DonorDreams – Page 5 – The Healthy Non-Profit

Class of 2012 should inspire all non-profit professionals: Part 3 of 3

May 24, 2012 DonorDreams Fundraising, leadership, organizational development, Planning

On Tuesday, we started a three-part series about educational opportunities for non-profit professionals. The first post looked closely at North Park University and their Master of Nonprofit Administration program (M.N.A.). The second post in the series investigated the Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University and everything they offer. Today, we’re zooming out and taking a wider view.

Lots of institutions

I invested the first two days of this blog series talking about two non-profit studies programs I think are really excellent. However, there are many different options available to those of you wishing to secure a certificate or degree in something related to the non-profit sector. The following is just a short list of other centers and institutes found in the United States:

Institute for Nonprofit Education and Research at University of San Diego
Center for Civil Society at University of California, Los Angeles
Center on Philanthropy and Civil Society at The City University of New York
Center on Philanthropy and Public Policy at University of Southern California
Helen Bader Institute for Nonprofit Management at University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
Institute for Human Services & Public Policy at Louisiana State University in Shreveport
Institute for Nonprofit Organization Management at University of San Francisco
Johns Hopkins Center for Civil Society Studies at Johns Hopkins University
Lodestar Center for Philanthropy & Nonprofit Innovation at Arizona State University
Nancy Bell Evans Center on Nonprofits & Philanthropy at University of New York

Don’t make a rash choice. Follow the advice that you received from your high school guidance counselor: “Do your homework and thoroughly investigate these programs to find the right fit for you.”

Lots of options

I like to joke with friends and colleagues that I went to the non-profit school of hard knocks to get my degree, but I’m really just being a joker when I say things like that. In reality, I attended the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and received both my BA of Urban Planning and Masters of Urban Planning.

Now some of you are probably wondering what urban planning has anything to do with the non-profit sector. I think Shannon Bond does a great job answering this question in her about.com article titled “A Guide to Nonprofit-Focused Graduate Degree Programs” when she said:

“Is there a program out there for you? You may be surprised at the variety of nonprofit-focused degree programs that exist. Here are descriptions of a few . . . MUP: A Masters of Urban Planning degree focuses on city revitalization, empowerment of impoverished areas, and environmental concerns. Graduates typically secure jobs in such organizations as the UN, USAID, the World Bank, local and state housing agencies and nonprofit organizations that assist the homeless.”

Shannon highlights a number of other graduate degree options including: Masters of Business Administration, Masters of Public Administration, Masters of Public Policy, and a Masters of Social Work. I encourage those of you who are seeking non-profit degrees and certifications to look at all of your options. Click here and start with Shannon’s article.

Of course, going to school nowadays has gotten really expensive. If you can’t afford to enroll in an institution of higher learning, I suggest looking more closely at some of the certificate programs that we talked about in the first and second parts of this blog series.

If neither a certicate or degree are in your future, you can always do it the old fashion way and get some “on the job experience”. The non-profit sector is always looking for good men and women regardless of their level of education.

Did you graduate from a higher education institution with a non-profit related degree? If so, please share more about your alma mater. If not, please share a non-profit experience from your past that you can honestly say helped shape who you are today. We can learn from each other.

Here’s to your health!

Erik Anderson
Founder & President, The Healthy Non-Profit LLC
www.thehealthynonprofit.com
erik@thehealthynonprofit.com
http://twitter.com/#!/eanderson847
http://www.facebook.com/eanderson847
http://www.linkedin.com/in/erikanderson847

Class of 2012 should inspire all non-profit professionals: Part 2 of 3

May 23, 2012 DonorDreams Fundraising, leadership, organizational development

Yesterday, we started a three-part series about educational opportunities for non-profit professionals. Today, we’re taking a closer look at the Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University.

The Center appears to be broken into a few different parts:

The Fundraising School
Academic programs
Research and consulting services
An institute focusing on faith and philanthropy
An institute on women, wealth and philanthropy

Just like North Park University (see yesterday’s post), the Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University offers certifications in Nonprofit Executive Leadership and Fundraising Management. They also offer Bachelor of Arts, Master of Arts, and Ph.D. degrees in Philanthropic Studies. Of course, if you’re like me and not looking for more paper to hang on your walls or letters to place after your name, you can always just sign-up for courses at the School of Fundraising or academic courses through the university. The following is a small sampling of course titles:

Giving and Volunteering in America
Law of Nonprofit Organizations
Developing Annual Sustainability
Planned Giving: Getting the Proper Start
Fundraising for Small Nonprofits

What I like about the last few examples from the Fundraising School is that they are available online.

