2018 Nonprofit Leader Academy

The 2018 version of the ONEplace Nonprofit Leader Academy (ONLA) is underway, with a great group of 19 participants. This marks the 7th year of this superb development program for nonprofit leaders. Like all the services at ONEplace, the Academy is provided free of charge to the nonprofit community in Kalamazoo County, thanks to the generosity of local foundations.

Prior to the initial group session we used a pair of 360 feedback assessments to gather a wealth of data on how each participant is perceived by their managers, employees, peers, and key others. The feedback is anonymous and completely confidential; the results are given only to the individual Academy participant. They’ll receive their feedback reports at the March session.

This year’s Academy is already turning out to be exciting, innovative, and a great professional development experience for the participants. It’s also a real pleasure for those of us involved in the Academy as instructors, panelists, mentors, and presenters.

The Academy meets one day a month from February through June, then takes a break until late August when the monthly sessions begin again. The Academy concludes in November, and then the 2019 application process begins. Stay tuned for more on the Academy. In the meantime, take a few minutes to check things out at ONEplace@kpl.gov. Director Matt Lechel and Associate Ragan Savara provide a full range of programs and services to nonprofit leaders, staff, volunteers, and boards. So if you work for or are involved with a nonprofit in the region, look to ONEplace for knowledge, information, and support. They’ve been making a huge difference in our community since 2011!

2016 Nonprofit Leadership Academy – Update

We’re nearly to the midpoint of this year’s ONEplace Nonprofit Leadership Academy (ONLA). 2016 marks the 5th year of this superb leadership development program. Like all the services at ONEplace, the Academy is provided free of charge to the nonprofit community in Kalamazoo County, thanks to the generosity of local foundations.

Prior to the initial group session in February we used a pair of 360 feedback assessments to gather a wealth of data on how each participant is perceived by their managers, employees, peers, and key others. The feedback is anonymous and completely confidential; the results were given only to the individual Academy participant.

With a full compliment of 16 participants, this year’s Academy is turning out to be exciting, innovative, and a great professional development experience for the participants. It’s also a real pleasure for those of us involved in the Academy as instructors, panelists, mentors, and presenters.

The May class included an excellent overview from governance expert Larry Hermen on nonprofit Board structure and roles. We followed up with a panel discussion with four Executive Directors, who willingly shared their perspectives on nonprofit management leadership issues. The ED Panel included Kristen Chesak, Jennifer Johnson, Troy Thrash, and Jilisa Williams. The afternoon included working with ONEplace director Thom Andrews on communication with boards and effective board meetings. All in all and outstanding day!

The Academy meets again in June, then takes a break until late August when the monthly sessions begin again. Stay tuned for more on the Academy. In the meantime, take a few minutes to check things out at ONEplace@kpl.gov.

Nonprofit Supervision & Management Course

The final few weeks of Summer are upon us and it’s time to think about professional development opportunities for Fall. This coming September and October marks another five-session Nonprofit Supervision & Management Series offered by ONEplace@kpl – the nonprofit management service center funded by the local foundation community. This is the fifth Fall in a row we’ve delivered this course for ONEplace and the participation has been great each time. In previous years the course has been offered on five successive Monday mornings with a limit of 40 participants.

We’ve wanted to increase the involvement of participants which just isn’t possible with a group of 40 people. So this year there will be two groups participating in the course, a group on Monday and another group onThursday mornings. Each class has an enrollment limit of 20.

If you work for a Kalamzoo area nonprofit you can keep an eye on the ONEplace website for details and times as well as all the other great programs and services provided by Thom Andrews and staff.

For those outside the local area, contact us to learn how you can bring this course to your nonprofit community.

Stay tuned,

Paul

Managing Your “Boss”

I need to make a confession. Frankly, I’m biased against the term “boss.” It’s an old label from the days when the person in charge of a crew or group of workers really did “boss” them around. “Do this! Do that! Do it this way!” Although there are settings or situations when having someone clearly in command makes good sense – first responders in emergencies and military combat come to mind – the term is really outmoded today. Still, it is short, easy to say, and everyone knows what you mean when you refer to “my boss” as the person you report to within your organization.

The relationship with your own boss is one of the most important work relationships you have. When you and your boss are generally on the same page, have good rapport, and communicate reasonably well, you’re much more likely to enjoy your job. On the other hand, if your relationship with your boss is strained, you don’t have good communication, and your ideas about how to get things done are substantially different, your daily interactions can quickly become conflict-ridden and, well, a grind.

