Managing Up

Keep ‘em happy.

Or at the least, help them do their job.

Ever since I got my first full-time job in my early twenties, I’ve followed the principle of letting my boss see the “good job” I’m doing.  It helps build trust, has been my philosophy – if they think I’m competent, they’re more likely to let me do the job my way and not be all over me.

In our coaching practice, we see this in its rawest state with founders…and development directors.  Development directors get paid a good amount of money, proportionally, in many a founder-led organization.  To get the founder to the point where he or she doesn’t get so frustrated they decide “I could do this better myself” (a thought always lurking just below the surface for a founder) – a development director has to build up trust, with a big quick win.  Or two, or three.

Interestingly enough, this also works for board members and executive directors.  As an ED of one organization and a board chair of another, I know how frustrating board service can be.  You want to help, yet you’re not right there.  You have all the right intentions, but you’re on the outside looking in.  The stress can be pretty debilitating – and it’s pretty much out of our control. In other words, it’s not an easy job.

So it’s the least we can do, those of us on the ground, to pass along encouraging news as well as warnings of an impending budget gap (and goodness knows there’s a lot of that around!).

Motivation by encouragement.  When I’m on the receiving end, I’m pretty grateful.  And what could be better than giving your board the impression (which is hopefully correct) that they’re on a winning team?  

Making a difference.  That’s what they’re in it for.  That’s what we’re in it for. 

An optimist always sees the bright side.  A pessimist sees the dark edges.  But a smart manager finds the light and spreads it around.  Giving us all the strength to continue.

The Expression on His Face

It happened again.   In fact, twice in the past week.

The first time it happened to a CEO whose board we’re working with to get them to step up to the plate in a big way, fundraising-wise.

We were leading them through some “what’s the value-added of this board” discussions, that sort of soul-searching stuff.  As the board was coming to its own understanding of what the mandate ahead of it was, I could see a number of expressions pass over CEO’s face.  Boredom, exasperation, ennui.  Even a flash of anger as the board went through the “We don’t know enough about what this organization does…” litany – and I could just see his thought bubble:  “But I send you oceans of stuff, all the time!”

And then the change moment happened – and his jaw dropped.  When one of the board members offered to throw a house party.  And another volunteered to make a standing appointment on his work calendar for an hour a week allocated to calls and/or visits on agency’s behalf.  And a third said (and I quote):  “We’ve got to get on the stick, folks!  Who’s with me on this?” – and you could see heads nodding all around the room.

And now it’s like the real estate saying – follow-up, follow-up, follow-up.  (And I mean on the staff side.)  This CEO has to go through the same transformation as we saw pass through his face – from sitting on his hands waiting to see if the board will come through (or fail “as usual”), to seeing a moment of change and moving to support it whole hog.  We talk a lot at Cause Effective about moving toward the light – discovering the positive in the threads around you (especially in board behavior) and thrusting them forward.  Behaving “as if.”

Well, as I said it happened twice.  In fact, the second time was me, with my board.  They were having quite a lively discussion, and I was trying to remain silent.  But then one board member looked at the expression flitting across my face (I’ve never had a good poker face) and called me on it: “Judy, what are you thinking about all this?”

And I had about 3 seconds to recharge from doubt, thinking about the daily workload and other administrative concerns, to “look at these guys coming through!”  From staff supervisor to institutional leader, in other words.

Love those board members!  The good ones really keep you honest…and performing as your best self.

What Happened

"He Said-She Said."

I've read board minutes where my brain goes into whiplash trying to keep up with the back and forth.

"Decisions Were Made."

I've read other sets of minutes where I'm left scratching my head, trying to figure out how a meeting in which two decisions were made took two hours.

The answer is somewhere in between.

I'm a firm believer in the idea that minutes should not only reflect core decisions, but should also serve to keep board members who couldn't attend in the loop.  There's always someone who couldn't make the meeting and the notes should serve to bring them along, both so they don't drop off the face of the earth and also so they don't come to the next meeting trying to reinvent the wheel (i.e., remake the same decision again because they weren't part of the process of thinking it through).  Minutes can bring the process to those who weren't in the room, and keep them involved.

But minutes are also public documents and so shouldn't reveal individual viewpoints or every last sordid detail.  In other words, due diligence but not bickering.  They should be clear and transparent – and should reveal reflection, consideration, and solid, thoughtful decision-making. 

Good minutes are teaching documents, creating coherence out of a group of disparate individuals.  There's a craft – beyond the tape recorder – to transforming notes into minutes that move an organization forward.

Mission and Means

I’ve been thinking about where money and mission coincide.  Or don’t.

We’ve been working with a client that is wrestling with finance questions around its business model.

But, really, these are mission-based questions – who do they serve, what’s their core expertise, and what is the meaning of why they’re here on God’s green earth.

Or something like that.

It’s not just about who they charge for what.

And it’s been the board pushing the staff – to look beyond – that’s forced the issue.

To look beyond the budget numbers, this year’s and next.  To look beyond the profit and loss, the cash flow knot in the stomach, the accounting tricks that make them look stable.

And to look towards mission.

“It’s not about the market – it’s about the mission.”  I listened to the board chair say that to the executive director, and I was once again reminded of the power and necessity of the board’s point of view.

But how does this come up for “fundraising consultants”?

We’re often called in to help an organization fundraise around program assumptions.  But sometimes, a lack of financial support for a program is, in fact, a sign of larger mission drift.  Programs that might have been started because there was a ready financial market, are now orphaned without funding and without a strong enough tie to mission.

And it takes a board member – who’s not bound to the day-to-day grindstone – to point it out.

Is it mission?  Or is it means?

If it’s mission, a fundraiser can find a way to sell it.  But if it’s means, it may not have the significance, the weight, to be carried.  It may, paradoxically, be too “light-weight” – too far from the core – to be saleable from a fundraising point of view.