The Media and Democracy Coalition and the Alliance for Justice will host a call on February 16th at 3 p.m. EST to discuss the recently released publication Influencing Public Policy in the Digital Age: The Law of Online Lobbying and Election Related Activities. Download the publication here. This publication is a valuable resource to help nonprofits navigate IRS and FEC laws while establishing their presence online. Join us to learn about industry best practices and ensure your organization is being diligent to avoid IRS challenges for your nonprofit.

This call is recommended for Executive Directors, Communication Specialists, Online Organizers and anyone with control over the organizations online presence of 501(c)3 and 501(c)4 organizations to understand legal implications for online communications including websites, social media, and outreach.

Please join the Media and Democracy Coalition and the Alliance for Justice for a conference call on: Feb 16, 2012 at 3pm est/12pm pst.This call will last 45-60 minutes. Please invite interested parties and allies.

RSVP for call information and email reminders

Trine Bech, Founder and Executive Director of the Vermont Parent Representation Center speaks with Common Good Vermont about the importance of data driven management for nonprofit organizations.

Trine is a champion of Results Based Accountability and has extensive experience with the designing and implementing systems for measuring the effectiveness of social service programs in support of child abuse prevention. Trine admits that she is “addicted” to Results Based Accountability and provides consultation on this topic.

Privacy Policies for Non-profits: A Sample and Resources

Shared by Notations on Nonprofits (Free)

L3Cs: The Hybrid Way to Do Well by Doing Good

Shared by InterSector Partners, L3C (Free)

FIO Partners Assessment Tool: Board Survey for Established Organizations ($25)  Shared by FIO Partners, LLC

FIO Partners Assessment Tool: Board Survey for Start-Up Organizations ($12.50)  Shared by FIO Partners, LLC

The Executive Director Report

Shared by Nonprofit Management Services, LLC (Free)

Principles and Practices for Nonprofit Excellence

Shared by Montana Nonprofit Association (Free)

This year marks Common Good Vermont’s third annual Vermont Nonprofit Day, a unique opportunity for nonprofit organizations, activists and community leaders from across the state and to unify across sectors and raise awareness about the crucial role we play in supporting communities, strengthening our economy and making Vermont a better place to live.

When you attend the Vermont Nonprofit Legislative Day you can:

• Educate lawmakers and state leaders about the positive impact of Vermont’s nonprofit sector and unify with other nonprofits from around the state to demonstrate why your work matters.
• Learn advocacy best practices from professional organizers, legislators and meet with the Governor to discuss the challenges facing Vermont nonprofits.
• Network with nonprofit colleagues, funders, legislative staff and the most connected and influential people in the state.

This Toolkit will help assist you in making the most out of this year’s Nonprofit Legislative Day. We hope you find the tips helpful and can act on them. (Thanks to the Main Association of Nonprofits for help with this!)

> GET STARTED

1. SIGN UP TO TESTIFY AT A HOUSE OR SENATE COMMITTEE

We are looking for nonprofit leaders who wish to make their work known by testifying in Legislative Committees on February 9th. Testifiers will be coached throughout the process. This is a great opportunity to get your name, organization and cause on legislator’s radar. If you do not want to testify, please think about committees that you would be interested in sitting in on as a witness. If you are interested in testifying, please contact Nick Carter of Common Good Vermont, (802) 862 – 1645 ext.21

2. CONTACT YOUR LEGISLATORS

•  Identify legislators of interest to your nonprofit: Keep in mind the district of a legislator and what committees they’re on. Find them with this Vermont Legislative Directory
•   Set up a meeting with your legislator(s) for February 9^th: Use the Lunch break, from 12:00 p.m. – 1 p.m. to schedule your one-on-one meeting!  *** You can use the Call/ Email script below to set up your meeting.

3. BRUSH UP ON YOUR COMMUNICATIONS SKILLS

• Watch the informational videos and read up on the Legislative Blueprint for Success here http://blog.commongoodvt.org/2011/09/16training-vt-lobbying-bootcamp-11/
•  Reflect on your legislative priorities. What bills are up this year that could impact your organization and cause? Prepare your message thoughtfully and succinctly.

4. SPREAD THE WORD

Let them know you’re coming! A major component of Legislative Day is the demonstration of the importance of the work we do to the well being of Vermont. Let’s show lawmakers, the press and the public that the nonprofit sector is strong and united! Here are some strategies for raising awareness about Vermont Nonprofit Legislative Day.

Prior to the event

• Tell colleagues, volunteers, funders and friends about Nonprofit Legislative Day 2012!  A strong turnout is key so please help spread the word about this inclusive event. Use the copy for E-mail Blasts that we’ve provided, below.
• Send a Press Release or Write an Op-Ed notifying the media of your involvement with Nonprofit Legislative Day 2012 and the importance of Vermont’s nonprofit sector!  You’ve got some solid tips for Writing an Op-Ed piece, below. For additional Op-Ed pieces see the North Carolina Association of Nonprofits examples.
• Get Busy on Social Media! Let your friends know you’re coming, become a fan @ www.facebook.com/CommonGoodVT.org, follow twitter.com/commongoodvt  Use the hashtag #npvt and let your friends and Twitter followers know you’re coming on February 9^th.

On the day: February 9^th

• Bring a Camera and take pictures.
• Upload pictures to Flickr and add the tag: npvt
• Share the link of your slideshow with your constituents, funders, volunteers and friends via Facebook and Twitter.

> WAYS TO CONTACT YOUR LEGISLATORS

1. FIND THEM: You can find your Legislator(s) from your community or subject area here at the VT Legislative Directory

2. CALL THEM

Hello (Representative/Senator NAME,

I’m calling in honor of Vermont Nonprofit Legislative  Day, which is coming up on February 9th.

• I will be attending the events taking place in Room 10 and testifying at a committee on the day (if applicable)

• I would like to set up a meeting with you during lunch while I’m in the state house on February 9th.

• We also want to invite you to Room 10 in the state house at 1:30 p.m. for a panel discussion on how to be effective in the Legislator at 1:30 p.m.  Peter Gilbert will also be reading a devotional on behalf of the nonprofit sector at 1:00 p.m. In the House Chamber.

3. EMAIL THEM (But Phone is best!)

Dear (Representative/Senator) NAME,

I’ll be in the State House from ___ to ____ and I would love to set up a time to meet with you to share [ORG NAME’s] goals for 2012, which include [GOALS]. I will follow up with a phone call to see if we can choose a specific meeting time.

I am [NAME], [TITLE] at [ORG] and I will be attending the 3^rd Annual Vermont Nonprofit Legislative Day events on Thursday, February 9^th at the State House. The goal of Nonprofit Legislative Day, coordinated by Common Good Vermont, is to raise awareness for the varied and deep contributions nonprofits make to Vermont’s economy and quality of life, and we are proud to be a part of this important sector.

I’ll be in the State House from ___ to ____ and I would love to set up a time to meet with you to share [ORG NAME’s] goals for 2012, which include [GOALS]. I will follow up with a phone call to see if we can choose a specific meeting time.

Vermont’s nonprofits sector accounts for $4.1 billion in revenue for the state of Vermont. Providing a wide variety of services including job training and adult learning, early child care, crime prevention environmental stewardship and advancements in renewable energy, Vermont nonprofits are absolutely vital to our all of our well being. The nonprofit sector is a huge contributor to the economy, making up 18.7% of Vermont’s Gross State Product.

We are proud to join with Common Good Vermont for Vermont Nonprofit Legislative Day on February 9^th.

Thank you for your time and for your service to the State of Vermont.

Sincerely, NAME/ TITLE/ORGANIZATION/ PHONE – EMAIL

> TIPS FOR YOUR ONE-ON-ONE VISIT

Start on time. Be prepared, and polite. Concisely introducing your organization. Include the following information: o Who you are

• What your organization does
• What you need from your legislator
• A reference to the fact sheet you have prepared

If they are at your facility, consider arranging a short activity that will showcase the work of your organization and allow your legislator to see your staff or volunteers in action.

• Don’t attack the legislator for his/her record on your issue(s), and don’t disparage government or politics.
• Don’t use technical terms or acronyms, unless you are certain that your legislator will understand them.
• If you don’t know the answer to a question, say you’ll find out and get back to him/her – and follow through.
• Before s/he leaves, ask how you can be of help to him/her.
• Thank him/her for his/her time. SEND A THANK YOU NOTE!

> TIPS FOR TESTIFYING AT A LEGISLATIVE COMMITTEE

1. BE RELEVANT: Be sure to check your respective committee agenda as frequently as possible to get a good sense of what they will be discussing that day. http://www.leg.state.vt.us/Committee01.cfm

2. BE PUNCTUAL: Arrive on time. Be prepared, and polite. You will be asked to sit at the table with the Committee members. Thank the Chair (know their name) for making time for your presentation.

3. IDENTIFY YOURSELF: When speaking: State your name, position and organization. Concisely state your mission and what you will cover. Then cover it. Written notes will help you to keep on track. Don’t hesitate to speak slowly.

