2017 Governor’s Four Easy Steps

Stephen F. Covey’s seventh habit “sharpen the saw” means preserving and enhancing the greatest asset you have–YOU! NANOE’s Governors enjoy a continuing education experience worthy of your tenure and will meaningfully contribute to your balanced program of self-renewal.

Your responsibilities as a Governor are both meaningful and manageable. We know you are busy and have designed this program in a way that will work for you. Here we go!

Step 1 – Determine your favorite TOP THREE New Guidelines that you’d like to tackle with your peers (see list below)
Step 2 – Determine ONE New Guideline you know your NOT interested in at all.
Step 3 – Email the numbers of your TOP THREE (and the ONE you’re not interested in) to Dr. Robinson at [email protected].
Step 4 – Dr. Robinson will send you a return email assigning you to a Working Group and a few easy but important tasks.

1. Trusted Reciprocal Relationships

Reciprocity is the key to sustainable connections. What changes must occur within
nonprofit leadership and administrative practice so that the organization’s social,
human, and economic capital flourishes through new and expanded relationships? What
happens to “Conflict of Interest” when reciprocity is invoked?

2. Re-Purposing Leadership Roles

How must relationships among the CEO, board, donors and for-profit business
partners be re-purposed and re-defined? With whom does true decision-making power
reside? What does a board and its members do and not do?

3. CEO Centricity

Strong CEOs lead people to build and maintain effective organizational and operational
capacity. What changes are required to further empower chief executive officers? What
boundaries must be set with board members, staff, donors and the public.

4. Rewriting Mission Statements

Mission is re-defined to highlight two primary customer sets: customers related to cause
and customers related to building capacity. How are customer’s goals reflected in an
organizational mission statement?

5. Donor-Driven Capacity Building

What reciprocal partnerships must be established between donors, foundations and
corporations to build a high performing organization. What systems should be put in
place that realizes partners’ passions related to mission, cause and desired involvements?

6. Prioritizing Income Over Program

Priority must be given to sustainable revenue generation developed from multiple income
streams. What tasks should CEOs undertake to improve cash-flow and organizational
health? What programs should be de-funded and re-directed to build capacity?

7. Financial Capital Investment

Investment money is raised from financial partners to build the enterprise and is
then reported separately. These monies are not derived from taking risks or strategic
shifts but is given based on evidence of what already exists and its outcomes.
Where will it come from?

8. Increasing Administrative Overhead

Leaders identify and communicate administrative costs as investments needed to grow
the organization. How should monies be spent to expand mission? How should these
investments be messaged to donors and the public?

9. Social Enterprise Partnerships

Nonprofit leaders join with those in the social enterprise movement to create
unconventional ways to earn income. What type of administrative time should strong CEOs
invest in new ideas regarding revenue generation, capital development, and valuation?

10. Strong CEO Fundraising

The CEO leads the fundraising process, is knowledgeable about philanthropy, and able
to sustain a development program. What fundraising pre-requisites must CEOs possess?
How does fundraising re-define CEO workflow?

11. Innovation, Research & Evaluation

High performing nonprofits invest in innovation. They evaluate their operations
producing data as a basis to test new ideas. What organization-wide exercises
could be engaged in to foster creativity? What research measures should be instituted?

12. Guidelines to be Determined

NANOE is about exploring seperate and critical thought. What’s missing from the list
above? What new and transformational ideas need to be added to New Guidelines. Who’s
talking about the next big ideas.