What I’ve learned from working with mission-based organizations

 

Here are a few lessons I’ve learned, in no particular order:

1. You need to make sure that your mission, operations, and desired outcomes are aligned with each other.
2. Movements for equity, inclusion, and belonging have the potential to revolutionize both mission-based organizations and philanthropy.
3. Carefully tailored one-to-one desk-side coaching usually increases a worker’s effectiveness much more quickly than classroom training.
4. The nonprofit/philanthropic sector in Massachusetts is different from the analogous sector in any other state in the U.S.A.
5. Poverty is an insufficient reward for devoting one’s professional life to a nonprofit organization.
6. In a mission-based organization, many problems that initially appear to be about information and communication technology are really about organizational culture, knowledge management, or a combination of organizational culture and knowledge management.
7. Age discrimination is alive and well in mission-based organizations.
8. It makes much more sense to aim to run a nonprofit organization like a highly effective organization, rather than to aim to run it like a business. There’s nothing inherently superior (or inferior) about businesses.
9. Every human being is eligible to help others and to be helped by others; moreover, it’s a mistake to stigmatize being helped by others.
10. Bringing token members of various demographic minorities into the building isn’t enough; real power means being at the table when crucial information is disseminated and crucial decisions are made.
11. When you decide to solve a problem, you need help from the people who are deeply affected by the problem in order to determine:

• the real nature of the problem
• the possible solutions
• a clear and specific idea of what success in solving the problem would look like

I invite you to leave comments about what lessons you’ve learned from working with mission-based organizations!

Or, if you prefer to send me a private message, you can do so by using the form shown below:

 

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A New Résumé for My New Career Path!

Over the past few months, I’ve been refining my thoughts about my new career path.  As I’ve become clearer about what I’m seeking and what I have to offer, it’s become more important to frame my résumé properly.

I find this unusually difficult.  I’d much rather tell the world about how great YOU are, and exactly what qualities, skills, and experiences make YOU the perfect candidate.  Meanwhile, I have trouble doing justice to myself.

However, I have now drafted a new résumé, with a little help from my friends!

Here it is. (Please click on this link to see it.)

I’ve had some really valuable assistance from six very kind people:

• Rodney Byrd from TSNE MissionWorks
• David Leonard from Boston Public Library
• Gordon Gottlieb from Technical Development Corporation
• John McNutt from University of Delaware School of Public Policy and Administration
• Kathleen Malin from Rhode Island Foundation
• Stephanie Guidry from Boston Foundation

I thank them wholeheartedly, and I now invite you to critique this new version.  Please feel free to email me directly or post your critique in the comments section.

 

In search of my next vocation!

“Excelsior!”   (Cartoon by James Thurber)

After five very productive years at Tech Networks of Boston (TNB), I am now looking for my next professional challenge. I’m ready for a career shift! I’ve notified the leadership at TNB, so this is not a covert search.

If you know about any job opportunities at organizations that need someone with my skill set, I’d love to hear about them. In my next job, I’d like to focus on some or all of the following:

• Weaving networks among nonprofit organizations in order to build collaboration, peer learning, and communities of practice.
• Building the capacity of philanthropic and nonprofit organizations to achieve and document their desired outcomes.
• Fostering equity, inclusion, social justice, and corporate social responsibility.
• Aiding philanthropic and nonprofit organizations in seamlessly matching resources with needs.
• Establishing best practices in the strategic use of information and communication technologies among mission-based organizations.
• Facilitating candid dialogue and successful collaborations between grantmakers and grantees.

I invite you to peruse my LinkedIn profile and my résumé, and to get in touch with me about any contacts or opportunities that you’d like to suggest.

Please help me find new ways to serve organizations and individuals who are working to make the world a better place!

Deborah Elizabeth Finn – résumé – June 2018