This series of posts looks at leadership through the lenses of a number of people who are making a difference in the not-for-profit sector.  To kick things off, I thought I’d keep things close to home - This first post will be about Val Green, the Executive Director of Volunteer Victoria.                                       

With VV since 1989, Val has played a major role in making Volunteer Victoria a true go-to organization for Victoria’s growing not-for-profit community.  Loved by her staff and highly regarded by professionals and volunteers across the region, it is obvious that Val must be doing something right where leadership is concerned.

Val was asked to kick off the inaugural Emerging Leaders Network lunch last week.  This is a brand-new initiative to fill a growing need in our community for resources and support for young non-profit professionals as they make their way through their careers and eventually lead the sector in the not-so-distant future.

Here are some of my favourite tidbits from the many sage words of advice she had to share:

Don’t be afraid to try just because you don’t know in advance where all the pieces will fit: Learn, grow and put the puzzle together as you go. When you inevitably make mistakes, take some time to write down what you have learned.

Trust your staff and rely on their knowledge and experience: You can’t be good at everything...and that’s OK.  Recognize the strengths of your team to help you excel in achieving your organizational goals.

There are as many leadership styles as there are leaders: As a result, understand that coming in as a new leader often means a culture shift within the organization. While spearheading change is one of the most challenging roles a leader will take on, it is essential because, as Val explains “If you don’t grow and change, you become stale and move backwards.

Leaders don’t have to wear a suit: You will see better results if you are who you really are not who you think you ought to be.

Put work 'back in the box': Val feels the typical 50-60 hour work-week of many ED’s is an unfortunate legacy that Boomer-era leaders have left to the next generation.  Younger leaders need to learn to “put work back in the box,” particularly seeing as many are starting families later in life and/or are caring for aging parents while balancing challenging careers.

Don’t listen to the lizard: The lizard is a prehistoric creature dominated by fight or flight impulses. It is easy in challenging situations for people to react using these prehistoric tendencies. Taking a moment to ensure you address situations in calm and measured way can help you to make the right decisions and to not do things you might later regret.

Do you know of someone who has an interesting view of NFP sector leadership whose lenses would be worth looking through? Drop me a line...

It seems to me that everyone has a different view on leadership.  There are too many books to count, each with their own view on the characteristics and habits of leaders, and what makes a truly great leader so hard to come by.

I’ve been thinking a lot about ‘lenses’ lately, particularly in the context of NFP leadership. So much so that I’ve decided to develop a series of posts here that look at this elusive topic through the lenses of different members of the NFP community who have contributed to leadership in different ways.

Here is why I think this will be interesting:

You would think that good leaders would be even harder to find in the not-for-profit sector, where so many are vastly overworked, underpaid, under-resourced and in many cases under-appreciated for the work they are trying to do. 

In fact, I think the opposite is true. The more I work with non-profits, the more outstanding leaders I see...in all kinds of different places. 

So what is it that I think makes not-for-profit leaders so great? 

I think that in many cases, the challenging NFP environment itself is what breeds a growing number of great leaders across the sector.  If their associations or causes are to survive, you better believe that these people need to have clarity of vision and a commitment to creativity in order to achieve that vision despite the many obstacles in their path.

Even more important, in my opinion, is passion. 

In the private sector, leaders have a hand-up when it comes to getting people on-board with whatever it is they are trying to accomplish because they are usually being paid or otherwise stand to benefit financially for their contribution.

But non-profit leaders don’t usually have the advantage of this particular carrot-and-stick.  As a result, they not only have to care about what they are doing, but their energy has to be contagious enough to convince others to roll up their sleeves to help them achieve their mandate...in many cases by volunteering their time or donating their hard-earned dollars.

So I guess it all comes down to survival – leaders in our sector have to be pretty darn good at what they do, because the very existence of their organizations are all too often at stake.

So if you or someone you know has an interesting perspective on NFP leadership, let me know – I’d love to take a look through your ‘leadership lense.’

Photo: Milivoj Sherrington

When it comes to leadership and organizational culture, authors Lee Bolman and Terrence Deal argue that leaders tend to address issues and challenges by referring to the way in which they naturally see the world - or their dominant ‘frame.’

Their book is (fittingly) called Reframing Organizations. I think it’s a great resource for any organization – for profit or not. The gist of their message is that different organizations and their leaders tend to be dominated by one or two ‘frames,’ or world-views. They argue that many organizations could be much better off if their leadership developed the ability to step outside of their natural ‘frame’ to look at issues and challenges using different perspectives.

In and of itself, being able to look at things from different angles isn’t a revolutionary idea and it can be an extremely effective problem-solving technique. What is interesting about Bolman and Deal is that they methodically lay out four main lenses they feel are used by most people. These apply both to leadership styles and organizational culture:

The Structural Frame:  Leaders who use this frame focus on process, achieving objectives, setting goals and clearly laying out roles and responsibilities.  Organizations dominated by this type of frame are akin to a machine or factory with a place for everyone and everyone in their place. They tend to have a more rigid, and bureaucratic culture, often with a top-down hierarchy.

Political: People who use this frame treat leadership like a game characterized by winners and losers, gaining and losing power, deal-making and negotiation.  Advocacy is the name of the game. The political organization tends to be jungle-like, and is sometimes dominated by a competitive, ‘survival of the fittest’ attitude in within its culture.

Symbolic:  Symbolic leaders are larger-than-life heroes focused on getting stakeholders truly excited about what’s going on.  They tend to use rituals, ceremonies and metaphors to inspire stakeholders to go above and beyond to help the organization achieve its goals.  This symbolism pervades the culture of the organization. For example, an organization with transparency as one of its core values might get its point across by separating their office space with glass walls.

Human Resources: The Human Resources leader treats people within the organization as family, with the primary focus being on addressing their needs, as well as developing and nurturing relationships within the organization.  Organizations with an HR-centered culture are characterized by empowerment of the people involved.

When looking at your own non-profit, which of the four frames would you say dominates your organization’s culture? What might happen (good and bad) if your organization adopted some aspects of another of the ‘frames’ in the way it does things?

Drilling down further, what do you think is your dominant leadership frame? The next time you face a major decision, take a step back and ask yourself which one you are using to come to your conclusion. Would your decision be the same if you looked at it from one of the other angles above?