Success Happens Here

An article in the May 11th issue of Crain's New York Business ("Made in New York") explores why some manufacturing businesses are surviving despite the economy. It offers up five lessons, which I think have direct application for cultural nonprofits:

1. Be High-End

As the article states, "If you want your company to last, you need a lasting reputation for quality." Cultural nonprofits strive for this -- many say so in their missions; it's time to take stock of your Quality Factor and take steps to burnish it or boost it starting at the front door.

2. Be Local

"It pays to focus on the big, dense...market in your own backyard." Nurturing your local audience, however you might define that, returns dividends in the forms of membership retention, event attendance, and volunteerism, to name a few. Locals are here whether times are good or bad.

3. Be Networked

"It's crucial to surviving recession," the article states. Think of your basic networks: your members, your colleagues, your accountant and insurance agent. Think of your programmatic partners, the artists and technicians. Think of your funders and the media. How well do you connect and reconnect these relationships? Is your organization a connecting force or does it wait to be connected to others?

4. Be Lean

"Lean is based on two simple goals: creating the least amount of waste possible and producing only goods and services that customers truly value." This lean philosophy has been around the corporate world since the 1990s, but it's been spreading rapidly through the service sector. Many nonprofits might argue that one of the tenets of our sector has always been 'lean'. In the wake of this recession, though, nonprofits are revisiting the lean philosophy and finding merit in taking stock and understanding their audiences' needs better.

5. Be Nimble

How well does your nonprofit move to meet the changing or expanding needs of your audiences or your community? If a program isn't meeting expectations, can you tweak it or ditch it? Replace it with something new? For-profits that can quickly exploit a market niche have the edge, but it requires confident leadership and a certain amount of fearlessness. Can this apply to nonprofits, too?

These lessons could be the overarching structure for nonprofit strategic planning or business planning. What do you think?

Photo: Success Happens Here by leefly

Three Most Important Nonprofit Executive Director Soft Skills

If you were asked to narrow down the list of executive director qualifications to the three most important, which ones would you identify? Would the list consist of soft skills, hard skills, or some combination? Would your list be based on the great ED you are or one you've worked for, or would it be your wish list for the ED you haven't been fortunate yet to work for? This was an assignment in my recent online class in leadership and administration for the American Association for State and Local History . I asked the class to review three-five advertisements for museum directors and analyze what these listings intimated about the organization’s past experience, current focus and goals, and future aspirations. Then, I asked the class to identify what they consider to be the three most important qualifications they would look for in a director. (Okay, so there's more than three if you dissect my three big groups.) Soft skills outnumbered hard skills, although

Back in the Saddle

MY LAST POST WAS NOVEMBER 2012, A LIGHT YEAR AWAY it seems, that marked the beginning of a long push toward completing a manuscript on history museum leadership with my co-author, Joan Baldwin. We finally submitted 350+ pages to our editor at Rowman & Littlefield this week. If all goes well, we expect the book to be available in early 2014. It's taken us two years to get to this point, so six more months or so of revision and production don't seem too long to wait until we can hold the final product in our hands (and you can, too!). The project put a lot of things on hold, including this blog. I'm glad to be back writing about intentional leadership -- leading by design -- for nonprofit boards and staffs. Certainly, my thoughts are now informed by the forthcoming book, in which Joan and I posit that nonprofits need to focus resources on leadership, not just management. Most cultural nonprofits are at a crossroad, as is the sector in general, where nothing is qu

What Would Make You Turn Down an Invitation to Join a Board?

THERE'S SO MUCH WRITTEN ABOUT RECRUITING BOARD TALENT, I thought I'd spend a little time thinking about it from the prospect's point of view. Clearly, there are boards where the line is long to get on them. But what would make you turn down an invitation? Here's a short list to get the conversation started: 1. You've had no prior exposure to the organization. Your immediate reaction is "did you pull my name out of a hat?" (Is that lady in the picture the head of the Nominating Committee?) Seems as though there must be a hidden agenda at work (like you're rich and once you become a board member you'll pour all your resources into the organization) or the organization is simply looking for any warm body to fill a seat. 2. The organization doesn't have a good reputation. There's something to be said for street cred. An organization that's floundering may be strengthened by your participation or you may find yourself sucked into

Leading by Design

Search This Blog