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News for June 2008
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 24 June 2008 |
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| Frictionless Fundraising Seminar on Aug. 6, 2008 and On Demand |
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We're offering our lengthy flagship seminar Frictionless Fundraising this Summer on Wednesday, August 6, 2008, from 8:30AM - 2:45PM Pacific Time. For the first time, the seminar will also be available On Demand for those for whom that date is inconvenient. (In honor of Hiroshima Day, if your organization is directly involved in nuclear disarmament work, please contact us to inquire about a discount.) The seminar is divided into three major sections: Save and Make Money by Converting Donors to Email, Ten Ways to Improve Cultivation and Stewardship of Donors, and Effective Email Newsletters. While those have stayed the same over the last few years since it was first delivered, the content has continued to mature along with the field.
Posted: 6/24/08; 5:08:42 PM # |
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23 June 2008 |
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| Teaching with a Clear Signal |
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I suffer from a flaw in my teaching at times, one that doesn't seem to affect my writing as much. I often deliver news that students don't want to hear (like no, I won't just tell you what software to buy, I am going to ask you to think critically about communication) and at the same time, I confuse clarity and completeness. In Teaching with a Clear Signal, Asher Bey takes a stab at some of the problems with this and how very often, less is more. This is a lesson that a great many issue oriented organizations can stand to learn over and over again.
Posted: 6/23/08; 10:27:43 PM # |
| 21st Century Dickens: The Dark Side of the "China Miracle" |
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I'm glad I'm not the only one discouraged by the mainstream press' treatment of the Chinese economy. Our own Burt Webb's piece on the so-called China Miracle touches on a whole range of basic democratic concerns, including working conditions, land use, environmental policies, and more.
Posted: 6/23/08; 10:20:31 PM # |
| George Carlin: American Radical |
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When I was a teenager, George Carlin probably did as much to shape my values as anyone. I was very sad to learn that he died yesterday. In my opinion, the absolute best obituary I've read so far is George Carlin: American Radical, by John Nichols in The Nation.
Posted: 6/23/08; 10:15:30 PM # |
| Ten Things Community Foundations Can Do to Address Climate Change |
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I love cross cutting themes, so of course I like the Funders Network's Ten Things Community Foundations Can Do to Address Climate Change Through Local Action (except that I have no clue as to why this is online as a two page PDF or, because I've been watching George Carlin on the Ten Commandments, why there are exactly ten). In brief, the actions are: (1) Provide leadership, partnership, and support for a range of local actions. (2) Support and disseminate research, especially information about local mitigation and adaptation measures. (3) Bring various interested organizations and residents together to discuss and debate global climate change. (4) Educate the public by enhancing media understanding; consider a media awareness campaign. (5) Use investment assets to leverage funds available for local action. (6) Support nonprofit organizations that will lead in addressing climate change; assist other nonprofits to see how they can help. (7) Partner with local governments to address climate change through local action. (8) Develop and support positive local economic strategies. (9) Engage in policy discussions to help guide state and national policy on global climate change. (10) Advise donors, and recruit new donors, to contribute to climate action solutions.
Posted: 6/23/08; 10:12:24 PM # |
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17 June 2008 |
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| Light a Fire: Successful Social Marketing for Nonprofits - Now Available On Demand |
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In our ongoing effort to accommodate the busy schedules of people in the nonprofit sector, we are adding yet another title to our growing catalog of online seminars that are now available on demand. What we do is take the most mature iteration of a live workshop and then add homework and personal coaching to create a powerful and flexible learning experience. The title becoming available today is a very hot topic: Light a Fire: Successful Social Marketing for Nonprofits. As usual, our goal is to combine high level strategies that you can apply over time with some tactics that you can apply immediately. Take a look. Pass the word. Sign up.
Posted: 6/17/08; 4:14:15 PM # |
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16 June 2008 |
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| Session Materials from the 2008 Nonprofit Technology Conference |
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I didn't attend this year's Nonprofit Technology Conference, but I have had a great time studying the Sessions Materials made available for download at the NTEN website. A number of sessions don't have such materials of course, including a few in which I was particularly interested (like "Will Your Data Be Yours? Evaluating Data Exchange in Software") and in other cases the materials are distinctly missing their context. But I recommend this material nevertheless, especially: What Your Stakeholders Aren’t Telling You, The Virtual Nonprofit, The Seven Things Everyone Wants, Postal and E-mail, More Than a Thank You, Mission Critical, Make Your e-Newsletter Work Better, Goofing Off or Learning, Getting the Big Picture, Five Ways to Set Up - Amp Up - Screw Up Your Email Messages, and Don't Push the River.