The research arm of the school is interesting and impressive. Your non-profit organization can hiring consultants to work with you on a variety of projects. Additionally, you can hire one of their research staff members to speak on a number of different topics pertaining to fundraising trends and donor communities.

The thing I love most about the research branch of the Center on Philanthropy is that there are resources available for consumption for people who are simply “lifelong learners”. For example, there is a link on their website titled “Academic Working Papers“. Using the interface on that page, you can find research papers and philanthropy data. The following are just a few examples of papers I found:

Executive Compensation and Gender: A Longitudinal Study of a National Nonprofit Organization
The Market for Charitable Giving
The Effects of Race, Gender, and Marital Status on Giving and Volunteering in Indiana

Here’s to your health!

Class of 2012 should inspire all non-profit professionals: Part 1 of 3

May 22, 2012 DonorDreams leadership, organizational development

Spring is in the air or at least that is what my allergy sensitive nose tells me. This can only mean one thing. Young adults (and even some not so young adults) are donning their mortar board caps and marching down the aisles at institutions of higher education. I really love this time of the year because it is full of hope and promise. So, in honor of the Class of 2012, I will spend the next few days talking about educational opportunities for non-profit professionals. Today, we’re taking a closer look at North Park University and their Master of Nonprofit Administration program (M.N.A.).

I don’t know about you, but “back in the day” my non-profit alma mater was the School of Hard Knocks. I learned how to manage volunteers by jumping in and doing it, succeeding in some cases, and making mistakes in other instances. I learned how to cultivate, solicit and steward donors in the exact same way.

I believe human resource professionals call this “learning on the job”. I know this might sound crazy, but I look back fondly upon all of those experiences (both successful and not so successful) and wouldn’t trade any of it in for all of the wealth in the world.

With this being said, I am excited to see that colleges and universities are now offering certificates and degree programs in a variety of non-profit professions. Here is how North Park University describes their M.N.A. program:

The M.N.A. prepares students for senior-level positions in the nonprofit sector. The curriculum responds directly to skill sets and knowledge required for nonprofit executives and leaders, including board governance, fundraising, financial management, and outcomes measurement.

Some of the classes they offer are packed full of information that today’s executive directors and fundraising professionals need to succeed. The following are just a few course titles:

Annual and Major Gift Fundraising
Measuring Outcomes and Assessment
Nonprofit Financial Decision Making
Human Resources Management
Nonprofit Board Governance and Volunteer Management

In addition to their degree program, North Park University offers a number of non-profit certificates including: Church Administration, Fundraising Management, Healthcare Management, Education Administration, Nonprofit Finance, Nonprofit Governance, Nonprofit Management, and Nonprofit Marketing.

Embedded inside of North Park University’s School of Business and Nonprofit Management is the Axelson Center for Nonprofit Management. It is here that non-profit professionals will find continuing education trainings, webinars, workshops, and an annual symposium. This year’s symposium is scheduled for June 4-5 at the Holiday Inn, Chicago Mart Plaza. While everything looks very engaging, a few of the more interesting training tracks in my opinion are:

Generating Resources
Next Gen
Growth Strategies

Click here for more information about this symposium and find out what they mean by “Reignite Your Vision”.

Did you graduate from a higher education institution with a non-profit related degree? If so, please share more about your alam mater. If not, please share a non-profit experience from your past that you can honestly say helped shape who you are today. We can learn from each other.

Here’s to your health!

How can apps help you and your non-profit get more things done?

May 21, 2012 DonorDreams Mondays with Marissa, Planning, technology

In many of my Mondays with Marissa posts, I tend to focus on how non-profits can use social media to spread the word about their mission to build a community of volunteers and donors. This week, I’m looking at how some handy applications can help you better organize your day so that you might have more time to build an awesome website or make the best Facebook page ever.

