It's been a long week here on the East Coast. Hopefully, we've had our last major snowstorm of the season. To end the week on a high note, I'm posting this link to one of my favorite bloggers, Vu Lee of Nonprofit With Balls. I always look forward to Mondays, because of his posts. http://nonprofitwithballs.com/2013/12/8-classic-nonprofit-jokes-to-tell-at-parties/
Please be in touch if you or someone you know needs the services of Intuition Consulting.
Happy weekend!
In honor of Dr. Seuss' birthday, a few of his memorable quotes: "Today you are You, that is truer than true. There is no one alive who is Youer than You."
"Why fit in when you're born to stand out?"
"A person's a person, no matter how small."
"It is better to know how to learn than to know."
"Be who you are and say what you mean. Because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind."
"To the world you may be one person, but to one person you may be the world."
"Sometimes the questions are complicated and the answers are simple."
"Fun is good."
“Leadership is about making others better as a result of your presence and making sure that impact lasts in your absence.” Sheryl Sandberg, COO of Facebook
In honor of President's Day, here are 2 Presidential quotes: "The best thing about the future is that it comes one day at a time."
- Abraham Lincoln
"The only limit to our realization of tomorrow will be our doubts of today."
- Franklin D. Roosevelt
Get out there (stay warm!) and do something important today!
Leadership is not a position or a title. It is action and example. --Cory Booker
I recently found myself with some unscheduled time, and decided to use it to catch up on reading the latest of Daniel Goleman’s books, Focus: The Hidden Driver of Excellence. In my work with nonprofit CEOs, I often draw from Goleman’s insights on emotional intelligence.Focus takes his concepts on EI and re-packages them in a new way, encouraging mindfulness to enhance self-awareness and create needed balance. Focus is defined as a mental asset that is essential for achieving success. It can be trained, like a muscle, to be strong and supportive. In today’s multi-tasking, multi-technology world, it’s easy to think in short spurts (like tweets) rather than about the bigger picture. But good leaders need to be able to do both, and to achieve balance.
Goleman says there are three levels of focus: inner, outer and other. Inner focus incorporates values, intuition, and decision-making capabilities. Outer focus enables existence in the larger world, and other focus governs social interactions and connections. Together, these levels of focus provide guidance, intelligence and navigation. Leaders who are able to cultivate each of these levels tend to be more self-aware, and more able to use their balanced focus to achieve success.
These successful leaders excel at listening to others while creating vision and direction together; coaching others to be better team members; collaborating and building consensus; and building trust.
How can leaders improve their performance and be more successful? Goleman says that by strengthening their focus through mindfulness, leaders can develop the skills to either “zoom in” to the internal environment or “zoom out” to concentrate on the broader perspective, as needed.
I'm looking forward to applying the techniques I possess to encourage mindfulnessand to help my CEO clients achieve balance and focus.
How am I Doing? There are many positive aspects to being a consultant: having diverse and interesting work, getting to know a variety of people, and balancing my time so I can make a 5pm yoga class are just a few. But one of the downsides is that I don’t always get feedback on how well I am doing in my job of helping organizations grow and succeed in their missions.
What makes a great consultant? I used my network of colleagues and clients to answer this question, and came up with this Top 10 List:
What other attributes make for a great consultant? Email me your thoughts!
"Do not go where the path may lead. Go instead where there is no path and leave a trail" Ralph Waldo Emerson Many of the organizations I work with are small and, to some degree, struggling to grow. Their efforts to fundraise, gain visibility, and expand their reach often stretch them to exhaustion. In that environment, it's often difficult to contemplate innovation, but that's exactly what they need to do. Pushing themselves to do something different- create a new program, introduce themselves to a whole new constituent group, raise money in a creative way- is challenging but can lead to a whole new world of results.
One of my clients has decided not to do the "same old, same old" type of program development and instead is moving toward embracing their social entrepreurial side by creating a new app. The process of bringing the app to fruition has introduced them to new people (including venture capitalists with funding!) and expanded their visibility in an entirely new way. Their efforts are bringing new enthusiasm to the Board, who are embracing the project and working toward its implementation.
So...be brave enough to innovate, and see if you can forge a new path for your organization!
I have never liked New Year’s resolutions. They feel restrictive and confining, like a sweater two sizes too small. They are focused on specific behaviors and seem to carry with them the suggestion of failure. “I will lose weight.” “I will stop smoking.” “I will exercise every day.” I’m a goal-oriented person so I bristle against self-defeating goals.