Posted: 6/16/08; 6:56:55 PM # |
| Simplicity Is the Nature of Great Emails |
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Gary Levitt and Rob Lubow have a great short article making the case that Simplicity Is the Nature of Great Emails. Ironically, the article is embedded in a plethora of distracting ads, but I'll recommend it nevertheless. Their three questions are completely worth asking and will definitely make your life easier and your email more effective: (1) What is your favorite kind of email? (2) How much time should you spend reading an email that was sent to you along with a zillion other people? (3) What else is happening on the page when you view a typical email?
Posted: 6/16/08; 6:33:26 PM # |
| How to Succeed in Your Work |
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Bryan Walker is an English academic, author, and advisor to humanitarian organizations. He's recently pulled together the second edition of his book How to Succeed in Your Work (choice of 67 page PDF or Word file). I would love to see the authors of Navigating Soft Skills review this book, but in the meantime I can just tell you this: It's a charming collection of the kind of practical information that I pretty much never touch upon in my own career coaching and counseling work.
The chapters include: How to Succeed in Your Work, How to Write Your Resume;, How to Apply for a Post, How to Groom for an Interview, How to Make Your Mission Statements, How to Appraise Your Work Progress, How to Manage a Meeting, How to Plan a Power Point Presentation, How to Prepare a Report, How to Control Your Time, How to Assess Your Personality, How to Master Stress, How to Pursue Distance Learning Courses, How to Work as a Manager, How to Help a New Colleague, and How to Decide Whether to Change Jobs.
Posted: 6/16/08; 6:25:12 PM # |
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13 June 2008 |
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11 June 2008 |
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| Social Networking Strategies and Tactics Seminar on July 23rd, 2008 |
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Every couple of months, there's a hot new online community that draws our attention. FaceBook, MySpace, Linked In, LiveJournal, Bebo, Orkut, Imeem, StumbleUpon, Last.fm, Friendster, Twitter, Ning, and others: Are they worth our investment as an organization? How can we use them without getting locked in? I'll be taking a hard-nosed look at these and other questions in a new seminar on Social Networking Strategies and Tactics, to be held live on July 23, 2008. I will focus on distinguishing between: handing away resources to anxious hype and real investments in genuine opportunity. If you are thinking about the relationship between your own networks & communication and these so-called social networking sites, then I hope you'll join me for this seminar.
Posted: 6/11/08; 4:37:33 PM # |
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9 June 2008 |
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| Nonprofit Taglines: Small Words, Big Impact |
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Nancy Schwartz has been investing some time recently in studying taglines (organizational and campaign slogans and the like) used by nonprofit organizations. In addition to the survey she's running, she explores the three main benefits of good taglines and looks at several examples of the role of a good tagline in the effective branding and rebranding of an organization.
Posted: 6/9/08; 9:20:05 PM # |
| Patterns for Sign Up and Ramp Up |
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The smart folks at Adaptive Path have produced an excellent library of Patterns for Sign Up and Ramp Up - web design elements that support new user registration and engagement of various sorts. They looked for patterns across twenty different applications (primarily commercial, but still relevant) and identified both trends and tactics. This guide is available as an online presentation and as a free 70 page PDF download.
Posted: 6/9/08; 9:14:45 PM # |
| Performers versus Non-Performers |
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In Performers versus Non-Performers, Sue Mackey has started a conversation about the difference between measuring production and measuring performance. I suspect many of you have both opinions and experience with this question and I would love to read them, so I encourage you to dive into the comments at Navigating Soft Skillss and share your ideas.
Posted: 6/9/08; 9:10:14 PM # |
| The Epoch of Incredulity: The Eleventh Megatrend |
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In The Epoch of Incredulity, Gavin Clabaugh articulates a trend he wishes he could have inserted into the book MegaTrends, back when he worked on it with John Naisbitt. This is the trend that I have often called "Scaling Up Listening" and which he refers to as "from sampling to monitoring" - the ability to gather real time information from across an enormous network, in real time. On the one hand, this could really just be about spying on people. But on the other hand, it represents a new kind of ability to both see and participate in large scale social enterprises, whether it's keg parties, or map-making, or citizen engagement.