4. TALKING POINTS:

• State Why you are here: You are one of more than 100 nonprofit leaders attending the third Annual Nonprofit Legislative Day, hosted by Common Good Vermont. The purpose of the day is to highlight the important work that we are doing as individual organizations and as a whole to improve the well being of our state. (See Quick Facts about VT NPO Sector, below).
• Clarify What you are talking about: It is ideal if you have comments on a particular bill that the Committee is considering. Otherwise, briefly describe what your organization does and how your work benefits Vermont.
• Define What you need from Legislators: Be clear about your ask if you have one.
•  Leave your Fact Sheet or Written Copy of your Comments: Pass our your Fact Sheet (See Sample below). Bullet Points that describe your proposal, what will change, what action you want the legislators to take, how to get in touch with you. Or share a written copy of your comments. Be sure to include your contact information.
• Watch out For: Avoid acronymns and technical terms and be sure to define key concepts. Not all Legislators may warm to your cause, so watch emotional responses and/or speaking to individual Legislator’s records. Don’t disparage government or politics.
• Thank Them/ Offer to Be of Service: Be sure to thank the Chair and Committee for their time and ask if you can be of help and let them know that you are available as a resource.

5. IF THERE ARE QUESTIONS: Answer succinctly. If you don’t know, simply tell them you will get back to them with the answer (and be sure to do so).

6. SEND A THANK YOU NOTE. Do this within two days of testifying.

> ADDITIONAL RESOURCES

• Vermont Public Radio’s Live Coverage from the State House
  http://www.vpr.net/listen/stream/
• VTDigger.org Independent Investigative News
  www.VTDigger.org
• Common Good Vermont Advocacy Resources & Talking Points
  http://blog.commongoodvt.org/2011/01/legislativedayresources2011/

• Richard Ting, SVP, Executive Creative Director of R/GA’s Mobile and Social Platforms Group http://www.flytip.com/
• Liz Gerber, founder and Director of Design for America http://www.creativeactionlab.com/

• Jay Peak Resort
• My Web Grocer
• Select Design
• Green Mountain Coffee Roasters
• The Burlington Free Press

More Money Next Year, Part 1 – Shared by Karen Eber Davis Consulting (Free)

FIO Partners Assessment Tool: Climate Survey – Shared by FIO Partners, LLC ($25)

Strategic Plan-to-Plan San Diego Cooperative Charter School – Shared by University of San Diego (Free)

The Two Hour Resource Development Assessment – Shared by Nonprofit Management Services, LLC ($5)

The (Quick) Skinny on Charitable Trusts – Shared by Notations on Non-profits (Free)

Results-based accountability with the United Way of Chittenden County

Monica Weeber (Director of Planning & Organizational Development) and Amy Carmola Hauf (Director of Community Impact & Engagement) of the United Way of Chittenden County discuss how nonprofits can improve their effectiveness with Results Based Accountability (RBA). They provide an overview of the RBA approach and discuss how Vermont nonprofits can learn more through the Benchmarks for a Better Vermont program.

The program provides a robust discussion of how the United Way of Chittenden County has established county wide measures of well being and supported their member agencies to address these issues through a practical application of performance measures and RBA.

More on the Benchmarks for a Better Vermont Project.

Recorded on November 14th, 2011 Part 2 of the Vermont Community Foundation’s annual meeting features an Irene recovery panel discussion with a Q&A session with Panelists : Neale Lunderville, Irene Disaster Recovery Czar, David Coates, Chair, Vermont Long Term Disaster Recovery Group, Chuck Ross, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Andrea Cohen, Vermont, Businesses for Social Responsibility, Sara Kobylenski, Upper Valley Haven, Upper Valley Strong and Christopher Kaufman Ilstrup, The Vermont Community Foundation .

Part I of the Meeting

An effective accounting process is the first step to sound financial management in a nonprofit. Implementing good accounting practices can ease the stress of preparing the Form 990, audits, evaluations and even some grant applications. Use these resources, shared by your colleagues on IdeaEncore, to make sure your organization’s accounting process supports your work.

 Learn More about Nonprofit Accounting

Most staff members should know some basics about nonprofit  accounting:

• Being able to read a balance sheet is of vital importance for all management level staff and board members. Nonprofits Assistance Fund’s  Balance Sheet Cheat Sheet explains a few important accounting terms and how to calculate them from information on a balance sheet.
• Third Sector New England’s short video, What are restricted vs. unrestricted funds? is a good place to start.

Encores of the Week

Knockin’ Around the Strategic Plan (Christmas song)

Shared by Community Solutions Planning & Evaluation (Free) … why let the holiday spirit fade, just because it’s January?!

Nonprofit Blog Post Template

Shared by EDA Consulting ($5)

Succession Planning Series Part III: Best Practices and Resources

Shared by Notations on Non-profits (Free)

The Two Hour Marketing Plan

Shared by Nonprofit Management Services, LLC ($5)

4 Rules and a Template for the Perfect, Donor-Friendly Website

Shared by Sumac (Free)

Looking forward to all you will share in the New Year,

ScottB-L@IdeaEncore.com

Community Asset Mapping
Wednesday, February, 15, 2012
1:00pm – 2:30 pm (EST)

Organizational Assessment
Wednesday, February 22, 2012
1:00pm – 2:30pm (EST)

A Model for Building & Sustaining Partnerships
Wednesday, March 28, 2012
1:00pm – 2:30pm (EST)

Gearing Up to Pursue Federal Funding
Wednesday, April 04, 2012

For more information, visit: www.manynet.org

Pure Water for the World, based in Rutland, posed a series of questions about how to motivate and manage a far flung staff in difference parts of the world. Vijay Desai shared his experience:

KNOW YOUR AUDIENCE: Changing organization is tough, situational subject. We need to understand the people and situation and focus on the benefit for all parties involved when starting projects and motivating people.Understand what motivates the people you are working with. What is their temperament and communications style? Listen well and work closely with your people.

GET THEM ON THE GROUND FLOOR: Be sure to engage people when you are making the plan – scope, schedule and targets – so they feel part of the process and are more inclined to participate.

VALIDATE YOUR COMMUNICATIONS: When you communicate on a regular basis, be sure to validate what you have said. You can determine if there is a disconnect and won’t continue to pile on misunderstandings.

Here are the 6 vital steps to Send > Receive information and get work done. If you miss any step then your chances of miscommunication are high. This is vital for successful project management:

•  Sender will form a message in the mind
• Decide on best communication mode? phone, email, skype, face to face
• Send the message with chosen mode.
• Sender Validate – Did Receiver get it or not?
• Receiver will  Record/ Interpret Message/ Confirm that they got it and will act on.
• Senders have to understand culture, the work to be done so that the receiver can comprehend completely.

Resource:  Heath Brothers, Switch: How to Change Things When Change is Hard – http://www.heathbrothers.com/switch/

Which is better for optimal team functioning; homogeneity or diversity? Consider the following teams. Team A members focus on process: on being inclusive and collaborative and on how team members feel about the team and its work. Sometimes they have difficulty being efficient.

Team B is results-oriented and linear in its approach. The focus is on technical expertise and achievement, but interpersonal communication is a challenge.

Team C consists of three people. The team leader is logical and focused on financial outcomes; his other team members consist of a warm, bubbly extrovert and a quiet, thoughtful introvert. There is a history of conflict within Team C.

Let’s assume the members of these teams are all highly competent, both technically and professionally. What differentiates them is the “character” of the team, which reflects the personalities of the members.

Within teams A and B there are “outliers” — members who are noticeably different from the majority. For example, in Team A, one member is frustrated by the focus on process. A member of Team B feels there is no personal warmth in the way members interact, and he finds this demoralizing.

I’m often asked to intervene with a team when the non-technical, intangible interactions become sufficiently derailed that the work of the team is suffering. Members are unhappy, morale is low, there may be high turnover, and ultimately the employer is losing money. Here’s how I typically intervene.

First, I interview the team members to get a sense of the individuals, their temperamental similarities and differences, and how these create a team character. Through these interviews I determine how the majority of the team members are functioning, who the outliers might be, and where the internal friction is occurring.

Second, I identify the points of conflict that need to be initially addressed to clear the air for the team as a whole. I’ll often initiate a discussion among the affected employees, focusing on questions about how the team functions and how these individuals are managing themselves individually and collectively.

Next, I’ll frequently present to the team a summary of my interviews and describe the team’s overall character, the extent to which there is homogeneity or diversity, and the opportunities and challenges these provide. I encourage members to discuss what they’d like to do with this information.

It’s often helpful to identify some “stretch” goals for the team and articulate who should do what to achieve these. Typically, it becomes clear that certain team members will be better suited to accomplish various aspects of the process. The old adage “Many hands make light the work” has a lot of truth to it.

A metaphor I often use with teams is that of a mosaic. Each team member represents a unique and colorful bit of glass that is critical to the final picture. The more variety there is in the color, shape and texture of each bit, the more beautiful the picture will be. However, with that variety, there are always challenges in fitting the pieces together.

