Posts Tagged As Nonprofit

Driving Nonprofit Innovation – Part I – Managing the Process from Idea to Launch

I see patterns.  Fear not, this isn’t the introduction to a new M. Night Shyamalan movie but I do enjoy opportunities where I can connect the dots.  Maybe it is the linear, logical, left –brain, former programmer in me but I relish when I find patterns that emerge across different disciplines, groups, organizations, etc.  Five years ago I was part of a public policy group that mixed professionals from different worlds – for-profit, nonprofit, government, education, etc. The goal of the program was to advance public policy awareness and build public policy leadership.  What I quickly recognized was that many of the same issues that were challenging me in the “for-profit innovation arena” were also plaguing these other groups.  The challenges of funding, personal & organizational risk, managing expectations, and the fear or failure were consistent.  There were some nuances but there was far more similarity that difference.

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Risk & Innovation Panelist – Bush Foundation Community Innovation Prize

The Bush Foundation will be hosting their first event focused solely on supporting their past and present Community Innovation Prize grantees.

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Community Agency Executives Retreat – Greater Twin Cities United Way

I will be presenting “Innovation, Risk & the Role of Failure – Innovating the in Non-profit Community” at the upcoming Community Agency Executives Retreat for non-profits funded by the Greater Twin Cities United Way.

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Facing Failure: The Bridge for Youth Shares Their Story So Others Can Learn

The truth is that nonprofits experience failure just like every for-profit business: new initiatives fall short of expectations, the synergy of partnerships fails to materialize, or expansion plans overburden an organization’s cash flow.  But because nonprofits are so reliant on donations and grants to fund their operations even mentioning the word failure can be lethal.  The perception, and perhaps reality, is that no donor wants to think that their contribution is being wasted and no foundation wants to report back to their board on “failed” investments.  The result is that “safer is better” and failures are frequently covered up.

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Propensity for Action: An Interview With Fuel Your Fight Founder Kari Kehr

When working with organizations I frequently talk about the need to build a “Propensity for Action” in order to support driving growth and innovation.  With many for profit, and nonprofit, organizations it is far too easy to cower behind the “Tyranny of No” rather than building a culture of action around the tools of hypothesis, test, and verify.  A frequently response from leaders is that new ideas are too costly or too risky to take on but if the alternative is waiting for the perfect answer it can be equally damaging to an organization.  The challenge is that the odds are stacked against new ideas and most of them will not work out at planned – they will fail.  The irony is that unless you are willing to take action and risk possible failure you will remain stuck with the status quo.

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“Facing Failure” a New Monthly Column in Civic-Minded Publication “Pollen”

Failure knows no distinction to whether our institution is in business, government, education, or the nonprofit sector.  Facing Failure is a new monthly series that I have launched today with the civic-minded publication Pollen. The goal for this column is to bring the topic of failure to the forefront of our civic conversations in an attempt to remove the negative stigma. I intend to do this by sharing stories and the lessons learned from business, nonprofit, education, and government sector failures. The best hope for this column would be that we are able to learn from each other and strengthen our Pollen community. If you have a story that you would like to share please reach out and connect via my contact information below.

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