On Wednesdays, I’ll make an attempt to review a book, blog, or article that I’ve read recently. I’m calling this series Wayward Wednesdays because, if I can say anything with any certainty, the items which I’ll review will be more recent, modern classics. These will be items that reflect a contribution to discussions on leadership, the social sector, social media, or living in the Last Frontier.

In writing his best-selling leadership treatise, Good to Great, Jim Collins noticed that he was seeing social sector organizations taking his principles to heart more than his business-oriented readers. He reviewed some of his original core principles, and identified and developed five for his monograph, Good to Great and the Social Sectors.

1. Create metrics for success that are outcome-based, and mission-centric. Use the values and mission of your organization to determine measurable outcomes. For example, the NYPD exists to fight crime, thus they focus on reducing crime rates.
2. Social sector leaders need to hone the ability to exert pressure within a diffuse power structure. Social sector organizations have numerous stakeholders all contending for decisional power. Leaders need to have the ability to articulate the organization’s vision in order give people the opportunity to follow.
3. You can’t fire a volunteer; instead get the right people on the bus, and the wrong people will leave. A professor once told me that if people are waiting in line, whatever it is must be worth the wait. This is true for organizations that are defined by the people that carry out their work. It is necessary to filter those who lack the passion to serve, thus creating a desire to participate.
4. Learn to say no to opportunities that take fuel away from your resource engine, what you care about, and what you’re best at doing. A key difference between business and social sectors in this principle is the use of economic versus resource engines. Money is the engine gives companies the ability to do the things they want to do. Non-profits must rely on their supporters’ time, money, and goodwill.
5. Develop and use your brand to build an unstoppable momentum that can sustain your organization beyond its systemic constraints. The more your organization’s values and mission has support, the more it can deliver results, further attracting more resources and commitment. If your organization means something in other’s lives, the less likely its death. This allows your organization to build an impenetrable pocket of “greatness” that can insulate it from negative systemic influences.

Post from JoshHemsath.com

Wayward Wednesday: Good to Great and the Social Sectors