By focusing on particular goals, you can discuss points of conflict and coalescence in a more neutral and transparent way. The emphasis is on what needs to be done, who should do what, and how the moving parts can best be coordinated.

Team members acknowledge how they differ in a more accepting and less pejorative manner. Ultimately, humor enters into the discussion, and what had been emotionally charged dissipates into a more relaxed acknowledgment of differences.

Typically, when team members laugh about what used to infuriate them, they realize the team is getting traction. That’s when you know they’re achieving a robust diversity. •

Emily Morrow (www.emilymorrow.com) of Shelburne, provides tailored consulting services to business owners, professional practice firms, executives and HR personnel. She can be reached at pelmorrow@mac.com.

Uh oh. We are all afraid of getting audited by the IRS, but we don’t really know what would happen in one. Here is the True Life story of an environmental organization’s audit, how they survived, and their tips for the rest of us.

It’s the phone call everyone dreads: “Hello, your organization has been selected for an IRS audit.” The call came to Karl Dickson (pictured left), board treasurer of an environmental nonprofit in Milwaukee, and his caller ID showed that the call came from an unidentified cell phone. Karl’s instincts were to suspect a scam.

Karl questioned the caller who told him (not very believably) that “most IRS agents don’t have an office” and therefore use cell phones. She also told him they had been selected by random and that he was called because his number was on the IRS Form 990. She told him to expect a letter. (What? No IRS agent flashing a badge? Not even certified mail? If we’re going to be audited, at least can we have some drama?)

What the letter said: But the letter did arrive a few days later (at the end of this article is a link to the actual letter). Behind the generic IRS publication, “Your Rights as a Taxpayer,” was a two-page list of documents that the IRS required (ask yourself how hard it would be for you to comply with such a request):

• Original application for 501(c)(3) status, articles of incorporation, bylaws, and any amendments
• IRS letter granting tax-exempt status. (Shouldn’t the IRS have this?)
• Minutes of all board meetings and committees to help the IRS determine whether the organization had “sufficient and adequate internal controls” and to “determine the extent of board oversight”
• Brochures, newsletters, and any advertising from the organization. (I know they’re in a box somewhere)
• And lastly, financial records including:
  • Chart of accounts
  • General ledger
  • Working trial balance
  • Cash receipts and cash disbursements journal
  • Cancelled checks
  • Invoices
  • Bank statements
  • Credit card statements
  • Expense reports
  • Three years of Form 990s
  • Contracts, Notes
  • Copies of all 990s, W-2, W-4, and any other federal documents
  • Description of membership benefits if any; and
  • Detail of any Fundraiser Fees and Event Schedules

The letter went on to say that they were looking at the financial information to determine

• Whether all income was related to the organization’s mission
• Whether all expenses were “fair and reasonable” and
• Whether all expenses were appropriately classified between program activities, fundraising, and administration.

Even for Karl, who is a Certified Public Accountant (and therefore a conscientious file-keeper), the list was exhausting. “You think you’re organized but you don’t really know until you actually have to put your finger on those documents.”

“I was expecting the finance requests, but wasn’t really prepared to find the original tax-exemption application. I was grateful to the original board members who kept it and passed it along.”

Karl told the rest of the board about the audit, but received little more than moral support from them. Most were puzzled: why is our little organization — with a budget of $100,000 — picked for an IRS audit?

The organization had been spun off from a larger museum. Was this the reason behind the audit? “Your guess is as good as mine,” Karl said, “but the IRS agent did focus extensively on whether we were still operating under the same manner in which our tax-exempt status was given.”

Karl takes his boxes to the IRS office: Karl chose to attend the IRS meeting alone so that there wouldn’t be any conflicting answers to questions and kept the board informed of the process via email.

He carried a cardboard box with all the documents, balancing a couple of binders precariously on top and went into the nondescript building.

Wait a minute . . . I’ve been in taxes for years at a big accounting firm and my first visit to the IRS is for a $100,000 nonprofit?

As he waited in the secured lobby, Karl had a moment of anxiety about the organization’s work preserving rainforests in Costa Rica: Did our foreign transactions spark the audit? What if I can’t remember all the details of everything?

Soon a middle-aged woman with a no-nonsense, formal demeanor showed him her badge and escorted him to a conference room. The room’s walls were bare except for a picture of the president and the room contained a table, two chairs, and the American flag. At least there aren’t any handcuffs in the room.

The agent asked Karl to walk her through the documents. Surprisingly, most of the questions weren’t about finance, but about organizational structure and activities. After half an hour (but it seemed like forever!) she said she would take more time with the documents and would call with any questions. She noted that Karl had the right to appeal her judgment.

Imagine you’re at your “day job” and the ringing phone isn’t a customer but an IRS agent with questions about the nonprofit where you serve as the volunteer board t reasurer;  the questions are about finances from two years ago! As the weeks wore on, the IRS agent phoned him often (“we’re not allowed to email you questions” — what?) and Karl found it helpful to say he needed to “research the  answer,” to give him time to confer with another board member before responding.

The questions were mostly about specific transactions:

• “What service did this vendor perform for the organization?”
• “Why is this expense classified as this?” 
• “Why is this considered restricted revenue?”

It reminded Karl of an accounting test. The phone calls and questions were crazy making, but ultimately he remembered everything and he received notice that the audit was complete.

The results and Karl’s advice: The IRS agent ended up only reporting three minor findings including that the organization had filled out one 1099 incorrectly (yes, it was that thorough). Now that lightning has struck Karl, it probably won’t strike him again, but here are his tips for the rest of us:

1. Keep a binder with key organizational documents, such as articles of incorporation, approval letter, a conflict of interest policy (if you have one), and other documents.

2. Keep a binder for minutes from the board and any committee meetings. Put a sticky tab on each page where a motion was approved.

3. At the end of each year, put all the brochures, reports, and documents from the year and put them into a folder 

4. Save all financial documents in line with your document retention policy (a sample policy can be found here.).

We would add: have a conscientious and calm treasurer like Karl.

In the end, the IRS audit was time consuming but not terrifying. As Karl notes, “Even though you’re fairly confident that everything is correct, no one likes an audit.”

Karl Dickson, C.P.A., is board treasurer of the Tirimbina Rainforest Center in Milwaukee (Tirimbina is in Costa Rica). Steve Zimmerman, C.P.A., is a finance and strategy consultant to nonprofit organizations and a regular contributor to Blue Avocado.

More Tax/IRS Resources

• Toolkit: TAX FAQ for VT Nonprofits
• Toolkit: 5 Internal Controls for the Very Small Nonprofit

1. What Makes for an Effective Nonprofit Leadership Development Program? – The Bridgespan Group (Free)
2. Prioritization Toolkit -  Partners for Change, Inc. ($10, or free for Partners for Change clients)
3. Nonprofit Needs Survey Results: Problems and Training Needs – University of Texas at Arlington (Free)
4. The Two Hour Financial Management Assessment -  Nonprofit Management Services, LLC ($5)
5. Social Media Firings: The Continuing Saga -  Notations on Nonprofits (Free)

Ready to turn 2012 into your organization’s best year yet? For many, the first step is to start (or revise) planning. A comprehensive, well-reasoned operational or strategic plan can make the difference between getting by and reaching your goals. Your nonprofit colleagues have shared these resources to help:

Not so sure about planning? Read The Bridgespan Group‘s free paper Business Planning for Nonprofits: What It Is and Why It Matters for a breakdown of what’s in a plan and some tips on getting started.

Download Montana Nonprofit Association’s free Q&A -What to Include in Your Plan gives you a simple list of what to include in a comprehensive organization plan.

For more resources Montana Nonprofit Association likes, browse the planning section  of their IdeaEncore-powered online resource library.

Use Nonprofit Enterprise at Work‘s (NEW) The Board Room -Assessment & Strategic Planning ($5) to get your board of directors involved in developing a strategic plan.

Community Solutions Planning & Evaluation shared a free flow chart How Strategic Planning and Evaluation Intersect that will help you visualize the objectives of organizational planning.

Use this Template: Strategic Plan Control Spreadsheet from Executive Service Corp of Cincinnati to guide you through the implementation of your organization’s plan.

Check out one of 2011′s most popular resources, Nonprofit Management Services‘ The Six-hour Strategic Plan ($5).

If you hit an impasse in the planning process and need a little inspiration and humor, take a break with a compilation of Morrie Warshawski’s Favorite Planning Quotes, collected from his LinkedIn Group

If you have experience with organizational and strategic planning, why not help the nonprofit community by sharing your templates and examples on IdeaEncore?

The ADA website and checklist were produced by the New England ADA Center, a project of the Institute for Human Centered Design and a member of the ADA National Network. The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) requires public accommodations (businesses and non-profit organizations) to provide goods and services to people with disabilities on an equal basis with the rest of the public. Businesses and non-profit organizations that serve the public are to remove architectural barriers when it is “readily achievable” to do so.
The Checklist is available here – http://www.adachecklist.org/

Kerry can be reached CopperHill@myfairpoint.net, 802-765-4019.

