The Leadership Blog

This post first appeared in the Corridor Business Journal. We’d never expect our public works departments to routinely repair our streets using shovels and wheelbarrows or our businesses to use manual credit card machines and typewriters to process customer payments. Yet, in many ways (although maybe not to these extremes), we expect our non-profit organizations to do their work with similarly outmoded technology and equipment. Investment in organizational infrastructure — technology and... Read More →

This post first appeared in the Corridor Business Journal. The themes of planning and change are frequent topics at this time of year. Whether it’s the start of your organization’s fiscal year or not, these early days of January are a great time for reviewing the past year, developing plans and doing a little housekeeping to lay the groundwork for success in the calendar year ahead. Planning Planning is one of the functional responsibilities of a board, but many boards struggle to make this... Read More →

This post first appeared in the Corridor Business Journal. Running and managing a nonprofit is a challenging proposition because it’s a business model reliant, to a greater or lesser degree, upon human generosity. And there’s no time of year when this is more apparent than it is now. Our mailboxes, real and virtual, fill up with donation appeals. In many cases, the organizations and their appeals blend together with the other markers of December — like snow, sales flyers and reruns of “A... Read More →

This post first appeared in the Corridor Business Journal. I’m a proud native Iowan. I appreciate our state’s topography, our first-in-the-nation caucus status and the friendliness with which we generally treat one another. However, our natural politeness and discomfort with conflict or uncomfortable situations often limit our ability to have difficult conversations with other board members. Constructive conflict can promote new ideas, spur innovative solutions and motivate members to... Read More →

This post first appeared in the Corridor Business Journal. This is the time of year when many nonprofit boards develop their annual budgets. Managing an organization’s financial resources is a fundamental board responsibility and creating a budget is a part of this work. Unfortunately, many boards spend little time on this task, often relegating the bulk of the work to the finance committee or to staff. This approach can create a disconnect in board members’ minds between the budget and the... Read More →

This post first appeared in the Corridor Business Journal. Nonprofit organizations often struggle with meeting attendance, complaints about the length of board meetings and dysfunctional member behavior and participation during meetings. And yet, much of the work of the nonprofit board occurs in its meetings. Therefore, it’s important to ensure that meetings make good use of the time and skills of the board members to ensure that the organization is getting its work done. An effective... Read More →

This post first appeared in the Corridor Business Journal. High-functioning organizations have strong co-leadership between the executive director who oversees the management of the organization and the board of directors, which oversees the direction and vision of the organization. An effective board chair often makes the difference between a board that exercises strong co-leadership and one that cedes much of its power to its executive director. Probably the most obvious role of the board... Read More →

This post first appeared in the Corridor Business Journal. Outside of the few wonkish people who really enjoy board meetings, these events aren’t usually very sexy or exciting. They’re often filled with overly detailed minutes of previous meetings, bewildering financials and verbal committee reports that drone on and on without any call for input or action. What’s a dedicated board member to do when meeting agendas and structures cool his or her passion for the work of the organization? It... Read More →

This post first appeared in the Corridor Business Journal. Nonprofit organizations play important roles in communities as experts in their areas of service. It is therefore problematic when nonprofit organizations shy away from advocacy and policy work. Admittedly, a nonprofit organization must be clear about what its board members and employees can and can’t do when it comes to political advocacy, but our communities miss out on vital perspectives on the issues when our nonprofit experts... Read More →