Evernote

I remember when Evernote first came out. It blew my mind. The basic idea behind Evernote is that it wants to be your external brain. It is a place to put notes, photos, lists, documents, anything. Anything you put in Evernote can be accessed from anywhere through a variety of applications for the desktop, web and smartphone. All of these notes can be organized into various notebooks that can be public, private or shared with co-workers.

What makes Evernote really remarkable is the fact that it can search text in photographs. So, for example, say you were in a special event planning meeting where your team used a whiteboard to capture ideas. Everything was laid out on the whiteboard, but there wasn’t enough time to capture all of those ideas into an email to be shared with everyone later. You could just take photo of the board and put it in one of Evernote’s collaborative notebooks. Later you could use the search function to look for the words “special event,” and if it was in the white board photo, it would show up in your search results.

Evernote is free to use, but for just $5/month or $45/year you can get more storage and more functionality. I could go on and on about the cool things you could do with Evernote, but you should just check out their website for more information.

Google Apps

Google has really tried hard to replace office standards such as Outlook, Word and Excel. I think they have done a pretty good job. With Google Docs, teams can work together on a document in real-time and not have to email large files back and forth. Google Calendar is a robust replacement for the calendar in Outlook. Additionally, if you use Gmail plug-ins, you can easily customize your email to your liking.

Google also has a tasks list built into both GMail and Google Calendar. I find this extremely helpful because I prefer to put my “To Do List” onto a calendar as opposed to just making separate lists. Once you create a task list, the window can stay minimized at the bottom of your window, which allows for convenient access at all times. If you put a due date on your task list, it will show up in a special tasks calendar next time you open Google Calendar. You can also set it up so that it emails you reminders.

Finally, GChat is something that I think many people overlook. As someone who works remotely, GChat is really convenient. It allows me to have conversations with people without having to be in the same room. Beyond the traditional text-based instant messaging conversations, GChat has a great video chat feature included. You can also make phone calls to landlines or mobile phones using GChat. Some of them might even be free!

Click here for a more comprehensive list of Google product. I suspect you will be surprised at all they are offering!

Remember the Milk

This last App is one of the oldest and fully featured to-do list applications out there. Remember the Milk makes list-making easy. You can create lists for all sorts of projects and sync them over all devices and programs. They even have an Outlook plug-in! Remember the Milk has options “up the wazoo” so if you use an organizational system like GTD you’ll find it easy to make your project lists here. What I like most about Remember the Milk is it’s simple design and usability.

Those are just a few of the numerous applications out there that help organize information, remind you to get things done, and find more time to spend on mission-related things for your non-profit organization.

Do you use any of these Apps or are there others that you prefer? Do you have a favorite? Please scroll down to the comment box and share your experiences!

One final note and commercial interruption . . . I wanted to mention that I wrote a guest article on about.com about where to get started with social media. I invite you to check it out and share it with others. Thanks!

Strike three . . . You’re OUT! Because you swung for the non-profit fences.

May 18, 2012 DonorDreams leadership, nonprofit, organizational development

Welcome to O.D. Fridays at DonorDreams blog. Every Friday for the foreseeable future we will be looking more closely at a recent post from John Greco’s blog called “johnponders ~ about life at work, mostly” and applying his organizational development messages to the non-profit community.

Today, we’re focusing on a post that John titled “My Last At Bat“. In that post, he talks about his last Little League game as a child. As a baseball fan, I immediately fell in love with this blog post. As a fan of the non-profit sector and organizational development, my mind has been spinning for almost a week about how many different ways John’s post applies to non-profit agencies.

I don’t want to give anything away (you really need to go read his post for yourself), but the story is about how John approached his last Little League game with an understanding of what he was “good at doing” and tried to play within his capabilities. His friend took a very different approach and got very different results.

