Archive for the ‘Organizational Culture’ Category

Sep

2011

29

Category:

Content, Mindfulness, Organizational Culture

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67 Comments

7 Tips To Help You Focus In Age of Distraction: Are You Content Fried!

Mindmap by Jane Genovese

This morning I learned a new word for information overload – “content fried” from a colleague at the Packard Foundation.    It resonated.    We have so much content in our professional lives.  I’m talking about the stuff we consume daily to keep inform of our professional field.    It comes speeding at us  from our email boxes, social networks, kindles, and even paper and snail mail!     We scan, we browse, we try to thoughtfully read the best stuff, and interact through online conversations.

Then there’s the whole other world of organizational content that you need to consume or create to get stuff done!   Reading, reviewing, commenting,  writing, and editing content.

For those of us who work on social media and networks,   “content fried” is an occupational hazard.  So, it is important for us to incorporate techniques in daily work life that reduce the chances of this happening.

I’m finding that my learning and online work is a fast forward, swimming in the stream experience.   I can’t possibly read everything, but I am using content curation skills to pick out the best stuff to give more attention to.  I find I can only do that work at certain times of the day or only for so long.       The biggest difficulty I experience is the shifting from this forward flowing process of consuming, curating, and sense-making of content to learn versus to get something done.   The latter requires a different type of attention and whole new set of information coping skills.

Howard Rheingold calls this process managing your attention or “Infoattention” and it is what he has been teaching in his courses.    I’ve been trying to curate content that offers  ideas, tips, and resources to get past that ugly feeling of “content fried.”    He curated the above mindmap and when I  shared this  Google + , I discovered that nonprofit colleagues have the same struggle.  I liked this map so much that I printed it out and keep at my desk.

I decided to spend a little bit time reflecting on the diagram and pull out some tips for re-learning focus:

1.)   Manage Your Attention,  Not Just Your Time: Don’t just create a to do list, lay it out on daily and weekly schedule, breaking down key tasks of the project to chunks.  But consider the level of concentration and focus that each type of task or chunk requires – and schedule accordingly.   For example,  if I have to do some writing – that requires a higher level of attention for me than does scanning Twitter or reading and responding to email.     I schedule my writing time during peak concentration hours in the day.   (I’ve charted those – so I  know when they occur).   I also use a timer when I’m doing scanning my networks and time box those activities into 15-20 minute bursts.

2.)  Visualize On Paper: Over the past 10 months,  I’ve made a return to paper and markers and using mind maps or visualization techniques to reflect, plan my week or day.     I use this as a pre-writing exercise as well as a reflection exercise.       It’s why felt the need to dive into visual facilitation and thinking techniques as a way to cope with content fried.

3.)  Establish Rituals: Rituals in your work life are valuable. The mindmap offers a lot of good suggestions for rituals – from decluttering your workspace to healthy habits like sleep and exercise.

4.)  Reflection: Reflection doesn’t have to be a huge amount of time to be effective.   I’m taking ten minutes every morning to practice some visual recording skills like drawing to create my “3 Most Important Things for Today List.”    At the end of the day,  I look at it, reflect on what I did – and plan for tomorrow.       The advice is not to go online or check email until you get your three things done, but that is very hard for me – given so much of my work is online.   What I do is try to avoid email first thing in the morning.

5.)  Managing Email and Other Distractions: I’ve turned off notifications that pop up on my computer screen or send me a text message to my mobile phone.

6.) Managing Physical Space: When I see clutter in my physical work spaces, I try to take that as a sign that I need to hit a pause button.   Usually it is because I’m doing too much.

7.) Just Say No: Maybe you are going to say no to social media for a day and go to meet with people, take a class, read a book, or talk a walk.     When I’m feeling most overwhelmed,  I take a break.   Even if it is just to get up and walk around my desk.

What are your tips to help you focus in an age of distraction?    Are there tips not on the mind map?   Have you read a helpful article or blog recently that helped get more focused?

Sep

2011

21

Category:

Failure, Organizational Culture

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11 Comments

That Was A Spectacular Failure!

On Monday,  I attended Compasspoint’s Nonprofit Day 2011.  The theme was “Inspired Resilience:  How we sustain People, Organizations, and Causes.”    I attended a fantastic workshop facilitated by Michelle Gislason, Senior Project Director, CompassPoint, called “How to Fail Spectacularly (and What You Can Learn from It)”   Here’s a few key takeaways and resources.