Q. Are nonprofit organization’s required to collect sales tax or room and meals tax at sales and special events?

A. There is a lot of good information covered at the UVM Tax School, well worth the time to read. The original document can be found on the Vermont Department of Taxes at: http://www.state.vt.us

See also: /tax/pdf.word.excel/misc/UVMTaxSchool11-2011.pdf

Q. Is there any requirement to file a copy of Form 990, Return of Organization Exempt from Income Tax, with the Vermont Department of Taxes?

A. For tax years beginning January 1, 2010, a nonprofit organization that carried out business in Vermont in 2010 and had unrelated business income greater than $1,000 is required to file the Vermont Corporate Income Tax Return with a copy of the Federal Form 990-T. Federal Form 990 does not need to be filed with the Department but the organization should keep a copy for their records.

Q. Youth groups, such as 4-H, Boy Scouts or Girl Scouts, or the PTO sell products such as Christmas trees, wrapping paper, t-shirts, picnic tables, as a fundraiser. Do they need to collect the sales tax?

A. Organizations recognized as 501(c)(3) do not need to collect sales tax on taxable items if the taxable sales are $20,000 or less in a tax year. Items such as t-shirts do not count towards the $20,000 threshold as t-shirts are not subject to sales tax.

Q. Please clarify the amount of time the 501(C)(4) through (13) and 501(c)(19) may hold events before subject to collecting the Vermont sales tax.

A. This provision is for activities upon which the entertainment portion of the sales tax is applicable. 32 V.S.A. §9743(5) allows these organizations to hold up to four events a calendar year – but not to exceed an aggregate of four days in that calendar year – and the events are open to the public. For example, the organization holds four two-day concerts, it would exceed the aggregate four-day limit. The organization may elect the event or days to exempt but this requires prior notice to the commissioner.

Q. Does the four event/four day provision apply to recreational-type entertainment events such as golf tournaments?

A. Yes, if the event is held by a 501(c)(4) through (13) or 501(c)(19) organization.

Q. Does the four event/four day exemption also include meals tax if the organization is selling prepared food?

A. The meals tax is a separate statute. 32 V.S.A. §9202(D)(ii)(VII) allows nonprofit organizations at bazaars, fairs, picnics, church suppers, etc. to sell meals for up to four days in a calendar year without an obligation to collect the meals tax. Note that if the organization is required to have a meals license, this exemption does not apply.

Q. Is there any filing requirement for a non-profit with income less than $100,000 per year?

A. The $100,000 threshold refers to the entertainment charges a 501(c)(3) organization may receive before it is required to collect the Vermont entertainment sales tax. While non-profits with $100,000 or less in admission charges to live entertainment do not need to collect the sales tax, the non-profit may have other tax reporting requirements such withholding for their employees. All non-profits should register with the Vermont Department of Taxes and obtain a Vermont Business Tax Account which is required to purchase taxable items tax exempt.

Social Media for Social Good: A How-To Guide for Nonprofits, written by Heather Mansfield and published by McGraw-Hill, is a comprehensive 256-page hardcover book packed with more than 100 best practices covering Web 1.0, Web 2.0, and Web 3.0 nonprofit communications and fundraising. From building your e-newsletter list to finding your “Twitter voice” to launching a mobile website and texting campaign on a small budget, this guide presents a step-by-step strategic plan for launching and maintaining successful social media and mobile marketing campaigns.

Here is an excerpt from Chapter 2 of a Social Media for Social Good: A How-To Guide for Nonprofits

Social Media: Before You Get Started, Get Organized!

The successful implementation of social media for your nonprofit requires forethought and planning. Some of the decisions you make early on will affect your social media campaigns for years. Make sure they are the right ones. Too many nonprofits have rushed in without proper training or know-how, and unfortunately have learned later on that they’ve made many mistakes—some of which cannot be rectified. Whether you’ve been using social media for years, months, or days or you have yet to get started, the information and strategies in this chapter can save you a lot of time and frustration.

1. Define Your Goals and Objectives

To lay a strong foundation for the successful long-term branding of your nonprofit on the Social Web, you need to define your primary goals and objectives. Are you using social media primarily to raise money? To secure new volunteers? To increase your website traffic? To build your online brand? To foster social good and create social change? Take an hour or two and write down five to ten goals and objectives. This will help you stay focused and give you a baseline against which you can monitor your progress.

2. Define Your Metrics and Create a Social Media ROI Spreadsheet

Once you have defined your goals and objectives, create a social media ROI spreadsheet to monitor and report your progress from month to month. In the far left column of the spreadsheet, list the metrics that you want to monitor. Next, create 12 columns for the 12 months. Finally, pick a day of the month to begin and enter the baseline metrics for the first month, then enter your progress for that month on the same day of every month thereafter. Some common metrics to monitor are website traffic, blog traffic, e-newsletter subscribers, Facebook fans, Twitter followers, online dollars raised, volunteers, and event attendees. If your nonprofit is on the right track with social media, then you’ll notice an increase in the metrics from month to month over time. If not, then your social media strategy is missing something.

3. Create a Google Account and Set Up Google Alerts

The need to have a Google account will come up many times in your social media and mobile technology campaigns. Go to google.com/accounts > Create an account. Once you’ve set up your new Google account, sign up to receive Google Alerts via e-mail on a daily basis at google.com/alerts. Fill out a query to search “everything” for your nonprofit’s name and acronym. You do not need a Google account to receive Google Alerts, but you do need one to manage them. Also, as you’ll see in Chapter 5, you will need a Google account to set up a YouTube Channel properly. Google offers an incredible range of products (google.com/options) that you are likely to experiment with in coming years, so a Google account is a must for any nonprofit.

4. Be Consistent When Reserving Vanity URLs

Consistency in vanity URLs is important for print materials, e-newsletters, and e-signatures (facebook.com/nonprofitorgs, twitter.com/nonprofitorgs, youtube.com/nonprofitorgs, and so on), although if your nonprofit is just getting started with social media, then you may have some trouble reserving your first choice of vanity URLs because there’s a good chance that it has already been taken. Ideally, your social media vanity URLs should match your website URL, but if your website URL is not available on the big three (Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube), then you may need to get creative. For example, the Latin America Work Group’s website is www.lawg.org, but when the organization was setting up its profiles on Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube, “lawg” was not available on all three sites. So, it went with “lawgaction” instead (facebook.com/lawgaction, twitter.com/lawgaction, and youtube.com/lawgaction).

To find out whether the URLs of your choice are available, simply enter your preferred vanity URLs in your Web browser. If you get a message that says, “That page cannot be found,” that means that the URL is available. It’s worth noting that in most cases you will not be able to change social media URLs at a later date, so put some serious thought into these URLs before reserving them. For organizational reasons, you could opt to use the Gmail e-mail account that you created for your nonprofit when setting up your Google account for all social media and mobile technology accounts. It will help you centralize all your efforts and reduce the amount of spam and notification e-mails sent to your work e-mail account. However, if you do opt to use your Gmail e-mail account, protect it fiercely. Go to “Gmail > Settings > Accounts and Import > Grant access to your account” and add an additional staff person (he must have a Gmail e-mail account) to prevent losing access to all your social media and mobile technology profiles and accounts in a worst-case scenario. That said, if you decide to use Gmail e-mail as your login hub, then it is best to not give interns or volunteers access.

5. Save Usernames and Passwords in a Secure Place

Create a master login sheet. Using a Word or Excel document, create a list of all the usernames, passwords, and vanity URLs for your social media and mobile technology accounts. Make sure that key staff members at your nonprofit have access to the document and that it is saved securely.

6. Use a Square Version of Your Organization’s Logo as Your Avatar on Social Media Sites

It’s very important that you invest the time and resources needed to designing a visually distinct, square avatar that matches the overall branding of your nonprofit. Since most nonprofit logos are horizontal, they cannot be used as your avatar on social media sites because they are automatically cropped once they are uploaded. Would you ever put a cropped logo on your website, in your e-mail newsletter, or in print materials? Of course not! Yet every day, nonprofits are sending out hundreds of thousands of tweets and status updates with completely wrecked logos. To begin branding your nonprofit on social media sites properly, start with an avatar that is a square version of your logo. After a year or so of building the brand recognition of your avatar, you can then switch and rotate square photos as avatars to spark curiosity and add variety, as long as they include a smaller version of your logo somewhere in the avatar.

7. Learn Basic HTML

Basic knowledge of Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) will make or break your social media campaigns. To add images to your blog, create custom tabs on Facebook, and/or design an e-newsletter template, you need to know basic HTML code. HTML allows you to format text and insert links and images on Web pages. Take a class or sit down for a few hours with a tutorial, just <strong>make sure that your learn <em>basic</em> HTML!</strong>

8. Experiment with Social Media Dashboards

HootSuite is a Web-based social media dashboard service that allows you to update and monitor Twitter, Facebook, Foursquare, LinkedIn, and WordPress from one dashboard. You can schedule tweets and status updates in advance (ideal for nonprofits with international audiences), easily monitor trending topics, and get access to useful statistics about your brand and its buzz on the Social Web in real time. HootSuite also offers numerous apps, making it compatible with most smartphones and tablets.