Looking back over the last 15 years, I’ve seen this dynamic play out in many different ways. Here are a few examples:

A non-profit board needs to fill an executive director vacancy. Rather than looking at competencies, skill sets and past experiences, the search committee gets WOWed by a charming big personality. Or they hire the internal candidate who has been a great front line program staffer, but doesn’t have any past experience with fundraising, board development, or financial management.
An executive director needs to hire a development director to provide thoughtful leadership and direction to the agency’s comprehensive resource development program. Rather than identifying what competencies, skill sets and past experiences are necessary for this person to excel and succeed, they interview a hodgepodge of fundraising people including direct mail professionals, grant writers, special event coordinators, and marketing people. Again, they end up hiring a special event person and ask them to do something that they don’t have a track record of doing.
The board development committee needs to recruit a new class of board volunteers. Rather than complete a gap analysis to determine what skill sets and experiences incoming board volunteers need in order to help move the agency forward, the committee puts together a list of “friends” who they know will likely say YES if asked. In the end, the wrong people are sitting around the table. They are all well-intentioned, but the boardroom feels dysfunctional and engagement is lacking.

Why do so many of us in the non-profit sector ask people to do things that are outside of their immediate capabilities?

I know that you can hit a single, but I need you to hit a home run today!

The silly thing is that stringing together a few singles puts a few runs on the scoreboard in the same way that hitting a home run will do. Translated into “non-profit speak” . . . asking people (employees and volunteers) to do what they do well will advance your cause as much or more than asking them to do something that they haven’t done before.

Here are just a few suggestions to get our conversation going:

Don’t ask a volunteer who hasn’t done any fundraising to join your board.
Don’t hire an executive director who hasn’t been an executive director before.
Don’t ask a volunteer solicitor to ask a donor for a significant contribution unless they’ve also given significantly.
Don’t hire a special event person to write grants unless they’ve been successful at doing it somewhere else.

I am sure that some of you are bristling at these suggestions and have good examples of when you might want to do one of these things. Please know that these suggestions are not meant to be “absolutes”. However, if you plan on asking someone to do something that they don’t have much experience doing, then you must adjust your expectations. You need to expect failure at first. You need to view it as a “project” and invest in training and professional development, accordingly.

Do you ask your employees and volunteers to “play within their abilities”? Or are you someone who is always encouraging them to hit home runs for your agency? How do you guarantee that you’re hiring and recruiting the right people for the right jobs? What would you add to the list I started a few paragraphs ago around Do’s and Don’ts? How have you managed your employees’ and volunteers’ disappointment when they fail to hit the home run that you asked them to hit?

If you haven’t done so yet, please go read John Greco’s post “My Last At Bat“. When you’re done, circle back to this post and share your comments, thoughts and answers to some of the questions I’ve posed using the comment box below. Let’s learn from each other.

Here’s to your health!

What won’t non-profits do to excite their board volunteers?

May 17, 2012 DonorDreams Board development, leadership, organizational development, Planning, volunteers

I ran across an awesome article while “Googling around” the other day. It was titled “Nine Keys for Reinvigorating Board Leadership,” and it was written by Paul Connolly, a Senior Vice President of TCC Group. While digesting this article, my mind first turned to those executive directors who I’ve seen in the last decade that actively try to disengage their board volunteers. After mentally traveling down that road (ugh … and it is an ugly road), I got more positive in my thinking and focused on all of the crazy things I’ve witnessed in the name of “board engagement”.

The following are just a few quick things I’ve seen over the years:

Of course, many organizations have turned to the good old fashion “mission moment” as part of their board meeting agenda.
How many “board retreats” have I seen organized all in the name of “engagement”? Ugh … too many!
One organization I worked with decided that social opportunities such as “Happy Hour” should be a part of their engagement solution.
I’ve heard some boards talk about putting together a mentoring program that hooks new board members up with tenured ones.
One organization I know even rented a trolley, loaded up its board volunteers and donors, and drove it from site-to-site as part of a facilities tour strategy focused on getting key stakeholders re-engaged in mission.
Oh yeah. You can’t forget about the “big conference” strategy where the executive director takes a board member (or a few) to one of those big inspirational conferences. When everyone returns, those board members are asked to “make a presentation” back to their fellow board members about what they learned. Hopefully, sparks of excitement ignite interest and activity.

