Many years ago a good friend of mine, Merrilee, and I were talking about some of our struggles to hit our personal and professional goals. We had no problem setting goals. We simply had problems hitting them.
Perhaps that sounds familiar to you.
How to Create Your Organization’s Core Values
Organizational values can be tricky to identify. You and your team likely value many things -- justice, quality, collaboration, innovation, etc. If you’re not careful, you’ll create a long list of values that sounds like the values of any organization.
That’s why we base our approach on the values identification model put forth in Pat Lencioni’s book, The Advantage.
Top 10 Quotes for Strengthening Your Organization
In my customer work I try to communicate powerful concepts in simple and memorable ways. One of my favorite tools to do this is using relevant and powerful quotes.
To that end I've collected scores of quotes during my career. Whittling that collection down to a "top 10" for this article was a tough exercise. Many excellent quotes didn't make the final list.
I ended up choosing this list because these are the quotes that I find most inspiring for myself and our customers. I hope you find them helpful.
Tips on Eating Frogs
A Simple Research-based Tip for Setting More Effective Goals
For several years we’ve told our clients that there are two types of goals: process goals and results goals. For example, a process goal may be "to write one grant per month." The correlating results goal might be "to acquire $100K in new funding this year."
So, for these goals, the question is: "Which goal will help us get the result we want -- the $100K?" The correct answer is "it depends.”
Research Indicates a Strong Positive Correlation Between Strategic Planning and the Fundraising Success of Small Nonprofits
Death by Meeting
I've borrowed the title for this blog entry from one of my favorite business books, Death by Meeting by Pat Lencioni. The basic idea of the book is not that you'll die by meetings. Rather, you might die from awful meetings.
As you know, awful meetings happen all the time. They take too long. They wander aimlessly. They don’t start or end on time. You’d pretty much rather be anywhere else.
A Coronavirus Walks Into a Bar...
If you’re like me, humor has lifted my spirits recently. I’ve laughed at some COVID-related jokes and memes people have shared with me. I’ve really enjoyed the videos of our pets wishing that we’d go back to work so they can have the house to themselves again. Thank you to those that have lifted my spirits.
Rhythm and Blues Co-champions
I had the pleasure of seeing Mavis Staples, an American rhythm and blues singer, at the 15th Nelsonville Music Festival last weekend. Mavis, who will celebrate her 80th birthday next month, still performs over 200 shows a year. While watching her belting out vocal lines and performing for the crowd, I was reminded of a critical concept in strategic planning.
elcyciB sdrawkcaB a gnidiR
Uh, what? Now, try reading the title of this article backwards, starting from the far right and reading to the left. It likely took you a few seconds to do that, going letter-by-letter to make the title out: "Riding a Backwards Bicycle".
You know, you've spent your whole life paving pathways in your brain to read from left-to-right. It's a well-ingrained habit that is difficult to change.
What about another ingrained habit, like riding a bike. What if a bike was set up "backwards" in some way? Could you ride it?
Take a few minutes to watch this entertaining video to learn more. You'll find the time well-spent and may even want to share it with your friends.
So what does this all of this have to do with strategic planning, leadership, management, and running a nonprofit? A ton. Essentially, building your organization's capacity is often about overwriting old habits with new ones. Just like learning to ride a different type of bike.
What are some of those old habits that you might like to change? Try these:
Writing strategic plans but not implementing them.
Waiting to the last minute to complete grants.
Doing more work in the evenings and weekends than you'd like.
Viewing funders as people that support you (versus people that you support too).
Providing the executive director with sporadic performance reviews.
Doing everything yourself and not delegating very effectively.
You may not view these as habits, but they are. They're individual and organizational habits. And, like the guy in the video, with some insights and a committed practice, you can change them.
Which brings me to an excellent resource for you if you'd like to learn more about changing habits: The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and In Business by Charles Duhigg. I read this book last year and have meaning to write about it ever since. It's fascinating. Duhigg provides a fantastic overview of how habits form and how you can change them. So, if you're serious about making changes in your life or organization, the concepts in this book are gold. The ideas will even help you ride a backwards bicycle if you'd like...
Charles Duhig - The Power of Habit