CompassPoints of View

Earlier this month, I had the great fortune to participate in a multi-day retreat with other consultants and faculty members from the Move to End Violence Initiative, a 10-year initiative of the NoVo Foundation that is designed to strengthen sector leaders’ collective capacity to end violence against girls and women in the United States.  The learning and reflective time I spent with these strategists and capacity builders made me think about some questions (among many!) we’ve been exploring in our leadership work at CompassPoint: What does leadership really look like beyond the individual or the organization? If you’re a leader working on the network, field, or even movement level – what types of skills, support, and experiences would best serve you?  

One of my favorite days of the year is “Fall Back” day, when we all get to sleep an extra hour as a result of the end of Daylight Saving Time. One of my least favorite days – you guessed it – is “Spring Forward” day which marks the beginning of Daylight Saving Time and a loss of an hour. This year I’ve decided to have a better attitude toward “Spring Forward,” which is March 11.  After all, it marks a time of the year when the days are getting longer, and, at least here in California, we are surrounded by color and fragrance as everything starts to bloom—daffodils, ceanothus, Scotch broom (apologies to those with allergies and the Native Plant people), camellia, azalea, jasmine, and the list goes on. Also, we can’t really complain about losing an hour when we gained a whole day from Leap Year!

How can we use the energy of “Spring Forward” to get a jumpstart on fundraising? Here are three tips:

On Tuesday, while you were sending cards and flowers and expressing affection for your loved ones, you were also enjoying taxes.

You were walking on roads built by taxes and eating at restaurants monitored for cleanliness by taxes. And maybe your kids were going to a school supported by taxes. San Francisco City Hall, where San Franciscans sang “I Left My Heart in San Francisco” to Tony Bennett on Tuesday, was paid for by taxes. So here at CompassPoint and NonprofitsTalkingTaxes, we decided to send a little love to taxes with the “Love It, Fund It” campaign.

For eleven years I led CompassPoint’s Executive Transition (ET) program, helping organizations and leaders to plan and execute effective leadership transitions. In 2010, I participated in one of the toughest transitions I have ever worked on: my own. While I wasn’t the Executive Director (ED) or CEO of CompassPoint, I was a long-time senior manager, so my situation has some parallels to an ED departure. Did I learn anything new from my own transition process? Did I practice what I preach to organizations and leaders about transition planning? Yes and yes, and here’s my story.