Is Your Non-Profit a "Closed" Organization?

Non-profit Consultant, Derek Link, offers some thoughts on the dangers of "closed" organizations:

One of the worst things a non-profit organization can do is to become a “closed” organization. First I’ll define what that means to me and then I’ll give you an example of how it looks in action. A closed organization is one that has become inbred and sort of nepotistic. Only familiar people are invited into the decision-making. The Board hasn’t changed in years or at the very least never includes anyone with a different viewpoint or who is strong enough to rock the boat. A closed organization can’t grow because it fears the innovation, requirements, and new attachments that growth requires.

So what does this look like in practice? I’ve seen a few organizational symptoms lately. Last week I was reviewing a nonprofit organization’s strategic plan. The plan looked fairly detailed at first blush, there were lots of items, neatly numbered, and there were various categories of things that the organization wanted to take action on. The problem was that all of the categories were things they already did and there was nothing new. The second problem was that the sub-items were all so general that it wasn’t possible to know what actions should be taken to actually accomplish anything. It was a 3 year plan that led nowhere. To make matters worse, it was a 3 year plan that ended last year and the action of the board was to re-authorize the same plan for the next three years! Obviously that Board is not including any new people and certainly not anyone who would question the status quo in order to propel the mission forward.

The second example is a non-profit that I have a lot of experience with because I sometimes volunteer there. Like most non-profits, the organization is always short of money but that is mostly because they don’t bring in any expertise in fund raising to implement any sort of organized fund raising plan. It’s always put this fire out then put that one out.

The leadership hasn’t changed over time and new members to the Board have not been added from outside the immediate circle of friends. In fact, I attended a Board meeting once when two new people happened to come in from the outside. They proposed that the strategy for fund raising wasn’t very good and they were actually shouted at by the Board President. These were people with concrete experience raising money so their concerns were based on real knowledge, but the closed system isn’t open to new ideas. The “interlopers” were driven away before the Board president’s veins had even receded from his forehead!

One symptom of a closed system is a Board that only cracks open the Board room door when it is in danger of fiscal collapse. Closed systems are locked in a death spiral that may be slow or fast, or it may simply spin in one place for eternity when the Board is wealthy enough. The Board members of the arts organization I volunteer with are wonderfully generous with their own money and time, but they aren’t wealthy. They periodically publish pleas for funding that are couched as dire warnings to the community that they are in immanent danger of going under financially. The appearance they give is that the only time anyone new is invited to participate is when they need money in times of crisis. That comes across as desperate and irksome to people who would enjoy being involved if a sincere invitation to do so were ever proffered.

So long as your organization has a solid funding stream then it may survive being a closed system, but as soon as that funding stream is compromised, it can come down like a house of cards. In the current economic environment, even some foundations with large endowments that have traditionally been closed systems are questioning the feasibility of remaining as such.

Join Derek for our BlogTalkRadio Tips from the Grant Goddess show this week (Friday, 3 p.m., PST).  He'll be talking about hjow to tell if your organization is a closed system, and what you can do about it. If you miss the live show, you can listen to the recording on demand.

The Importance of Networking

Non-profit Consultant, Derek Link, shares some good strategies for effective networking:

I am not by nature a super-social person. Not that I suffer from any social-anxiety dysfunction or anything but I tend to be an inward-thinking person who tends to process and do critical thinking internally. I like to process first, express second. Many people process verbally first and unlike me, they love to be in social settings where they can process to their heart’s delight.

If you’re more like me, you need to force yourself to network. It’s important because most business connections are made this way. This places you in the less-than-comfortable position of meeting, greeting, shaking hands, and spending time with those verbal processors. The thing is, networking effectively is mission-critical if you’re in business - and this includes those of you in business as non-profit or school administrators. You must be out there, be known, pass out cards, do some verbal processing; if you don’t, you won’t be given any contracts that play to your internal processing strengths.

• Practice being a “there you are” person, rather than a “here I am” person. Force yourself to make eye contact and make the first approach. Many people feel just as fearful as you do about making the first contact and they’ll be relieved that someone has taken the pressure off of them by making the contact.

• Avoid alcohol in places where you are networking. If you’re kind of an internal processor anyway, you may find that drinking isn’t helping you open up, at least, not in ways that are helpful to building business connections.

• Be sure to carry lots of cards with you! These can help spur conversation about your business. I can be bad about this so I am constantly putting a couple into my wallet since it’s everywhere I am except the shower

• Take a verbal processor with you and dovetail off his or her natural gift.

