Leaders seeking to build excellent, ethical, and enduring organizations engage people more, gain their loyalty, and creativity, and build mutually beneficial relationships with other stakeholders, according to Bob Vanourek and Greg Vanourek, the authors of Triple Crown Leadership (©2012, McGraw Hill). The book shows how to achieve results without cutting corners. It focuses on leadership, not the leader, believing that leadership is a group performance, not a solo act. Their book addresses five practices of triple crown leadership:
- Head and Heart: Most organizations focus on knowledge, skills, and experience—head issues. Triple crown leaders recruit for all that, plus character, emotional intelligence and fit within the organizational culture.
- Colors: Triple crown leaders employ their organizations shared purpose, values, and vision as sacrosanct colors to represent their quest, infusing them into the DNA of the organization.
- Steel and Velvet: Trip crown leadership requires the judgment to flex between the hard and soft edges of leadership, depending on the situation and the people, without being inconsistent.
- Stewards: Inside triple crown organizations, stewards develop and protect the organization’s colors and culture of character.
- Alignment: Triple crown leaders align organizations to achieve peak performance.
A Passion for Giving: Tools and Inspiration for Creating a Charitable Foundation (©2012, John Wiley & Sons), by Peter J. Klein and Angelica Berrie, provides an overview and template to understand the issues involved in managing a private foundation, starting with an engaging narrative that introduces the basics of estate planning, charitable giving, and private foundations. Among the topics the book addresses are: the whys of giving; estate planning and charitable giving; starting and managing a private foundation; investment management; women leading through philanthropy; empowering the next generation of philanthropists; and the journey from doing good to making change. Of particular interest is the advice the book gives to readers on how to evaluate nonprofits that may be the recipients of foundation grants.
The Nonprofit Board Answer Book (©2012, Jossey-Bass), by BoardSource is written as a hands-on guide for nonprofit board members and other nonprofit leaders who are charged with meeting the goals of their organizations. The book addresses 85 questions under the following sections:
- Basic board functions details responsibilities of serving on a nonprofit board, plus the board’s special role in such areas as strategic planning and fundraising;
- Board structure covers topics related to the board’s internal organization, including the appointment of standing committees, the selection of board officers, and the key role played by the board chair;
- Board member selection and development provides practical information on how to recruit, retain, evaluate, and engage board members so that they and the organization benefit from their service;
- Board and committee meetings offers strategies to board members to make the most of their time together, whether in the boardroom or on a retreat;
- Board role as fiduciary tackles the details of safeguarding an organization’s financial assets, as well as the board’s role in budgets, investment, and revenue generation;
- Board-staff relations clarifies the roles filled by staff, with a special emphasis on the board’s responsibility in selecting and adequately compensating the chief executive officer;
- Organizational change addresses issues that often arise as an organization matures, such as how to proceed after the founders are no longer involved, when to consider strategic alliance or merger, and how to keep pace with organizational change.
Managing To Change the World: The Nonprofit Manager’s Guide to Getting Results (©2012, Jossey-Bass) by Alison Green and Jerry Hauser, is a very basic manual with advice and tools that will help nonprofit managers get better results in their work. The book addresses managing the work, managing the people, and managing yourself. Among the topics covered are: effectively managing specific tasks and broader responsibilities; setting clear goals and holding people accountable to them; establishing a results-oriented culture; hiring, developing, and retaining a staff; addressing performance problems; using your time wisely; exercising authority; and maximizing your relationship with your own boss. Sample worksheets are offered throughout.
Asking empowers us, yet it is one of the most underutilized tools we possess. In his book The Answer is Yes But First You Have to Ask (©2012, CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform) Jim Charette explores the power of questions to help deliver more of what we want and need. The book presents a roadmap to improving both business and personal relationships, including case studies and related exercises. Among its key points:
- Asking creates opportunities. Ask for feedback and then inquire as to what you must do in order to get what you want.
- Don’t stop at “no.” Consider it to be just the beginning. View it as the beginning of a negotiation and ask what it would take to get a yes.
- Suspend certain assumptions; don’t let the assumption of a negative response stop you from asking. In other words, don’t say no for them. Assume that you’ll get what you ask for.
- Focus on and listen to the answers. Answers serve you little benefit unless you truly hear them. Sharpen your listening skills to ensure you understand what’s actually said.
- Knowledge alone is not enough; seek to turn it into action. With today’s Internet capabilities, knowledge is abundant. Put your knowledge to good use by taking action with it. Make something happen.