Stanford Social Innovation Review

Bully!  The Scourge of Nonprofit Boards, and What to Do About It

Like every other human organization, a nonprofit board of directors is subject to being dominated by an internal bully. Nonprofit boards are actually more at risk of bully dominance than other groups, because the only compensation for serving is psychological. For most board members, the psychological reward is the consciousness of doing good in good company—but for some, satisfaction can only flow from being utterly and completely in charge.

The bully turns a nonprofit board into a corporation of one, and deprives the executive director (ED) and the agency of everyone else’s expertise and skills.

Here are three common forms of nonprofit board bully, and what to do about them:

The Martinet Bully: Often a man, and often the board chair. He is determined to import the standards of the business world to the nonprofit sector whether they’re applicable or not. His methods involve an exaggerated concern for efficiency: meetings start early, whether or not people are there, and discussion is foreshortened with a remark such as, “We’ve got the report—let’s just vote.”  In the short term, the ED should gently say, “I’m not sure everyone’s been heard from yet.” In the medium term, give the martinet a project he can handle by himself which will keep him out of others’ way. In the long term, find someone else willing to serve as board chair who will practice for that position by deliberately sticking a spoke in the current chair’s wheel when he starts running over the rest of the group.

The Expert Bully: “I’m on 33 other boards, and it’s always done this way.” He or she shuts down others’ opinions with a look of condescending pity for those lacking experience.  Interestingly, this brand of bully is rarely willing to serve as board chair (too busy with the other boards, perhaps). In the short term, the board chair and ED should make sure they know of at least one example of things being done differently, and mention it. In the medium term, give the expert a project that can be handled exactly as the expert bully pleases. In the long term, identify and work to empower other board members in specific areas of governance—personnel, say, or taxes—and thus gradually reduce the scope of the expert’s terrain.

The Passive-Aggressive Bully: “You can do it that way if you want, but then I’m going to have to quit.” This one arises most frequently at the pivotal moment when an agency is finally adopting a minimum gift. The bully hopes to make everyone else feel guilty for having too much money and not enough sympathy for poor little Passive-Aggressive. In the short term, the board chair and ED can pretend not to hear what’s been said. In the medium and long term, ask other members of the board to pretend not to hear what’s been said. The only way to handle these bullies is to ignore them.

Kelly Kleiman, who blogs as The Nonprofiteer, is a lawyer and freelance journalist whose reportage and essays about the arts, philanthropy and women’s issues have appeared in the Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Christian Science Monitor and other dailies; in magazines including In These Times and Chicago Philanthropy; and on websites including Aislesay.com and Artscope.net.

Posted by Katie Harrington

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Board Members Are Not Hypothetical Constructs

It’s fairly common among Board development writers and consultants to suggest that nonprofits take inventory of their current Boards and develop lists of what they need and want to add to the strengths of those Boards. Then (goes the conventional wisdom) put your list in priority order, and you’ll be ready to do Board recruitment.

To which the Nonprofiteer responds: what a waste of time. What’s the point of identifying a desired outcome, “Someone wealthy, with lots of connections, who’s eager to do fundraising,” if there’s no way to accomplish the outcome? What’s the point of fantasizing about imaginary people, “Someone wealthy, with lots of connections, who’s eager to do fundraising,” when the point is to find real people and attract them to your cause?

The real process of Board development takes place when an entire Board sits down in a room with a consultant or a strong leader and a good note-taker and says: who do we know? After the obligatory 10 minutes of “We don’t know anybody,” people will start saying, “Well, there is my cousin’s brother-in-law, who owns the copy shop on Fourth Street and has been looking for a Board to join . . .” Your options may not be as glamorous as “Oprah” but you will have a better chance of producing community members who are willing to join and support your cause—and that’s what Board members are.

It’s so simple (I hear you cry), why do most Boards find it so hard? Because they neglect the essential first step: deciding what it is they truly want and expect Board members—all Board members, not just new recruits—to do. If you don’t write a job description, you’ll find it remarkably difficult to identify anybody who can do the job, and even more difficult to persuade him/her/them to take it on.

Which highlights yet another common error among Boards trying to do recruitment: getting preoccupied with describing the job they want someone else to do. “We want a lawyer, and an accountant, and someone to do fundraising, and someone to write our newsletter”—no. What you want is people who will join you in identifying and assigning all of the tasks a Board must do to keep its agency healthy. Maybe it’s best to use a Board member as your lawyer; maybe it’s better to hire a lawyer. Ditto accountants. Ditto marketing professionals. What you must have is people who understand that they face not one but many tasks, and not individually but collectively—and the people you recruit will only understand that if you do. You are not seeking someone to fill a position; you are seeking someone to share with you the position you already occupy.

So—to summarize—Board members are not hypothetical constructs. They’re actual people who, in conjunction with you and other actual people you will recruit, will perform actual tasks in support of your actual institution. So proceed as follows:

1. Identify those tasks, and write them down.
2. Identify people who might be interested in supporting your agency, and then compare their known skills and abilities to the tasks you’ve identified.
3. Go talk to those people! Even if half of them say “no,” the other half will say “yes,” and you’ll have a set of new Board members—instead of another set of charts describing the Board members you wish you had.

If this process sounds familiar, that’s because it’s the same process every successful charity uses in beginning a capital campaign—asking the people around the table, “Who do you know?” Board development is fundraising is Board development; the closer your process hews to a successful fundraising process, the more likely you are to create a Board that will do its fundraising job.