Oh, the things I’ve seen. I could go on and on and on. I doubt that there isn’t anything an executive director, who actually wants an engaged board, would do to achieve this goal. Of course, when this topic of conversation usually comes up, there is an overwhelming desire to bypass “strategy” and go right to “tactics”

When I read the article by Paul Connolly, I had a moment of clarity because he didn’t go right to tactics. He focused on the following nine strategies:

Encourage board members to tell each other what motivates them to serve.
Educate board members about the organization and their responsibilities.
Hold the board accountable for its own performance and conduct a candid board assessment.
Compel the board to continually plan for the future and focus on results.
Infuse board meetings with more meaning.
Add some new board members and graduate some existing ones.
Nurture future leadership.
Develop a synergistic board-CEO partnership.
Consider alternative models for governance.

Ohhhhhhh! Ahhhhhhh! Has your curiosity been piqued? I know mine was. If you are intrigued and want to learn more about more deeply engaging your board volunteers, then I have two suggestions:

First, I strongly urge you to read Paul Connolly’s article “Nine Keys for Reinvigorating Board Leadership“.

Second, circle back here to DonorDreams blog and engage your fellow non-profit professionals in a discussion using the comment box found below. We can all learn from each other, especially if we share examples of what we’re doing and what has worked (or not worked) for us.

So, are you one of those executive directors who focuses on deepening board engagement? If so, why? If not, then why not? What things have you done or seen others do in the name of board engagement? Did Paul Connolly’s article trigger any ideas? If so, please share.

Here’s to your health!

Should social service non-profit organizations ever own property?

May 16, 2012 DonorDreams Fundraising, organizational development

For the last few weeks, I’ve been working pledge cards for one of my favorite charities. I must admit that I’m having a blast. The conversations with local philanthropists and donors are so engaging and thought-provoking. Frankly, I’ve been surprised by what some donors believe and in some instances those encounters have turned into interesting blog posts. Today’s post was inspired by one donor’s passionate belief that social service non-profit organizations shouldn’t ever own property.

Oh sure . . . hospitals and colleges are non-profit corporations, and there is little question that those organizations need to own the property and buildings in which they operate. However, some donors in my hometown of Elgin, Illinois don’t believe that the same is true for social service agencies.

Why? Well, this is an interesting question that comes with a long answer.

Let’s just say that more than 10 years ago one of Elgin’s more stable non-profit agencies ran a capital campaign, expanded their building (dramatically), and couldn’t afford to operate within such a dramatically expanded building footprint. Long story short . . . the new building was “sold” within a few years of opening, and the agency had to merge with another organization from outside the community to ensure services continued.

So, what is this really all about? I think it is about donors having LONG MEMORIES. Additionally, the following old expression keeps echoing through my head:

“Fool me once shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me!”

As you can imagine, I did my best to engage this donor in a conversation. Here were some of the highlights of what I said:

Not all non-profit organizations go out-of-business.
Not all non-profits conduct business that can be accommodated by existing rental opportunities.
Not all non-profits have an unstable revenue model or operate under a cloud of financial uncertainty.

In the end, there was no changing this donor’s mind, and it is easy to understand why. He invested and now feels burned. He passionately argued the following powerful points:

Too many social service agencies lack organizational capacity and are stretched too thin. Funding expansion of an agency that has a culture of operating on a shoe string can be like stretching a rubber band too far.
Too many social service agencies don’t operate within a culture of transparency. They sell donors on a capital campaign contribution. Their operations expand, and the agency is back in no time asking for more operating cash to fund their larger footprint. If this was all explained at the same time as the capital campaign solicitation, then that would be one thing, but when that doesn’t happen it leaves a bad taste in the donor’s mouth.
What is the real estate market suppose to do with buildings that are built specifically around specialty functions of a social service non-profit agency? These buildings aren’t just office spaces with cubicles that can be re-sold to any number of potential buyers. Oftentimes, social service organizations are building spaces unique to their services.

I get it . . . I get it . . . Fool me once; shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me! I may not agree with this donor, but I definitely get it and respect his feelings.

So, what are your thoughts? Do you think social service non-profits should place a premium on renting rather than owning their home? What would you have said to this donor that I might not have? Is there a more donor-centered fundraising approach that should be used when soliciting for a capital campaign so that future annual support won’t be jeopardized? Any suggestions on how a donor like this one can be re-engaged? Please use the comment box below and share your thoughts. We can all learn from each other.

Here’s to your health!

Should Development Directors be allowed in the boardroom?

