by Susan Detwiler | Mar 26, 2015 | fundraising
Consider the IRS Form 990. The executive director tears his hair out over it. The accountant prepares it. The board looks at it and nods. Let’s just get it done.
But when the Internal Revenue Service redesigned the Form 990 in 2008, it created an opportunity that too few nonprofits take advantage of.
High net-worth donors check your financials before making a major gift. The federal government requires the 990 to be available upon request. You can’t turnaround online without a governance guru writing about transparency.
So what are we waiting for? If the 990 is so important, why aren’t we figuring out ways to use it to our own advantage? Just because it’s a government form, created for the government’s purpose, doesn’t mean we can’t take it to its highest potential.
Talking to foundation executives, I heard one say that she checks the 990 to see the ratio of board members relative to the size of the budget. The Community Reinvestment Officer for a national bank said she checks for a tangible lack of board involvement.
Why not use the 990 to lay the groundwork for a more substantive conversation with donors and foundations?
Imagine the possibilities! Where the 990 asks for your purpose, make it sing! Footnote the heck out of it. You can add as many expansions as you want, so why not use it. And since you’re putting it on the website so everyone can easily find it (you are putting it on the website, aren’t you?), take a little extra space and answer funders’ questions before they ask them.
One terrific example of taking the Form 990 to new heights is at the Creating the Future website. Creating the future is a living laboratory for developing and demonstrating tools for individuals and communities, so people are living well, individually and collectively. It’s a concept that begs to be explored, but most funders won’t take the time to ask. So the organization has its Form 990 on its website, as well as an annotated Form 990, that gives detailed explanations of why they answered each part the way they did.
You can just see someone looking at their website, seeing Form 990 and Form 990 annotations, and clicking the second one out of curiosity. Creating the Future has just engaged a supporter.
Imagine the possibilities. What will make supporters feel good about giving to your organization? Can the Form 990 help?
To talk more about using what you have to make a difference, governance transparency, or to see how The Detwiler Group might partner with you to plan the future, contact me at sdetwiler@detwiler.com or www.detwiler.com.
by Susan Detwiler | Feb 2, 2015 | governance
Why don’t the board members know all the programs you put on?
Why didn’t the board president make the fundraising calls like he promised?
It’s really not hard to understand. The people who volunteer to be on the board have other lives. They do care, it’s just that their daily routines are filled with other stuff and the board commitments haven’t found a place in those routines.
Here’s an example:
Preparing to facilitate a strategic planning retreat, I talked with the executive director about plans for getting board consensus on the way forward. In the middle of our conversation, he commented that he wished he could figure out how to get the board to understand everything the organization does. He said the staff keeps telling them, and it’s as if the board doesn’t take in what they say.
Fast forward to the retreat, and a board member speaks up, saying she can’t work on strategy when she doesn’t have a picture of everything the organization does. Another director agrees. There are nods all around the table. Meanwhile, the staff interjected with where the information was, and that the emails keep them up-to-date.
Clearly, I said, there’s a disconnect. So I stopped the process and asked the board members how they would like to hear from staff.
Well, it was as if a dam broke loose. Email is good, but make sure it’s set up a certain way. The subject line has to have a deadline if you need us to do something. Let’s have a calendar where we can see at a glance what’s going on. Who’s going to be in charge of the calendar? Who will help the Executive Director translate what he wants to say into what the board will hear? Can we have a one-page fact sheet that has all the information we need? Can you keep it up to date and in one place so we know how to get it? Who’s going to create the fact sheet? When will it be done by?
There was palpable energy and eagerness around the table, ready to work on improving communication.
Both the executive director and the board had been frustrated. Board members really wanted to be good advocates. The executive needed the directors to be advocates. But the system wasn’t in place to make it easy for them. They needed to talk to each other to figure it out. In fact, creating a successful model for internal communications became part of the strategic plan.
A few generations back, most people took in information the same way. Everyone knew exactly what to expect and where the information they needed could be found. But in a world where you might have five generations working together between the staff and the board; a world where our boards need to reflect different views, experiences, and backgrounds; this uniformity is just not going to exist. Board members and staff have to work together to find the best way of communicating with each other.
For the board <-> executive partnership to work, start by talking about communication.
Oh, and why didn’t the board president make the fundraising calls? That was something else we had to make easy. Check it out.
I’d be happy to hear other stories of systems to make it easier for directors to fulfill their obligations. Let me know, at sdetwiler@detwiler.com or 302.463.0327.
by Susan Detwiler | Oct 25, 2014 | Communication, fundraising, governance, leadership, management, mission, nonprofit
It’s human nature to group people and stick a label on them. We segment out individuals who are donors as being different from other people. We talk about ˜donor relations’ as if that’s distinct from building a relationship with everyone, regardless of who they are. Too often, though, we forget that this is just shorthand for real people.
Recently, Harvard Business Review blogger John Michel did an excellent job of explaining the positive impact of focusing on people and not their roles, in his post A Military Leader’s Approach to Dealing with Complexity. It made me revisit a post of my own, C’mon People It’s Not Donor Relations, and consider implications for board leaders.
Donor relations are people relations. Just like employee relations are people relations, volunteer relations are people relations, and board relations are people relations. Any time we interact with another individual we are in relationship with that person.
Michel’s post includes two gems that strongly correlate with board leadership, and the impact of the relationship between people who serve on nonprofit boards and people who are on the frontline of delivering the nonprofit’s mission.
First, if you focus on people instead of their roles, it promotes their inclusion when you craft your vision.