And let’s dispense with a favorite nonsensical quarrel: between those who think you have to recruit people with passion for your mission and those who think you have to recruit people who have the ability to fundraise. The answer is “both;” and the other answer is, “No one is born with either.” If you talk to a stranger about your mission and s/he catches fire with it, s/he’s eligible in the passion department, even if s/he hasn’t been a long-term supporter: enthusiasm is contagious, and of course you have it, right? By the same token, if you talk to someone who knows and loves you and says “I’ll do anything for you, but I don’t know anything about raising money,” the appropriate reply is, “Don’t worry, we’ll teach you.”

Raising money is nothing more than stating the case for an institution you love to people with the resources to support it. Board recruitment is nothing more than stating the case for an institution you love to people who will be prepared to do the same thing. Let’s stop complicating it, and preparing for it, and just get out there and do it (Life is not a dress rehearsal.) Real people—the restaurant owner down the block, the lawyer who spent $600 at your last auction, the retired engineer who organized your inventory down to the last screwdriver—are waiting to be asked.

Kelly Kleiman, who blogs as The Nonprofiteer, is a lawyer and freelance journalist whose reportage and essays about the arts, philanthropy and women’s issues have appeared in The Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Christian Science Monitor and other dailies; in magazines including In These Times and Chicago Philanthropy; and on websites including Aislesay.com and Artscope.net.

Posted by Kelsey Walker

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A New Spirit, a Time for Giving

The election of Barack Obama as president marks the start of a new era for giving and making a difference.

In his victory speech in Chicago, Obama asked Americans to serve, sacrifice, and work together to fix what is wrong in America and strengthen our communities, our economy, our environment, and our security.

Throughout the campaign, Obama has urged Americans to pitch in.

He has promised, for example, to repay college graduates who perform public service for groups like the Peace Corps and Teach for America by helping to cover their college costs.

Charitable giving in the U.S. totaled $306 billion last year, and nearly 61 million Americans age 16 and older volunteered, giving 8.1 billion hours worth over $158 billion.

Over one million nonprofit organizations depend on the contribution of time, money, and know-how, and the dedication of employees who often are overworked and underpaid, to address the urgent needs our communities face.

“So let us summon a new spirit of patriotism, of service, and responsibility where each of us resolves to pitch in and work harder and look after not only ourselves, but each other,” Obama said Tuesday night.

Long known as the “nonprofit sector,” or “voluntary sector,” the charitable work and investment of individuals and organizations more accurately should be known as the “giving sector.”

The giving sector is the heart of America.

And now, in the face of overwhelming economic, environmental, and global-security threats, the giving sector needs to be stronger, more strategic, and more collaborative.

Nonprofits must equip themselves to truly succeed. They need to engage their givers and their boards. And boards need to know their role, help the organization focus on the mission, and give staff the support they need.

Individuals must connect themselves to causes they care about, and make strategic investments of their time, their expertise, and their financial assets.

And charitable foundations and corporate-giving programs must dig deep and do more to address the organizational and operating needs of nonprofits.

Obama promises he will work to engage everyone in the job of fixing what is wrong in America, making government truly diverse and inclusive.

That job will require that we learn to bridge the gaps that divide us and work together, and nowhere is that more needed than in the giving sector.

Nonprofits and foundations talk a lot about collaboration, but few are willing to actually give up even the tiniest measure of control or power to form the partnerships that will be critical to solving problems that are bigger than individual organizations can handle.

And most foundations, for all their talk, still will not give more each year than the law requires them to “pay out,” a mere 5 percent of their assets.

In addition to the financial incentives he has promised to give college graduates who perform public service, Obama can push for incentives for individuals, foundations, and corporations to give more.

Obama also can engage in the giving sector the truly remarkable political organization he has built.

And nonprofits, applying the social-networking strategies and technology Obama used to build his organization, now can do a better job mobilizing, engaging, and managing their own givers.

“This victory alone is not the change we seek, it is only the chance for us to make that change,” Obama said Tuesday night. “And that cannot happen if we go back to the way things were. It cannot happen without you.”

In this new era of giving, the challenge for the giving sector is to move beyond talk and giving as usual to truly fulfill the dream of a “new spirit of patriotism, of service, and of responsibility.”

Todd Cohen, a veteran news reporter and editor, is editor and publisher of
Philanthropy Journal, an online newspaper published by the A.J. Fletcher Foundation in Raleigh, N.C. Cohen has taught nonprofit reporting and media relations at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and at Duke University, and regularly speaks on the topics of nonprofit media relations and trends in the charitable world.

Posted by Kelsey Walker

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Arts Policy Redux: A Board of Artists that Can’t Govern

Amid the sound and fury accompanying the National Academy Museum’s decision to sell some paintings, and the Association of Art Museum Directors’ decision to shun the Academy therefor, one sensible commentator stands out: Michael O’Hare at the public-policy blog “The Reality-Based Community.” In a series of postings and comments on others’ postings, O’Hare applies straightforward what-are-we-trying-to-do-and-for-whom analysis to the situation, and strips away the pretense that the people involved are operating in a universe so complex and unique that none of the rest of us can hope to comprehend or, God forbid, critique their behavior.

