Dream Job…and My Title Would Be Chief Dream Merchant
What I want:
An arts charity that makes my community better.
Value to the community:
Safety. Knowledge. Personal Power. Issue solutions.
Artistic Tools:
Provocation. Entertainment. Populism. Progressiveness. Mischief.
Other Tools:
Educational residencies in both art and topic.
Partners:
Every other charity, educational institution, or NGO with similar values.
Differentiation:
50-50 split on revenues with partners. Partners open their mailing lists to help themselves financially through ticket sales.
Quantifiable outcomes:
The measured outcomes of the partners. Quantity of classes, students, and schools participating.
Non-quantifiable outcomes:
Populist results defeat the arts’ elitist reputation. The needs of the charities are filled.
Initial budget:
Enough so that all artists receive at least $15/hour (in 2014 dollars) and no full-time hourly rate is more than 4x anyone else’s.
Impact:
Arts moves people to action. Thorny issues seen can never be unseen. Life is better.
Jack and Jill: Why Smart Nonprofits Search for Interim Leadership
Executive Director Jack resigns.
Jack leads the committee to replace himself. The committee selects Jill.
Jill is not Jack.
Jill discovers too late that she been enlisted to follow Jack’s path rather than set her own.
After a year, not only is Jill unhappy, but trustees and employees resign.
After a second year, Jill resigns. Or is fired.
The reeling company hires Fred – who is neither Jack nor Jill.
Uneasy lies the head that breaks a crown.
Succession planning needn’t require permanence. It might be best to hire an interim leader from outside the organization (not a board member) while the permanent search is carefully executed.
Every organizational leader’s legacy ends the day the leader leaves. Which means it is never a good idea to have the outgoing director have a say on a permanent successor.
Seen on a sweatshirt while walking around Green Lake: “Change is good. You go first.”
Innovation is annoying. Instigation is even worse. I ought to know. I’ve been accused of both.
But when companies are stagnant (or failing), staying put is not an option.
Innovators and instigators can be difficult. Steve Jobs, Thomas Edison, and Henry Ford are/were not particularly “easy” people. Nor were César Chávez or Copernicus. Nor were many women who broke through glass ceilings.
Too often when things aren’t working, managers paralyze themselves by thinking without forensic analysis. For them, all they believe they need to do is to keep doing what they’re doing.
“We tried change,” they’ll tell you. “It didn’t work. All we have to do is work harder.”
Forensic analysis matters. The great leaders know that and use it to their competitive advantage. They may also consider change agency to be annoying – but also rewarding.
One size fits one.
I recently worked with a nonprofit theater company to find ways to increase its revenue. The assignment was through a parent volunteer organization. There were a slew of rules dictated by that organization, mostly leading to lots of pre-printed worksheets.
This is a longstanding theatrical outfit that’s doing fine, but outside the current audience and tiny board, there is little chatter. That was the issue.
Even the mission statement only described their activities. It did not define their goals.
The best project would have been to aim higher, enhance internal branding, and take steps to build a fan base (instead of audience). But that advice wasn’t allowed.
It’s too bad. Each nonprofit is unique. Leaders are too often drawn to uninspired project management tools because they’re easy, and obviously worked at some time for some company somewhere.
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