Jan 25, 2012 | Leadership
In a feature article of The Nonprofit Quarterly – The Inclusive Nonprofit Boardroom: Leveraging the Transformative Potential of Diversity – authors Patricia Bradshaw and Christopher Fredette shared highlights of a study they conducted of Canadian nonprofit organizations examining how they made sense of diversity, and what they saw as best practices for enhancing it. Their findings and reflections reveal the potential in harnessing the power of diversity in organization leadership.
Their focus was on diversity and the dynamics of inclusion, versus assimilation or differentiation, defined as the degree to which members of diverse and traditionally marginalized communities are present on boards and meaningfully engaged in the governance of their organizations.
I believe that a commitment to diversity and inclusiveness among organization leadership is vitally important. And my observation is that this work is challenging, complex, and requires dedication and commitment over the long-term. Many organizations, as they attempt to bring greater diversity to their board and staff, have experienced a decline in organization performance and forward progress. I’ve witnessed the changes creating tension, conflict, and division. I conclude that this is due in great part to two factors: 1) a misunderstanding of what it truly means for an organization to embrace diversity and inclusion, and 2) the lack of sincere, consistent, long-term commitment to and execution of a diversity plan.
From the study, interviewee Kristina Bourne described an environment of inclusion as “a culture in which every individual is valued as a vital component of the organization’s success and competitive advantage.” Bourne describes this concept as an alternative to seeing diversity as an end in itself or something to be managed or tolerated.
Reflecting on their interviews, they found that informants were talking about two different types of inclusion — which Bradshaw and Fredette termed “functional inclusion” and “social inclusion”— and about how the two can work together to create something transformational.
The article describes functional inclusion as characterized by goal-driven and purposeful strategies for the increased inclusion of members of diverse or traditionally marginalized communities. Social inclusion, in contrast, is characterized by the participation of members of diverse groups in the interpersonal and cultural dynamics of the board, based on meaningful relational connections. Unlike the functional notions of inclusion, social inclusion also stresses the value derived from social standing and relational acceptance within the context of the board.
A commitment to and healthy balance of both social and functional inclusion is required for success. Merely recruiting board members from diverse communities and expecting positive outcomes is not enough. As you consider how your nonprofit’s board will evolve to embrace diverse, inclusive leadership, consider the following:
- Your organization’s leadership must be reflective of the diverse communities and constituents you serve. It’s simply sound business practice.
- Be prepared for the complexities and challenges of becoming a more inclusive organization.
- Include your commitment to diversity and inclusiveness as a core part of your organization’s strategic plan. Approach the work with a sincere and genuine commitment to execute this core strategy consistently over the long-term. It must become a part of your organization’s DNA.
- Begin with simple actionable steps, with people you know. Progress slowly and steadily, remembering that relationship building takes time.
- Once on board, support new members through transitional phases of board entry, and authentically engage them in social aspects that build strong relationships and board cohesion, such as mentorship, orientation practices, and other group-building processes like retreats and workshops.
- Ensure that yours is a strong and welcoming organizational culture, helping new members feel comfortable and at ease.
- Hold meetings at times and in locations where everyone could attend (in locations with elevators in order to be accessible to those with physical disabilities, or on days that accommodated religious holidays, for example),
- Exhibit sensitivity regarding the use of humor and choices of subject matter that could marginalize or silence people, or exhibit unconscious privilege.
Nov 29, 2011 | Leadership
During a staff meeting one day, one of my employees passed out paper bags – the kind you packed your lunch in as a kid. She sat a big box in the middle of the table and lifted the lid. Inside, it was filled with magic markers, crayons, chalk, and colored pencils. She instructed us to decorate our own personal bag in such a way that would make us smile. Everyone dug in, laughing, commenting on favorite colors, and began the art project.
Next, she passed out skinny strips of paper and asked each of us to write something we liked about every staff member around the table, then fold it up, and drop it in his or her bag. She suggested that, in the coming weeks, we keep the bags on our desks and that we continue writing these simple acknowledgment notes for one another. Then, whenever we need a “pick me up,” reach in, grab a handful of notes, and read them to ourselves.
Funny. It’s now five years later and the bags are still on the desks, full of notes. I’m no longer with that organization, but the bag sits on the desk in my new office. Powerful, isn’t it?
How often do we pause to say nice things about those with whom we work? To let them know how much we truly appreciate what they do? The formal feedback, like annual performance reviews, gets done, but what about the simpler things? Isn’t it really these simple things that make the biggest difference? It’s what defines a workplace’s culture – mojo I call it. And it’s a key part of building team commitment, loyalty, and satisfaction.
In all workplaces, but perhaps even more important in the nonprofit sector, we need to identify the simple, yet powerful actions and benefits that help us recruit and retain our human capital. After all, it’s our single greatest resource.
