In this three-part series, we explore the building blocks of culture and provoke thinking around leadership’s role in cultivating an engaging workplace. Culture is a critical yet difficult-to-define element of every organization. While leaders may strive to create or foster a particular culture, culture is something that develops and evolves organically as people interact and circumstances change. It can be promoted and modeled, but not controlled. It is also interpretive, and as such is most intimately reflected in how people…
In a recent LinkedIn post, Detroit’s “Gig Economy” was showcased highlighting several freelancers and their experiences. Freelancing is a growing component of our national (and local) economy, fueled in great part by technology and globalization. This creates powerful opportunity, and nowhere is the value proposition for “gigging” more compelling for business than in the nonprofit arena. Several dynamics converge to yield a strong case for considering outsourced talent as a uniquely effective mission-booster. As with any proposition, there are pros…
Do you remember when you first learned about the magical process of how plants convert sunlight to energy? How your teacher lovingly and patiently guided you through the various parts of a plant until you got to the glorious leaf and its hallowed chlorophyll? How you longed to immerse yourself in all of science’s wonders rather than spend time on frivolous play and socializing? Okay, maybe it wasn’t THAT captivating, but you have to admit it is pretty amazing when…
OF COURSE I KNOW EXACTLY WHERE EVERYTHING IS! The ringing in of the New Year in the US is accompanied by dramatic increases in testosterone resulting from the seasonal onset of Football Fever. College teams vie in Bowl games (44 Bowl games will take place in 2016), many with curious sponsorship-induced names (the Taxslayer Bowl?). Pro teams are in the thick of the playoff contention race, and the Super Bowl is roughly a month away. One of the situations you’re…
This is how change sometimes happens. Nonprofits that are funded by government agencies are frequently confronted by a challenge unique to their business model, which I’ll whimsically refer to as The Curious Case of the Customer Curveball. This “case” begins with our hero (you – the nonprofit) innocently walking along the path laid out by the mission. You’ve got your map, compass, weather gear – all the things that the nature of the work and the efforts of your forecasters…