Nonprofit Leadership Pipeline

Who Knew? The Washington Post Cares About Emerging Nonprofit Leaders

March 3, 2008 by rosetta · 2 Comments

A new report about the next generation of nonprofit leaders was released today. The survey, Ready to Lead? Next Generation Leaders Speak Out, the largest national survey to date of emerging nonprofit leaders was produced by the Meyer Foundation in partnership with CompassPoint Nonprofit Services, The Annie E. Casey Foundation and Idealist.org. They surveyed 6,000 emerging leaders and found, guess what? That many of us do, in fact want to become nonprofit executive directors, but low pay and lack of work/life balance turns us off. Younger workers and people of color will be the most likely successors of today’s nonprofit leaders. And, we need mentors and leadership development to help prepare us for the next level. It’s a great report to be sure, but really this is no newsflash. I really hope this is the final report on this issue and now foundations and nonprofits can finally start doing something real to solve the problem.

In the meantime, the Washington Post is keeping interest high on this one. This morning’s article, “Crunch Predicted in Nonprofit Sector” quotes me and this blog! (see page 2). Today at 1pm, the Post is also hosting an online discussion about the issues in the new report and in the article:

Albert Ruesga, one of the study’s co-authors and a vice president at the Eugene and Agnes E. Meyer Foundation, and Paul C. Light, a nonprofits expert and professor at New York University’s Wagner School of Public Service, will be online Monday, March 3, at 1 p.m. ET to discuss the crisis in leadership faced by the nonprofit sector. Submit your questions and comments before or during today’s discussion.

Work What You Got: Bring Your Authentic Self to the Nonprofit Sector

February 24, 2008 by rosetta · 9 Comments

Photo by jaymce

Our best leaders are those that aren’t afraid to take a delicious risk. Mary J. Blige has a hit R&B song out right now called, “Work That” and I think it offers some encouragement for young people trying to find their way in the nonprofit sector. The new nonprofit leaders are definitely not the prototype of the current leader, but we bring a lot to the table. In fact, the next generation looks, thinks, and acts differently than your average Baby Boomer executive director or board member. We’re younger, more racially diverse, and have more formal education than our predecessors. So no wonder it’s so difficult for us to find our place, our leadership roles within a sector that is changing before our very eyes. For many of us, it seems like the system’s already been established – to be a leader, you need X years of experience, you should be 4o years old, you’ve got to work your way up the ladder, you have to be a good martyr for the cause. It’s hard for us to make our own rules to the game of leading social change. We have the same dedication as those who started so many successful social change movements in the ‘60s, but somehow we make it harder to lead than it really has to be. First and foremost, we just need to be ourselves.

Last month, I launched Thurman Consulting, with no expectation that I would have any clients for the next five years. OK, I’m exaggerating, but honestly I didn’t think anyone would call me to do anything for a while. But fortunately people have been calling me for projects, and I’ve been enjoying training and educating folks on all the challenging nonprofit management areas other people hate that I study for fun. The universe responds. And last week I had the opportunity to train the board of directors for Words Beats and Life on how to ask individual donors for contributions. The first thing we talked about was why each board member had gotten involved. I can’t tell you how amazing it was to hear each person around the table explain how excited they were to be involved with the programs and being a part of change in the lives of youth. These dozen young Black professionals volunteering after work for a cause they all believed in was so real to me. It felt natural to me to be facilitating the conversation and helping them learn to harness that passion and turn it into fundraising results for the organization. In that particular hour, I was working what I had to help others.

I’ve been learning the hard way that it doesn’t make sense to fit yourself into the roles other people make up for you. If your passion is in the arts, don’t fake it ’til you make it at a scientific association. If your heart is in advocating for women’s issues, that’s where you need to be eight hours a day instead of at the environmental gig you took right out of college. As young people, we may not bring 20 years of experience to our leadership roles, but we all wake up in the morning with passion about something, and we need to work that. Don’t try to be a superwoman for the nonprofit sector. Instead, do what you love and be authentic in your work for social change.

I meet young people in the nonprofit sector all the time who are struggling in their current jobs. They’re not doing what they really came to the nonprofit field to do, not getting paid a fair salary, not being given the chance to make a real difference in their work. I try to remind them that we always have a choice of where we spend our time. Sometimes, all we need to do is speak up. Sometimes we need to quit our job and find another one that fits our more authentic selves. There’s nothing stopping us but ourselves. Ask for a raise. Get your job title changed. Switch departments. Whatever it is that you want to do, just be real about it and get persistent about changing yourself so you can change the world.

Rebecca Thorman thinks part of the problem is that we need to stop being so nice, and I wholeheartedly agree. As young people, sometimes we can be too quiet, even when we see things that are unjust and need to be changed. But we need to remember that it’s OK to get disruptive so we can help make things better.