Here are the Nonprofiteer’s additional two cents: almost certainly, the stated ethical principal that museums shouldn’t sell art from their collections except to buy new art for their collections is a specific example of the general principle that nonprofits, governments, and businesses, shouldn’t sell assets to pay for operating expenses.  Ordinarily the sale of assets to pay operating expenses reflects some long-term management/budget problem in the agency, crying out for a long-term solution–and asset sales are, by definition, a short-term solution.

It’s probably also true that the prohibition against selling art except to pay for other art is a clumsy swipe in the direction of preventing arts Boards from looting the assets over which they have stewardship.  The old Harding Collection in Chicago comes to mind–before the Art Institute swooped in to save it, the Collection’s trustees had sold off precious swords and suits of armor and God knows what all else so they could pay themselves salaries.  As nonprofit Board members aren’t supposed to get salaries to begin with, perhaps it would have been wiser to emphasize that prohibition rather than creating an ancillary one against selling assets–but certainly the stuff that went into the black market from the collection was lost to the museum world forever, and so certainly curators would be concerned about the specific method of underwriting trustee luxury as well as the bare fact of doing so.

And finally, the press coverage makes clear that proper governance of the Academy Museum is made almost impossible by the interference of the academicians, member artists whose contributions to the museum consist of a single piece of their own art.  What possible motivation could these people have for regarding sales of any museum art as a disgraceful insult?  Perhaps the next battle the embattled Executive Director should fight is one for restructuring the institution so that people with personal interests in particular museum decisions are moved out of the way.

Having said all of that: the museum directors’ posture that a museum about to go under is to be deprived of the help it needs because its leadership has accepted an unpleasant necessity involved in saving it is so foolish and unhelpful as to be destructive, and O’Hare’s anatomization of the position’s wrong-headedness is clear, to the point and completely correct.  (Also smart and thoughtful: the analysis offered on the Arts Law Blog.)

Those who advocate “furious fundraising” to solve the problem are certainly correct: again, in general, the role of the Board of Directors is to raise money to assure that the agency has enough money to function, and Boards should be urged and aided to resist the temptation to sell off the agency piecemeal to avoid having to do so.  Similarly, governors and mayors should be helped to resist the temptation to sell off state buildings and highways and parking meters to avoid having to raise taxes; here in Illinois, we find imprisonment of public executives the best deterrent.

But it’s also true that agencies, like governments, often own assets they shouldn’t have purchased or no longer need, and that selling those would advance their mission by providing them with resources with which to acquire assets they should have.  And qualified staff and the ability to put on exhibitions, or otherwise pursue the agency’s mission, are “assets” too.

Finally, the Nonprofiteer is compelled to agree with O’Hare that styling a disagreement over management approach as an ethical lapse is the last refuge of the people who can’t explain why things ought to be done their way.  She’s been battling for years with those who argue that anyone willing to raise money for a commission is “unethical,” a position that merely assures that agencies most in need of fundraising assistance can get it only from people willing to put themselves beyond the professional pale.  Maybe our new year’s resolution should be to reserve the term “unethical” for things that actually shock the conscience, like torture and race discrimination, instead of for things on which reasonable people can disagree.

Posted by Kelsey Walker

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Brandeis Betrays Its Givers

If Hollywood ever remakes a Three Stooges movie, Brandeis University should get a leading role.

The school’s decision to shutter its art museum and peddle its artwork is a knuckleheaded move worthy of Moe, Larry and Curly, making a hash of the trust of givers who gave dollars and art to the school.

Panicked by the plunge in the value of its endowment because of the collapsing economy and, apparently, losses from funds it invested with disgraced investor Bernard Madoff, the school’s move is a crass poke in the eye of its supporters.

Givers give because they trust charities to use their gifts the way the givers intend and expect them to be used.

Precisely because the economic crisis is putting them under growing financial stress, nonprofits need to be clear-headed, ethical and vigilant in honoring the intent of their givers and steering clear of ham-fisted moves like the one Brandeis aims to pull off.

The intent of givers matters: Princeton, for example, recently agreed to pay nearly $100 million in settling a lawsuit by a donor’s family that had charged the school violated the terms of a gift by failing to use the money for the purpose for which it was given.

Now, by shutting its museum and hawking for quick cash a collection of artworks that were intended to be perpetual gifts, Brandeis has become a role model for nonprofits behaving badly.

Giving is the lifeblood of nonprofits, and it is rooted in trust.

To survive the deepening financial crisis, nonprofits must work harder than ever to earn and keep the trust of their givers.

But if, like bumbling fools, they whack their givers upside the head, nonprofits will shoot themselves in the heart.

Todd Cohen, a veteran news reporter and editor, is editor and publisher of Philanthropy Journal, an online newspaper published by the A.J. Fletcher Foundation in Raleigh, N.C. Cohen has taught nonprofit reporting and media relations at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and at Duke University, and regularly speaks on the topics of nonprofit media relations and trends in the charitable world.

Posted by Kelsey Walker

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Giving Sector Should Get Over Sense of Entitlement

Slapped in the face by the economic crisis, nonprofits should be focusing on how to best run their shops, serve their clients and engage their givers.

The news is grim: Paul Light of New York University expects 100,000 of the 1.3 million nonprofits in the U.S. to fail this year, while a new survey by consulting firm Marts & Lundy says the recession has triggered roughly 20 percent in staff cuts at nonprofits.

And barely a day passes without reports of charitable retrenchment.

