Vu

Welcome back to work, you sexy Jedi unicorn

Posted on January 4, 2016 by Vu

My friends in the nonprofit sector—most of you are probably returning to work this week after a well-deserved break and are feeling “blegh.” Our field can be unrelenting, and even during the break, I know many of you were still answering emails and sending out year-end appeals. As you look at your calendar and the innumerable items on your to-do list, you may feel the urge to crawl under your desk and hold your knees while rocking and weeping. No one would think less of you for admitting today—and many other days—that you desperately wish to be back on your couch binge-watching Jessica Jones or Narcos on Netflix while eating an entire bag of Spicy Sweet Chili Doritos. It is OK. Most of us are feeling crappy today, and some of us look crappy to match our moods. You are not alone.

But take heart, for you are a sexy unicorn who uses its horn of equity to stab injustice in the face and help build a beautiful and vibrant community. Take a look in the mirror. Damn, that is one good-looking nonprofit professional. How do you manage to look so stylish in that Ross “Dress for Less” shirt, you stunner, you?Continue reading →

15 lessons for the nonprofit sector we learned in 2015

Posted on December 28, 2015 by Vu

Hi everyone, I hope you are having a restful and much-deserved break and are reading this in bed while sipping on a nice single-serving box of red wine, like I like to do on the weekends. Next week, the new year starts, and I am excited. Personally, because my new baby boy arrives in March, and I’m looking forward to meeting him. He will be named Equity and get all his older brother’s used clothing. As soon as he can hold his head up, his training to be a nonprofit warrior will start, just like for his brother, who at 2 years old can put sticky dots on easel paper at community forums.

2016 will be a game-changing year for our sector, I just know it. From my conversations with readers and colleagues, there is a hunger for us all to do things differently, to examine complex issues, to talk honestly about challenges, to express our needs assertively and push back against the forces that prevent us from doing our work. There are long-held philosophies and beliefs, among ourselves as well as within society, that we must unravel, and there are several critical polarities we must shift. NWB will continue to bring up these conversations, this time with more urgency, more attitude, more moxie—whatever that is—, and possibly…more merchandising. (Be on the lookout for NWB T-shirts and mugs, and, if I can swing it, severed stuffed unicorn heads you can send as warnings to under-performing colleagues and board members, Godfather-style).

But first, we need to close 2015 by reflecting on the lessons we learned. Below are a few of the many I gathered, frequently the hard way, as well as some shared with me by the talented and very good-looking members of the NWB community. Some of these we’ve talked about before, and some I’ll elaborate more on in the coming year. Jot down your thoughts and lessons learned in the comment section:Continue reading →

“I’m Dreaming of a Green Christmas” and other nonprofit holiday songs

Posted on December 21, 2015 by Vu

Hi everyone, happy holidays. I hope that you are taking it easy these next couple of weeks. This week, instead of reading serious articles about our sector, I learned about the dark origins of Christmas carols. Apparently, back in the olden days, carolers were drunk hooligans who went door-to-door demanding to be let in and served your best food and booze, and could get rowdy and belligerent if you turn them away.

So of course, that inspired me to re-write some of our holiday songs. Why don’t you learn them, and then we can try old-school caroling as a novel fundraising technique. Suggest other #nonprofitholidaysongs in the comment section and on Twitter.Continue reading →

Hey, you want nonprofits to act more like businesses? Then treat us like businesses

Posted on December 14, 2015 by Vu

A couple of months ago I was at a conference, and during lunch the keynote speaker got up and paced the stage and mentioned several times about how we nonprofits need to be more like for-profits. Despite the two drinks I had had that morning—stop judging; it was a Saturday—I found myself getting more and more irritated. This happens over and over. Seriously, if I hear one more person blather on and on about how we primitive, inept do-gooders should learn from our sophisticated siblings from the business sector and get into earned-income and blah blah, I’m going to roll my eyes so hard that they will pop out of my head, and then I will have to find them to put them back in my eye sockets but I won’t be able to see so I will have to feel around on the floor to find them while freaked-out passers-by scream all around me.

Our nonprofit sector has an identity issue, and I think we should resolve this if we are going to reach our potential. Are we nonprofits businesses, or are we something else entirely? I’ve talked to lots of nonprofit leaders who are proud of their work and who say, “Nonprofit businesses are businesses! But instead of making money for our stockholders, we create dividends in benefits to the community!”

But lately, I’ve started wondering if perpetuating this philosophy is actually harming us. Ideally, yes, we are businesses, and we should be accorded the same level of respect. But the frustrating reality is that we are judged as businesses without given the rights and resources to fully operate as businesses. If funders and donors and society want us to be like businesses, then fine, but we also need the following: Continue reading →

All right, everyone, we need to freak out more about nonprofit leadership

Posted on December 7, 2015 by Vu

During the 17 months of our existence, my start-up organization has been guided by a single profound question: “Whose disgusting leftover salad is this that’s been in the fridge since June?!” That, and also, “What kind of leaders do we need in this time and place?” Both questions have prompted us to do some serious soul-searching. The latter, posed by our partner organization the Center for Ethical Leadership, has been on my mind a lot lately.

If you’ve been reading the news, it seems that the world is getting more and more complex, and sometimes scarier, and oftentimes sadder and more confusing. I know there are lots of good things happening too, but as I part with my two-year-old son each morning to go to work, I can’t help but hold him for a few seconds longer.

The world is changing, and the nonprofit sector has a significant role to play. A big part of that role is to provide our community with the leaders that it needs. As much as we would like to, we can’t really rely on our corporate friends to be leading social movements, and political leaders have their challenges to wrestle with. It is often up to us to bring balance. Nonprofit leaders are the underappreciated Jedi knights of our world.Continue reading →