  • There are two different views about failure that people in the room who work for nonprofits have – one positive and one negative.  The negatives include:   shame, embarrassment, and guilt.     The positives:  learning, opportunity, and improvement.       The big point is that failure is a not a bad thing if you can reap from insight and learning from it.
  • The process of learning begins with you can admit failure, avoid the stigma – either the voice inside your or if working with a team not to play the blame game – but to reflect on why it happened.   This leads to deeper insights and improvements of what you’re doing.  Michelle shared a story about project she was managing that failed and the insights that it generated.  It was a particularly powerful story because it involved being honest with a funder who had supported the failed project.
  • Failure happens for a lot of reasons – these can include unrealistic expectations, not having a strategy or plan, not doing due diligence or research, or mission creep driven by funding.    These can provide ripe learning experiences.     There is also “intentional failure” – that is a form of risk-taking that leads to innovation.  Often, these may lead to incremental success or dramatic success, but if you don’t take these risks you won’t ever see innovation.      She was not talking about careless failure – but trying something new – as a pilot – and learning from it.   This takes an agile, learning culture.
  • The topic is a hot right now with a couple of recent books and articles.   (I’ve been curating a list on failure and have them here)   Two really good resources:   A new book called “Why Success Always Begins With Failure” by Tim Hartford.    Here’s a post that gives you tip on how to fail in the right way and reap the benefits based on the book.   There is a nonprofit site called “Admitting Failure” that was created by the NGO Engineers Without Borders to avoid having mistakes replicated.
  • We did an exercise in small groups where we reflected on a failure and share it with others.   The exercise is based on failfare.   It was a simple set of questions that can be used to debrief any project and gain insights.    Some nonprofits have instituted their own internal fail fest – like DoSomething.Org

What was the project?
What were you trying to do?
What was the fail?  Where did it go wrong?
What would you do differently?
What would you never do again?
What lessons can be learned?

 

 

 

  • The workshop included some profound and inspirational quotes about failure as well as a humorous play list of songs on the theme of mistakes.

 

How does your organization deal with mistakes and failure?  Blame game or learning?

 

 

Sep

2011

20

Category:

Organizational Culture

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2 Comments

When Culture Eats Your Foundation’s Social Media Strategy for Breakfast

Council on Foundations  

View more presentations from Beth Kanter

Yesterday, I had the honor of facilitating a workshop on culture change and social media at the Council on Foundations Conference for Community Foundations in San Francisco.      John Kobara, Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer, California Community Foundation, was the session designer and introduced the session with a famous quote from Peter Drucker,  ”Culture eats strategy for breakfast.”

Instituting a new strategy that is not within the cultural norms of an organization has a very difficult job being supported by the existing culture.    And working a networked way and using social media requires a shift in mindset – and that’s a change for many nonprofits (and nonprofits.)   My overall advice is embedded in another Drucker quote along the same lines reinforces the struggle, “Company cultures are like country cultures. Never try to change one. Try, instead, to work with what you’ve got.”

Photo by Christine Beddia

I was lucky enough to have 90 minute session and I used my model for sharing content but also using it to leverage a peer discussion that shares insights and experience.    It requires round table set up, a wireless mic, and a good set of reflection questions related to the topics.    The questions we explored were:

  • What needs to change in your foundation in order to scale a networked approach or use of social media?  What’s holding you back?  What move your forward?
  • What does your foundation need to do to open to free agents or how do your grantees need to change?  Is the concept of working with a free agent out of the question for a foundation?
  • What do you need to do less of to make time for social media?
  • How does your foundation translates mistakes or social media strategy that didn’t work into learning and improve what it is doing?   What keeps your organization from learning and improving social media strategy?

How Is The Connected World Changing Your Work?

I started with a story about this crazy world of networks and Facebook is changing our personal relationships and the way we work within organizations.   I asked for examples from the group.     Several participants observed that with recent natural disasters the people they want to provide support to are organizing faster than their institutions through the use of social networks.    This help inspire change.

Does it take a natural disaster to change a culture?

Thankfully no.   But it does take work and a strategy based on behavior patterns and perceptions.  It is also important to expectations.    The magic thinking of “everyone on social networks” may not happen over night.   There has to be a social change process within the organization.