But despite the reality check, nonprofits and foundations alike seem lost in their delusion of entitlement.

Instead of getting their act together and making their own way, nonprofits are rushing to belly up to the federal-stimulus buffet while moaning that the federal government is ignoring them and that proposed limits on tax deductions for charitable contributions will hurt them.

And foundations continue to squeeze out crocodile tears about the decline in the value of their investments, forced tears that cloud the vision of foundation officials so badly they cannot read the bank statements showing they still control vast wealth.

That wealth, which givers donated to foundations to support charitable causes, is not the personal piggy bank of foundations’ boards and staff, or an investment portfolio for perpetuating their personal power.

Despite the drop in its value, foundations can and should use that wealth to address the urgent needs of nonprofits and the communities they serve, needs that are escalating in inverse proportion to the free-fall of the U.S. economy.

Foundations need to do a lot better.

In “Philanthropy at its Best,” released last week, the National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy prescribes benchmarks designed “to assess and enhance” grantmakers’ impact.

Saying the largest U.S. foundations give only one of every three dollars, for example, to benefit “the economically and socially disadvantaged,” the watchdog group wants every foundation to make its board more diverse, and to invest at least half its annual giving in meeting the needs of low-income communities, communities of color and marginalized groups, and one-fourth for advocacy, organizing and civic engagement.

Foundations should in fact be required to give more of their assets in return for the generous tax breaks they and their donors enjoy, and they should indeed be pushed to give more to groups mainstream philanthropy often ignores.

And instead of griping about the plunge in the value of their assets all the way to their expensive luncheons and gala dinners, foundations should be digging deeper than ever to address urgent social and global problems that simply are getting worse in the economic crisis.

But forcing foundations to pick their boards and make their grants to better reflect the complex demographics of the communities they serve would betray the free choice in which democracy and the charitable marketplace are rooted and on which their survival and success depend.

And where would the mandates stop? Should foundations also be required to make their boards and grants better reflect the broad range of spiritual belief, political affiliation, sexual orientation and cultural taste in their communities? And who would be the final judge of whether the makeup of the board and grants was correct?

The pain and suffering the economic crisis is causing for millions of people, including the most vulnerable among us, underscore the need to foster a charitable marketplace that will expand and improve giving and its impact, and produce the most effective solutions to our most urgent social problems.

That requires a charitable marketplace that is open, competitive and fair.

Nonprofits must be free to develop the strategies and partnerships they believe will strengthen their operations, more effectively serve their clients, and better engage givers.

Foundations and individual givers must be free to invest in the charitable causes they choose.

And because they have failed to show they can police themselves, nonprofits and foundations must be subject to tougher regulation that is even-handed and requires they be more open and accountable for the way they do business.

Regulations also must require that foundations pay out a bigger share of their assets in grants.

Foundations now must pay out only five percent of their assets each year, and they can count overhead costs as part of that payout.

In donating their assets to foundations, givers dedicate those assets to support charitable causes, and receive big up-front tax breaks in return.

Instead of sitting on their assets, foundations should give more of those funds to the charitable causes they were donated to support.

In a collapsing economy, the tired claim by foundations that paying out more of their assets will force them out of business rings hollow, whiny, self-serving and plain selfish.

With Washington policymakers at a loss to know how to fix our malignant economy and overwhelming social problems, foundations and nonprofits need to get over their sense of entitlement, face reality and make their operations and programs leaner and smarter.

Moving beyond their belief that their cause alone entitles them to the support they need, nonprofits must prove their value and effectiveness in a fiercely competitive charitable marketplace that will get only more cut-throat as the economic crisis deepens.

Foundations, which do not get a license to operate virtually unchecked simply because they control donated wealth, need to stop making empty promises that they can police themselves.

Instead, foundations must start giving the taxpaying public a full accounting of their operations and a fair return on the tax breaks they and their donors enjoy.

In the face of the damage the imploding economy is causing, the indispensable role the giving sector plays in addressing social and global problems has never been more clear.

Playing that role effectively will require that givers and nonprofits alike stop complaining and instead develop strategies and partnerships that can succeed in the charitable marketplace.

Todd Cohen, a veteran news reporter and editor, is editor and publisher of Philanthropy Journal, an online newspaper published by the A.J. Fletcher Foundation in Raleigh, N.C. Cohen has taught nonprofit reporting and media relations at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and at Duke University, and regularly speaks on the topics of nonprofit media relations and trends in the charitable world.

Posted by Kelsey Walker

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From Entry Level to Leadership: How to Join a Nonprofit Board of Directors

I’ll just go ahead and tell you that my view is that all young nonprofit professionals should serve on a board at some point. If you plan to stay in the nonprofit field, you should see the work from all angles, especially the governance arena. But more importantly, if you aspire to a CEO or other leadership position, board experience will prove to be invaluable to you.  Here’s why:

• Board membership can bring credibility to your reputation and help you gain respect from older colleagues
• Serving on a board will allow you to hone skills you may not be able to learn at work in your current nonprofit role
• While there may be a gray ceiling in your organization, on boards, there are plenty of leadership positions available - you can lead one of the committees or serve as an officer
• Being a board member forces you to become knowledgeable about many different areas of nonprofit management: finance, human resources, fundraising, legal issues, ethics
• You can build a strong network through you connections with other board members - you will likely meet fellow board members who you may not have otherwise crossed paths with
• Serving on a board will help you gain the leadership skills you didn’t learn in college or grad school - how to make that judgment call, when to speak up even when it’s unpopular, how to build consensus

I joined my first nonprofit board in 2007, and it’s been the best leadership training I’ve ever had. Of course, many young nonprofit leaders already realize the benefits that board membership can provide for their career.  For them, the next question they always ask is: How do I get on a board? Who would any nonprofit want such a young person as a board member?  I don’t have any wealthy friends or connections! How would I raise money for the organization?  It’s then that I think back on leadership guru Margaret Wheatley’s definition of a leader:

“Leader: anyone who wants to help, who is willing to step forward to make a difference in the world.”

