Nonprofit AF

[Image description: A raccoon, grayish brown, peeking over a thick tree branch, staring directly at the camera with its piercing dark eyes. Image from Pixabay.com]

Every once a while, an up-and-coming nonprofit professional would ask me, “What advice would you give us folks who are just starting in the sector?” This is how you know that you yourself are no longer an up-and-coming nonprofit professional. I am trying to embrace my status as one of the grizzled old-timers with the battle scars:

“When I entered the sector years ago, we had to walk five miles—in the snow!—to deliver a grant proposal. Back then, paperclips weren’t invented, and funders wanted the attachments to be clipped just right. We had to make paperclips out of pine needles. But, there were only eight pine trees west of the Mississippi, and they were fiercely guarded by vicious raccoons. I can still see their beady eyes, glowing red like those sticky dots people used to vote with during community meetings. Of course, back then, the sticky dots weren’t just something you bought at the store. They were gum drops we had to slice by hand. Problem with using those gum drop slices though was that they attracted the raccoons. We spent as much time battling raccoons as we spent running programs.” Continue reading “The game of nonprofit is flawed. Learn to play it so you can change it. “

Hi everyone, and valar dohaeris to all the Game of Thrones fans. A few people have been asking me, “Vu, what’s your process for writing your blog posts each week?” So today, we’re going to take a break from normal nonprofit topics, and I’m going to meta-blog, which is to blog about blogging—which is nearly as fun as meta-drinking, which is drinking about drinking (It makes more sense if you have a few drinks).

But first, why should you blog? Blogging may seem archaic to younger people, with your “Snapchat” and your “Instagram” and your “Myspace,” but blogs are totally awesome when they don’t suck. If you or your organization aspire to be a “thought leader,” a consistently-updated blog is a must. With society’s short attention span and constant barrage of information, having a platform you control to deliver your opinions is critical, and social media are great for sharing content, not hosting it.

To have a killer blog, though, you need these three things: One, topics people actually care about and that you actually know enough stuff about to actually write. Two, consistency (I always post every single Monday, come rain or shine, or stomach flu, except holidays, and that’s mainly because people are off work so no one will be reading); for blogging, I would argue that quantity/consistency is more important than quality. And three, blood, sweat, tears, your soul, and the occasional anguished silent scream on your balcony at 2 or 3am. Continue reading “12 steps for writing a kick-ass blog post”