Ten Ideas to Strengthen the NonProfit Sector

In this posting I offer 10 ideas that non profit sector organizations might consider undertaking to strengthen themselves.. All of them may not be necessary to the same degree for your organization but this list of ten transformations does, I believe, contain at least several major changes your organization should at least think about. Here they are in no particular order.

Innovation is intentional change

Organizational innovation calls for the players to understand and affirm the vision and direction of the organization. They need to be able to identify, recognize, and decide upon vision relevant opportunities and challenges. 

To innovate effective, the organization should be intentional, objective or goal oriented, and be able to create and sustain momentum to achieve the objective.

 The attributes of an innovative environment…

• There is an inspirational mission and vision embraced by all and that serves at the heart of organizational planning, execution, evaluation, and innovation.
• The organization understands that innovation involves risk and failure. The environment is tolerant of risk and not only affirms and celebrates innovative successes, it also affirms and learns from innovative attempts that did not work. This latter point is crucial. If the organization is truly committed to, and engaged in, innovation practices, it knows there will be failures. The point is always to at least “fail forward.”
• There are rewards for innovations.
• The organization ensures there is time to innovative, to “incubate” ideas, to pilot possibilities.
• The organization is intentional about the information it collects and disseminates to ensure information helps evaluate performance as well as inform strategic thinking.
• There are meaningful relationships with customers, other organizations that complement one’s mission and vision, and with competitors.