That’s you! If you have the desire and passion to serve as a board member, there are thousands of organizations that would be happy to have you. But before you take the plunge, make sure you do your due diligence. You don’t want to go wasting your good talent on a cause or organization that’s not a good fit for you.

Understand the Roles and Responsibilities of a Board Member
The best place to learn about all the different responsibilities of being a nonprofit board member is on the BoardSource website. You want to make sure you can sign on to each one of them. The experience can be rewarding, but being on a board takes hard work and integrity just like a full-time job.

Don’t Be Afraid You Won’t Be Able to Raise Money
Now I’m not Mama Moneybucks, but what I learned is that if you can’t make a significant donation as a board member, it’s really not that difficult to raise money from others to fulfill your committment to the organization. Last year, I asked my friends to donate $26 to one of the nonprofits I serve with in honor of my birthday. I raised over $600, an amount that I wouldn’t be able to give personally, but was able to raise from my network.

Learn About the Experiences of Other Board Members
I took this really fun, interactive online tutorial called Nonprofit Board Basics from CompassPoint. It’s really informative and free training applicable to anyone thinking about joining a nonprofit board.

Find Board Openings on boardnetUSA
A simple first step for young professionals looking to join a board would be to create an account and profile at boardnetUSA to find listed board opportunities in your area. It only takes about 20 minutes to fill in the requested information, especially if you take a little time beforehand to think about the kind of nonprofit you want to work with and the skills you want to utilize.

Don’t Hesitate to Contact the Organizaton Directly
If there’s a cause or nonprofit you’re interested in already, don’t be afraid to call them directly and express your interest in board membership. In my experience, nonprofits are always looking for good board members!  The best person to reach out to would be the CEO or Executive Director, who will be able to inform you of any openings and the process for throwing your name in the ring. You’ll never know until you ask, so put yourself out there!

Rosetta Thurman is an emerging nonprofit leader of color working and living in the Washington, D.C. area.  She holds a Master’s degree in Nonprofit Management and blogs about nonprofit leadership and management issues at Perspectives From the Pipeline.

Posted by Kelsey Walker

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Generation Y and the Perils of Milli Vanilli Leadership

I know y’all remember Milli Vanilli. They were a 80s/90s pop/R&B group made of up two hardbody models named Fab and Rob. If you’re a Gen Y baby like me, you might have had their posters on your wall just like I did, singing along to their many hit songs on the radio:  Girl You Know It’s True and Blame it on the Rain and Baby, Don’t Forget my Number. Milli Vanilli’s debut album skyrocketed to the top of the charts and earned a Grammy Award in 1990. However, their success turned to failure when their Grammy was revoked after it was revealed that they were lip-syncing all their songs.  The actual vocals on the record were not the voices of Fab and Rob. Turns out they were just mimicking the voices of other singers.

Milli Vanilli’s downfall reminds me of what can happen when Gen Y nonprofit leaders try to copycat Baby Boomer leadership. It just doesn’t work. Let me tell you about this guy I know. He’s a young, energetic nonprofit leader in his field and in his extensive volunteer work as well. We are about the same age, but our leadership styles are so different. Not to say that my style of leadership is perfect, just that I get put off by the way he works. He acts like a Baby Boomer stuck in a Gen Y body, choosing to follow hierarchy versus letting the team decide. In meetings, he behaves like an older CEO of a large nonprofit who can’t be bothered with the opinions of people lower on the totem pole. On the Blake Mouton leadership grid, he is probably closer to the Authority-Compliance/Produce or Perish style.  He rarely showcases any personality or aspects of his personal life, as if afraid it would taint his image as a nonprofit professional on his way to executive leadership.  This is not to say that all Baby Boomer nonprofit leaders act like this. But for many young professionals who complain about their older bosses, this is one of the issues they often bring up. That the relationship is all about the tasks, and there’s not room for much dialogue or building a relationship of mutual respect with their boss.  So why, then, would we want to lip-sync that kind of leadership?

Better to be like Maya Enista, the Gen Y CEO of Mobilize.org. Maya is the kind of person you can relate to. Even though she is the head woman in charge of an entire organization, her down-to-earth personality still shines through as she talks about her passion for engaging young people in democracy and decision-making.  Her leadership style motivates others to join her cause and help in any way they can.

Or we might examine the collaborative leadership style of Ben Rattray, the Gen Y CEO of Change.org. Ben’s team player attitude makes it easy for him to find win/wins for Change.org’s many partners that allow them to reach so many people interested in social issues. Ben recognizes that he doesn’t know everything, so he regularly invites input from stakeholders, and respects their opinions. This allows his organization to test new ideas with the support of as many people as possible.

