When More Duct Tape Won’t Do It

A number of years ago I was flying to Rockland, Maine with a couple friends and we needed to take a small puddle jumper for the final leg of the trip.  Before we took off, the pilot got out a ladder and went over to the wing near the window where we were sitting.  Then he pulled out some duct tape and applied it to something we could not see on top of the wing.

Duct tape as a “fix” to the wing of an airplane?  We kind of shrugged at each other, the plane took off, and we landed safely.  Over drinks later, however, we decided it was really dumb to not at least have asked what was going on!

How often does this happen in organizations?

My good friend, Dr. Gerald Suarez, has a favorite comment when discussing organization dysfunction: “They are tinkering with an unstable system!”

I love it.  “Tinkering with an unstable system.”  So often that is what happens in organizations!

Here’s how to avoid it.

Create a vision for your organization in its ideal state – describe what it would it look like, right now, if your resources were unlimited and you had no obstacles to making it happen.  Dr. Russ Ackoff used to call this an “Idealized Design.”

Once you have your “ideal” in mind then move toward that.  Rather than fixing problems with bailing wire and duck tape when they arise, develop new systems, programs, and processes that take you toward the “ideal” you have invented.  It's the difference between being proactive and reactive. 

If you do this, you will stop “tinkering” and begin taking your organization toward a future where you can make even more of a Mission Impact.

For more ideas on how you can lead breakthroughs in your organization, follow this blog and check out my web site at www.SheehanNonprofitConsulting.com   You will find free resources you can download, including a Breakthrough Strategy Workbook that you can download at no cost.  You can also check out my book, Mission Impact:  Breakthrough Strategies for Nonprofits, and buy it if you are interested.  And you can follow Sheehan Nonprofit Consulting on Facebook.

"Now Let's Go Fail"

I have heard six different commencement speeches during the past couple of days.  They were all very good, but the best one was from an undergraduate student (now a new graduate) from the Smith School of Business at Maryland, Manas Kulkarni.

The theme of Manas’ message was “Now Let’s Go Fail.”  You can hear the entire speech at this link and fast forward to the 54 minute mark.

Some of the great thoughts and sound bites:

*Failure is not necessarily the opposite of success

*Failure and Success are “two points on the same learning curve”

*Failure can help accelerate success

*We should actively try and fail – this is a means to achieving and appreciating success

*When we embrace and understand failures, we can use the understanding to seize success

About a year ago a wrote this blog entitled “We Celebrate Noble Failure.”  But I like the way Manas says it even better.  We need to transform our relationship with failure if we are going to innovate and achieve even higher levels of Mission Impact for those we serve.

In a few weeks, Manas will start his new job with Teach for America in San Francisco where he will be teaching math to kids in the inner city.  I have no doubt that he will experience failures, but I am totally confident that he will be a great success – and those children he teaches will be the great beneficiaries of that success.  Good luck Manas!

For more ideas on how you can lead breakthroughs in your organization, follow this blog and check out my web site at www.SheehanNonprofitConsulting.com   You will find free resources you can download, including a Breakthrough Strategy Workbook that you can download at no cost.  You can also check out my book, Mission Impact:  Breakthrough Strategies for Nonprofits, and buy it if you are interested.  And you can follow Sheehan Nonprofit Consulting on Facebook.

Should Nonprofits Run Like a Business?

As a professor in a business school who is a former nonprofit CEO and consultant to nonprofits, I am often asked: “Should a nonprofit be run like a business?

Easy answer, “No.”

A nonprofit should be run like effective nonprofits are run. 

However . . . . .

There is a lot we – in the nonprofit world – can learn from business best practices.  Far too many nonprofit executives dismiss many “business practices” because they think that nearly everything businesses do is “tainted” by the profit motive, and therefore “wrong.”

This is short-sighted thinking.  We can study business best practices and then figure out if and how they fit the nonprofit world.  Some may not fit.  But plenty practices fit perfectly.

How about the importance of making data driven decisions, or managing our finances effectively, or using sound human resources practices?  This is just a short list of business best practices – but they are also nonprofit best practices.

Dan Pallotta’s TED Talk, “The Way We Think About Charity is Dead Wrong,” (check out the link here) in which he encourages the use of business thinking for the nonprofit world, is going viral in the nonprofit world lately.  I don’t agree with everything he says, but he is rattling a lot of cages and getting people to rethink some key assumptions. 

Don’t assume that all business practices are wrong for nonprofits.  The whole concept behind the Mission Impact book was to take business best practice in the area of strategy and retrofit it for nonprofits.  We can learn a lot from businesses and – as I frequently tell my business friends – they can learn a lot from us as well.

For more ideas on how you can lead breakthroughs in your organization, follow this blog and check out my web site at www.SheehanNonprofitConsulting.com   You will find free resources you can download, including a Breakthrough Strategy Workbook that you can download at no cost.  You can also check out my book, Mission Impact:  Breakthrough Strategies for Nonprofits, and buy it if you are interested.  And you can follow Sheehan Nonprofit Consulting on Facebook.