People who use social media dashboards tend to acclimate and convert for the long term. In fact, more than half of all Twitterers use a third-party dashboard tool to manage their Twitter campaigns. These tools can be incredibly useful and innovative, but make sure that you commit to not wrapping yourself in a HootSuite bubble. These tools are designed for marketers, and sometimes users can lose touch with how their individual supporters experience Twitter, Facebook, Foursquare, and other sites—which is by logging into each site individually. If you are going to use a tool like HootSuite regularly, take a break every so often. You should also never automate content using these tools, or spam each community with the same message. Every social networking community has its own unique ebb and flow, and your supporters have no interest in liking, following, or friending a robot. While these tools can help you streamline your social media campaigns, they have made poor social media managers of many. That said, other well-known social media dashboard tools include TweetDeck, Threadsy, Seesmic, and CoTweet.

9. Get Buy-in from Executive Staff

For many nonprofits, getting the green light to use social media, and, more important, to invest the time and resources necessary to launch and maintain a successful social media campaign, is unfortunately still much easier said than done. This is where the age divide often becomes blatantly obvious. Many older executive staff members just don’t get social media. They are deeply entrenched and often stuck in the era of Web 1.0—much to the frustration of some of their younger colleagues.

The reality is that social media is no longer new. Many nonprofits are entering their sixth or seventh year of using social media. If your nonprofit is still on the fence about social media, then it is dangerously close to becoming dysfunctional in terms of online communication and fund-raising. Tell your boss that. Show her the stats. Research how other nonprofits with missions and programs similar to yours are using social media, and then let the executive staff clearly know that your nonprofit is falling behind. Be persistent. Social media is not a fad. It is a fundamental shift in how people use the Internet for social good. Failing to participate in the Social Web will be detrimental to your nonprofit in the long term.

10. Create a Simple Media Policy

An organization’s social media policy should provide basic guidelines to staff members and volunteers about what is appropriate to post on social media sites, an overview of privacy and legal issues, and some general rules about using social media during office hours. The overall message should be one of empowerment, not control and restriction. Keep it simple and on the short side. Focus on the big picture and create guidelines that can be applied across many social media tools, such as

• Commit to high standards of professionalism when representing the organization online. Our goal is to build online communities in order to share our expertise and better serve our mission and programs.
• Be respectful and polite at all times—even during online disagreements.
• Delete content that is off-topic or inappropriate in character. When in doubt, get a second opinion.
• Link to online references and source material often.
• Acknowledge mistakes quickly.
• Be honest and authentic.
• Engage in conversation.
• Think before you post, and make sure that your content is accurate and factual.
• Share only content that is meant for public consumption. Don’t discuss programs or campaigns that have not yet been officially launched to the public.
• Personal use of social media during breaks is allowed, but use of social media for work purposes must be approved first.
• Enjoy yourself! If you are not having fun engaging in online communities on behalf of the organization, then don’t do it. Social media is not for every personality type.

11. Follow Large Organizations with Mission and Programs Similar to Yours

Large nonprofits usually have the resources to experiment, hire consultants, and get extensive training on what works and what doesn’t. Follow those whose mission and programs are similar to yours, and mimic their work. Nonprofits like Amnesty International, PETA, the American Cancer Society, the Sierra Club, and the Susan G. Komen for the Cure excel in online communication. Learn from them. Study their websites and blogs. Experience their online donation process. Subscribe to their e-newsletters. Like them on Facebook. Follow them on Twitter. Almost every action that these nonprofits take online is for a good reason. They know what works and what doesn’t, they are constantly innovating and experimenting, and they are usually one or two steps ahead of most other nonprofits.

That said, have realistic expectations. Don’t expect the same results from social media that the large nonprofits have. Their brands are well known and much loved. They usually have enormous e-newsletter lists and multiple communications staff members. For those reasons, large nonprofits have a huge advantage on the Social Web, but you can duplicate their success on a smaller scale.

Benchmarks for a Better Vermont is the topic for this year’s statewide Vermont Nonprofit Conference 2012 slated for Tuesday, March 20^th (from 10 – 3:30 p.m.) at ten convenient VIT locations. The nonprofit event of the year is designed to meet help you manage and measure your results so you can run a more effective organization! REGISTER TODAY!

Enriching,  Convenient & Affordable! The full-day event combines skilled presentations with skilled, facilitated regional break out discussions at ten easy to reach Vermont Interactive TV locations. The cost (thanks to a grant from the Corporation for National & Community Service) is $15.

Who’s Invited? Vermont nonprofits with revenues of $1 million or less.   Teams of 2-3 that include staff and board members are strongly encouraged to attend.

REGISTER TODAY! As a result of attending Benchmarks for a Better Vermont, you will:

• Understand the framework for Results Based Accountability, a time-tested approach for managing outcomes in Vermont.
• Learn specific skills that you can apply to managing and measuring your organization’s results
• Connect with  your regional network and as part of a state-wide independent sector
• Learn about the application process for the BBVT Performance Institute
• Qualify for the Core Capacity Assessment ($300+ value)
• Gain access to easy to consume, relevant resources available at www.CommonGoodVT.org

Conference Agenda (10 a.m. – 3:30 p.m.):

• Welcome and Regional Networking
• Overview of BBVT Grant and Next Steps for Involvement
• Presentation: Results Based Accountability and How to Use it to Become More Effective
• Regional Break-Out Work Sessions with experienced local facilitators
• Lunch and Networking
• Regional Reports and Feedback
• Criteria and Application Process for BBVT Performance Institute & CCAT
• Wrap Up, Thanks and Final Networking

REGISTER TODAY! for one of ten convenient Vermont Interactive TV sites near you.  Space is limited at each site.  Act Now!

CONFERENCE PARTNERS: Common Good Vermont, Marlboro Graduate School/ Nonprofit Certificate Program, United Ways of Vermont, United Ways of Addison, Chittenden, Lamoille and Windham, SerVermont, Vermont Community Foundation.

CONFERENCE SPONSORS: Corporation for National and Community Service, A.D. Henderson Foundation, Vermont Community Foundation, National Life Foundation, High Meadows Fund,  Key Bank Foundation, SoverNet, Northfield Savings Bank, Fairpoint Communications, Merchants Bank, Green Mountain Power, FoundLine, Ben & Jerry’s Foundation, Comcast Corporation, REM Development, Lintilhac Foundation, Evslin Family Foundation.

Funders look for outcomes: what does that mean? 

Outcomes are ultimately the good that is achieved as the result of implementing a project.  When all is said and done, outcomes are the answer to the “so what?” question.  In the case of the Henderson Foundation, how are children better off?  Has the quality of their childcare improved? Are they ready to enter Kindergarten?  Are they performing in school?  Are they exhibiting positive and not negative behaviors?

Why is this important to you?

A. The foundation has a limited amount of money to invest, and it wants to achieve as big an impact as it can for its investment.  If you think in terms of a nonprofit organization asking the foundation to pay for implementing a project, the foundation is paying for outputs, or the activities needed to carry out the project.  However, what the foundation is buying is the outcomes: how are the children better off.  The outcomes can be considered as the return on investment that comes back to the foundation.

Why is it important for the organizations and health of the NPO Sector?

In the non-profit sector, the outcomes are the profits that are ultimately realized by the organization.  The more good work an organization achieves, the more attractive it becomes as a place for a foundation or the government or other funding source to invest.  In order to convince its investors that these outcomes/profits are real, the organization has to find a way to document that the outcomes were indeed achieved.

Can you give examples of effective organizations that use outcomes and indicators to tell their story?

I can think of one that is partially developed and has a vision for where it would like to be: The Vermont Community Preschool Collaborative helps start partnerships between school districts and private childcare providers to deliver high quality preschool for three and four year olds.  As outcomes in that project, we can count the number of school districts that have expanded their preschool programs, the growing numbers of children who are enrolled in high quality preschool, and improvements in quality at childcare centers that also serve children younger than age three.  What this project also aims to do is find a way to track the progress of children who attend publicly supported preschool and document the impact high quality preschool has on their later school performance.

What do their proposals look like?

In general, a solid proposal details the problem to be solved, or what I like to call, “what’s broken”.  In the case of the Vermont Community Preschool Collaborative, the proposal discusses the needs of families for quality childcare and the challenges for funding preschool.  The project section of the proposal discusses the opportunity for school/childcare partnerships, and the inputs (start-up funding and technical assistance) needed to create those partnerships.  The outcome section clearly states, as a result of these activities, here’s the return on your investment: more children enrolled in high quality preschool programs, and ultimately more children performing well in school.

Do you think funders need to learn more about how to structure their expectations?