The key to successful next generation leadership is to be who you are, not what you think an “official” nonprofit leader looks like.  Loosen your tie and let your unique personality shine through. Stop acting like you were born in the 50s, because it’s obvious for all to see that you are young as hell. So make it work to your advantage, instead of trying to seem older than you are. Don’t make the same mistakes you complain about in your Baby boomer bosses. You can end up alienating your peers, and missing an opportunity to build lasting relationships.

Craft your own brand of leadership, and others will see you as an authentic person they can follow and trust. After all, it’s pretty easy to tell when somebody’s lip-syncing. Just ask Milli Vanilli.

Rosetta Thurman is an emerging nonprofit leader of color working and living in the Washington, D.C. area.  She holds a Master’s degree in Nonprofit Management and blogs about nonprofit leadership and management issues at Perspectives From the Pipeline.

Posted by Kelsey Walker

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10 Free Things Every New Social Entrepreneur Should Have

A successful social entrepreneur is scrappy and resourceful. They know how to do more with less, and create a social impact while doing so. The 10 resources below are free monetarily, but each is an invaluable tool for launching and sustaining a lean social enterprise.

1. Interns. Treat them well, give them meaningful projects, and make it worth their while. Most universities even offer credit for coursework, so contact a university’s marketing, nonprofit, or social work departments. You can also post opportunities for free on Enternships and InternshipIn.

2. A good lawyer. Unless you’re also a lawyer, you’re going to need to find someone with legal expertise to help you navigate contracts and ensure you comply with state and federal law. Fortunately, many lawyers are generous enough to donate a portion of their time to pro bono projects. CorporateProBono, a national initiative of the American Corporate Counsel Association, plays “matchmaker” between nonprofits and such generous attorneys.

3. 501(c)3 status. Okay you can’t skirt paying for filing these forms, but you can save by filing them yourself. Yes, it’s time consuming and challenging; but I guarantee your journey ahead will be even more so. When I was trying to incorporate Yoga Bear as a 501(c)3, I used the Nolo Guide Starting & Building a Nonprofit, which I borrowed from the local library.

4. Board Members. Finding directors with complementary skills, as well as the experience and spirit of public service to guide your organization is essential. Post your opportunities on BoardNetUSA, BoardSource, and VolunteerMatch.

5. Local Support. Know thy neighbor. Regardless if your initiative is hyper-local or entirely global, get involved with the local changemaker movement. A great place to start is joining the listserv of your local YNPN chapter. You’ll be added to an e-mail list that exchanges ideas, questions, local news, and events.

6. Global Exposure. It goes without saying that you will need to create a Twitter Account and Facebook Page, at the very least. Use Namechk to see if your organization’s username is still available. Even if you don’t plan on starting a YouTube page, claim the name now.

7. Collaboration and management tools. These tools are especially important if volunteers and team members are geographically dispersed. Google Docs or PBworks are two excellent (and free) products that will allow you to coordinate work on documents and spreadsheets. And the Salesforce Foundation donates CRM product licenses to qualified nonprofits.

8. A great logo. I am far from an artist, but I am proud to say that I created the Yoga Bear logo using stock photo art and a free version of Photoshop. Try GIMP, a free Photoshop-like software and their free tutorials to learn how.

9. A Web site. Your home on the web. Depending on your needs and programming skills, there are a plethora of options. If you know a bit of HTML, try Ning to create a homepage with social network features like message boards and a blog (this is what we use for YogaBear). Or if you need an easy drag-and-drop interface, use Weebly.

10. An Understanding of the Space. Knowledge of the work being done in your niche can open doors and opportunities to key players. Create a Google alert (such as “homelessness AND Detroit” or “cancer AND yoga”) to receive daily or weekly emails with links to news stories using these keywords. You’ll start to learn who is making strides in the domain, and be able to reach out to those teams. Keep in mind that there are no competitors, as long as everyone has the same mission.

This is far from a comprehensive list of the amazing free tools out there. Please share! What have you used to launch and sustain a successful social enterprise?

Halle Tecco is a San Francisco resident and social entrepreneur passionate about technology, service and healthy living. She is the Founder and Executive Director of Yoga Bear, a non-profit providing more opportunities of health and wellness to cancer patients through the practice of yoga. Halle has worked as a Product Manager at various consumer-internet startups, including Enternships.com and Kiva.org. She also serves as an advisor to GreatNonprofits.org. She is pursuing her MBA at Harvard Business School and will graduate in 2011.

Posted by Samantha Penabad

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Failing to Govern?

Is there a breakdown in the governance function of nonprofit boards?  This is the question behind the article with the above title in the current issue of SSIR. Michael Klausner and Jonathan Small argue that there is a deep ambiguity in the role of the boards of nonprofit organizations as they currently operate:  Unlike boards of commercial corporations, nonprofit boards are supposed both to exercise full governmental oversight and serve as fund-raisers and image-enhancers of their organizations.  This, according to the authors, sets up a dysfunctional situation wherein many nonprofit boards do neither job very well. 

The solution recommended by Klausner and Small is to establish a legal bifurcation of boards, in which there would be designated “governors,” who have the full responsibility for organizational governance, and “nongoverning board members,” who fulfill the other board functions.  Could this be a solution to the challenge of nonprofit oversight, or is it a solution to a nonexistent problem that would set up a distinction between “first class” and “second class” board membership?  What do current members of nonprofit boards think of this idea?