Nov 14, 2011 | Leadership
I’ve been thinking a lot about powerful questions lately. And how the potency lies in their simplicity and delivery.
In coaching, the power of a direct, concise, well-timed question evokes reflection and propels a client toward self-discovery and transformation. You know you’ve ‘got one’ when a coachee’s reaction goes something like this: “Wow. That’s a great question. Let me think about it for a minute.” Or, “Well, I never thought about it quite like that before…” Powerful questions halt you in your tracks and even make you uncomfortable. Your head tilts. Eyes squint. You grow quiet, contemplative.
In my experiences working with organizations, I’m reminded of a time when a particularly insightful and courageous individual asked precisely the right questions, spurring actions that changed an entire course (though in the moment they seemed unrelentingly stubborn and persistent).
In this particular case, I was working for the United Arts Council of Greater Greensboro. We were holding our monthly board meeting and reporting on financial results of a recent special event. These disappointing results, paired with other line-item budget-to-actual revenue shortfalls, painted a picture of concern. A financially savvy board member began firing a series of powerful questions, probing into current and prior year financial data.
Following this meeting and subsequent analysis, we began a review that ultimately revealed significant, cumulative direct and indirect revenue loss related to our events and also to other business functions that had failed to meet projections. Individually, each issue alone had quietly gone unnoticed or was of minor concern, but together the problems were steadily building. During the examination some reasoned, too, that we were distracted from a lack of focus.
I recall the general initial reaction to this individual’s inquiry as that of frustration, defense, and a sense of vulnerability – though over time, it evolved to one of gratitude. That day, the board member began to pull a thread that ultimately unraveled a series of issues that received immediate, priority attention, and we began crafting a strategy that changed our overall scope of work and the way we did business. All because one individual saw what others didn’t, or were afraid to question.
I’ve learned a lot from this and other experiences where I’ve witnessed powerful questions in action.
– Don’t be afraid to question. Chances are if you have a particular question, others probably have it too.
– Ask with a spirit of curiosity and sincerity. Great questions are selfless, not asked to illustrate the cleverness of the questioner, and are supportive, insightful, and challenging.
– Think before you ask. What do you want your question to accomplish? Intentionally frame your question so that you encourage collaborative thinking and cannot be perceived as threatening.
– Be succinct and direct. The powerful question is powerful because it cuts through to the heart of the issue. Short is good.
– Allow silence to do its work. Ask, then be quiet and wait. Pay attention to the impact of the questions you ask.
Oct 1, 2011 | Leadership
Do you recall your first formal leadership development experience?
My first experience was in 2000 – I was sponsored by a local foundation to participate in the Leadership Development Program at the Center for Creative Leadership (CCL). I was 30, and I had been working for nine years, building a career in the nonprofit sector.
Up to that point, my leadership development experiences had been more informal – in school, on the athletic field, and over years of music lessons – all through interactions with insightful teachers and coaches.
In the early years of my career, I received leadership training from various bosses, mentors, and other seasoned professionals in the form of sage advice, best practices, and – most often – “in the moment” life lessons at an operational, grassroots level. My ‘classroom’ was “on the street,” “in the trenches,” and oftentimes in sink or swim situations…some of the greatest learning opportunities there are.
At 30 years of age, most of my professional development occurred when wearing many hats, trying new things, taking risks, and making my best efforts to exhibit courage in the face of fear. Progress and discoveries came as much by failure as by success.
Today, colleges and universities have more formally developed leadership programs and offerings for students; many are course requirements for undergraduate study. Students graduating and entering the for-profit workplace often begin on a career development track and are exposed early on to corporate leadership training programs, assessments, and executive coaches.
These kinds of critical opportunities, while assumed and plentiful in the corporate environment, are glaringly absent in the nonprofit sector. And even if available, many leadership programs are cost-prohibitive for many small to medium-sized organizations.
My formal CCL experience was made possible by a new funding relationship between CCL and a local foundation partnering to sponsor nonprofit executives’ participation in the Center’s Leadership Development Program. For me, it was life-changing. It was the first time in my career that I was exposed to behavioral assessments, 360-degree feedback, insight into my natural and adapted leadership styles, and in-depth analysis of my strengths, weaknesses, and blind spots.
After that one-week intensive, I was different. Armed with new, critical insight, it was as if the Vaseline had been wiped from my windshield. My discoveries and newfound vision:
- Augmented my leadership, management, and decision-making capabilities.
- Sharpened my abilities to value, work with, and manage others.
- Spurred me to create a career vision and goals to chart and navigate my course.
- Fueled my desire to gain increasing responsibility, ultimately helping me achieve my goal of leading a nonprofit arts organization.