Every funder is a unique entity.  I think the biggest need and challenge for funders is to communicate their expectations.  Of course, before you can communicate expectations, you have to articulate what those expectations are.  In the matter of outcomes, there is still the question of accountability (outputs:  did you do what you said you would do.)  However, I think the sea change in thinking is that the outputs are not as important as whether or not any real and tangible outcomes were achieved.

Where do orgs and funders go to learn about outcomes, indicators and performance?

The United Ways have been doing a lot of work related to developing outcome indicators for the United Ways’ investments.  Some individual organizations, such as the Lamoille Family Center, are also taking a lead on reviving the Mark Friedman/Results Based Accountability framework that was prevalent within the Agency of Human Services during the Dean administration and the Con Hogan era.  My Henderson Foundation colleague in Fort Lauderdale has helped organize the entire children’s services sector to work with Mark Friedman’s Fiscal Policies Institute out of Santa Fe to make Results Based Accountability the norm in Broward County, Florida.

Watch it Now: December 5th, 2011 interview with Eddie, Jen Peterson of the VT Community Foundation and Lesli Blount of Key Bank Foundation

Common Good Vermont speaks with Vermont funders about the importance of nonprofit tracking of outcomes and performance. This has bearing on overall organizational effectiveness,  successful grant applications and meaningful evaluations. Lesli Blount, Director of Community & Public Relations at the Key Bank Foundation, Jen Peterson, Vice President for Community Grantmaking, Vermont Community Foundation and Eddie Gale at the A.D. Henderson Foundation.

For more discussion of this topic, see Common Good Vermont’s interview with Eddie Gale of the A.D. Henderson Foundation.

GuideStar’s mission is to revolutionize philanthropy and nonprofit practice by providing information that advances transparency, enables users to make better decisions, and encourages charitable giving.

There new report, “Your Fundraising Calendar for 2012,” fundraising consultant Gail Perry presents a month-by-month plan to help nonprofits get the most out of their fundraising efforts next year.

Download this helpful guide to scheduling your 2012 development efforts

About the reports author: Gail Perry is the author of Fired Up Fundraising: Turn Board Passion into Action and founder of Gail Perry Associates, a Raleigh, North Carolina-based consulting and training firm. You can find more fundraising tips in her Fired Up Fundraising blog, found at www.firedupfundraising.com.

1) What’s the Story Behind the Number? A Grant Maker’s Guide to Understanding Nonprofit Audits

Shared by Edelstein & Company LLP (Free)

2) Ensuring the Rights of Study Participants: Resource Documents and Toolkit for Philanthropic Organizations

Shared by BTW Consultants, Inc. (Free)

3) Benchmark Against Leading Practice: Fund Development Checklist

Shared by San Diego Social Venture Partners ($10)

4) Program Related Investments – Social Investments

Shared by interSector Partners, LC3 and Created by Annie E. Casey Foundation

5) Financial Internal Audit

Shared by Nonprofit Management Services, LLC (Free)

Common Good Vermont’s Lauren-Glenn Davitian moderated  “7 Social Media Tips in 7 Minutes” at the annual Women’s Economic Opportunity Conference, Saturday, December 10th,  put together by Senator Leahy’s staff with strong partnerships from Vermont economic development organizations.

Rocio Clark of Applecheek Farms talked about how she uses Facebook and Twitter to develop relationships with her neighbors, generate interest in her family farm and share tips on nourishing food. She has built a loyal following that connects both on and offline. Her presentation is here.

Janice Shade, founder of True Soap and True Body Products has help with her social media presence and shared her experience as a marketer and innovator. She recently launched Community Supported Enterprise (modeled on Community Supported Agriculture shares), which encourages grass roots investment in her business.

Common Good Vermont put together it’s own 7 tips, which you can see here.

Audience questions were hot and heavy: How much time should we spend? (Depends on what you are trying to accomplish) Who do we reach out to? (Know your audience before you start). How secure is social media? (There is no privacy and your data is used by marketers) Along with specific questions about how to manage Facebook and Twitter accounts.

Our presentation and links are shared here. Questions? Send me an email at davitian@cctv.org

Media Maven TV: Gary Kessler: Covering Your Tracks in an Online World

Gary Kessler talks about his work as an online forensics expert and his views on the Surveillance Society. We ask him if it is a problem that we leave breadcrumbs all over the internet and how we can protect ourselves. This is a continuation of our discussion: Digital Media at the Crossroads.

Alex Aldrich, Executive Director, Vermont Arts Council
Email: aaldrich@vermontartscouncil.org | Phone: 802-828-3293 | vermontartscouncil.org
As Executive Director of VCA, Alex Aldrich increases the public’s awareness of the importance of the arts by developing collaborations with statewide agencies that expand and improve Vermont’s cultural infrastructure and marketing visibility. A former symphony manager, music producer for the 1996 (Atlanta) Cultural Olympiad, assistant director of the National Endowment for the Arts Music Program, and director of several small northeast chamber and vocal ensembles, Aldrich is a graduate of Harvard College (AB, English, 1980) and Yale School of Management (MBA, 1985). He serves on several state, regional, and national boards; and writes on arts issues at (artsissues.blogspot.com).

Todd Bailey, Government Affairs Specialist, KSE Partners
Email: todd@ksepartners.com Phone | Phone: 802-229-400 x122 | ksepartners.com
Todd Bailey is senior government affairs specialist with KSE Partners. He was Executive Director of the Vermont League of Conservation Voters. Previously, Todd worked for Howard Center for Human Services, where he served as the Transition Coordinator at Woodside Juvenile Rehabilitation Center. He has been active throughout his career in grassroots and electoral politics. Todd holds a B.S. in Environmental Science & Natural Resources from Johnson State College and is a graduate of the Environment Leadership Institute.

Lauren-Glenn Davitian, Exec. Director, Common Good Vermont a project of CCTV Center for Media & Democracy
Email: davitian@cctv.org | Phone: 802-862-1645 x12 | cctv.org & CommonGoodVT.org
Lauren-Glenn Davitian is a free speech advocate who helped to start Vermont’s public access TV/ community media movement in 1984. She oversees Channel 17/ Town Meeting TV, CCTV Productions (video and streaming services) and, most recently, Common Good Vermont—a “go to” resource for nonprofits that want to make a difference.

Kevin Ellis, Partner, KSE Partners
Email: Kevin@ksepartners.com | Phone: 802-229-4900 x107 | ksepartners.com
An award-winning former journalist, Kevin Ellis heads a communications practice that positions clients for success with the media, political community or in public campaigns. He provides strategic counsel to companies and nonprofits nationwide in message development, crisis management, PR and social media. Kevin was a reporter with newspapers in Tennessee, Washington, D.C. and Burlington, Vermont. He covered Congress, the White House, national political campaigns and environmental/energy policy. He graduated from Amherst College in 1981 with a B.A. in history and splits his time between Cambridge, MA and Vermont.

Cassandra Gekas, Health Care Advocate
Email: cgekas@vpirg.org | Phone: 802-223-8421 ext. 4097 | vpirg.org

Cassandra Gekas is VPIRG’s Health Care Advocate. Since moving to Vermont in 2005, she has spent time as a national level legislative analyst, an anti-hunger policy advocate and most recently, as a research fellow at UVM’s Transportation Research Center. During her time at the Vermont Campaign to End Childhood Hunger (VTCECH), she played a leading role in several major policy achievements. She has also worked extensively on gender issues, serving as a facilitator for the Domestic Abuse Education Project, volunteering for several domestic violence programs and serving as President of the Vermont Women’s Transportation Seminar. Cass holds a BA in Women’s Studies and Political Science from Pennsylvania State University and MS in Community Development and Applied Economics from the University of Vermont. At VPIRG, Cass conducts policy research and advocacy on health care reform efforts at the state and national levels.

Allen Gilbert, Executive Director, ACLU-VT
Email: agilbert@acluvt.org | Phone: 802-223-6304 | acluvt.org
Allen Gilbert has been executive director of the ACLU of Vermont since 2004. Before that he worked in journalism, as a reporter and then city editor at the Rutland Herald and as assistant editor of the Sunday Herald-Times Argus. He taught writing at several Vermont colleges, and lived abroad for three years, teaching American studies at a German university. For 14 years he was a principal in PressKit of Montpelier, a communications and public policy research firm. He has also been a commentator on Vermont Public Radio. Allen holds a bachelor’s degree in history from Harvard, and a master’s degree in education from the College of William and Mary.

John Hollar, Partner, Downs, Rachlin & Martin
Email: jhollar@drm.com | Phone: 802-225-5505 | drm.com
John Hollar has been a partner at Downs Rachlin Martin since 2004. He co-chairs DRM’s Government & Public Affairs Group as well as its Regulated Entities Group, which includes the firm’s energy & telecommunications, real estate, and land use & environmental law practices. Before joining DRM, John operated a private law and lobbying practice in Montpelier. He worked in a Washington, D.C. law firm from 1989-90 representing cities and towns on a wide range of environmental matters. Prior to that, he served as legislative assistant and legislative director for former U.S. Representative Mike Synar (D-Okla.). He also served as a press assistant for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee in 1982-83. John served as chair of the Montpelier School Board from 2003-2011. He currently serves on the board of Central Vermont Home Health and Hospice, and has been a board member of the Central Vermont Chamber of Commerce and the Onion River Arts Council. He has served as a volunteer teacher for Prevent Child Abuse Vermont. John is listed in The Best Lawyers in America 2011.