I recently had the pleasure of seeing Geoffrey Canada speak at a Washington Grantmakers conference in DC. I had seen him on Oprah and heard so much already about how his leadership of the Harlem Children’s Zone has transformed an entire community. But what what struck me about his speech was how authentic it was. Here he was before a room full of funders with pocketfuls of cash and he really wasn’t speaking on behalf of his organization, and there was no framing, no “spin” of the issues to the point of a meaningless yawn of organizational babble that so often comes out of the mouths of current nonprofit leaders “on behalf of the board of directors”. No, here was Geoffrey talking to us as a passionate advocate for children and families in need of good education and a fair chance in life. So much of his personality and committment shone through an hour of inspirational words. For me in that moment, Geoffrey was working what he had to help us see the need for us to focus on educating our children the best we can. He was using his own personality and bringing his entire self to the speech he gave us. In a society rife with lies, non-reality TV, airbrushing and constant “spin, we all can smell bullshit a mile away. But here was a man sharing his truth.

Authenticity is a key characteristic of a true leader. We can all rally others for a cause that’s bigger than us by sharing our passion with others. Don’t try to be somebody you’re not. Work what you got, and give your best to the nonprofit sector. That’s all we ask for.

Don’t worry bout who’s saying what
It’s gonna be fine
Work what you got
Work that
Work that
Work that

Girl don’t hold back
You just be yourself

Filed Under: Next Generation Leadership · Tagged With: Nonprofit Leadership Pipeline

Lead Where You Are Called: The Responsibility of Young People in a Country Ripe for Change

February 5, 2008 by rosetta · 1 Comment

Next week, I will be making a presentation to the Capital Hill Rotaract Club here in DC. They are a spinoff group of the traditional Rotary Club for young professionals involved in the work of social change here and internationally. I’m excited that they contacted me to speak to their group because I’ve been just dying to talk about the importance of young people getting involved in nonprofit leadership right here in the nation’s capital. And yesterday I was struck by a recent comment on the Stanford Social Innovation Review Blog, a strong call to action for each of us to do something to change our world:

I think we, specially in America now, need to take responsibility: How are we going to solve the problems we created for ourselves. Why are we living in a society that does not represent who we are? What am I going to do today about it, what’s the smartest thing I can do?

Young people in America have seen so many failures of our society to take care of our most vulnerable citizens, of our democracy to represent the values of the American people, of our corporations not exercising the appropriate responsibility for their actions. We are still living in a country where children go to bed hungry, where millions of people can’t even go to the doctor because they don’t have health insurance, where we are fighting a war on drugs with no end in sight.

When I was born in 1982, the crack epidemic was just beginning to hit my hometown of Cleveland, Ohio and I lost many of my family members who got caught up in it and couldn’t get out. So I saw that growing up. But we’ve all grown up hearing about all of these problems, many of us volunteering to be a part of the solution, tutoring kids in afterschool programs to help them get a better education, or feeding our homeless neighbors at the local soup kitchen. But now, here in 2008, all the young people who grew up witnessing social problems are, in fact, all grown up and we want to do something real to make this country a better place.

In a January 24 Chronicle of Philanthropy op-ed, “A New Generation, a New Commitment to Change,” Robert Egger said,

“…our country has invested trillions of dollars in the right fight, with the best intentions, but in the wrong strategy. In 2008, as we reflect on this generation’s genuine efforts, and we look toward this year’s presidential election, it is time to begin anew, to honor amazing advances and acknowledge deeply rooted flaws, and then rededicate ourselves to repositioning nonprofit organizations as an undeniable force in a new American century.

The simple truth — my generation of baby boomers missed its shot at the proverbial brass ring. We dropped it 40 years ago on the muddy field of Resurrection City. But another ring is coming around. Our job, the boomers’ great destiny, is to be brave enough to let go of the past and open our heads and our hearts to a changing world, and then to hoist the next generation onto our shoulders, so that this time around, it doesn’t pass our country by.”

There’s no doubt that young people today have just as much passion as the boomers who came before us, blazing paths through an avalanche of social problems around the country. And now we’re in different place, a different era, where we’re facing the kind of real challenges in our country once again where we need courageous leadership to step in. So now as young professionals, we need to be asking ourselves, what’s the smartest thing we can do?

We live in one of the wealthiest nations in the world, but y’all know we’re in it up to our eyeballs with societal woes. And the worst part is that instead of making systemic change, most of us working, volunteering, interning in the nonprofit sector are overly skilled in knowing where to put the band-aid and avoiding the bigger issues that prompted the need for a band-aid in the first place.