Trust Is Cheaper Than Control:  The Message House

We discussed the importance of a social media policy – not just cutting and pasting from another foundation or nonprofit.  And while almost 1/3 had policies,  there were still questions such as “How do get social media out of the silo of one person’s job description and encourage others to participate.”

Marc Fest from the Knight Foundation shared the story of how they use “Message Houses” – which includes the main bullet points and people can use that as a resource for talking about the Foundation’s work on social networks.  Susie Bowie from the Sarasota County Community Foundation talked about making it easy for people who are not used to tweeting to provide examples they use as a base.

Free Agents and Foundations

I think I was the person to coin the term Free Agent back in 2008 when I first wrote about Shawn Admed’s work.   My book, The Networked Nonprofit, helped shine a lot on the work of many free agents such as Mark Horvath and others round the world.

The Pittsburgh Foundation told an amazing story about “The Pittsburgh Tote Bag Project,”  a project that got launched as a result a single tweet.    Someone was watching a person leave a food pantry with food and vegetables, including cabbage, in a plastic bag.  The bag broke and the cabbage when rolling down the hill with the man chasing after it.   She tweeted,  ”why don’t we provide tote bags to food pantries?”    The Pittsburgh Foundation noticed the tweet and helped with the launch of Tote Bags for Food Pantries where thousands of bags ended up being donated.

Sidney Hargro talked about an effort work with free agents as a philanthropic advisors who connected with the foundation through LinkedIn.

The discussion about failures and mistakes was quite insightful.     The takeaway is that if failure can be connected to learning – that it becomes an opportunity.     As I was headed to a session on Failure at Compasspoint Nonprofit Day in the afternoon – I’ll go into more depth in my next post about failure.

How has your nonprofit or foundation avoiding having your organization’s culture eat your social media strategy?  How have you made able to make change from the inside out?




Sep

2011

08

Category:

Measurement, Organizational Culture

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7 Comments

Data-Informed, Not Data-Driven

Flickr Photo by epsos.de

I saw an interesting post from Eric Petersen called “The Myth of Data-Driven Business” by way of KD Paine’s blog.   It caught my eye because we’ve working on a chapter about  how nonprofits can make the shift to a “data-driven culture.”

Holly Ross at NTEN and I chatted about the myth of data-driven nonprofits  and how this is slightly different with mission-driven organizations.    Some nonprofits consider themselves “data-driven” simply because they collect data (often at the request of funders), but they may not necessarily be collecting the right data!    Collecting data does not equal being data-driven.

Eric Peterson calls out a discussion on “What the C-suite should know about analytics” from Kishore Swaminathan, Accenture’s chief scientist:

“Data is a double-edged sword. When properly used, it can lead to sound and well-informed decisions. When improperly used, the same data can lead not only to poor decisions but to poor decisions made with high confidence that, in turn, could lead to actions that could be erroneous and expensive.”

Eric Petersen says that it requires  a balance, and  leaders should not become slaves to the numbers, but leave room for business knowledge and experience to help them understand and learn.   Eric says that the term being “driven” implies   — “going out of your way to devalue experience, ignore process, and eschew established governance in favor of a new, entirely metrics-powered approach towards decision making. ”

He suggests a new term, “data informed.”

I suggested the phrase  “curiosity-driven.”   That an organization knows the questions to right ask, how to collect the right data to answer those questions.  Above all the organization uses its collective wisdom to making decisions.   That the nonprofit doesn’t  just look at the pretty charts and graphics as if it they tea leaves, but brings multiple lens to understanding how to apply the data.   And, it is part of a process of learning and continuous improvement.  But, Eric’s “data informed” is much better.

What are the myths of being a  ”data-driven” nonprofit?    Is there a better term to describe making decisions based on combining data with organizational experience to learn?

Update:  Cross posted this on Google+ – Conversation Summary

Data-driven and data-informed are two different things and that it is better to be data-informed because you need knowledge to interpret the data.    Being data-driven can lead to a/b testing 40 different shades of blue.     Ian Thorpe from Unicef said:

“Decision makers to have better skills in using data before they are too driven by it. But I also have a theory (but no data to support it) that there are two ways to look at a problem – the first is to analyze data and draw conclusions – the job of an analyst or researcher, the second is to form your opinion by consulting with a diverse network of people whose judgement you trust (including but not limited to analysts) – the second is what most leaders do since they often don’t have the time or skills to do the data analysis themselves – and the social interactions are what helps make sense of the data. I think we actually need a bit of both sorts of decision making.”