Posted: 6/9/08; 9:05:53 PM # |
| Key Differences Between Web 1.0 and Web 2.0 |
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I didn't really think I was going to comment much more on the often tedious subject of "Web 2.0". But, in the current issue of First Monday, Graham Cormode and Balachander Krishnamurthy offer an interesting analysis of what they see as the Key Differences Between Web 1.0 and Web 2.0. Although I think the entire Internet is Web-2.0-like from its inception, on a web site centric basic, that is less true. (Meaning many web sites were, and still are, conceived as static publications, even though they are embedded in this extraordinarily interactive medium. Perhaps that means that they really went backwards? That they have been at Web 0.1 and are only now catching up with the nature of the Internet itself?) The authors actually do some pretty rigorous analysis of features and draw some important conclusions about how this changes the metrics of success for web sites.
Posted: 6/9/08; 8:56:57 PM # |
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5 June 2008 |
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| Quick Survey on Online Cultivation and Stewardship |
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The field of online fundraising has matured somewhat in the last few years, at least in regard to the sheer number of organizations pursuing it. And we've also figured out a few things that we know work. So, it's time for another one of our Quick Surveys, this one on Online Cultivation and Stewardship. (It should take two to three minutes to read and complete.) It has all multiple choice questions and in most cases are related to information that you will have on hand, but we set things up with these surveys so that you can come back and amend your answers later if you need to. Please help us out by telling us about your online fundraising practices!
Posted: 6/5/08; 4:05:40 PM # |
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2 June 2008 |
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| Opening Space for Democracy: Curriculum for Third-Party Nonviolent Intervention |
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As part of Training for Change 2004, Daniel Hunter and George Lakey prepared a 634 page training manual on third-party nonviolent intervention called Opening Space for Democracy. The core curriculum (a 159 page PDF) is available for free online and that's a gold mine in itself. Third-party nonviolent intervention is a growing and important social change strategy in movements that are increasingly global in nature. The three to four week core training curriculum is rigorously designed around four techniques (interposition, observing/monitoring, protective accompaniment, and presence) and seven proficiencies (mission, environment, large-scale conflict analysis, immediate conflict skills, team dynamics, personal well-being, and technical skills). I particularly appreciated the appendices, which include recommended reading and a model for a group of nonprofit reservists working to help civil society defend civil society.
Posted: 6/2/08; 6:22:33 PM # |
| Tactical Philanthropy's Coverage of the 2008 Council on Foundations Conference |
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I wasn't able to attend this year's Council on Foundations Conference, but a number of writers over at Tactical Philanthropy did. Their coverage compiles commentary from an amazing group of contributing writers (in the order of their appearance): Beth Reiter, Sean Stannard-Stockton, Peter Deitz (whose Social Actions site did as well as I had hoped with the folks at NetSquared), Brian Walsh, Taylor Ansley, Carla Javits, Sharna Goldseker, Sandra Bass, Roxie Jerde, Sara Melillo, Peter Manzo, Dahna Goldstein, Chris Cardona, Steve Butz, Debbie Kobak, Jacob Harold, Taylor Ansley, and Rusty Stahl. The Council's openness to bloggers and Sean's wrangling have come together to create an extraordinary resource. Take your time with this one.
Posted: 6/2/08; 5:41:07 PM # |
| GrantCraft Guide on Grants to Individuals |
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GrantCraft has produced another excellent guide for grantmakers, this time on the topic of Grants to Individuals. Their download process has become more cumbersome than I recall, but the steps are almost always well worth it. The guide offers five case studies, as well as advice on designing, managing, and evaluating programs that make direct grants to individuals.
Posted: 6/2/08; 5:26:16 PM # |
| Blackbaud Acquires Kintera |
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I guess it was only a matter of time before Blackbaud Acquired Kintera. I don't know if I can write dispassionately about this, given my own dotcom experiences. But I do have one question for Blackbaud: Will you let go of any of those overreaching business process patents Kintera has?
Posted: 6/2/08; 3:41:24 PM # |
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