May 15, 2012 DonorDreams Board development, Fundraising, organizational development

A resource development colleague called me a few weeks ago. They were upset and pissed off after a recent board meeting, and they just wanted to vent their anger. As a good friend who was just asked to lend a shoulder to cry upon, I shut-up and listened. I didn’t offer any advice because it wasn’t asked for; however, the situation that was shared with me has been burning on my mind for weeks. It is such a serious issue that I thought I’d share it here and open it up for discussion.

In a nutshell, here are the facts that color this story:

The development director is a fixture in the boardroom and gives a “development report” at every meeting.
After delivering their report, a board member asked a question about what the development department might look like in the future.
While the development director had talked with the executive director about this issue in passing on a few occasions, neither of them had formally engaged on this subject in a meaningful way.
The answer caught the executive director off guard a little bit, and they jumped into the conversation with a “sharp tongue”. This response felt demeaning to the development director, and they felt “put in their place” in front of the board of directors.
In the days following the board meeting, the development director was verbally reprimanded and given what HR people would describe as a “verbal warning”.

I am very sympathetic to my resource development friend. It feels like the response was harsh; however, as a former executive director, I hated surprises in the boardroom, and I was a bit sensitive to how my employees interacted and engaged with board members.

All of this aside, I wonder what is the appropriate role for resource development professionals inside the boardroom. Is there one? Should the boardroom just be a place for an agency’s chief executive officer and the board of directors?

I am sure there are a number of you ready to share your thoughts about how important it is for fundraising professionals to have access to board volunteers and how strong relationships with volunteers are the key to a strong resource development program.

While I will be the first to agree with you, I keep wondering why does that need to occur in the boardroom?

Don’t resource development directors “have access” at resource development committee meetings? Special event planning meetings? Over a cup of coffee or lunch?

Isn’t the boardroom a sacred place where board members and their sole employee — the executive director — get to have frank conversations about the agency and its strategic direction?

There are so many other tangent conversations I could bring into this blog post such as:

What role should an executive director play in the agency’s resource development program when there are fundraising professionals on the payroll?
What should the communication protocol be for agency employees who report to the executive director and need access to board members?
Should development professionals guard against sharing their opinions with board members when the executive director hasn’t been fully brought into the conversation? If so, how? If not, why not?

However, I want to stop the conversation just short of those topics and just focus on the boardroom question. What staff are allowed in your agency’s boardroom? What function do they serve? What protocols are in place to ensure situations like the one I just shared with you don’t happen?

Here’s to your health!

How Can Non-Profit Organizations Use Google Hangouts Effectively?

May 14, 2012 DonorDreams Fundraising, Mondays with Marissa, Planning, technology

When Google launched their social network, Google+, people were all excited because it was a real alternative to Facebook. People were even saying that Google+ might be a “Facebook Killer”.

Flash forward to today. Facebook is about to about to go live on the stock market this week and is still one of the most used and growing social media sites. Google+ is still alive and well, but mainly with an active tech focused community.

One of the reasons I think Google+ hasn’t died is because of its interactive feature — Google Hangouts. Put simply, Google Hangouts are video chats with up to 10 people. While participating in a Hangout, people can watch the same YouTube video together and discuss it live. People can share presentations using SlideShare or even share their own computer screens.

Google Hangouts can be a powerful tool for nonprofits in a number of ways.

First of all, meetings can be held from anywhere. If you only need to meet with a few people and everyone’s availability is tight, then a Google Hangout might be a perfect solution for you. As long as each person has a computer with internet access and webcam (all of which are pretty standard when it comes to computers these days), your special event planning meeting can take place within a Google Hangout. It used to be that you had to pay a lot of money to use a video conferencing services, but today all you need is a Google account.

In addition, Google Hangouts can help build a sense of community with staff. If you work at an agency where people work from home or different locations, you can have a Google Hangout water cooler session. People could log in and just chat about the news of the day, or the latest happenings around the office.

Google Hangouts makes team-building in a virtual environment possible. This may seem like a small thing, but as someone who used to work from home, I missed the social interactions that would happen in an office. If I were able to set something like this up, it would have helped me feel more connected to my co-workers.