Jill Krowinski, of Planned Parenthood Northern New England
Email: jill.krowinski@gmail.com | Phone: 802-448-9700 | plannedparenthood.org/ppnne
Jill Krowinski moved to Vermont in 2002 to work as a field organizer for the Vermont Democratic Party and founded a non-profit dedicated to registering young people to vote. She stayed active in state politics and worked as the Director of the Vermont Democratic House Campaign, then in 2005 the Assistant to the Speaker of the House Gaye Symington, and served as the Field Director for the Welch for Congress campaign. In 2007, Jill became the Executive Director of the Vermont Democratic Party and then went on to run the Symington for Governor campaign. She is currently the Vermont Director of Public Affairs for Planned Parenthood of Northern New England and serves on the Board of Directors of the Montpelier Chamber Orchestra, Begin Blue, and Vermont Access to Reproductive Freedom. She has also served as a delegate in the Philippians for the American Council of Young Political Leaders.

Jay Henderson, National Field Organizer, Democracy for America
Email: jay@democracyforamerica.com | Phone: 802-651-3200 x 193 | democracyforamerica.com
For the past 2.5 years, Jay Henderson has worked with Democracy for America’s over 1 million members to elect progressive candidates and fight for progressive reform. This work includes teaching candidates how to run for office at DFA’s Campaign Academy and teaching issue advocacy at DFA Action Summits, as well as working on the campaigns of “No on 1” in Maine and Beth Krom for Congress. Prior to DFA, Jay worked with Silicon Valley for Obama, the Lorain County Urban League, ACLU of Southern California, the Office of Mayor Adrian Fenty and organized on campus at Oberlin College.

Representative Tony Klein, Vermont House of Representatives
Email: twk@tonyklein.com | Phone: 802-793-6032 | tonyklein.com
Tony Klein is the Vermont State Representative for the Washington County towns of East Montpelier and Middlesex. He is the current Chair of the House Natural Resources & Energy Committee, as well the Chair of the Joint House & Senate Energy Oversight Committee.

Andrew MacLean, Esq, MacLean Meehan & Rice
Email: andrew@mmrvt.com | Phone: 802 249-9103 | mmrvt.com
Andrew MacLean is a founding partner in MacLean Meehan & Rice, and he represents commercial clients and specializes in developing strategies to allow those clients to thrive in Vermont’s unique legislative and regulatory environment. Andrew was a partner in the law firm of Wilson & White from 1992-2003 and was managing partner from 2002-2004. He was an Assistant Attorney General assigned to the Civil Division for the State of Vermont (1987-1992) and Department of Corrections (1985-1987). Andrew was admitted to the Vermont bar and the U.S. District Court for the District of Vermont in 1980 and to the Second Circuit Court of Appeals in 1986. He received a B.A. in 1976 from Middlebury College and a J.D. from Suffolk University Law School in 1979.

Glenn McRae, Organizational Consultant
Email: glennmcrae56@gmail.com | Phone: 802-363-6700
Glenn McRae has a long history in Vermont developing capacity building programs for nonprofits and organized the first Nonprofit day at the Statehouse in the 1990s while working with the Snelling Center for Government. He currently teaches in the UVM public administration program and serves as Outreach Manager at the Transportation Research Center.

Lawrence Miller, Secretary, Vermont Agency of Commerce & Community Development
Email: lawrence.miller@state.vt.us | Phone: 802-828-5204
Lawrence Miller was the founder of Otter Creek Brewing, Inc. As owner, CEO, and Brewmaster Lawrence grew Otter Creek to a leading Regional Specialty brewer from 1990 through the successful sale of the company in 2002. In 2007 he accepted the position of Chairman and CEO at client company Danforth Pewter where he led a migration strategy from wholesale to multi-channel consumer marketing, including acquisition of compatible pewter brands. He has held various board positions related to economic and community development.

Adam Necrason, Partner, Sirotkin & Necrason
Email: necrason@snlawvt.com | Phone: 802-223-9988 | snlawvt.com
Adam Necrason is a government and public affairs attorney working in Montpelier since 1996. His firm advocates for a wide range of nonprofits, public interest groups, businesses, and trade associations.

Jessica Oski, Attorney, Dunkiel Saunders Elliott Raubvogel & Hand
Email: joski@dunkielsaunders.com | Phone: 802-860-1003 x 105 | dunkielsaunders.com
Jessica Oski has lived in Vermont for 30 years and is a graduate of UVM and Vermont Law School. Jessica was a registered lobbyist from 1990 to 2006 representing a wide variety of interests including: labor, senior citizens, disability rights, civil liberties, reproductive health and the City of Burlington. She now practices general corporate law for non-profit and for-profit businesses and health law. Jessica is currently the board chair for CarShare Vermont and is a long-time board member for a local family foundation.

Tim Palmer, Principal, VerMentor
Email: timjpalmer@msn.com | Phone: 802-879-3207
Tim Palmer works on organizational and leadership development with nonprofits and socially responsible businesses through his consulting practice, VerMentor. He has been involved in the early stage development of the Vermont Alliance of Nonprofit Organizations (VANPO) and Common Good Vermont, as well as lobbyist for Vermont Businesses for Social Responsibility (VBSR). He’s also served as Executive Director of the Sustainability Institute, the Community of Vermont Elders (COVE), Vermont CARES, and the Boston AIDS Consortium at the Harvard School of Public Health.

Liz Schlegel, Community Outreach Director. Central Vermont Community Action Council
Email: lschlegel@cvcac.org | Phone: 802-477-5237 | cvcac.org
Liz Schlegel has been working to help organizations make connections for 25 years. She manages communications and advocacy for Central Vermont Community Action Council, an $18 million nonprofit which served 18,000 low-income Vermonters last year. Liz has worked with hundreds of Vermont businesses and groups to help them tell their stories effectively. She lives in Waterbury with her husband, Rep. Tom Stevens, and their children.

Nick Sherman, Government Affairs Specialist, KSE Partners
Email: nick@ksepartners.com | Phone: 802-229-4900 x117 | ksepartners.com
Nick Sherman is a KSE associate and has represented clients in the Vermont statehouse since 2006. He has worked on a wide range of transportation, election, health care, energy and consumer product issues. He earned a B.A. from Sarah Lawrence College, in Bronxville, NY in 2003. He is a life long Vermonter and lives with his wife Anna Rankin in Huntington, Vermont.

Amy Shollenberger, Owner, Action Circles
Email: amybeth@together.net | Phone: 802-793-1114 | action-circles.com
Amy Shollenberger has more than 13 years of grassroots organizing, policy, and political issue campaign experience, including work as a press secretary for a member of the U.S. House of Representatives and as a senior policy analyst for Public Citizen’s Critical Mass Energy and Environment Program. At Action Circles, she offers non-profit organizations, candidates, and small businesses help with campaign strategy, organizational capacity building, and facilitation. Amy worked as Rural Vermont’s executive director, where she worked to help members successfully lobby for the Chicken Bill, the Farm Fresh Milk bill, the Hemp for Vermont bill, and the Farmers Right to Know Act, among others. Recently, she was the campaign manager for a gubernatorial primary candidate in Vermont.

Ross Sneyd, News Director, Vermont Public Radio
Email: rsneyd@vpr.net | Phone: 802-654-4364 | vpr.net
Ross Sneyd joined VPR in 2007 and oversees the production of up to nine daily newscasts on the statewide network. A veteran journalist, Ross worked with The Associated Press for 18 years, including 16 in Vermont covering politics, state government and the state Legislature. He has covered the presidential primaries in New Hampshire, the presidential campaign of Howard Dean and the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans. He graduated in 1984 with a journalism degree from Kent State University. He began his career as a print reporter during college in Ohio. He moved to Vermont in 1987 to write for The Burlington Free Press.

Robert J. Stannard. President, Stannard Associates, Inc.
Email: bob@bobstannard.com | Phone 802-345-0786 | bobstannard.com
Bob Stannard is a longtime public servant, serving in the Vermont House and as Selectman and Planning Commissioner in his hometown of Manchester, Vermont. He became a lobbyist in 1995, works as a commercial real estate broker, writes regular columns for the Bennington Banner and Vermont Digger, recently published “How to Survive the Recession-A Vermont Perspective” and is a blues singer and harmonica player.

