Collective Impact Follow Up | By Amy Delamaide and Seth Bate

About a million years ago—or maybe just a few months—I wrote a post about an article we at CCSR are reading, “Collective Impact” by John Kania and Mark Kramer. I promised a follow-up post once we had discussed it at staff meeting.

Your wait is over. Here is that promised follow-up post.

We talked about the article at our August 10th staff meeting. In no particular order and without attribution to the staff members who contributed, here are some things we discussed:

• Communication is important to keeping collective impact efforts going. When different organizations are working on the same issue, sharing what each organization is doing and the impact it is seeing would energize the other organizations and support mutually reinforcing activities.
• The idea of collective impact seems rather utopian. In real-life, it was suggested, change takes much longer than the article indicated. The work is never done and practitioners are constantly revising their approach.
• It is worth exploring what barriers exist that prevent us from moving towards collective impact. How do you reinvigorate organizations at a grassroots level when they are in crisis or under stress, such as many are in these economic times?
• When doing research, especially participatory or action research, it is worth engaging the people doing the work as co-researchers and co-evaluators. This could result in having several “layers” of researchers—the participants in an intervention, the direct service staff delivering an intervention, and those academics observing at a distance could all contribute as researchers.
• It is useful to us as an organization to continue sharing articles and periodically discussing them as a large group. This makes sense for us as a university-based center where continued learning is valued. This might be something that makes sense for your organization, too.

We’ve continued hearing “backbone support organization” and “collective impact” in meetings with partners, so the ideas from the Kania and Kramer article are definitely worth grappling with if you haven’t yet. There is also a blog where the authors and other contributors are continuing to develop their ideas: Collective Impact Blog. Check it out.

Managing Volunteers by Amy Delamaide: Part Two

Picture courtesy of Sanberdoo

Organizations responsible for managing volunteers should think about the experience from the volunteer’s perspective. These are questions I have before volunteering for an event or organization for the first time:

• Where should I go? At what time should I be there?
• What will I be doing?
• Who will give me instructions about what I am doing?
• Who do I call if I can’t be there?
• What information are event participants receiving? Will I have a copy of that same information?
• What do I need to bring with me?
• Will there be food and drink available if my shift is over a meal time?
• What should I wear? Do I need to bring or have any special materials, clothing, or equipment?

Preparing a volunteer packet with the answers to these questions inside, along with the information that event participants receive, will help your organization have well-prepared volunteers who contribute to the success of your event.

What else does your organization do to prepare volunteers for service? We’re interested in your thoughts.

Elements of Executive Transition Planning

Tom Adams, president of TransitionGuides™, is impressed with the work and mindset of nonprofit organizations in Kansas.

“I think Kansas is sweet. The nonprofit leaders I’ve met care passionately about their work and their community – just kind of a no-nonsense, let’s-get-it-done approach to things,” Adams says. “I think there are many areas in which Kansas has led the region and the country in attention to leadership development.”

Adams has been a valuable voice as CCSR has developed a multi-pronged approach to helping nonprofit organizations plan for the transition of long-time or founding executives:

CCSR will provide subsidized succession and executive transition services to identified nonprofits.  This will include:

Succession Basics: Emergency Backup Plan and Succession Policy
The purpose of an Emergency Backup Plan is to define and clarify short- and long-term unplanned executive absences, clarify who decides such an absence is occurring, and to state who assumes the functions and roles of the executive during the absence.  The service will be provided as a stand-alone capacity building activity provided to individual organizations or incorporated into some if not all strategic planning packages. Succession policy supports this plan, institutionalizing best practices and insuring succession plans are regularly reviewed and updated.      

Departure Defined Succession Planning
Departure Defined Succession Planning includes assessment of strategy, financial, systems, management/staff, board and executive readiness. Work in these “readiness” areas involves preparation for the transition, an organizational review and subsequent succession plan development, and plan implementation support.             

Executive Transition Management
The goal of executive transition management is to hire an executive who meets the current and future leadership needs of the organization. In addition, the organization’s board and staff should be well-prepared to work with the new executive.
   
