The Fedcap Group’s 2019 Celebration of The Power of Possible Gala took place on Monday, December 2nd. What an extraordinary evening!
Even with nasty weather, over 430 brave souls joined us to meet up with friends and colleagues in celebration of our mission and shared purpose. A festive spirit permeated the grand hall at Cipriani 42nd Street, adorned with banners recognizing the individuals we serve.
As a nonprofit agency, we are committed to knowing that what we do matters and lasts.
Today, “the nonprofit sector is the third largest component of the American economy, beating out banking, construction, telecommunications, and accounting,” writes Heather McLean Grant in a Philanthropic News Digest article, “Force for Good: Six Practices of High impact Nonprofits.”
This reality provides the nonprofit sector with a tremendous platform to make a fundamental, lasting impact.
During our Gala this past week, The Fedcap Group put a stake in the ground in our commitment to making a lasting impact. We announced our Five Bold Goals that will drive our work for decades to come.
Our Five Bold Goals include:
We are focusing our research, resources and talent on achieving these goals. Succeeding will make a dramatic and lasting difference—leaving society in a much better place.
A recent video talk by Anne Wallestad, President and CEO of Board Source, resonated with the way I think about our work. In order to achieve lasting impact, we need to: 1. Start with purpose – why do we exist? 2. Define our values and live them. 3. Cultivate resilience and relevance through flexibility. 4. Build influence by demonstrating the power of possibility.
This requires that the leadership of our nonprofit companies be strategic. To achieve high impact, we must be continually moving and evolving – getting better, refining our focus and the quality of our practice. Authors Meehan and Jonka shine a spotlight on the importance of our role: “We are at the dawn of a new age, the “Impact Era” in which nonprofits will play an ever more pivotal role in supporting, safeguarding and sustaining American Civil Society.”
I believe we are up to the task of making a lasting impact.
What are your thoughts?
There are very few good leaders who dive headlong into change without some caution, yet at the same time we know that in order to fulfill our mission, we must EVOLVE to make progress. To meet our goals and succeed in achieving long term relevance, sustainability and impact, nonprofits need to continue to refine technology, human resources, communication strategies and approaches to donor engagement.
At The Fedcap Group we are driving into the future with our eyes on the following high level goals:
In order to accomplish these major goals, we have spent a considerable amount of time ensuring company leaders are fully engaged and onboard and understand their role in achieving success. We are investing in the staff of the organization through new efforts to listen and learn from their perspectives. We are upgrading our technology to provide staff with state-of-the-art tools required to effectively monitor program outcomes and finances. And we are engaging our community of donors in very specific ways around our future. In other words…we are evolving.
In “Creating Change: A Brave Path Forward for Nonprofits,” Jessica Haynie and Vicki Pozzebon, reporting in North Carolina State University’s Philanthropy Journal, stresses the importance of creating forums where leaders are able to talk openly about the pressing questions and/or issues that are blocking them from moving forward. This kind of self-check is critical. We have spent a tremendous amount of time over the past several years clarifying expectations, laying out and refining our major areas of focus, building more effective communication strategies, and supporting leaders in their ability to effectively lead. These conversations are not always easy, but they are imperative.
We have also engaged partners in very dynamic ways. The bigger the goal, the more important the partnerships.
Paula Schneider president and CEO of Susan G. Komen, the leading breast cancer organization, suggests in a Forbes Nonprofit Council post, that nonprofits need to work together for real change. “As much as we’d like to think our nonprofit organizations are uniquely equipped to change the world, we can’t always do it on our own.” She believes “partnerships are an essential part of our existence. It takes everybody rowing in the same direction, tackling each project hand in hand and focusing more on reaching our common goals than on who gets credit for the effort.”
This has proven to be true for The Fedcap Group. To make the kind of systemic changes needed to significantly improve outcomes for our target populations requires strategic partnerships—moving from fractured systems to integrated and seamless pathways to getting the right services at the right time.
Evolution is not always easy—but it is imperative for organizations who want to make a difference.
As individuals in the US are getting ready to celebrate Thanksgiving, I thought I might share some interesting perspectives on gratitude in the workplace.
According to Greater Good Magazine, the practice of gratitude has started to infiltrate workplaces, from new software companies to older institutions like Campbell Soup, whose former CEO wrote 30,000 thank you notes to his employees. Though research on gratitude has exploded over the past two decades, studies of gratitude at work are still somewhat limited. The results so far link it to more positive emotions, less stress and fewer health complaints, a greater sense of confidence in the mission. It also can help us achieve our goals, fewer sick days, and higher satisfaction with our jobs and our coworkers.
Emerging research suggests that gratitude is revolutionary in the workplace, contributing to the kind of workplace environments where employees actually want to come to work and don’t feel like cogs in a machine.
Robert Emmons, author of The Little Book of Gratitude: Creating a Life of Happiness and Well-being by Giving Thanks, and a leading researcher on the subject states “Most of our waking hours are spent on the job, and gratitude, in all its forms, is a basic human requirement.” Emmons highlights that gratitude takes people outside of themselves and to a place that is part of a larger, more intricate network of sustaining relationships that are mutually reciprocal. “In this sense, it, like other social emotions, gratitude functions to help regulate relationships, solidifying and strengthening them,” he says.
Researchers from the London School of Economics, in analysis of 51 companies, found that while financial incentives can backfire when it comes to motivating employees there is overwhelming evidence that gratitude and appreciation are highly effective motivators for staff. They found that 80% of employees are willing to work harder for an appreciative boss.
