Through the Noise recently spoke with Jeff De Cagna, Executive Advisor at Foresight First LLC, to discuss the way you think about board recruitment, management, and collaboration. Listen below or check out the full library of podcasts here.

Podcast Description: This podcast discusses how nonprofit organizations might be missing a crucial opportunity for growth and relevance by underutilizing their boards. Jeff De Cagna is an author, speaker and advisor for associations and non-profit organizations across North America and around the world with decades of experience under his belt.

Foresight First LLC is a governing orientation that provides actionable insights on plausible futures by challenging association and non-profit boards to deal productively with the past so they can focus their attention on the future and pursue the generative work of transformation. To learn more about Foresight First LLC, visit their website at www.foresightfirst.io.

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Nonprofits tend to attract strong leaders with high aspirations and an unparalleled focus. But without step-by-step workflow procedures, consistent communication or designated responsibilities, even the strongest of leaders won’t be able to improve upon their organization’s effectiveness.

Utilize these 4 methods to create a more balanced and productive workplace:
 

1. Identify both short and long-term priorities. Creating measurable goals will help your nonprofit measure progress on an annual basis, allowing you to determine where your strengths and weaknesses lie. Prioritizing these goals will keep everyone on the same page and help accomplish objectives at a more efficient pace.
2. Break down communication barriers. Share your organization’s priorities with all employees whilst ensuring that their current roles contribute to each goal. Don’t forget to encourage cross-department communication to achieve faster, consistent results.
3. Assign responsibilities so employees maintain ownership. Because employees spend more time and energy devoted to tasks that they’re solely responsible for, give your team members individual responsibilities that directly impact your nonprofit’s goals. This will help alleviate any confusion when employees are determining who’s in charge of what.
4. Clearly define the work processes. Taking the time to carefully articulate the work procedures will improve consistency and time management. Because your employees will be fully versed in the new processes, they will make less mistakes and develop a greater confidence in their work ethic.

As a nonprofit leader, you have the power to portray change as a necessary evil or an ongoing opportunity. By setting a positive example and carefully managing both your nonprofit’s goals and employees, you can encourage your staff to constantly challenge themselves and broaden their skill sets—increasing overall organizational effectiveness.

Learn more about how to improve leadership and management practices here.

Your nonprofit may have the time, mentors and training courses needed to mold up-and-coming leaders, but do you have a plan of action that takes full advantage of this developmental support system?

Setting measurable goals and creating systematic procedures for leadership development programs will enable you to address leadership skill gaps at a more efficient pace. Follow these 4 steps to implement an effective leadership development plan, while gaining support from your current management team:
 

1. Get your Board and other Decision-Makers involved. Have your executive staff participate in the brainstorming process when creating leadership development procedures. If your Board members make leadership strategy a priority, and clearly communicate their expectations, your team can better identify and work toward future leadership objectives.
2. Identify your leadership strengths and weaknesses. Having a firm understanding of your nonprofit’s mission and organizational priorities is crucial when identifying skill gaps. Once you decide what future leadership capabilities are required, you can begin training internally and/or seeking new leadership candidates.
3. Continuously raise the bar and increase task ownership. Prospective leaders will accrue most of their knowledge and skills through hands-on learning, rather than formal training. Therefore, you must provide consistent assignments that test their leadership competency by taking them out of their comfort zone and creating a greater sense of accountability. Don’t forget to provide ongoing feedback and recognize their successes.
4. Review and improve procedures when necessary. Like your leadership candidates, development procedures must be carefully monitored and evaluated. Leadership development plans are often intricate—continue to tweak them so they meet your nonprofit’s specific needs. Taking the time to measure your procedures’ effectiveness, and edit when necessary, will help you build prospective pool of future leaders.

Discover more methods on how to create future leaders here.

If your Executive Director/CEO, CFO or COO suddenly couldn’t show up to work, would your organization be prepared?

Sometimes it’s sudden, like an accident or health crisis, and other times it’s simply a short term window to prepare for a leader leaving—but it is always important to have a backup plan when it comes to a leader’s absence.

It’s called emergency succession planning, and it’s critical to your organization’s survival.

Like any good emergency plan (think of those fire drills as a kid in school) – there should be clearly laid out steps to your emergency succession plan.  Ready to stop, drop, and roll?  Here are some basic elements to any good leader succession plan:
 

1. Identify the key responsibilities and functions of the position that would need to be taken over in an emergency loss of a leader.
2. Who are the people/titles internally who would take over these functions in the interim? Is it one person or multiple?
3. Create a training and orientation plan for these backups.
4. Who will the Acting CEO be? Consider whether an Interim CEO would be best for the coming 6-18 months and how you would recruit that role. Best practice states that the Interim CEO should not be an internal employee, so they can be a voice of neutrality for other employees and provide an outside perspective to identify opportunities for improvement.
5. Determine what the Board’s role in the process will be. How will they be involved in selecting a new CEO, and how will they support the new CEO and the onboarding process?
6. Have the emergency succession plan reviewed and adopted by your Board.

Learn more about emergency succession planning in this report.

Bad habits can be contagious

Even your strongest staff members can be negatively influenced when working with bad employees. Pairing others with someone who is unmotivated and performing inadequately can cause a domino effect of poor performance—making the overall business suffer.

Poor employees could chase away top performers

Top tier employees want to work with others who are just as driven and focused as they are. When talented workers see poor behavior or lack of contribution go unnoticed, they will begin looking for alternative job opportunities—ones where they can work with other high performers and feel more appreciated.

Low performers take up valuable space

By keeping low performing employees, you could be missing out on a new crop of talent. But how can you hire these rockstar candidates if there are no available roles at your organization? Making room for strong individuals who are willing to take initiative and contribute to the team is imperative when building a strong organizational foundation.

Because nonprofits often work with limited budgets and resources, developing and retaining a top-notch staff is key to successfully attaining mission objectives. And while it’s never an easy task to fire a bad employee, you’re doing what’s necessary as a leader to keep your organization moving forward.

Learn more about talent development strategies here.