Manageable Process

Nonprofits Build Planes While Flying Them, Or So I Hear

If I had a nickel for every time I heard a nonprofit professional say they were building the plane while flying it, I could buy my own fully-built jet! In the context of program design, what does this even mean? Is “building the plane while flying it” just code for “making it up as we[…]

Anchoring Your Nonprofit Strategy

In my last two posts, I have been exploring how to articulate and align what I see as the four elements of a nonprofit organization’s strategy: Why: Vision statements often express an organization’s “why.” It describes why you exist and do the work you do. This is the change or result you seek. What: A[…]

Answerable questions

Decision-Making Requires Answerable Questions

Analysis paralysis. Navel-gazing. Beating a dead horse. Talking in circles. Spinning our wheels. Do any of these describe how decision-making feels in your organization? A client recently lamented to me that, in the face of an enormous strategic decision, her organization’s board was talking around the issue repeatedly, never making any progress toward clarity much[…]

Change

Practicing What We Preach: Reflection and Planning

Two years ago in January, I wrote a blog called 6 Tips for Setting Meaningful Goals in which I admitted often falling short of following my own advice. All our work at The IllumiLab – whether it’s evaluation, performance management, planning, data management, quality improvement, or process management – is about helping organizations articulate and[…]

Who’s On First? Using a Responsibility Matrix to Clarify Roles

Unclear roles, responsibilities, and decision-making processes are some of the biggest causes of delays, rework, frustration, and confusion in any organization that relies on teamwork to make the dream work. The same is true in nonprofits. Maybe even more so, because we tend to shortchange valuable self-reflection and planning time in favor of direct service[…]