Stephen Downes summary of the conversation here

 

Aug

2011

17

Category:

Capacity, Measurement, Organizational Culture

Tags:

13 Comments

How Can Nonprofits Switch to a Data-Informed Culture?

Example of A/B Testing Results

I’ve been reflecting on why some nonprofits do a better job of  measurement and learning, while others do not.  What is the difference?  It comes down to organizational culture.   The nonprofits that embrace measurement have a data-driven culture.  That is they make decisions based on meaningful data, rather than solely by gut.

Not all nonprofits are born with the spreadsheet gene.    And it isn’t simply a technical problem that can be solved through training or purchasing analytics software.   The  challenge has to do with organizational beliefs and work styles.    Whether it be a widely held belief that measurement practice is not worth investing resources.  Or a practice that swings the other away where there is an excessive investment in collecting gobbly gook data to appease a funder.

What is needed for  nonprofit organizations to make this shift?

The Evolutionary Stages of  A Data-Driven Culture

It is helpful to look at making the switch  as an evolutionary process.   In the end, it comes down to leadership.

Dormant: At this stage, the organization does not know where to start.  Does data collection may occur from time-to-time, but not formal reporting.   There are no systems in place, no dashboards or simple collection method.  Staff is often overwhelmed by thought of measurement and the task falls to the bottom of the to do list.     Or there is an emphasis on collecting lots and lots of data, but does not relate it to decision-making.  There not is a reflection process for analyzing success or failure to take into next use or campaign.

Testing and Coordinating: At this stage, the organization is regularly collecting data but in a bunch of different spreadsheets and collected by different people or departments.  Data is focused on the metrics that are specific to social media channel.   It is used to  improve  content, messaging, and engagement on specific channels.  Social media data is not linked to higher level organizational results or mission-driven goals across programs.   Discussions on how to improve results are rarely part of staff meetings.

Scaling and Institutionalizing: Has an organization wide system and dashboard for collecting measurement data that is shared with different departments.    Has different views or level of detail for senior leaders,  implementors, and different departments.    Holds weekly campaign check-ins to evaluate what’s working and what’s not across communications channels, as well as, any specific social media feedback received that would help shape our future campaigns or social media use.   Monitors feedback from target audience in real time but balances with trend or survey data.     Documents quantitative results against goals and value when asked by senior leadership.   Works with measurement consultants or specialists to improve skills and capacity.   Provides training and professional development for staff to learn how to use measurement tools.

Empowering: Sets organization wide key results areas and key performance indicators that are used across programs.   Has a staff position responsible for stewarding organization’s data, but staff are empowered to check and apply their own data.    In addition to weekly check-ins, the organizational dashboard includes  key performance metrics related to goals as well as more detailed metrics.  The organizational dashboard is shared across departments and there is a process for analyzing, discussing, and applying results.  They use data visualization techniques to report the data analysis but also to reflect on best practices culled from the data.

There is a regular report to senior leadership which details high level successes, challenges, and recommendations for moving forward.    Staff performance reviews incorporate how well the organization is doing on KPIs.  Works with measurement consultants or specialists to improve skills and capacity or to commission independent study and provides training and professional development for staff.    Celebrates successes by sharing measurement data across the organization.

DoSomething.Org: A Data-Driven Nonprofit In Action

DoSomething.Org is most definitely moving into the “Empowering Stage”  and are leaders in the non-profit world for exhibiting the characteristics and work habits of a data-driven organization.    Look at their approach to social media measurement in this terrific slide show by George Weiner, CTO, at DoSomething.Org called “What Does The Data Say.”   Despite being a relatively small nonprofit, they have a “Data Analyst” on staff, Bob Filbin.      What makes an organization to make this kind of investment in being data-driven?

It has to do with leadership.   Their Board, which is dominated by leaders in the tech field including Reid Hoffman, co-founder of Linked-In, and Raj Kapoor, co-founder of Snapfish, are all staunchly behind the philosophy of  ”The future of the web is data.”

The board supports the organization’s orientation towards using tech and data to realize its mission.   CEO  Nancy Lublin was  the driving force for hiring a data analyst and leading the charge for DoSomthing.Org to become a poster child for a data-driven nonprofit.

So, what does a data analyst do at a nonprofit?  It is more than hiring someone who knows how to program formulas in Excel spreadsheets.  Bob’s  job is to make sure that  departmental and overall organizational goals are aligned, and that social media data are seamlessly integrated into achieving their  organizational key results.