Expressing gratitude is not difficult, but it does require a small bit of time and intentionality. In this season of thankfulness, I want to express my heartfelt gratitude to the board members, staff, donors, funders and consumers of The Fedcap Group—for their unwavering commitment of time and talent to doing the right thing, in the right way to achieve the right results.
Female entrepreneurs are more likely than their male counterparts to see their loan applications rejected or underfunded, and New York City is launching a program to close the gap.
Evaluation of Pretrial Justice System Reforms that use the Public Safety Assessment.
Everyone who meets me learns fairly quickly that I value structure. I spend a lot of time discussing structure, and I firmly believe that good people fail in the absence of it.
Structure impacts communication, productivity, morale, efficiency, organizational learning and effective knowledge sharing. Well-designed structure promotes growth, drives innovation and provides clarity in roles and expectations.
Companies build new structures for many reasons: a reaction to market shifts, to improve financial performance, to enhance internal collaboration. Industry disruption on a global scale has led to more frequent restructuring–nearly half of all CEOs launch a restructure during their first two years on the job.
At The Fedcap Group’s recent Solution Series on organizational structure, one of our panelists, Mike Sicard, Chairman and CEO of USI Insurance Services emphasized that structure has to follow strategy, and given the complexity of today’s environment, evolving organizational structure looks more like a chocolate chip cookie than the top down, formal hierarchies of the 20th century.
To drive innovation and growth, many companies are moving from 20th century hierarchical, siloed structures to flexible, collaborative structures with flatter networks and fluid, -outcome-focused teams—arranged within the organizational cookie like those chocolate chips. We need to learn how to change, restructure and work with cross-functional teams. The proactive participation of mid-level managers in flatter organizations produces positive outcomes.
Also stressed during our Solution Series was the idea that structure must be in service to strategy. Structure cannot be designed in the absence of understanding long term strategy.
One size does not fit all anymore as John Sutherland points out in European Business Review: “The purpose of structure is to organize your resources in such a way that you are able to deliver your strategy.” To prevent bureaucracy from suffocating innovation, he said, “effective structures bring clarity so that everyone can quickly understand how they are to act and relate to others, internally and externally.”
Today’s leaders understand that innovation is the key to growth and survival, and many believe that structure determines how innovative their organizations can be.
In a world where technology, markets, politics, and economies are in constant flux, one thing is certain: structure that supports strategy results in innovation, productivity and financial performance is the way forward.
Up to 88% of the people arrested in the city will be released without bail while their cases are pending under changes to the state’s criminal justice laws coming on Jan. 1, according to the state Office of Court Administration.
As we honor our veterans today, I am so pleased to invite Colonel David Sutherland, Chairman of Dixon Center for Military and Veterans Services, to be my guest blogger. His experiences and voice are so important for us all to hear.
Diversity and inclusion frequently take a one-size-fits-all approach. For example, recruiting and retention may focus on veterans, as a whole, rather than the divergent qualities that enhance thinking and execution.
It’s ironic that lumping veterans together as a category defined as “diverse” may cause us to ignore the individual characteristics that make them assets to organizations.
I like to say that if you’ve met a veteran, you’ve met “a veteran.” One veteran, one time, each one is unique.
We veterans are more than just the sum of our parts. Yes, Veterans Day is a celebration of an amazing group of people. At the same time, we are remiss in not looking beyond the massed surface and into each one’s experiences and goals.
My wish is for you to get to know us as a unique group of people who have taken a different path to get to this point in our lives, and who may have hit roadblocks on this journey created by their service to our country. Let’s start with three areas key to ensuring that veterans succeed where they live:
This Veterans Day let’s keep in mind that as with people, one size does not fit all. In fact, one size often fits none.
In the age of social media, when anyone with many Friends or a large Twitter following can be considered a thought leader, we need to step back and consider exactly what thought leadership is in the non-profit world, and why it so important for us to develop it to our best advantage. Thought leadership is a way for a brand to position itself as a leader in its field or sector by demonstrating its values, its expertise, and sharing its thinking about the future.
Michael Brenner, recognized as a top marketing influencer by Forbes and by Huffington Post as a top business keynote speaker, believes “thought leadership means you provide the best and deepest answers to your customers’ biggest questions in the formats your audience likes to consume.” To Brenner “authentic thought leadership remains a driving force in successful companies across almost every industry.”
In Business News Daily, Skye Schooley, writing to define thought leadership and why it matters, adds “As a notable expert in a specific company, industry, or society, a thought leader is someone who offers guidance and insight to those around them. In other words, a thought leader has a positive reputation of helping others with their knowledge and insight.”
As Caroline Avakian points out in the Jewish Philanthropy blog: “Thought leadership is not just a PR function. It requires that we have an idea–something to make the world a better place, something that will solve a problem or improve a process.” Organizations can be treasure troves of excellent ideas waiting to be unleashed and shared with the world. These organizations can succeed with limited resources and small or non-existent communications and marketing teams that are allocated to drumming up support in an overcrowded charity marketplace.
An organization’s energy is sometimes focused on elevating a single member of its team to thought leadership status, usually someone high in the hierarchy like the executive director. At The Fedcap Group, conversely, we are totally committed to populating our organization with thought leaders who serve as a collective asset. When we foster a culture of deep learning and train staff in our core philosophy and values, we will develop more ways for thought leadership to become embedded in the DNA of the agency. We recognize that thought leadership can come from any source – executives, customers, product managers, designers, customer service reps, and sales people. We all have knowledge, experience and a point of view. As it permeates the organization, it organically spreads to the community.
Avakian notes, “Thought leadership is arguably the most effective and least expensive way an organization can build awareness, support for ideas, and influence the communities it needs to reach, including decision makers, policy makers and donors.”