Marginalizing Board Members
I have no time for an executive director who intentionally shuts out the organization’s board. Putting it succinctly: you are a self-aggrandizing, stupid and, might I even go so far as to say evil...
View ArticleStrategic Planning the Right Way
Strategic planning just may be the most important policy a board of directors, executing its governance responsibilities, may create. And yet, far too often, it isn’t done “right”. Why? Let me be...
View ArticleI Dare You
The rule “Don’t ask, don’t tell” is, fortunately, defunct. At least in the military. I think, however, it is alive and well in the culture of too many nonprofit boards: if we don’t ask, we don’t...
View ArticleMight as well face it…you’re addicted
Several years back, a funder introduced me to a group of her grantees as the “bad cop” in the tag team which was about to do a presentation, a persona that continues today. Call me what you will, but I...
View ArticleWaking up the Brain Cells
Congratulations! Today is your day. You can learn what is right And be off and away! You have brains in your head. Yet dumb stuff you say. You can do yourself harm You can steer yourself Any...
View ArticleSearching for the Right ED
I’m frequently asked about the best way to build a board, but rarely about how to effectively find a new executive director. With the continued warnings about retiring baby boomers and the growing...
View ArticleThe Accidental Executive Director
Recently, we got a query from someone wanting to know the statistics on how many executive director tenures last 25 years. “Too many,” I thought. But that was a knee jerk reaction and not totally fair....
View ArticleDisrespecting Nonprofit Leadership
We truly are our own worst enemies, a key purveyor of the negative images of nonprofits that the larger public whole-heartedly believes and takes as gospel. If we want to dispel those myths—and we...
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When Founders Leave
News flash for anyone connected to a nonprofit led by a founder or much loved, long-serving executive director: someday that person is going to leave. Regardless of timing or circumstance, when it...
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The Clairvoyant Executive Director
It’s never been easy being a nonprofit executive director and these days a normally challenging job has been made even harder by unprecedented circumstances. Based on recent conversations with dozens...
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