Bob’s responsibility is less to provide fish to staff, but more to teach them how to fish.   “My goal is to make sure that every person on staff has access to the data they need in order to create actionable changes in the way they do their programs. Ideally, each person will receive the data they need with automated dashboards that have different levels of detail and ladder up to organizational results.”

One of the biggest barriers in nonprofits for staff is finding time to devote to rigor and discipline measurement.  The time to collect data, the time to analyze, and the time to action on it.   Bob concurs.  ”DoSomething.Org understands the value of data-driven social change and has backed that up by creating a “data team” of three staff people.  For the past month-and-a-half, I’ve been working organizing our data collection, storage, analysis, and dissemination efforts.  Unless someone is put in charge of data, and it’s a key part of their job description, accelerating along the path towards flying is going to be hard, if not impossible.”

Bob points out the secret is to not to collect more data, but smarter data.   He says, “Just in case data collection can get in the way of achieving goals because it is wasted energy and time.  I am working with each department to make sure departmental  all data collection supports decision-making. ”

Do.Something is integrates critical metrics from social media,  e-mail, SMS, and Web.    They don’t just count the data, they use it to improve their tactics.    Says Bob, “DoSomething.Org uses A/B testing, where people can be randomly assigned to get different messages simultaneously. ”  This fall, DoSomething.org will start a push to acquire members via mobile phone, and A/B testing will be a crucial part of figuring out how to keep those new members engaged.  (The graph above is an example.)

Bob likes to quote Hal Varian, Chief Economist at Google,     “I keep saying that the sexy job in the next 10 years will be statisticians,” to others on the DoSomething.Org staff.  He thinks the business world is moving in the direction of more data analysis. “With the advent of social technology, we are facing an avalanche of data. The goal is to be able to sift through it, and find the diamonds in the rough on how to improve organizational effectiveness. That’s where statisticians, or data analysts, come in.   Non-profits know this is true, but the problem is investing in the resources needed to become a data-driven non-profits.”

Bob also believes that part of the problem moving away from making decisions by “gut” feelings, or intuition.  Bob says, “The data should tell us whether or not the program is effective.”

To make the shift, Bob suggests using small wins and share an example from an analysis on Facebook Ads for an event sign up.  ”We discovered the conversion rate was very low because we directed people to an external site (our web site) versus a sign up on Facebook.”   This insight will help use Facebook ads more effectively the next time around.”

Bob also talks about how to overcome resistance on staff to using data for decisions.  ”Your reports should be presented in a way that seeks to avoid bruised egos. Rather than bringing a number to a meeting, people should be reviewing their own statistics and data.     This is part of what I am doing at Do Something – closing the data loop. Making sure each department can access its data to answer their questions.”

Tips for Making the Switch

Culture is an organization’s operating patterns of behavior, activities, and attitudes, influenced by a shared set of values and beliefs that characterize the way people work together.  Changing a nonprofit culture isn’t as simple as
identifying the new ways of working you want to see or articulating a new set of beliefs and values associated with them.   Most people won’t change their behaviors until they observe the role models in their organization acting
differently as DoSomething.Org has done.   Also, when new behavior is positively recognized and rewarded — job promotions or some praise from the top of the organization –  change begins to happen.

1. Start at the top. Does your Executive Director know where the organization stands?  Educate through examples – showing how adding a data-driven approach to your social media can avoid ineffective campaigns and increase audience satisfaction.  The organization’s leadership needs to model and encourage a data-driven approach.

2.  Make the case to improve your measurement practice. The only way to evolve is through implementing a series of social media measurement pilots and small data wins.        Keep the end in mind when agreeing to how experiments will be structured, run, and measured.

3. Think big, but take baby steps. Start with looking at Key Result areas and key performance indicators, but since these may outcomes deal with long-term changes, you can’t get there overnight.  Keep the steps in the plan small and manageable.   Use measurement pilots.

4.  Share stories: Celebrate every bar graph that leads to a program or campaign victory.    Share it at staff meetings.    Also circulate stories about other nonprofits that have  become data-driven success stories.

Does your nonprofit have a data-driven culture?  How are you making the shift?  Where does social media measurement fall in that mix?

I’m working on a book with KD Paine about social media, networked nonprofits, and measurement.    Have a story to share?  Let me know in the comments.  You could be in the book!

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