Two months ago, I was on my way to a reunion weekend at New College of Florida in Sarasota. I am currently on the college’s foundation board, and a trip to Sarasota was long overdue. I made the reunion a quarterly goal. Perfect timing! As the director of programs and research at HERS, we were in between the February and March delivery of the HERS Leadership Institute, our signature leadership program for women leaders in higher education. My team was moving forward as planned. It was the right time for my vacation. Furthermore, I needed time away. Well being, particularly self-care, is essential as a team leader. I was glad to take the time off and committed to not working. In the past, my team felt that I wasn’t sincere when I would encourage them to truly leave the work during their vacations, because they knew I never did. I was determined to be a good example. [Read more…]

Prior to becoming a parent, I managed a development team and relied heavily on my HR experience to shape my management style. I managed to make it work. However, there was room for improvement.

Little did I know that, for me, improvement came in the form of parenting.

I became a parent nine years ago. And as many new parents do, I read a lot on how to be a better parent. Aside from the practical tips of how to install a car seat, I read books on how to get children on a path of healthy sleeping, how to manage toddlers and their raw emotions, how to raise confident children, and this list goes on and on.

At the same time, in my professional life, I found myself again building a development team. I was also reading books on leadership, some of it was a review from my corporate years in HR, but some of it new. [Read more…]

One of our passions at Fundraising Leadership is helping nonprofit leaders to bring a coach-like approach to their organizations. And of course we like to walk our talk in this regard. This means we focus on building trust, setting goals, measuring progress, being curious, and creating a culture of accountability within our own team. 

So as our Q2 came to a close, the Fundraising Leadership Team gathered together for a mid-year review. 

We structured our conversation around our OGSM (Objectives, Goals, Strategies and Metrics) tool that we created at the beginning of our fiscal year. Simply put an OGSM provides clear goals and identifies the strategic choices to achieve them.  [Read more…]

Gossip–The practice of sharing information about people who are not present in a “casual or unconstrained conversation [that] typically involves details not confirmed as being true.”

We are all familiar with it. Every organization seems to be infused with it, and many leaders in the nonprofit world with whom I work believe it’s a good thing. They mistakenly believe that it helps grease the wheels of communication and that it will somehow serve as a source of valuable information that enables the organization to function smoothly.

[Read more…]

When did you begin to see yourself as a leader? Some of us only see ourselves as leaders when we attain a certain job title. Or once we have staff reporting to us.

The Fundraising Leadership team (David, Silvia, Michelle and I) have all completed the CTI Leadership program. This program rejects the top-down, one-dimensional leadership model and expands our definition of leadership.

This new model is grounded in the idea that everyone is a leader because “leaders are those who are responsible for their world.” [Read more…]