Still, the idea of a resolution or guidepost held real appeal for me. So, in 2013, I decided I wanted the best of what a resolution could be without the rigidity of a resolution. I determined to set an intention instead. Where a resolution is focused on behavior, an intention concerns itself with attitude. And where a resolution is limited, an intention can be expansive. Intentions do not need be tied down to specific outcomes. Intentions, by definition, inspire mindfulness.
The intention I chose for 2013 was “less judgment, more compassion.” During the year, I actually used that phrase every day, in conversations with clients, friends and family. Over the course of the year, I found myself thinking less critically and taking more time to explore other angles of a situation or story before forming an opinion.
My decision to choose an intention and bring intentionality to my life was both satisfying and successful. So much so that I began thinking of my intention for 2014 well before the new year. I had grown very fond of “less judgment, more compassion.” While I was reluctant to let it go, a new year deserves a new intention.
But how would I choose my new intention? Could it ever be as satisfying as my old one?
In late December, I found myself in the Redwood Forest in Northern California. While walking beneath the redwoods, I stopped and listened and heard… nothing. At least, none of the sounds I was so familiar with. No traffic noise. No television talking heads. No cell phone ringing. There was not even the sound of a bird chirping. I listened more closely. Only then did I hear the soft sound of the breeze stirring the leaves and the gentle rustle of those incredible trees.
And my new intention came to me: Listen.
I was pleased with my new intention but, after several days of contemplation, I felt that it needed a companion. But what would that be? I let the question percolate into the new year and my return home. Once back in my office, I found myself distracted by the many emails and social media that had accumulated while I was away. As I was reflexively deleting many of these missives, too overwhelmed to bother reading them all, I realized that I was deleting a lot of valuable information, and missing an opportunity to learn. And just like that, there it was. The second part of the intention: Learn.
Listen and learn.
Let’s see how that works.
Thought for the day: When you stop giving and offering something to the rest of the world, it's time to turn out the lights.- George Burns
Early on in my career, when I described what I did in my various jobs, people would often say, “Oh, so you’re a fundraiser.” I would vehemently deny this (not that there’s anything wrong with fundraising!) because it just wasn’t the way I saw myself. I didn’t actually ASK people for money- oh, no- but it was my responsibility to plan and execute a program, and it was necessary to have the funding for the program as well….so I went out and “found” the money. How did I do this without asking? The answer is: I created relationships. I went out and met with people. I schmoozed. I drank a lot of coffee. I spent time getting to know them and together we figured out how they could best participate in supporting the organizations and programs I was working with. Many of these relationships have lasted 20 years or more, and have traveled with me through my career, sustaining me and my work.
In their new book, The Generosity Network, Jennifer McCrea and Jeffrey Walker showcase this perspective in transformational fundraising. By operating with the assumption that people want to make a difference, you can tap into their lives, listen to their stories, and channel them towards the worthwhile causes that they want to support, by creating connections.
What’s the best way to facilitate these kinds of connections? How can you open up the process and allow the generosity inherent in people to flow? A few suggestions from McCrea and Walker:
This can have far-reaching effects on your organization, helping you to access the right board members, reach your target audience and, yes, improve your bottom line.
Good luck on your journey!
As a nonprofit leader, when is it time for you to look for help in addressing the weaknesses in your organization? If you are from the corporate world, how do you engage your company's resources in philanthropic ventures that align with your values and those of your employees? How do you develop the relationships that can lead you along your best path, toward growth and visibility and success? It's a given that you will not always have all the answers you need to do your work. Sometimes you need someone with an objective perspective to spark fresh thinking, or someone who has a deeper understanding of the issues you are facing and the possible solutions, or someone with an awareness of best practices that can help you make choices. Who is that someone??
A consultant can play the role of advisor, analyst, diagnostician, teacher and problem solver, depending upon your needs. They can help you identify and address key challenges, changes in organizational structure or direction, and questions about mission alignment. The right consultant can perform specific tasks such as conducting a search for a new CEO, providing a board development workshop, creating and implementing a strategic planning process, and helping to cultivate new relationships with corporate partners.
I like to think that in my role as a consultant, I am the student to my client in some ways, and the instructor in others. The dialogue that evolves from this dynamic is candid, objective, inquisitive and informed, and leads to workable goals, shared expectations, and long-term, sustainable success.
You can find the consultant who is the best fit for your needs by asking a few questions of yourself, your organization/company, and the potential consultant:
Good luck as you search for the best way to find your path!