- Ignited my interest in seeking out additional opportunities, including books and articles on leadership, other continuing education, and connecting to coaches and mentors.
“What if I had had a similar kind of formal leadership development experience in high school, or college – or in the first year or two of my career? What difference would it have made in my professional development, how I interacted with co-workers, teams and boards, and in my overall career track? I know the difference it made at 30 years of age. What if I had had the same experience at 20?
Today, I can only imagine that impact. It has prompted my own drive to help make leadership coaching opportunities available and accessible for students and young professionals. I believe we must reach teachers, coaches, and other mentors interacting with our young people and ensure they have the skills and training necessary to take advantage of the critical leadership teaching moments in everyday experiences.
I’m discovering exciting ways to be involved in the creation and delivery of such opportunities, including participating in CCL’s Young Women’s Leadership Program, the University of North Carolina’s student mentoring program, and working to help coach and develop the next generation of arts and culture leaders.
I encourage you to begin where you are:
- Seek out formal leadership development for yourself – early on and often; I guarantee it will be an eye-opening experience and have countless positive effects on your life.
- Surround yourself with trusted and respected mentors and consider working with an executive coach. You’ll be more purposeful and mindful of your career and life path, taking charge of your present and future direction.
- Get involved in positively influencing the life, education, and/or career of a young adult. You’ll receive as much or more than you give!
- Advocate for leadership development within the nonprofit sector. Encourage it as a priority in your workplace, among peers, and to funders to invest in and support leadership development opportunities.
About Jeanie Duncan: Jeanie is President of Raven Consulting Group, a business she founded that focuses on organizational change and leadership development in the nonprofit sector. She is a senior consultant for Raffa, a national firm working with nonprofit clients to lead efforts in sustainability and succession planning, executive transition and search. Additionally, Jeanie serves as adjunct faculty for the Center for Creative Leadership, a top-ranked, global provider of executive leadership education.
Sep 1, 2011 | Leadership
(A guest blog post by: Michael Wilkerson, Assistant Professor of Arts Management at American University. As posted on the American’s for the Arts ArtsBlog at http://blog.artsusa.org/2011/02/25/what-is-leadership-an-eals-blog/)
Leadership. As someone who loves to lecture (sorry, students), even my own eyes glaze over at the word. Go to any business section of any bookstore and you can find hundreds of tomes that boil down to one extended metaphor in the form of a book length advice column: “The fiction writer’s way of leadership,” The housewife’s way of leadership,” “Leadership: the Mad Men Method,” “How Would Jesus Lead (HWJL)?”
Okay, I made those up, but among this blizzard of works on leadership, what actually helps? We’ll try to find some answers at the symposium. My views are too complex to reduce to sound bites or slick metaphors, probably because I believe leadership is not solely about the leader as much as it is his or her interaction with co-workers, or followers.
We make too many assumptions that the CEO is The Leader. But one can lead from the middle (director of marketing) or even below (program associate). The weird irony of organizations seems to be that those who hold leadership positions are not necessarily any good at leading. Yet spectacular feats of leadership can occur at any level. Followers influence leaders with their ideas and their ways of working, and more importantly, they influence each other.
To me, leadership is about understanding the environment in which you operate, the assets (people and other resources) you have available, and making sure that you are getting the most out of those assets. Which may sound like working folks harder, but it really means inspiring them to bring you their best selves, not filling up all their waking hours. A really good leader can sometimes appear to be doing nothing, because he/she has been so successful at empowering employees, at turning them into leaders.
We spend too much time thinking about leadership and not enough about “followership.” What does it mean to work “for” someone? In my years as assistant to several university vice presidents, we followers debated one core issue: are we there to make the big boss look good, or to enable him or her to do good? The former takes no courage whatsoever; the latter is all about courage, about speaking truth to power (“no, boss, it would be wrong of you to make that decision”), about listening harder and more carefully to others, about participating so deeply in the life of the organization that you can be confident that you can identify a wrong or right decision when you see it coming.
There’s a book by Ira Chaleff called The Courageous Follower. I’d recommend that everyone slavishly tromp your way to the bookstore and buy a copy.
Emerging Arts Leaders Symposium. It sounds like a conference for butterflies who are about to emerge from their chrysalises, dry off their wings, and magically fly. As Russell Taylor, president of National Arts Strategies, says, “You have already emerged.” It’s not a moment but a process. I see leadership in all kinds of ways from my students, even the ones who would be the first to say, “I’m not ready.” So shorten the learning curve and take your power. Lead from where you are.
In closing, let me tell you a secret: even old, veteran, longtime leaders feel insecure about this leadership stuff. Even if your organization never changes mission, the environment is never stable. Consequently, what’s required of a leader is constant adaptation and prescience. Therefore, the old guard does not stand in your way, so much as it hungers for your help.
