“The Future of Leadership” Nonprofit Leadership Summit was convened on June 9 – 10 in Minneapolis, sponsored by the Minnesota Council of Nonprofits, Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs, CompassPoint Nonprofit Services, The Nonprofit Quarterly, and the Twin Cities Young Nonprofit Professionals Network.
Summit theme: As society changes and grows, nonprofit leadership must evolve.
Following are tidbits noted from a plenary session on the future of leadership. Panelists sharing these thoughts included: Jeannie Bell, executive director, CompassPoint Nonprofit Services; Sean Kershaw, executive director, Citizens League; Ruth McCambridge, editor in chief, Nonprofit Quarterly; Ron McKinley, project director, Kellogg Action Lab, Fieldstone Alliance; Mai Moua, principal, Leadership Paradigms, Inc.
A definition of leadership: speaking, listening, and acting in a way that allows a community to address its challenges and affect change in the community.
In order to affect systems change, we need to look at leadership as a process rather than a position.
Any discussion about leadership needs to include a discussion about democracy.
Challenges / opportunities in the leadership context:
- Listening well / Conflict resolution
- The notion of advocacy has changed. “Day on the Hill” events are losing effectiveness; we need to advocate from inside our organizations; not outside.
The role of government is changing fundamentally; its role is diminishing (Balancing the budget at the expense of poor and elderly constituents is a manifestation of this.) How do we as a nonprofit sector take this on?
Innovate/Innovate/Innovate. We must pretend that the money we have now is the money we’ll have five years from now, and we have a great opportunity to innovate. However, this is hard to do in our resource dependent sector.
We still have a long way to go to achieve diversity in leadership in our nonprofit sector. We must remind ourselves that the outcome of diversity is having a diverse set of inputs. It’s a means to a good end.
Engage others outside the organization as leaders within the organization. The strategic advantage is to pay attention to the board recruitment and development process.
Create boards that will collaborate and not be the obstacle to meeting mission and achieving goals: How? Strive to be better at containing conflict; be direct and express differences when they occur; use stakeholders as part of leadership. Nurture diverse boards in terms of both skills and representation.
Each one of us has leadership capacity within ourselves. What is it that we need to do next, along with being aware of those around us who are also developing their leadership? We must be constantly surveying the landscape to bring others to their best and highest goals for their organizations and communities.
Kathy Grochow, NRS, St. Cloud Area
Lois Schmidt, NRS, Willmar Area
Holly Witt, NRS, Alexandria Area
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