Failing to Succeed
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One of my great joys is receiving updates from individuals and causes with whom I have partnered.  I always hearing updates on their latest adventure.  Often these get-togethers include tales of new summits climbed and being lost in valleys of disorientation.  What I treasurer is the maps that each cause creates to find their own way.  Sometimes these adventures include finding a resource that is particularly relevant to their situation.


My friend Tara founded the remarkable enterprise, Create Common Good. When we met yesterday, she recommended the book Little Bets, by Peter Sims which I immediately started reading.  Peter suggests that many of the most entrepreneurial individuals look at opportunity through the lens of what they could afford to lose and not solely by thinking about what could be gained.  He points out that even the largest enterprises that continue to maintain their entrepreneurial spirit make little bets constantly.  A pitfall for those that gain a little success is that they being to focus only on big bets.

“There’s a natural tendency to think in terms of bigger bets as you get to be bigger”

Peter’s book explores some of the most successful individuals who continue to make small bets constantly before finding one success among many failures.  Comedian Chris Rock takes to a small comedy club stage with a notepad of bits that are very much in draft form and tries little pieces of his act many times before ever stepping in front of an HBO camera.  He is their to fail repeatedly but he is looking for the few lines that produce the laughter that seems to follow him everywhere when he takes his act to the big stage.


Tara’s cause, Create Common Good has been taking little bets for more than three years in its current form.  She knew that there was an amazing opportunity to serve and incorporate individuals and families from the local refugee population into the community.  The evolution of Create Common Good’s program is remarkable but was certainly not one that could be mapped out when they started.  It was only with this trial and error approach that they found themselves with a model that is now being recruited to other towns across the nation.  It is important to recognize the donors and volunteers who were equally willing to make little bets with their contributions.   They also recognized that there was a way to develop a partnership between those who needed the most support but in many ways had the most to offer the community in return.


What type of bets are you taking?  How does your enterprise respond to success and failure?  What is the best little bet your cause has ever made?

Intern

If your enterprise is committed to a stated purpose and authentic in its actions, people will want to work with you.  They will actually line-up and offer their services.  Imagine if there was a waiting list to be a board member or volunteer for your cause.  I recently came across David’s webpage in which he outlines why he would be an ideal intern for Khan Academy.  He starts by sharing his belief and then outlines his talent.


Who is stepping-up to join your cause?  Why?

Swarm & Blast


One of the gifts of watching FC Barcelona play was the patience they showed.  Often the player who made an unselfish pass early the sequence would be rewarded with a scoring opportunity from just a few meters from the goal.  This contrasts with the soccer I played in the states.  There was a propensity for all the players to gather around the ball as if they were a swarm of bees.  Inevitably somebody would take a shot on goal from just inside the penalty area.  The chance of success where marginal and the results were often discouraging.  This contrasts to the ball-control and certainty about ones role exhibited by a professional futbol team.  Just when you thought a player must shoot, he was able to manufacture a pass that lead to a high percentage scoring chance.  The ability to honor the duties that came with playing a specific postion kept the team spread out across the offensive side of the pitch and made them so hard to defend.


I believe the same is true for all of us.  When we swarm and blast we are desperate.  However, if we stay true to our purpose the results can be electric.

Renewing with Purpose
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Three calls in the past week have started with appeals to make year-end financial donations.  Each was from a causes that I have previously supported.  I assume most of you have received some of your own.  The quickest way for an organizations to alienate me is to inform me that they are sending a pledge form in the mail to my home address even when I have made it clear that I will consider renewing but I am not prepared to make commitment at this time.  A pledge is a contract with the cause that I intend to make a philanthropic gift.  It is more than a gesture and under some interpretations a pledge represents a legal obligation.  Now you rarely hear of a nonprofit organization taking a donor to the collection agency to make good on a pledge if circumstances or inclinations change but once a pledge is signed and returned it must be reported on the nonprofit’s tax return for the current fiscal year.  I readily encourage causes to send me information or even a reminder but a pledge card suggests we have an agreement.  I have seen data that the conversion rate on pledge cards is much higher than just mailing a donor card.  I would suggest that if your campaign is based on trolling for anyone with a credit cards number who has had a previous interaction with your cause then you are preaching to the uninspired.  However, if you have a relationship and gain permission then you are asking your fans to add to their investment.  


