Beth Kanter

What We Find
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Attending a Middle School Open House the other day a teacher of humanities was sharing research tips he provided to his students.  One piece of advice was to add .edu or .gov to the end of a Google search.  The Google results are sorted with a preference for primary sources that are generated through universities and government archives for example.  The addition of these internet domains removes much of the paid for placement results that often fill the first couple pages.  The difference in the quality of information is transformative.  Nonprofit social media guru Beth Kanter addressed the move to create a .NGO designation in an blog post at the end of last year.  How would that change the way the social sector interacts?  How might it impact your cause?  What search results might be available that have not been easily run before?  Are you ready?

Where to Start?

The more I read of Beth Kanter and Allison Fine’s, The Networked Nonprofit the more organizations that come to mind who would be well served by its resources and information.  I especially like the idea of capturing free agents (people working outside an organization who work on mobilizing support for a cause). We all know people who are connectors.  Those individuals who posses an innate ability to network every moment of the day and do so in an authentic manner.  Developing strategies to assist these free agents promote your enterprise is a powerful experience with a high return on investment.  I highly recommend Beth and Allison’s book. 

Headlines from BoardSource Leadership Forum

I arrived home from the BoardSource Leadership Forum last night, by the far the best nonprofit conference I attend each year.  Many new ideas, trends and conversations which I will share in the coming weeks.  Beth Kanter, the social media guru shared a great presentation that reminded all of us that a social media policy is now a leading practice.  Maya Enista from Mobilize.org was a compelling spokesperson for the Millennials.  She reminded us to give full status to our younger board members, “I would not want to be somebody’s boyfriend a quarter of the time so why would I want to serve as a junior board member with limited rights?”  R Todd Johnson from Jones Day is on the leading edge of the movement which is designing new entities.  L3C Corporations, B Corps, Benefit Corporations and a Flexible Benefit Corporation model being implemented in California are all beginning to take form in the space between the social and corporate sectors.  Lastly, BoardSource just released its Governance Index. Highlights of the index show that the average size of a board is 16, 70% of the organization’s surveyed have term limits, and the average tenure of a board member is 7.2 years.  Of course, BoardSource would immediately say, “if you have seen one board, you have seen one board.”