Archive for the ‘Agency Capacity Building’ Category
Using a Strategic Plan for Capacity Development
. This post is one of a continuing series on strategic planning and is based on my work facilitating strategic planning with nonprofit agencies. In strategic planning one of my initial conversations with an agency executive director will invariably include a discussion about the use of the strategic plan following its ...Read More
Facilitating Meaningful Differences between Vision and Mission
. As a facilitator I work with a range of social sector organizations on strategic and business planning processes. In my work, I often encounter ambiguity about the difference between a vision and mission statement. In some cases, I will hear an executive director or board chair say something like, “Our ...Read More
Facilitating Strategic Budget Plans & Resource Development
. For many nonprofit organizations this is time of the year where the board and staff turn their attention to drafting a budget to guide business operations for the next fiscal year. For many agencies, this annual ritual simply starts with taking last year’s budget and incrementally scaling the numbers up ...Read More
Facilitating a Capacity Building Process
. The economic downturn that occurred in the last couple of years has been unquestionably harsh on most nonprofit agencies. The increases in service demand, coupled with the decreases in revenues have created organizational strains and fractures that will linger for years to come. If there is any silver lining to ...Read More
Facilitating Conversations on Collaboration
. In my last post I asserted that the nonprofit organizations of tomorrow are being born out of the economic crisis of today. In this current economic turmoil, there are many voices counseling the nonprofit world to increase “collaboration.” Unfortunately, many of these experts are using “collaboration” as euphemism for “merger ...Read More
Facilitating Nonprofit Strategy in Economic Uncertainty
. I recently read, yet one more so-called expert advice column promoting the ultimatum of “merge” or “die” as the pathway for many nonprofits. In this iteration, the ultimatum arises out of the knee jerk reaction caused by the recent economic downturn. Citing duplication of service and competition for scarce resources, ...Read More
Facilitating Models of Social Impact
. I will confess that I am a visual learner. I like to not only see the big picture but to be able to draw it as well. This inclination towards a visual process has served me well in facilitation. In fact, I have staked out the position that visual learning is ...Read More
Advancing Capacity of Organizations: A Strategic Conversation
. In one of the early posts to this blog I offered a taxonomy to help nonprofits think about organizational capacity, resource development planning and fundraising. In that post I described capacity development as the practice of developing and maintaining staff skills, organizational systems and intellectual and physical resources required to ...Read More
Strategic Planning: Building Momentum & Process
. In this series on strategic planning, my goal is to outline principles that inform the development of a strategic planning process. The first principle is that agencies need to connect the planning process and their organizational culture. The second principle is that strategic planning must be tied to a clear ...Read More
Facilitating Collaboration: Five Potential Models
. Facilitators are often called in to help design projects involving multiple stakeholders such as in convening interdepartmental workgroups, cross-functional teams or inter-agency committees and coalitions. For these assignments one of the key assessments that the facilitator needs to make is to determine whether the convening is for the purpose of ...Read More