What kinds of expectations do you think your boss has of you? What are the things you generally do to keep your boss in the loop? Some expectations a manager might have of you as their direct report are pretty universal, such as “Know your responsibilities and carry them out effectively without a lot of detailed instructions.”

What other specific expectations do you think your manager has? If you aren’t sure, maybe it’s time to ask – having a conversation about what you think they expect and what they actually do expect might be a highly useful discussion. After all, if you aren’t clear about what is expected, it’s going to be difficult to be effective as a supervisor or manager.

We live in a world that’s dynamic, fluid, and fast-paced. Priorities change and external events present new challenges. Try sitting down with your boss. Say to them, “Here are the things I’m currently working on. Here’s my perspective on what you expect of me in my current role. I just want to make sure we’re on the same page about priorities and whether you think I’m focusing on the right things.”

Help your boss manage you. It might just be the most important thing you do this year.

What do you think?

Paul

What If the Answer is “No?”

We seem to have this notion that becoming a supervisor or stepping into a middle management position is an irrevocable shift from being “one of us” to becoming “one of them.” Certainly our formal organizations – corporations, universities, government agencies seem to work that way. Many nonprofits too, for that matter; especially the large ones.

Supervising and managing is, frankly, not for everybody. And yet our organizations are set up in a way that basically says, “If you want to make more money and have a more secure future for your family, you need to become a manager.” I guess that may make sense to those that run larger organizations; certainly it was the path I chose for much of my career, since I worked in large organizations.

Suppose you’ve stuck your toe in the “supervision pond” and maybe even jumped in with both feet. There’s lots to like about management, but perhaps you miss the thing that brought you to the organization in the first place. Maybe that was direct contact with customers or clientele. Maybe it was the hands-on “making” of something; you, creating something of value. So where is it written that when you become a manager you no longer can do the things that attracted you in the first place?

I think it makes great sense for every supervisor, every manager, to stay in touch with their roots. Keep a hand in the game, an oar in the water to make sure you are connected to the folks that make it happen out there every day; the people making the products, delivering the services.

In the University world, presidents often make sure they continue to teach a class or two in their field, CEO’s take time to get out of the executive suite and see what’s going on in the trenches. Managers make sure they keep connected to their core interest by spending time with their sleeves rolled up.

Makes sense to me. What do you think?

Paul

Game Changer – ONEplace@KPL

ONEplace@KPL has become a significant Game Changer for nonprofit organizations in Kalamazoo, Michigan. Opened in 2009 with support from local funders including the Irving S. Gilmore Foundation, the Kalamazoo Community Foundation, and others, and with administrative support and facilities provided by the Kalamazoo Public Library, ONEplace is a management support organization (MSO) for nonprofit organizations. Their focus is on four key areas common to nonprofits:

• Management – operations & program directors
• Communications – marketing, public relations & media relations
• Fundraising – individual, foundation & corporate support
• Leadership – board & executive director

With leadership from director Thom Andrews and associate Lolita Moss, the list of professional development opportunities for nonprofit organizations is extensive and comprehensive. The list includes workshops, roundtables, webinars, interest groups, courses, and plenty of other resources.

At the same time a variety of  direct services, such as consulting, advising, problem/opportunity identification, and action planning are provided on a confidential basis. And because of the ongoing financial support of area foundations everything at ONEplace is available at no cost to the nonprofit organizations.

Several of us at Midwest Consulting Group have been involved with ONEplace since its founding. We love working with nonprofit organizations and the wonderful work they do; it’s a great way for us to give back to our local community.

Last week saw the kickoff of the 2015 ONEplace Nonprofit Leadership Academy (ONLA) with a bakers’ dozen of Kalamazoo County’s best and brightest nonprofit professionals taking part. ONLA consists of nine monthly day-long group sessions, one-on-one work with an executive director mentor, and other activities throughout the year.

If you lead, work in, or volunteer with nonprofit organizations in Kalamazoo County, you owe it to yourself and the nonprofits you serve to check out ONEplace@kpl. They are indeed a Game Changer for nonprofit organizations.

Stay Tuned

Paul

360 Assessments Underway

Conducting a 360 assessment process is an important part of each ONEplace Nonprofit Leadership Academy, and the data-gathering is well underway for the 2015 Academy group.

