NavBar M Brand Logo Homepage Services About Publications Contact Me

What Do You Want to Do ??

Rejuvenate Performance

Remember when work was fun?  When you awoke each day ready to go make a difference in the world? Remember when your nonprofit was viewed with envy as a leader in the community?  When staff was energized and morale was high?

How long has it been since you felt that way?  If you answered ‘far too long’ then it is time to stop now and make this a priority.  Average morale and average enthusiasm leads to average performance.  Average performance is not going to make it in the coming years.  Besides, life is short, why would you be spending 8 hours a day in work that is just OK.

Improving employee morale benefits everyone at work. Boosting employee morale means that people will take more pride in their work, call in sick less often and be more productive. Happier employees mean happier employers, since the employer will not lose money due to inefficiency and lost time. I will show you how improving employee morale can be accomplished with some simple, consistent steps.

Restructuring to get more done…to unleash the creative talent in you and your staff…that’s what makes work and life exciting.

  • Why Employees Don’t Do What They’re Supposed To Do
  • Leading Meetings That Get Results
  • Diversity In Depth
  • Creating The Enthusiastic Employee


Reinvent Programming

Research recently published in the Chronicle of Philanthropy documented that nearly 40% of human service providers still do client intake via pen and paper (with staff subsequently entering the data on a computer).  This is symptomatic of our programming and the way we deliver programs.  If we’re looking to get more done and be more effective, this is an area  ripe for reinvention.

There are a wide variety of reasons for reinventing programming in a nonprofit…especially in today’s chaotic environment. However, there are several catalysts for reinvention that come up again and again.  Four warning signs…

  1. Staff complain (and you agree) that they are overloaded with work.
  2. Funders question whether your services duplicate others.
  3. Leaders doubt whether you actually produce measurable outcomes.
  4. Clients gripe about heavy paperwork requirements in order to get your help
  • Where Did The Money Go?: A Framework For Thinking About How We Spend Our Resources
  • You Can Measure Your Success: Whole Enterprise Evaluation
  • Diversity In Depth
  • Consumer Involvement in Planning and Delivering Services
  • Focus Groups


Rekindle Leadership

In the early 1990s I joined a small group of colleagues for two days with the legendary management expert Peter Drucker,  Over 50 years of writing and lecturing, Drucker had this unerving habit of thinking 3 steps ahead of everyone else. His message was clear, the majority of nonprofits waste their most valuable resource, their leadership.   How true!    People come to you because they believe in your mission…and they bring all this passion.  Is that passion still there?  Four warning signs are:

  1. Relationship between Board President and Director is indifferent, distant or strained
  2. Poor Board attendance and lack of enthusiastic engagement
  3. No compelling vision for where your organization wants to go
  4. Difficulty explaining concisely your organization’s reason for being.


Old models of leadership are falling aside to make way for new thinking.  Some of this change is driven by a wealth of creative, energetic talent flodding in from Generation X and Y.   Another pressure point is the demands of the changing economy. Today’s leadership requires passion, open-mindedness and courage. Modern leaders need to adapt to this new environment.

  • Leading Meetings That Get Results
  • How To Be A Great Board Member, Especially Now
  • Lead From Strength: Understanding and Applying Your Core Leadership Assets


Revive Careers
 

  • Do you enjoy your job?
  • Do you feel challenged and are you are using your skills?
  • Does your job suit your personality?
  • Do you enjoy working with your colleagues?
  • Do your personal values match the values of the organization you work for, or are they out of synch?
  • Has your career reached a plateau and do you need a new role, either within your existing organization or elsewhere?


These are questions for you…and ones we should be asking our staff.   The good news is that between 1980 and 2004 employee satisfaction grew at  consistent rate…..the bad news is that trend has reversed….dramatically.  Now less than 20% of the workforce is ‘engaged”, and on the other end 25% are openly disgruntled.  That is a bad omen for your future productivity and economic growth.

  • You Have Only So Much Talent, Use It Wisely: A Strengths Base Approach To Life and Work
  • Creating The Enthusiastic Employee
  • Mentoring Your Employees: New Ways To Connect And Foster Improvement
  • Performance Coaching


Restore Funding

We are living through a once in a lifetime transformation in our economy.  For the past 25 years we’ve generated enormous wealth….but also took on enormous debt.  Over the next 10-15 years we will have to digest a lot of that debt as well as deal with the staggering retirement and health care costs of the Baby Boomers.

Competition for resources will increase to a level never witnessed in our lives.

With a trend toward decreased public funding, some are questioning the sustainability of profit organizations. . An emerging new breed of philanthropists is also generating significant changes in the way philanthropy will be practiced in the 21st century. The nonprofit environment has changed. Community needs are growing in size and diversity. More nonprofits are competing for government and philanthropic funds. Traditional forms of funding are becoming smaller and less reliable. New for-profit businesses are competing with nonprofits to serve community needs. Funders and donors are demanding more accountability. “In the face of this new reality, an increasing number of forward-looking nonprofits are reinventing themselves as social entrepreneurs, combining their passion of a social mission with an image of business-like discipline, innovation, and determination.

If you still want to be in business in 2015 then you have to look for new ways of financing your agenda….dependence upon government contracts or large donors leaves you extremely vulnerable.  To survive you have to seriously plan for social enterprise, joint operations, strategic alliances and other emerging ways to deliver services in the new environment.

  • Becoming The Principled Entrepreneur:  Funding Your Efforts Through A Social Enterprise
  • How To Think About Sustainability
  • Securing Your Financial Future (Sustainability Planning)