I COULDN'T SAY IT BETTER: GREAT NONPROFIT IDEAS

Last week I wrote a "hate" post and created a del.icio.us tag "IhateMeetings"; Today I offer an antidote: a new del.icio.us tag: "Icouldn'tsayitbetter"

I've tagged articles (and blog posts) that are so well put that I'm left humbled. These authors write what I've felt for so long, but could not articulate.

When you're feeling overwhelmed by the insanity in the nonprofit world, here are some ideas that will help you find your way back to sanity (some already becoming "classics"):

1) Clara Miller talks about why the "normal" rules of accounting get very weird when applied to nonprofits in: The Looking-Glass World of Nonprofit Money: Managing in For-Profits' Shadow

Clara steps "through the looking glass" asking (and answering) the following true/false questions:

Rule 1: The consumer buys the product.
Rule 2: Price covers cost and eventually produces profits, or the business folds.
Rule 3: Cash is liquid.
Rule 4: Price is determined by producers' supply and consumers' ability/willingness to pay.
Rule 5: Any profits will drop to the bottom line and are then available for enlarging or improving the business.
Rule 6: Investment in infrastructure during growth is necessary for efficiency and profitability.
Rule 7: Overhead is a regular cost of doing business, and varies with business type and stage of development.

2) Erline Belton, an Organizational Healer, blows the roof off of corporate B.S. in: Truth or Consequences: The Organizational Importance of Honesty

3) Ever look around and see a lot of "dead weight" and why someone hasn't evaluated them out of there??? For a real breath of fresh air, read a post in my latest favorite blog, The Agitator: When a Nonprofit Isn't Good Enough


4) Kim Klein's keynote at a 2006 CAN conference was called Transparency, Integrity and the Nonprofit Sector. With that title I might have overlooked her revolutionary exposition on the shadow-side of nonprofits. Read Kim's article as she examines both sides of our longest held nonprofit myths.


Related Nonprofit Eye posts:

The challenge of working for (and staying in) a Nonprofit Job

Nonprofit Confidence Problem: Kim Klein Names the Shadow Side of Nonprofits


Technorati Tags: , , , , , ,

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

THE LIES PEOPLE TELL US (AND THE ONES WE TELL OURSELVES)

"I don’t understand these fundraisers, …they waste all this money…why don't they just give the money to …the sick people?" "…you know what? They don’t! They throw a party so rich people like me can spend $10,000 on a table and then they give it to the sick people!" ...that’s how it’s done ! Joan Cusack to Jennifer Aniston in "Friends with Money" Alright, let's get this over with folks: Fundraisers are a Lie! Yes that's right you heard me. A few months back, I attended a luncheon to raise funds for a school for the deaf. Yes, it was luncheon and a fashion show and a fundraiser all in one. First there was the obligatory silent auction, then (during lunch) the not-so-silent auction, and then after lunch when the plates were taken away, we were asked if we would like to purchase the Orchid Centerpieces! Hadn't they got enough from us? Let me think-No! Easy as it is to lampoon a fundraiser, that is not where I am going today. One of the ladies w...
Read more

GRAFITTI OR SOCIAL CHANGE?

Image
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...
Read more

BIRTH OF A BLOG: GUERILLA MARKETING, EFFECTIVE USE OF TECHNOLOGY & GOOD CONTENT WIN THE DAY

Birth of a Blog: Guerilla Marketing, Effective Use of Technology and Good Content Win the Day by pam ashlund A funny thing happened when I started using Technorati. All I wanted was a quick way to see who ( if ANYONE ) was linking to my blog. First, I had to sign up with one of these services and I picked Technorati because it was the first one I came across. Second, I then found out that I was right from the beginning, no one was linking to my site. Third, I decided to try my hand at a bit of self-marketing, which went as follows: Get my brother-in-law to link to my site Set up another dummy blog and link to myself Arm wrestle another friend to link to my site None of that had much of an impact (of course) so I moved on to some actual strategy: Add tags to my blog configuration on Technorati Add tags to my posts (this was painful and manual although I later found a script for it) Test the results - found I showed up in search engines a LITTLE bit more frequently Still no links (tap, ...
Read more