We’re using a pair of excellent multi-rater assessments, the Management-Leadership Practices Inventory (MLPI) and the Professional Communications Inventory (PCI) – [click here for more info]. Each Academy participant selects the 360 that best fits their situation and provides us with a list of people they want to ask for feedback. The scores are provided only to the Academy participant and individual rater’s responses are reported in aggregate, so confidentiality is assured throughout the process.

At the March session the group will receive the results of the assessment process. For many this will be the first time they’ve received this kind of feedback, and the enthusiasm within the group is pretty high.

When is the last time you got really honest feedback on what you do (and don’t do) as a professional?

Stay tuned,

Paul

Nonprofit Leadership Academy – Version 4

For the past three years I’ve been involved with the ONEplace Nonprofit Leadership Academy (ONLA) here in SW Michigan. This fantastic leadership development program is provided free of charge to the nonprofit community in Kalamazoo County through the generosity of local foundations. The 2015 version kicks off this month and promises to be exciting and innovative as we welcome a baker’s dozen of nonprofit managers. ONLA is always a great experience for the participants as well as for those of us involved in The Academy. Watch this space for more information as the process moves along.

In the meantime, take a few minutes to check things out at ONEplace@kpl.gov to see what’s going on in the nonprofit community. Thom Andrews and Lolita Moss do an outstanding job at ONEplace!

 

What Did You Learn?

What did you learn from each of your previous bosses? Maybe you worked for one of those rare “natural” supervisors or managers. I’ve met a few, but they are few and far between. Most of us who have worked inside organizations have worked for a series of bosses. And we probably had no difficulty finding things about their style that bugged us, frustrated us, even made us angry from time to time.

But at the same time, looking at it from the rear view mirror, I bet you also learned some valuable lessons from each of them. I know I did. Some of those lessons were positives – things to emulate, copy, and modify to fit me. And some were negatives – things to not do when faced with a similar situation.

One of my first bosses was The Chief. He was a Master Chief Petty Officer in the U.S. Navy and was the lead admin for the Supply Officer on my ship. He’d been in the Navy about 25 years and had risen steadily to become one of the senior people in his logistics specialty. Since our ship had one of the first on-board computers in the Navy (a Univac 1500 that took up a lot of room and was one of the few air-conditioned spaces on the ship), we were dealing with state-of-the art in some ways, and very old technology in others. Remember 10-part carbon paperwork?

From The Chief I learned precision and the importance of doing the job to the best of my ability. He also served as a role model of how to handle a difficult boss who had spent his entire career on shore duty. When we were at sea, the Supply Officer spent the whole time holed up in his cabin, alternately hollering at somebody over the ship’s phone and bouts of throwing up .

Some years later I worked for a boss I’ll call Sam. I was running an organization-wide system with multiple locations and nearly round-the-clock operations. From Sam I learned the value of building effective cross-departmental relationships and the wisdom of seeking multiple opinions and perspectives before making major decisions. My mid-20’s shoot-from-the-hip, get-it-done-now style sometimes backfired on me, particularly when I failed to identify key stakeholders and give them a “heads-up” regarding plans. Sam showed us all how to lead a diverse (and often highly competative) group of department heads in a positive direction by “communicating lavishly,” to use a favorite Max DePree quote. Sam knew where we were heading, kept us all in the loop, and ran interference with other senior leaders when necessary. Quiet leadership, practiced daily.

Those are just two of the people I learned from. What did you learn?

Think about what you’ve learned from some of the people you’ve worked for over the years. If you’d like to share a thought or two, that would be great. If not, at least think about it.

Collaboration

Recently I gave a brief talk to InterCom, the regional group for communications professionals. The topic was collaborative organizations, using our Midwest Consulting Group as a model. We believe MCG is the oldest virtual corporation in Michigan, and probably one of the oldest in the U.S. Building business through collaboration is what we have been about since 1990. The bright, diverse, neat-to-hang-out-with people who make up MCG are involved in both individual and collective projects and collaborating has become part and parcel of how we operate. Clients and projects may differ considerably, but working, thinking, planning together has become part of our hardwiring. The common denominator is helping organizations, individual professionals, and teams get great at what they do.

Whether it’s helping a nonprofit agency to create a strategic plan, guiding a university faculty member through the process of publishing in an academic journal, helping create a brand identity for a business or nonprofit, coaching executives and professionals, teaching and training people to be better supervisors, managers, and leaders or creating a comprehensive management development program  . . . the commitment to collaborate, cooperate, and help each other grow our businesses is in everything we do.

Who are you collaborating with? And what have you achieved through collaboration? Would be an interesting discussion, I think.