So first and foremost, do not be a band-aid. If you want to see some real change in your community, don’t just volunteer once a month at your local soup kitchen or afterschool program. Be a voice and advocate in your neighborhood to recruit others to volunteer with you, or write letters to your city/county council about improving the school system so the need for afterschool tutoring isn’t so critical. Be the head of the PTA down the street. You say you care about global warming? Quit your day job and work at an environmental nonprofit that could use your skills. Join the board of a grassroots group that advocates for this work. Better yet, be the chair of a board that matches your passion. Don’t just donate a few bucks a year to your local food bank, encourage your friends to give as well. Want to see a Democrat elected President in 2008? Phone bank for Obama or Hillary. Don’t just join the committee; be the chair. Every social cause needs somebody to take responsibility for it. Let that somebody be you.

We’ve all got time to do something to save the world. So, whatever your cause is, lead where you are called. To solve the issues we’re facing, to really be a part of this country’s solution, we’ve gotta take it one step further than what we’re doing today. Take your passion and turn it into action for a cause that desperately needs it. America is ready and ripe for change. All we need now is your commitment.

Smile. Shine. Emerge. The world is waiting for you.

Photo by Thiru Murugan

Full disclosure: Robert Egger is the President of D.C. Central Kitchen, where I am a member of the Board of Directors. His work is why I got involved, and I will continue to co-sign whenever he writes brilliantly about what we can do to change this world.

Filed Under: Inspiration, Leadership, Next Generation Leadership · Tagged With: Inspiration, Leadership, Nonprofit Leadership Pipeline

Reader Email: The Leaders of Tomorrow Are Already Here

January 18, 2008 by rosetta · 8 Comments

I received a mind-blowing email last week from a reader who we’ll call “Shawn” to preserve anonymity. I’m always a little saddened when I hear stories of not-so-good nonprofit job experiences, because that’s what give us such a bad rap! Anyway, Shawn says:

As a member of Generation X (we’re on the heals of the Baby Boomer), I feel like I’ve been forced to sit at the kids table for a bit too long, waiting for positions currently held by baby boomers to open up. But even when they do become available, all too often non-profits look everywhere but within the organization to fill them, either by trading senior level executives with another organization, or looking in the private sector. I have worked for three organizations the last dozen years, two of which underwent changes in the Executive Director position while I was an employee. Neither position went to an internal candidate. In one case, the decision not to go with an internal candidate was so egregious, so clearly the wrong decision, a fact which was later confirmed by the external candidate lasting just eleven months in the position. The other external ED hire faired only slightly better, serving a tenure of under two years.

These “idealistic baby boomers” who have been running non-profits for the last 20 year have tightly held on to the reigns of powers, sometimes to the detriment of the organizations they work for. And when senior management positions do open up, the search all too often begins and ends outside the organization’s front door. Organizational board members are to blame as well. An open Executive Director position means the chance to “infuse new energy” into an organization, which to them typically means going outside the organization. It never occurs to them that the “infusion of new energy” they’re looking for might be down the hall from the ED’s office, waiting for an opportunity to lead. Too often, “young professionals” leave oranizatins for career advancement. I left both of my previous organizations to take positions with more responsibily and better pay. I would have preferred to stay at my last organization, but after five years and no promotions, I decided I had no choice but to move on.

Let’s focus on the half of “young professional” who plan to remain in the non-profit sector. And by focus, I mean trust, trust that we have been developing the skill set, gaining the experience to become leaders of tomorrow. We’re waiting for our opportunities.

Does Shawn’s experience resonate with anyone? Any baby boomers want to comment on the tug-of-war between the generations?

Filed Under: Next Generation Leadership · Tagged With: Nonprofit Leadership Pipeline

A Fair Salary + Connection to Mission = Nonprofit Job Satisfaction

December 18, 2007 by rosetta · 3 Comments

Today’s math problem comes from “M”, who blogs at Inside Foundations. She is a Program Associate with a foundation and gives us insight into what makes philanthropy a dream job, and what makes it suck. For anyone who is wondering what makes the next generation of nonprofit leaders happy, “M” would say that first of all, you can start with adequate compensation and the chance to be a part of the mission:

Frankly, my job quite often sucked over the last quarter. Crazy work loads, a lack of respect from some people. But staffing changes have been made, structure changes have been made, and quite frankly, the salary adjustment for the position so that it would actually fall closer to the median of what PA gets paid, according to the COF Salary Survey, really helped. Being at the bottom of the program staff can be hard, especially when it is a relatively new position in the organization, and they are not sure what to do with it.

But the past few weeks have been improving, and today, today really just tops it off. When you get to “do your job” – it feels magnificent. And I do love where I work, and I see some very exciting things I can be a part of.

What about you, dear readers – what are some other things that would make you happier in your nonprofit job?