Posted by Perla Ni

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...but some are more equal than others

You’re meeting with a nonprofit Board as it tries to establish a mandatory minimum gift by individual Board members.  These meetings are always excruciating because Americans would rather detail their sex lives—honestly!—than talk about money.

But this meeting is about to become doubly excruciating, because the agency in question serves poor people of color and has one or two Board members of color adrift on a milky sea.  Often these Board members have been recruited from institutions in the neighborhood the agency serves—the pastor of a local church, perhaps. 

So no sooner is the toxic monetary topic broached than some well-meaning pale person says, “Well, of course, whatever number we pick we wouldn’t expect Reverend Jones . . . ” and then tails off because s/he doesn’t want to say what s/he’s thinking so obviously it could be spotted on Google Earth: ” . . . . wouldn’t expect Reverend Jones TO HAVE ANY MONEY BECAUSE HE HAS DARK SKIN AND LIVES/WORKS IN THIS AWFUL NEIGHBORHOOD.”

[The Nonprofiteer doesn’t mean to suggest that only agencies serving poor people of color do, or should, have nonwhite Board members.  Rather, she’s trying to give clueless whites the benefit of the doubt.  At a community-based social service agency, white Board members might conceivably think Reverend Jones doesn’t have any money because of the neighborhood he and the agency share.  Whereas at the city’s main art museum, white Board members who hastened to exempt the Reverend from having to make a gift would be proceeding solely and blatantly on the basis of their beliefs about his skin color.]

If the consulting gods are with you, you’ll be spared the necessity of forcing the issue (“You wouldn’t expect Reverend Jones to do what?  And why not?”) by that gentleman’s polished pastoral tact.  Reverend Jones, who’s too polite to have said “I’m right here!” when his Board colleagues began talking around and about him instead of to him, will ask, ‘How much money are we talking about, again?” and, once the number is reiterated, nod and say, “That wouldn’t be a problem for me.” 

But you can’t always expect to be so lucky; because, again, most people will do whatever they must to avoid talking about money, especially their own.  So any random Reverend Jones—one might almost say any self-preserving Reverend Jones—will most likely keep his mouth shut and enjoy not being pressed for a contribution the way the rest of the Board will and should be.  Because after all, if you’re going to tolerate the costs of your fellows’ racism you might as well enjoy the benefits.

The Nonprofiteer can’t possibly be the only one who understands that we’re talking about literal costs, actual lost gifts, to every charity in America where white people let their racism trump their good sense.

And it goes beyond Boards: friends of friends of ours, who’ve retired very comfortably, observe that local charities never ask them for contributions.  Why?  They’re only guessing that the color of their skin, coupled with the slight drawl that reveals their roots in the South, causes people to assume they’re just “poor country Negroes.”  They, like the imaginary Reverend Jones, are gracious about it, but you can tell it sticks in their craws.

So here are some suggestions.  Every Board President should—and if s/he can’t or won’t every Executive Director must—impress upon every member of his/her Board the sacred Nonprofit Syllogism:
All Board members must be treated equally;
Every Board must include members of color;
Therefore, Board members of color must be treated equally. 
Client representatives are an exception to this rule, though the Nonprofiteer strongly suggests that even they be asked to make some contribution—“meaningful to the giver” is the phrase currently popular.  Why?  Mostly because it requires non-client Board members to treat clients as partners instead of supplicants, but also because it makes for a great story when you’re out soliciting.  “100% of our Board gives to support the agency—even the client members!”

If necessary, mention that
Not all poor people are black or brown.
Not all black or brown people are poor.
Most poor people are more generous (by percentage of income) than most rich people—and if that makes you uncomfortable, handle it by giving more yourself not by asking less of others.
If you have indeed recruited people to your Board with some special half-articulated understanding—he’s a community representative; s/he’s from a cooperating nonprofit and has prior fundraising commitments—now’s the time to revisit that understanding.  In a private conversation, those “special cases” will readily agree (at least in principle) that every Board member needs to meet the same standard. 

So ask her to do so.  Don’t just assume she can’t.  There’s a tendency to let one’s prejudices skew the outcome—to try to spare someone the imagined embarrassment of having to say, “I don’t want to do that” by asking them to do something else, something less: “Chair our new Community Advisory Board!  You won’t have to give any money!”

But that’s just compounding the original underestimation of Ms. Special’s capacity—which may well have been based on her race.  Lest you accidentally create a separate-but-unequal Board for people of color, ask her to accept the full range of Board responsibilities, and give her the chance to decline.  If she does, you can always float the Advisory Board idea then—but she won’t.  Because amazingly when you treat people as your full partners, they return the favor.

Kelly Kleiman, who blogs as The Nonprofiteer, is a lawyer and freelance journalist whose reportage and essays about the arts, philanthropy and women’s issues have appeared in the Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Christian Science Monitor and other dailies; in magazines including In These Times and Chicago Philanthropy; and on websites including Aislesay.com and Artscope.net.

Posted by Katie Harrington

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You identify the problems, we solve them!

As a subscriber, the Nonprofiteer received The Nonprofit Quarterly’s summary of its annual reader survey identifying areas of concern in nonprofit management.  And what did she find at the very top?

The board won’t fundraise (receiving by far the most mentions).

Not too far down the list: “recruitment is a concern” and “the organization needs to involve board members in strategic planning.”