Leadership Development and Talent Management
This area includes activities designed to align resources and practices to support leader development; strengthen the capacity to manage leader development and talent management; make leader development a central part of annual operational and strategic planning; and create “bench strength” by expanding development and training opportunities for existing and emerging leaders.  CCSR will support these efforts with Kansas Leadership Center principles, competencies, and concepts.  CCSR will provide leadership training to address adaptive challenges faced by agencies.  CCSR will facilitate a planning process to help agencies meet the technical or management related challenges.  One important adaptive challenge to be addressed by organizations will be the intentional development of individuals of diverse cultures and ethnic backgrounds.     
   
Leadership Transition Coaching
CCSR will provide coaching specifically tied to executive transitions as a stand-alone service or as part of Departure Defined and Leadership Development/Talent Management proposals.  The current approach (Kansas Leadership Center Coach Training, 2010) used by CCSR will apply to this service context.      

As with other organizational planning, the biggest mistake organizations can make regarding transition planning is putting it off too long because of daily deadlines.

“Transition planning has great potential,” Adams says. “I think the challenge always for the no-nonsense leaders that we desperately need is to not overlook the important but not urgent work.”

To begin a no-nonsense sustainability review and examine your own organization’s need for transition planning, contact Amy Delamaide at CCSR, 316.978.6773.

National expert on transition planning consulting with CCSR

 Does the executive director (ED) of your favorite nonprofit organization remember The Beatles on Ed Sullivan?

Tom Adams visiting with Scott Wituk

That’s a wonderful memory, but it also might be a sign that he or she is considering retirement.

“A lot of people have a lot of investment in the work of a particular nonprofit organization. They’ve co-created something that’s very meaningful to them and the community,” says Tom Adams, president of TransitionGuides™.  “Unless attended to … there is the risk of it not going forward or not going forward successfully.”

For several years, the Wichita State University Center for Community Support & Research (CCSR) has helped nonprofits plan for and manage transitions of their executive staff. These transitions sometimes happen in unplanned scenarios – deaths or dismissals. Other transitions are planned, as the ED moves on to something else. Increasingly, these departure-defined transitions happen as EDs retire.

Thanks to a partnership with the United Methodist Health Ministry Fund, Adams has visited CCSR three times in the last few months to share his expertise in executive transition planning. This is helping CCSR expand and refine its abilities to respond to this key issue for nonprofits.

Adams says, in light of the beginning retirement of the Baby Boomers who remember growing up in front of the Ed Sullivan show, this is a particularly important time for non-profit executives and board members to be aware of this issue. It will not be a one-size-fits-all solution, especially because economic conditions are an incentive for some EDs to keep working longer than they planned.

“[The economy] is leading to more creativity about more gradual transitions and phased retirement and in some cases creative continuation of a role that’s clearly defined and not a threat to the incoming executive,” Adams says. “I think we’ll see more and more creativity as the economy continues to improve.”

Intentional planning by the board and staff members of organizations allows these creative ideas to take shape intentionally, before the pressure of an announced (or unexpected) transition.

“There are a lot of long-term executives and founders,” Adams says. “I find that succession planning is getting deeper and deeper roots each year … and that smart organizations are planning ahead for transitions.”

In addition to planning for the transition of the executive role, Adams feels strongly that to remain successful, organizations must increasingly fill key professional and volunteer positions with younger, more diverse talent. It might help to remember that Ed Sullivan populated his show with all kinds of performers, including the brash young working-class moptops.

“There is a wonderful opportunity over the next 5 years to make some significant change if people come together around that,” Adams says.

To learn more about executive transition planning, look for Tom’s new book, The Nonprofit Leadership Transition and Development Guide. To begin a sustainability review and examine your own organization’s need for transition planning, contact Amy Delamaide at CCSR, 316.978.6773. We want to hold your hand!

Managing Volunteers by Amy Delamaide: Part One

A Tale of Two Volunteer Opportunities…

In October, I volunteered for two different community events. The people running these events had several things in common: both organizations depended on a few staff people and hundreds of volunteers to make a large, annual event possible. They had a few differences: one had seven years’ experience gathering and organizing the volunteers they relied on; the other was running its inaugural event and learning for the first time how to manage volunteers.

Nonprofits thinking about how to manage volunteers can learn from what both organizations did well.

The two organizations both did several things well:

• They held a pre-event informational meeting for volunteers.
• They assigned volunteers to particular staff person for supervision of the volunteers’ activities during the event.
• They held “thank you” parties for the volunteers, with food, drinks, and celebration of the volunteers’ contributions to the event.

