Leadership Lenses: Don’t Listen to the Lizard (and other good advice from Volunteer Victoria’s Val Green)

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...

Leadership Lenses: Why NFP Leaders Have to be Twice as Good

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

Don’t be the Boiled Frog: Complacency No Longer an Option for NFP’s

Did you know that if you throw a frog into a pot of boiling water, it will try to jump out? But if you put that same frog into a pot of water at room-temperature and heat it up gradually, the frog will let itself be boiled to death? While reinvention is not easy, it is definitely achievable. For NFP’s that want to survive and thrive into the 21st century, complacency just isn’t an option anymore...Just ask the frog.

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The Nintendo Generation?

Not too long ago, I was at a dinner where I found myself in a conversation with a senior association leader. He chaired the board at one of a model non-profit and had been around the block more than a few times in the business world. So, needless to say, I was all ears when he decided to share with me his theory on young professionals. He said: “I like to think of young people today as the ‘Nintendo Generation.’”

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