The Nonprofiteer would like to suggest that these three are different faces of a single pervasive problem: unarticulated expectations. Because the rest of the “my board won’t fundraise” conversation sounds like this:

  “What have you asked them to do?”

  “Well, raise money.” 

That’s not an answer. You can ask board members to look at a list of your current donors and identify the people they know and whom they’d be willing to call on in your company to ask for a bigger gift.  You can ask them to come to the next board meeting armed with the names of two people to be added to your list of fundraising prospects. You can invite them to join you in calling on the program officer as your most significant foundation donor, where their very presence will illustrate board support and involvement. You can ask them to help plan a benefit event to raise X while spending no more than Y and targeting Z audience. 

What you can’t do is say, “Raise some money!” and walk away, though that’s certainly every staff member’s fantasy.  Lest we forget, board members are volunteers—and volunteers can move mountains, provided there’s a staff member around with a supply of scaffolding, tools, wheelbarrows, safety glasses and maps to the new location. There’s a tendency among harried development staff to disdain board members’ need for support. But you’re not really authorized to critique the fundraising incompetence of your doctor and lawyer board members until you can remove an appendix or argue a Supreme Court case without their assistance. It’s their volunteer gig, but it’s your job, so the responsibility rests with you. 

Many harried nonprofit executives also are so uncomfortable with “the M-word” that they recruit people to their boards without telling them, in writing, that recruits are expected to write checks (and for how much?) and secure checks (and in what context?). So of course “recruitment is a concern”—the concern being that people won’t do what you want unless you tell them what you want. But if you tell them what you want they might say “no” right up-front. This leads many otherwise sane executives to utter recruitment idiocies like, “You won’t have to do anything—we just want your name;” or, “You can’t come to meetings? That’s okay;” or, “Money? Oh, don’t worry about it.”

If, by contrast, you go to board-recruitment sessions with a written, unambiguous statement of what you’re seeking, perhaps 50 percent of your interlocutors will say, “no.”  But they’ll walk away impressed with your agency and its level of preparation; and the 50 percent who say “yes” will join ready to give and get and identify others like themselves.  (The Nonprofiteer has several sample “Statements of Board Member Expectations” which she’ll be glad to share with anyone who’d like to simplify his/her board recruitment tasks and/or assure him/herself of a fundraising board.)

Finally: of course you can’t involve the board in strategic planning if you told prospective board members they wouldn’t really need to be involved in anything. But this one’s actually relatively easy to solve, using an efficient, team-based, preferably facilitated planning process (see the Nonprofiteer’s “Three-Meeting Strategic Planning” guide). Any team-based system can accommodate up to 50 people, and any efficient facilitated process can go from soup to nuts in six months; so there shouldn’t be any problem in getting board members involved. (Board members who can’t manage to come to three meetings in the course of six months aren’t really board members at all—invite them but start planning now for how you’ll replace them.) And once they’ve written the plan, you’d better believe they’ll fundraise for it. Of course, the process isn’t board-only—staff should be fully integrated as well—so there should be a good balance between what’s dreamed and what can be done. 

More in future postings on other interesting aspects of the Nonprofit Quarterly survey results. 

Kelly Kleiman, who blogs as The Nonprofiteer, is a lawyer and freelance journalist whose reportage and essays about the arts, philanthropy and women’s issues have appeared in the Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Christian Science Monitor and other dailies; in magazines including In These Times and Chicago Philanthropy; and on websites including Aislesay.com and Artscope.net.

Posted by Katie Harrington

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In Praise of Fixed Board Member Contributions

When governing boards finally take up the contentious question of a minimum contribution for their members, someone can always be counted on to say, “I’m glad to give that much—in fact, I’m sure I already do—but I don’t want anyone telling me I have to.” In the Nonprofiteer’s experience, that person is NOT glad to give that much, and certainly doesn’t already, unless we’re prepared to count every logoed coffee cup he’s purchased since the beginning of time as part of a single annual donation.

So the reason for stated board gifts is simple: Without them you won’t actually reap that amount of money. Yes, but that’s not the only reason. There’s also

• Equity. Nothing creates bad feelings in a group faster than realizing that some people are being included and others excluded, even when being excluded could be interpreted as a favor (“Oh, you don’t have to make a contribution—you’re a member of the clergy/schoolteacher/championship gymnast”). In a nonprofit board room, there’s only one kind of person—a board member—and identical people have identical responsibilities.
• Sense of ownership. Nonprofits attract all kinds of volunteers, but the ones who get to govern them are the ones who pay their bills (and not even that big a share of their bills: few nonprofit boards put up more than 10 percent of their agencies’ budget, though often the board raises an additional 10-15 percent).
• Ability to pick others’ pockets. If you ask someone for a contribution—and a board member who doesn’t is a waste of space—she or he will inevitably reply, “How much do you give?” If the answer is, “Nothing,” the meeting is over—and soon, the agency will be, too.

So screw your courage to the sticking place and set a dollar amount minimum gift. ($500 is nice: that’s approximately Starbuck’s five days a week for a year.) Remind people that they don’t have to pay it all at once; but remind them that they do have to pay it.

Kelly Kleiman, who blogs as The Nonprofiteer, is a lawyer and freelance journalist whose reportage and essays about the arts, philanthropy and women’s issues have appeared in the Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Christian Science Monitor and other dailies; in magazines including In These Times and Chicago Philanthropy; and on websites including Aislesay.com and Artscope.net.

Posted by Katie Harrington

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