The organization with years of experience in managing volunteers did a few more things well:

• They respected my time – The informational meeting in advance of the event wasn’t too long, there was food available, I met and got to know other volunteers, and I met the volunteer coordinator and the staff person to whom I was assigned.
• They had several points of contact - They built “supervisory redundancy” into their system of volunteer oversight. There was one primary volunteer coordinator. Then each different type of volunteer reported to the staff person who oversaw that function. If I had a question, there were at least two people I could call for help.
• They had a central Volunteer Spot – During the event, the volunteer coordinator was available at a central location. I could access information about the event, instructions on how to help, and food or drink at that location.
• They had info available - Printed information about the event was available to all volunteers at several locations. This helped me feel equipped to answer the questions of event-goers.
• They gave me meaningful work - The activities I volunteered to do were clearly vital to making sure the event went well. I felt that my service was necessary—if I hadn’t been there, the event would not have gone as well.

What does your organization do well in its management of volunteers? Share your thoughts in the comments below.

Picture courtesy of Mike Baird

Step Away from the Can of Doing: What a Home Depot Commercial Teaches About Evaluation | Dr. Tara Gregory

I've been mesmerized lately—in that kind of love-hate way—by Home Depot commercials wherein a manly man announcer urges people to shop at Home Depot with statements like "turn your doing dial up to 11" and "set your savings swagger on full tilt" and, most nonsensically, "open up a can of doing." I may not be quoting these perfectly except for the "open up a can of doing" phrase. Open up a can of doing? I'm not even sure what this means. But these commercials irritate me quite a bit—mainly because they fill me with an overwhelming urge to run to Home Depot. For what, I don't know.

And that's where my issue lies. Indiscriminate and unplanned opening of a Can of Doing can be wasteful of time and resources. Owning a house that's over 100 years old, as I do, there probably isn't a big enough Can of Doing to cover what needs to be done. If I really thought through what it would take to make my house what I want it to be and made a plan, my trip to Home Depot might be valuable. But I have to admit that my savings swagger will undoubtedly propel me toward superfluous and relatively easy tasks versus those that might actually make my house more solid and valuable.

So what does this have to do with evaluation? I've been involved in a number of evaluation projects where it seems that people have opened up a can of doing without really knowing why. More specifically, organizations often say they want to do an evaluation, but frequently lack a clear idea of what they want to know.

Evaluation is simply a way of answering the big questions about an organization: "What should we be doing? What do people think of our services?  Are we making a difference for those we serve?"

But organizations can get too focused on just doing something, even when it comes to evaluation. I've had multiple experiences where organizations have a list of questions they want to ask, but no real idea of what it is they want to KNOW. There's a big difference here—questions with a capital Q  and questions with a small q. Big Q questions represent your evaluation goal—what you want or need to know. In reality, there aren't that many big Q questions. They're basically about whether your program is needed, how well it's implemented, and what difference it makes. That's pretty much it. But there are a huge number of possible small q questions for each of these big Q questions. And if you don't identify the big Q first, your small q's can go down unnecessary or misleading paths.

If you open the can of doing before really knowing what needs to be done—if you ask the small q questions before identifying the big Q question—at best you'll waste time and energy. At worst, you'll be led astray by information that doesn't really tell you what you need to know.

What nonprofit organizations really need to hear is: Before you get your evaluation swagger on and open up a can of assessment doing, ask yourself what one or two things you really need to know. And step away from that can of doing unless you've finished this task!

For more on evaluation basics, come to the next Compassion Kansas workshop on May 20 (1 - 5 p.m.) called "Does Your Program Work? How to Use Simple Evaluation Techniques and Tools to Answer this Question."  Contact Angela Gaughan at 316-978-3843 or angela.gaughan@wichita.edu to register. (Registration is still open, even if the website says otherwise)




Photo courtesy of  J. Stephen Conn

"So what is it that you DO exactly?" | Amy Delamaide

The task of describing to others the work that CCSR does can be daunting.

My co-worker Kevin Bomhoff tells a story about the time his son asked him what he did. He wanted to be able to tell his friends that his dad was a lawyer, or a doctor, or an engineer. After hearing Kevin's lengthy explanation, his son said, "I think it would be easier if I just tell them you work for the CIA."

