NonprofitEye

This year, the Oscars have been knighted the  "Green Academy Awards".   I'm not going to go into "Leo" driving up in a Prius (wanna bet Toyota gave him that one? also, if his was modified to go 100 mph, why didn't he have it souped it up to give it some umph while he was at it?). I know, I know, get to todays subject, so here it is: I am (as you may have noticed) a "facts and figures" girl. I believe in numbers. There is no more perfect a world. I depend on them. That is why I was thrown for a loop when I attended the Los Angeles Economic Development Commission's (LAEDC's) 2007 Economic Forecast and Industry Outlook this week. And the outlook wasn't so good. A bit of the local entertainment industry tanking, a bit about a slipping housing market, a bit about defaults and how to hedge your bets in the old investment department (I took notes on that last). When Jack Kyser, Sr. Vice President and Chief Economist, LAEDC gave his pr...

Nonprofit Series: Burnout, Tech & Fraud Detection by pam ashlund Just finished a rant on "blogging about blogging". Took a look at the topics I write and found close to 10% of my posts on blogging & tech. Sigh. On Blogging and Tech: THE TEMPORALITY OF DIGITAL KNOWLEDGE I WILL NOT BLOG ABOUT BLOGGING... ANTI-SOCIAL BLOGGING CARVING OUR WAY TO DISASTER RECOVERY TAG YOU'RE IT: NONPROFIT TAG SYSTEMS I BLOG THEREFORE I AM BIRTH OF A BLOG NONPROFIT OPEN SOURCE DO I DARE DISTURB THE UNIVERSE? ASK AND YE SHALL RECEIVE: ERROR 404 FILE NOT FOUND Burnout & Balance: NONPROFIT BURNOUT: IS YOUR ADVENTURE WINDOW CLOSED? DYSFUNCTION & NONPROFIT BURNOUT OR A BALANCED LIFE? NONPROFIT BURNOUT? NONPROFIT HALL OF SHAME APPLYING KARMA YOGA TO THE NONPROFIT WORKPLACE Accounting: JUST THE FACTS MA'AM: ALLOWABILITY, REASONABLENESS & ALLOCABILITY! OH MY! NONPROFIT IMAGE PROBLEM: FLAWS IN FRAUD DETECTION DEVELOPMENT & FINANCE: A BROKEN MARRIAGE? ...

I was so steamed I forget to include my most fundamental complaint about blogging in my last post ! I publish a post You write me a comment I'm notified of your comment by email I respond to your comment Question: How do you know I've written a response? Answer: You don't! (unless you come back again and again until you see the reply and who has time for that????) How could it be that in a Social-bookmarked-Wiki-Folksy-World that our most popular tool (the Blog) isn't social? ????????????????????????????????????????????? Good, now that that is off my chest, I think I'll go listen to a podcast on podcasting! Technorati Tags: NPTech , Blog , blogging , Folksonomy , Podcast , Podcasting , Social Bookmarking , Wiki , iPod

Who can put Jesus, Confucius, Dr. Strange, Emma Goldman and Eliza Doolittle all in the same thought? Read on as a Nonprofit Eye reader (Janet) responds to last weeks post: Applying Karma Yoga in the Workplace : Ah grasshopper, with the dawn of awakening knowledge comes the morning fog of obscured certainty save for one truth: all is karma. Or, as they put it in the Fram oil filter commercials: pay me now or pay me later . It may be possible to use a Calvinist metric to evaluate one's life choices: those who make the best choices are demonstrating their closeness to nirvana. Or not. Is the path to enlightenment so easy to discern? If only it were so. We look at choices others make and then compare our own actions and motives. It is strangely remarkable that very few of us , in our own estimation, ever live up to the standards we esteem in others . We mistake the simple answer and the shortest route as the one true path: the person who washes the dishes or cleans the toilets without ...

Part II: The Yoga Series Continues How can we change the world? Let me count the ways! Just as I thought I was forging new ground on Yoga and Nonprofits, a source sends me a lead on a group called " Yoga For Good ". Guess I haven't killed my ego just yet. Check out the PaloAlto Online story: Bad Girls Doing Time Learn Art of Yoga for a story of how yoga is transforming the lives of incarcerated girls. Another program helping incarcerated youth and at-risk teens and "transitional age youth" GETTING OUT BY GOING IN © is a non-profit organization that educates and rehabilitates incarcerated and at-risk individuals by providing essential tools needed to make stronger decisions. "I use the breathing technique at night to block out the sounds around me." --C.F., Inmate, Terminal Island, 2005 "On helping children? Love and attention, take the kids out of the hood and show them that there is something else than that hopeless hole."- E.A.C. Technor...

Part I in a series examining nonprofit service and "doing good" What does karma OR yoga have to do with nonprofits?" If you think of yoga as an exercise class with a bit of de-stressing meditation, then the answer would seem to be "nothing". Bear with me on this one. I think we'd all agree that nonprofit work is based on the principles of doing good.  The reality is that our work may be driven by political goals, seeking funds, getting paid and getting noticed (publicity). Where does Karma yoga (Sanskrit: कर्म योग) fit in? Karma Yoga is one of the four pillars of Yoga, consisting of entirely selfless service, in which the Ego is given up. It is the path of doing the right thing, of following ones' personal Dharma and accepting destiny. In less abstract terms, Karma Yoga might be cleaning toilets or washing dishes. Doing any type of service without seeking any remuneration in the shape of wealth, satisfaction, name or fame. So this got me thi...

art institutions are a severely limited arena of reception for ideas about public issues --Robbie Conal If I can't take my coffee break, Gone is the sense of enterprise ...something within me dies. -- How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying I was born with a "Question Authority" bumper sticker metaphorically stuck on the back of my car. I grew up with that expression (and what it represents) as my moral imperative. But I've been worried lately. I've been worried because it doesn't seem to be turning out the way I thought it would. Seems a QA attitude is not necessarily conducive to civil society. It all depends on who's the authority I suppose. I seem to have the easiest time applying it to government and politics. But at what point do the concepts of "questioning" and the notion of "participating" intersect? Becoming a manager was a pivotal point in my life. A place where I had to make the transition from "hating t...

Nonprofit Burnout by pam ashlund PART IV - NONPROFIT EYE BURNOUT SERIES Cross posted from a differnt perspective in my El Loro blog in the post Don't Want to Work for the Man Don’t it always seem to go/You don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone — Big Yellow Taxi, Joni Mitchell Somethings comin’ something good…who knows? — Westside Story I've written about Burnout (see series at end of article) before. Certainly, burnout is not unique to the nonprofit sector, but it has indirectly been on the radar recently re: the changing of the guard, the baby boomer effect of nonprofits, the "are we mentoring a group to replace our current leaders as they retire? Who wants to talk about that? Normally not I because I still find the prospect of my own retirement (and mortality in general) depressing. The truth is, that even now (possibly 20 years before retirement), I feel worn out. Words to the effect of “my soul is dying” come to mind. Of course I mainly have these feelings in the...