Sports fans who hold season tickets make a critical decision every year.  They receive a window of time in which to renew their tickets.  If the only time the fan hears from the team is around renewal time, the relationships is most likely transactional.  If however, the fan is connected to the players and identifies with what the team stands for then it takes extenuating circumstances to keep a fan from renewing.


Do you have fans or are you relying on sleight of hand?



Make it Yours

Why do so many causes mirror their competition and partners?  I received four end-of-the-year appeal letters this week that all started with the same opening line.  At the airport this morning a person told me all the facts and figures about the nonprofit they serve.  When I asked them how it compared to similar enterprises in their community, this inspired individual told me many more facts and figures.  I immediately recalled attempting to select a new mobile phone number this week.  The phone company representative who I was speaking with offered numerous four digit options in rapid fire.  I could not even write the numbers down since they came so quickly.  Finally, the agent suggested one that seemed easy to grasp.  This was not remarkable, it was simply convenient.


My focus is to inspire causes to create their identity theirs and not be defined by your neighbors metrics.  Own your purpose and wear it.  Tell me what you believe and then have the facts and figures to answer my specific questions.  Be authentic, insist your enterprise’s actions are consistent with the cause’s stated purpose.  Why overwhelm those who are being introduced to your cause with bizarre.  Most house tours I have received do not start out with the owner stating the framing was 2″ x 6″.  They talk about how the home serves their lifestyle.  Guests should be able to see, feel, touch, and feel an organization’s vibe.  Create an environment that brings forth your best ideas.  If that means assembling in front of a campfire in folding camping chairs then bring the marshmallows.  Duplication simply folds you into the batter and you are destine for a cookie cutter.  Please stand out, we need the inspiration you generate!   

I am Sorry

Yesterday I turned off our cable TV service (keeping our broadband internet) and returned the equipment to the cable provider.  As I placed the digital cable box on the office counter the cable company representative said, ‘I am sorry.’  Sorry about what I thought?  Sorry that I am customizing the service to meet my needs?  Sorry that I will paying less money? The sorry was intended for the cable company, not me as a customer.  When a client interacts with our enterprise and we may have expectations about their needs that are not in alignment with the customer’s intentions.  We apologize or become frustrated when we believe they are not getting maximum value from our cause.  Yet in may be that they are receiving everything they desire and our sorry is misplaced and possibly awkward.

How do you measure and gauge your client’s needs?

Guarantee

What guarantee do you place on your services?  Will you go back and fix that which broke?  Will you offer free hours of professional services to take a client to their best level?  Do you accept returns and for how long?  How do you measure level of satisfaction and is it yours or your customer’s?  Patagonia’s commitment to their fans is well stated in their recent Common Threads campaign.

Responsibility

The price of greatness is responsibility

~ Winston Churchill

Many of my transformational moments have come when somebody provides not only feedback but a suggestion on how to improve.  Their advice was an investment in my growth and formed a partnership.  It is easy for us to lob a complaint at any entity using a customer feedback form and hope for some form of acknowledgement or even a token of good-will.  Rarely do we take the responsibility of providing a solution.  A recommended improvement offers an actionable course by which we can measure growth.  Just saying, ‘don’t do that again’ cuts off many other options and limits dialogue.  Reading the New Yorker article on the origins of the Occupy Wall Street movement, I was intrigued by the following summation.
“But, in the end, the point of Occupy Wall Street is not its platform so much as its form: people sit down and hash things out instead of passing their complaints on to Washington. “We are our demands,” as the slogan goes. And horizontalism seems made for this moment. It relies on people forming loose connections quickly.”
It makes me wonder how many complaints could have been rephrased as suggestions?  How many times could I have offered a reasonable and unique solution to a problem?  How easy is it for me to yell into the wind and assume a concert hall audience is listening?  Perhaps the greatest responsibility comes in taking the first step to correct that which can be fixed.