When I first started working at CCSR three years ago, it took me about five minutes to describe my job. I would have to include examples. "Well, I work with organizations. They could be coalitions, or nonprofits, or government entities, or something else. It could also be a combination of those things. And I help them figure out what they want to do and where to go. Right now, I’m working with a group of people creating a comprehensive early childhood plan for their community. And I’m also working with a nonprofit run by and for people with mental illness to improve their services."

If I talked to someone with a background in business, I could tell them that what I do is like management consulting, but for nonprofit organizations or government bodies.

If I talked to someone with a background in psychology, I could tell them that what I do is like being a shrink for an organization. I try to ask a series of questions that help the organization come to the own best solutions for their situation.

After a few months of working at CCSR, I realized that my job is to help organizations better serve the mission or people they are designed to serve. This means I work with organizations in a variety of fields--public health, education, social services, and more. While each of these settings is different, I can bring the same set of skills, tools, and questions to bear in each one. I have expertise in the process of getting a group from point A to point B.

CCSR’s Special Projects Assistant is working on materials to describe all the different services CCSR offers. Be on the lookout for these materials soon.

How do you describe the work of CCSR? Post your thoughts in the comments.

Photo Courtesy of Erik Charlton

Staying on Top of Change: The Value of Research and Evaluation Part Two | Tara Gregory

Evaluation is directly connected to organizational effectiveness.

There are two issues that are particularly salient here – especially when there are larger societal changes swirling around organizations. First, just because an organization implements a program or activities doesn’t mean it has made a difference. Social services aren’t just about numbers i.e., the number of people served, the number of sessions held, the number of resources provided. Those things are easy to count, and some organizations look at these numbers as evidence of doing “a good job.” 

But without true evaluation—which looks at the actual impact on recipients and the resulting changes created in their lives—there’s no real measure as to whether those served are gaining anything of value. If changes DO take place, and there’s been no evaluation, it’s hard to tell if the program contributed.   What’s worse? Not knowing if it’s done something harmful. 

Providing services without knowing their impact on recipients is like a doctor doing a procedure without paying attention to whether it helped or hurt the patient. Just like diagnostic or follow-up exams, program evaluations help outline and document:

•    the need for and purpose of the program (needs assessment and outcomes identification):
•    How it was implemented (fidelity measures)
•    How recipients responded (process measures)
•    How they were changed (outcome measures)

All of these evaluation elements help increase the likelihood that programs stay true to their intended purpose, do no harm, and are changed appropriately when they’re off target. 

My next post will look at the second issue that is important to consider when planning your research and evaluation.


Photo courtesy of Yasser

Change Part 1 | by Kevin Bomhoff

When my daughter (now grown and managing pension funds for hospitals and medical clinics) was six years old, I remember picking her up after her first day of first grade.   She had loved kindergarten and all available data confirmed our suspicions that she was indeed a genius.

The new first grader walked slowly to the car and climbed in without a word.  We belted in and I waited for a report.   More silence.  She peered straight ahead; I could see a small simmering hole forming in the dashboard.   “So, how’s first grade?” I asked.   The silence broke as she announced, “Dad, there are a lot of rules.”

Despite my efforts empathetically strike up a conversation, she sank back into reflective silence.   I tried to comprehend the enormity of her dreadful discovery:  The joy of kindergarten had been systematically destroyed by some uniformed autocrat.   Not only did the system impose unnecessary constraints, the length of the day had been doubled.  Twice as much fun - not a problem.   Double the tyranny – unacceptable.

Change.  Ronald Heifetz  talks about the “Pathway of Adaptive Change” using terms such as the “Productive Zone of Disequilibrium” and “managing the heat.”   

Change is life’s (and work’s) crucible.   Much energy is spent managing, avoiding or complaining about change.   At CCSR, we often get called when organizations are on the precipice of change:

•    Increased demand for services
•    Reduced resources
•    Seeking to collaborate with others to address a common concern
•    Need to prepare for what’s next  

The lesson from Heifetz is this:  there is a productive zone of disequilibrium in every system.     The “productive zone” is a place where observation, interpretation, and intervention take place in a cycle that promotes learning and progress.  

I invite you to come back next week for a look at how knowing about this zone is helping CCSR - and, we hope, other Kansas organizations - respond to change.



Photo courtesy of Rachel