fact, we expect it to have a major resurgence in 2026.
5. Blend Traditional and New-School Approaches
While it’s important to embrace meat-and-potatoes PR and storytelling, it’s equally vital to incorporate new school approaches into your 2026 communications diet.
The bots may be attracted to info they can verify through third-party sources, but many of the people you’re trying to reach are continuing to digest content delivered via podcasts and in channels such as TikTok, Reddit, and Discord.
As a result, it’s important to make sure you’re serving up a balanced diet of content.
The year ahead promises to be just as challenging as 2025 for many organizations.
But by following this recipe, you’ll be well positioned to meet the moment and taste success in 2026.