Or, as Michel writes:
“Making inclusivity a priority will increase ownership, enhance motivation, improve information sharing, and result in leaders making wiser, more informed choices.”
We’re all aware of trustees who operate in an ivory tower and create strategic plans without involving the people who are actually charged with executing that plan. Remembering that employees are people with their own ideas and thoughts makes it easier to bring them into the process.
Build your vision in pencil, instead of ink, so you can be flexible enough to hear and incorporate the ideas of staff and increase the buy-in of everyone involved. Increased buy-in leads to increased success.
Second, remember that every single interaction has an impact. Every spoken or written word and every non-verbal communication becomes a part of the whole image of who you are. Relationships are a result of both conscious communications AND unconscious communications. Every time a member of the board speaks to the person on the frontline, that conversation has an impact. All the more so when the communication is nonverbal. That’s when the leader is less conscious of what she is ˜saying.’
As Michel writes:
Effective leaders understand that every interaction is a potentially powerful means of nurturing a relationship, eliminating an obstruction to progress, or reinforcing trust.
John Michel based his observations on his experience in the military, relaying the impact of interpersonal relationships when confronting complexity. The situations and scale may differ but the principle is the same. People matter. Relationships matter.
Building relationships is a fundamental tool to make sure that when you lead, others will follow.
Have you seen the impact of leaders who build relationships? Or the impact of those who don’t build relationships? Let me know!
And I’d love to have a conversation about how your strategic planning can successfully include staff, board, volunteers and community. Contact me at sdetwiler@detwiler.com.
by Susan Detwiler | Jul 22, 2014 | fundraising, governance, leadership, mission, nonprofit
*Big Hairy Audacious Goal
I’m a really big advocate for starting any project with a Vision.
Where’s your horizon?
What do you need to get there?
What steps do you have to take?
Sometimes, though, even the steps to get there require a lot of little steps first. This is especially true when the people involved haven’t experienced much success.
That’s a pitfall of focusing on the Big Hairy Audacious Goal. As proposed by Jim Collins, et al, the BHAG is important for inspiring the troops. I agree, our BHAG “ our Vision “ is the horizon to which we are pointing all our efforts.
However, when the troops are downtrodden or haven’t worked together in the past, they may not have the self-confidence or a level of trust to focus on an audacious goal. In this case, small successes pave the way.
I watched this in action at a private school with an aging, authoritarian founder. The board of this school is hand selected by the founder and will not take a step without his approval. This founder does not let anyone but himself meet with those he considers major donors. The school is viewed as his school; a cult of personality.
The obvious question is whether the school will continue much beyond the founder’s life. Or rather, the question was obvious to everyone except, it seemed, the founder.
I met with a handful of lay leaders who knew they had to find a way to build supporters with a loyalty to the school, not just to the founder. They also knew the founder would resist every step of the way.
A Big Hairy Audacious Goal for this group would be for the school to have a true governing board, with a succession plan for the founder, deep and broad relationships with existing donors, and plans for growing the image of the school distinct from the founder.
That’s quite a BHAG. But the initial need was to inspire the confidence needed to act without the founder’s permission.
We began with just meeting to discuss the issues. It may have seemed like nothing happened, but the mere fact that the meetings were being held began the process of instilling confidence in the actors and a trust in each other. Having meetings about board and school issues without the founder was a huge step.
Discussions revolved around ways to engage prospective supporters and advocates without relying on the founder. They knew that trying to wrestle existing supporters from his stewardship would cause a head-on collision. Instead, they sought ways to expand the circle. It took six months to get to the point of reaching out to potential supporters, yet those six months of meeting for a shared purpose served to build confidence.
Although certain the new ideas were unnecessary, the founder was willing to let the lay group reach prospective supporters outside his circle. After persevering, they reached one high-profile but previously unappreciated individual who became convinced of the group’s sincerity, the value of the school, and ultimately, the value of their BHAG. Together, he and the lay leaders crafted a process that used his influence to approach the founder and reinforce the goals of the group.
As I write this, there are still many steps to take. The culture is slowly changing. The founder is still reluctant to release the reins, but he has accepted that change is needed.
I don’t know if this school will be able to make all the necessary changes. However, I do know that without first building self-confidence in the lay leaders, they would not be in a position to make any changes at all.
Have you encountered boards reluctant to take on Big Hairy Audacious Goals? Try building confidence with small successes.
And let me know if you have other examples! You can reach me at: sdetwiler@detwiler.com.
Susan
by Susan Detwiler | Apr 22, 2014 | collaboration, governance, leadership, mission, nonprofit
A remarkable event occurred in the Fall of 2013, that demonstrates the power of a community coming together to embark on a new venture.
The community foundation in a rural Pennsylvania county decided it wanted to build capacity in its community. Acknowledging that there is wisdom beyond its own borders, they invited colleagues from far and near to a two-day conversation led by the organization, Creating the Future.
Before you read the blog post about that conversation, I invite you to envision what your community would be like if you, your organization, and your sister organizations, as well as each of your organizations’ supporters and suppliers, all had the same vision for your community. Now add in each of your organizations’ funders. Now add in the local and state government.
What could you accomplish together?
It takes reframing how you envision working together. Read what they did here in Building Community Capacity.
And join me next week at the Pennsylvania Association of Nonprofit Organizations/Creating the Future Conference: The Power of WE.
Have some thoughts to share on this subject? Get in touch with me at sdetwiler@detwiler.com.
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