• Work on using some active listening techniques. Respond to what is being discussed with clarifying questions or summary statements. This helps keep your mind in the conversation and truly creates a connection to the other person.

• Keep moving to contact as many people in the event as possible. Don’t stay in a mini-conference with one or two people, or with people you already know. Work the room!

• You don’t need to talk only about business, networking can also be social, so if something cool is happening your life it’s OK to share it. remember, the whole point of networking is to establish relationships.
  

So don’t hesitate to find those opportunities to get out and shake hands. You want to be memorable so put on your best duds, polish that smile, and walk in the room with the “there you are!” attitude.

Does Philanthropy Serve the Common Good?

Non-profit Consultant, Derek Link, shares some thoughts on philanthropy:

I love when I hear that a foundation is changing its priorities.It tells me that someone is paying attention, that the Board isn’t asleep at the wheel, and that the Executive Director is in a learning curve about the needs of the community they serve. Changing priorities tells me that a foundation may be avoiding the trap of entrenchment in some ideologically-static mission.

Michael Edwards recently wrote an article, “Philanthropy Needs a Major Overhaul to Better Serve the Common Good” in which he asserts that, “The best way to reinvent philanthropy is for ordinary people to get involved in a way that does not reinforce the unhealthy patterns of the past.”

I can see from grant research why he would make such an assertion because I see many foundations that give away lots of money, yet all of it goes to a specific political or religious cause. The question isn’t whether the recipients of the money are doing nice things with it, the civil society questions should be, “Are those the most important things to be doing?” and, “Should the government be giving tax breaks for giving money away when it merely represents maintenance of social inequalities or blatant promotion of personal bias?”

Social change must be driven by social needs but when the wealthy foundations are rewarded for doing nothing more than supporting programs for the wealthy as when donations are made to a senior center serving relatively well-to-do seniors, or the wealthy children who attend schools of a certain religion, the social responsibility a foundation assumes by accepting tax breaks is undermined.

The idea that foundations should be established for the public good is fundamental to civil society principles. But if a foundation refuses to change its mission even when more pressing concerns are evident in their community, one must question the motives and the relevance of their existence and whether our government should be granting tax exempt status for organizations that are nothing more than proponents of a class, race, religious, or political point of view.

What's the Value of a Mini-Grant?

Mini-grants are grants for a relatively small amount of money.  Some people call a grant a mini-grant if it is for less than $1,000.  Others think it's a mini-grant if it is for less than $10,000. There's no formal definition, but you get the point, right?  Mini-grants are small grants.

Because they are small, they don't get the respect they deserve. Large grants of $100,000 or more are sexy and get lots of attention, and people clamor to complete proposals for the big grants, but some mini-grant awards are granted with relatively little competition. 

Why?  People look for a big dollar solution to multiple problems rather than multiple smaller dollar solutions. This is a mistake. It's like jumping off a boat into the ocean before you know how to swim.

Mini-grants are the wading pools of the grant world. They provide you valuable grant writing experience.  When you do well, you are rewarded with a payoff that can help you fund something your organization needs. When you fail, you learn a lesson without having invested hundreds of hours to learn it.  And with each failure, you get a little better.  With each mini-grant success, you gain a little confidence.

Then you move from the wading pool of mini-grants to the deep end of the big pool, and you apply for some mid-size grants. Success gives you the skill and confidence you need to fish in the big ocean of large grants.

The first grant I wrote was a mini-grant. It was a five page application, and I struggled with it for a week. The 30-75 page applications I write now contain most of the same components as that first mini-grant, but they feel different. The only real difference is that now I know how to "swim."

So, what's the real value of a mini-grant? Mini-grants can give you more than a few hundred or a few thousand dollars.  They can give you the experience and confidence you need to succeed with larger grants in the future.

That makes them very valuable.

Become a member of grantgoddess.com to have access to Mini-Grant Central in the new CRR Forum!

Don't Let Opportunity Slip Away

The charter member rate for membership in the GrantGoddess.com Member Site expires in 7 days (January 31, 2010). Those of you who follow our blog know that I do not use it as forum for selling stuff.  We're pretty committed to keeping it as a useful resource for you.  However, I'm breaking my own rule in this case because of the incredible opportunity that will have passed you by if you miss the charter member rate.

We just launched the new website and the member site earlier this month.  We're offering membership for January ONLY at a ridiculously reduced rate of $5.95 per month (or $59 per year).  On February 1, the rate goes up to $9.99 per month, and in June, it will go up again to $19.99 per month. 

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