Finally, and perhaps the most exciting thing about Google Hangouts is that they can now be broadcasted to everyone using Google Hangouts On Air. A few months ago, President Obama participated in a Google On Air Hangout where a few people were live in the Hangout with him, but everyone could watch along via YouTube. This same functionality is now available to everyone.

Using Google Hangouts On Air, you can broadcast your special event to people all over the world. Or if your staff is scattered over a large geographic area and you have an important public announcement to make, why not use a Google Hangout On Air to have a mini staff meeting to share that big news? Are you having a guest speaker at one of your events? You could easily share the speech with people who couldn’t make it.

Oh one more thing, Google Hangouts On Air allows you to record your Hangout, which makes it easy to share with others after it is over.

The roll-out for Google Hangouts On Air will be happening over the next few weeks, so make sure you sign into your Google+ account and check it out. For more information, you can watch this video:

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ohlHn6Kt5YM]

What do you think? Do you think Google Hangouts is a viable solution for your organization when it comes to video conferencing? What are your thoughts about the usability of Google Hangouts On Air? Let’s discuss it using the comment section below!

Work-Life Balance for non-profit professionals? Ask a donor for help.

May 11, 2012 DonorDreams Donor-centered fundraising, leadership, organizational development

Today, we’re focusing on a post that John titled “At Peace“. In that post, he talks about two different pictures and uses those images to illustrate the point that there is a difference between “at peace” and “getting some peace”.

After reading this post, I couldn’t get my mind off of the idea of work-life balance. This topic of conversation comes up all the time when I’m talking to non-profit professionals. As I previously blogged about in a post titled “Kissing While Driving for Non-Profit Agencies,” non-profit organizations are typically under-resourced. As a result, almost all nof the on-profit professional who I know wear multiple hats, lack balance in their life, and appear to be on the brink of “going postal”.

At Peace? Definitely NOT!

Over the last 15 years, I’ve battled with the ideas that John eloquently lays out in his blog post. The following are just a few things that I’ve tried:

Attending time management trainings (e.g. FranklinCovey, David Allen’s Getting Things Done, etc)
Using various time management tools ranging from FranklinCovey to Microsoft Outlook. I’m now a Android smart phone junkie, who is utterly lost in life when my device isn’t within reach.
Going on vacation
Quiting my job and opening The Healthy Non-Profit LLC

In hindsight, John is so right . . . I was “getting some peace” in most of those instances. So, what can non-profit professionals do to be “At Peace“????

I like John’s suggestion that re-evaluating and adjusting our expectations about what “peace” really means. In his post, he talks about the picture of a violent waterfall, jagged mountains and an angry sky being a picture of “peace”. Maybe accepting this idea rather than fighting against it is more than half the battle.

I also like John’s challenge at the end of his post where he asks the following question:

“Perhaps, when leaders disrupt our peace when making organizational changes, they should orchestrate efforts to enable us to adapt and change?”

As I contemplate this question, I struggle with what those efforts might look like.

So, I have a suggestion for all of you who find yourself struggling with the same question:

Open your donor database.
Run a report showing your agency’s top 50 lifetime donors.
Scan the list in search of a donor who owns their own business, has gone through some change initiatives in the last few years, and appears to be busy and yet peaceful.
Pick-up the phone and call that donor.
Invite them out to share a cup of coffee.
Tell them about John’s blog post topic.
Ask them to share their secrets to success with regards to being “at peace”.
Ask them what efforts they orchestrated at work to help their employees adapt and change and in effect putting their workplace “at peace”.

Not only will you most likely get some great advice, but this conversation will have a “stewardship effect” for that donor. It will deepen a relationship with someone who is already important to your organization.

I like this suggestion mostly because it reminds me of the fact that donors are not just ATMs that produce cash every time we ask for it. Donors are friends and part of our non-profit family. We can put this principle in action by asking them to donate their knowledge and experiences in addition to their financial contributions. In doing so, the relationship gets stronger and grows.

Do you struggle with work-life balance issues at your non-profit organization? What have you personally done to try to achieve balance? What has your agency done to help facilitate this idea of being “at peace”? Have you ever engaged donors in questions like this? How did it work out for you?

Please scroll down and share your thoughts in the comment box. We can all learn from each other.

Here’s to your health!