Chuck Storrow, Partner, KSE Partners
Email: chuck@ksepartners.com | Phone: 802-229-4900 x11 | ksepartners.com
Chuck Storrow is a lawyer/lobbyist in the Vermont Statehouse with deep experience in energy/utilities, telecommunications, environmental policy, insurance and health care. Chuck combines versatility with an eye for detail and a comprehensive understanding of Vermont’s political, economic and social landscape. Prior to joining KSE in 1989, Chuck practiced law with a Burlington, Vermont firm, specializing in civil and administrative litigation. He served on the Vermont Environmental Board from 1989 to 1992. In 1982-83 he served as a judicial law clerk for the Hon. Sterry R. Waterman, Senior Judge, U.S. Court for Appeals for the 2nd Circuit. He has a B.A. in history from the University of Maine and his J.D. from Vermont Law School. He had the highest academic ranking in his law school class. Chuck grew up in Jericho, Vermont.

Jane A. Van Buren, Executive Director, Women Helping Battered Women
Consultant, Noonmark Nonprofit Services
Email: janevb@noonmarkservices.com | Phone: 802-324-1724 | noonmarkservices.com
Jane Van Buren has more than 30 years of professional experience in the nonprofit and public sectors. She is the founding executive director of the Vermont Alliance of Nonprofit Organizations and the current director of Women Helping Battered Women, a Chittenden County domestic violence service agency. Jane provides nonprofit organization development consulting in Vermont and internationally. Jane has a doctorate in management from Case Western University and a Master of Public Administration from Northeastern University.

Ben Walsh, Clean Energy Advocate, VPIRG
Email: ben@vpirg.org | Phone: (802) 223-8421 ext. 4096 | vpirg.org
Ben Walsh has worked with VPIRG since 2009, first directing VPIRG’s summer canvass office and then working as VPIRG’s Field Director. In both these roles, Ben engaged and mobilized thousands of Vermonters in support of a clean energy future. Prior to coming on board the VPIRG team, Ben worked with National Environmental Trust, Environment America and the Oregon Natural Desert Association. He graduated from the University of Vermont in 2007, and from the Green Corps field school for environmental organizing in 2008. At VPIRG, Ben works with VPIRG’s Clean Energy Program Director to research, identify and advance clean energy policy solutions in the State House.

Kevin Ellis, Todd Bailey and Elliott Bent of KSE Partners presented this Blueprint for Legislative Campaigns in November 2011 at the Vermont Statehouse. These questions meant to guide you as you develop legislative strategy and  identify your goals.

To view the complete recording of the 11/15/2011 presentation, click here.

THE BLUEPRINT

I. Research:

1. Who are you? Your mission, your goals, your organization’s abilities.
2. What’s the goal? You need to stay focused on this.
3. What’s the landscape? What’s the lay of the land?
4. Who are your allies? Do you have a champion?
5. Who are your opponents?
6. Do you have experts who are willing to saliently make your point?
7. Is your position unique?
8. Who has the power to get this done for you?
9. What is the process? Legislative, administrative etc.
10. Who else is working in this sphere?
11. Are there statistics to back up your claims?
12. Who are the stakeholders?
13. Is there similar legislation and policies? Who sponsored it? Who was against, who was for?
14. Make a power map.
15. How do you deal with the media?
16. What media will be interested? Have they covered similar stories?
    1. Three TV Stations
    2. Burlington Free Press
    3. Times Argus/Rutland Herald
    4. VPR/Mark Johnson Show
    5. Digital – VTDigger, VT Tiger, Green Mountain Daily.

II. Message Development:

1. What do you want to be when you grow up?
2. 30-second elevator speech.
3. The two-minute statement.
4. Create a position statement: This should be able to be summarized in a sentence, a paragraph and a page. The simpler the better!
5. How do we control the narrative? What needs to be avoided? What needs to be emphasized? Start with arguments that have broad appeal and use more narrow supplementary arguments where needed.
6. Develop a full list of arguments and counter arguments (understand your opponents).
7. Train your leadership to be conversant on the issue so that they can talk to the media and legislators. Prepare testimony for committee.

III. Materials Preparation

1. Using messaging notes, create a “core document” the document should be 1-2 pages. It will inform all other materials and also can be used to inform audiences.
2. Op-ed (based on core doc) – the op-ed should be 500 words maximum and should cover your most important points.
3. Sample letters for your grassroots base to mail – these letters should be 200 words maximum. Each letter should address a single argument.
4. Press release.
5. Timeline.
6. Logos.
7. Website.
8. Facebook page.
9. Twitter feed.
10. Press list.
11. Email list.

IV. Execution:

A. Legislature

• Meet with supporters.
• Plan testimony.
• Statehouse presence – someone monitoring every nook and cranny of the statehouse.
• Have an event. (Bring all your people to the Statehouse).
• Collaterals: Hats | Shwag | Press release

B. Governor

Open line of communication to the Governor’s office/Administration including secretaries and other staff concerned with the issue.

C. Media

• Who at each outlet are you dealing with?
• Keep them informed every step of the way so that when a newsworthy event comes around, they’re ready to cover it.
• Time the op-ed for maximum effectiveness.
• Letters should be ongoing.

D. Public

Presence in towns and counties with coordinators. Public/Grassroots. The goal is to keep constant information coming to legislators.

F. Politics

We need to work within our existing system (even as we try to change it). Bringing value to legislators and the administration is important. This can be providing quality information, bringing Get Out The Vote efforts on their behalf or fundraising.

1. Expert testimony.
2. Are there timing considerations?
3. Who needs to know first?
4. Who will write, or submit an op-ed – the more prominent the better.
5. What channels will be effective?
6. Stay calm.
7. Approach opponents with respect.
8. Make it easy for everyone involved. Make it easy for lawmakers to support you. Give them respect and strong arguments to use. Make it easy for the press to know about your cause and write about it.

KSE Partners delivers government affairs and communications strategies for national, regional and local clients.

http://www.cctv.org/watch-tv/programs/lobbying-communications-bootcamp-2011-part-2-2

Following brief reports from Design the Perfect Campaign groups, this experienced panel will detail what really happens to well laid strategies and tactics when you reach the Statehouse. Panel of lobbyists and legislators comment on morning case.

Panelists: Ross Sneyd of Vermont Public Radio, Representative Tony Klein (Washington County), Secretary Lawrence Miller of Vermont Agency of Commerce and Community Development, Cassandra Gekas of VPIRG.
Moderator: Lauren-Glenn Davitian, Common Good Vermont/ CCTV

The report is worth a read for anyone interested in improving nonprofit effectiveness using innovative techniques based on R &D.

Produced by the TCC Group, who for over 30 years have provided strategic planning, program and grants management, evaluation, and capacity-building services to foundations, nonprofit organizations, corporate community involvement programs, and government agencies. In the briefing below, the group explains their finding that R & D is about innovation is not about trying to create something brand new,and it is not about evaluating a finished product or service.

Read the full report

Melissa Levy has been an Associate of Yellow Wood Associates, Inc. since 2003. Community economic development is about recognizing, preserving, and growing community wealth in all its forms: human, financial, social, ecological, and physical (infrastructure).  In this program, Lauren-Glenn Davitian talks to Melissa about measurement best practices used by her organization and how you can use them too!

1. Conflict of Interests: It seems that conflicts of interests are the root of all evil (or at least all negative headlines) in the nonprofit sector. It’s surprising, but not everyone understands that a transaction between a board member and the nonprofit can create a conflict between their separate interests that can jeopardize both the nonprofit and the board member. Does your nonprofit require disclosure of a conflict, and of potential conflicts? (The first is a “must” and we think the second idea is compelling.) What procedures are used to manage conflicts? Is there annual documentation that records how your board handled conflicts to help you complete the IRS Form 990? You can never avoid conflicts entirely, but you can take steps to prevent unjust enrichment to ensure that an insider, such as a board member, does not benefit more from the transaction than the nonprofit. (Such a situation could result in penalties to the individual who benefits, and to the organization.) Read about the importance of having a policy and view a sample conflicts of interests policy.
2. Compensation: There have been too many headlines about how “excessive” nonprofit salaries are. All nonprofits must make sure there is board approval of the staff leader’s compensation. Ensuring that the board has approved “reasonable and not excessive” compensation for the executive director/CEO and senior staff is one of the critical fiduciary responsibilities of every nonprofit board. Read about the 3-step process for the board’s review of “executive compensation” recommended by the IRS, and take a look at a sample policy developed by the National Council of Nonprofits.
3. Media Spokesperson: Who is authorized to speak to the media on behalf of your nonprofit? What happens when a staff member or board member is contacted by a local news reporter? Do they realize that rather than agreeing to be interviewed on the spot they should follow a procedure so that the organization offers a consistent (and thoughtful) response? See a sample policy reminding staff and volunteers that only the nonprofit’s designated spokesperson(s) should speak with the media. This is one of those policies that you might not have right now – but you’ll be happy you have it in place when a reporter calls.
4. Public Disclosure: We think it’s a good idea for every staff member to know how to respond to a request for documentation by a third party and for every nonprofit to have a notebook handy with copies of all the “public” documents that they must provide when asked. It helps to have a straightforward policy outlining how such requests are handled by the organization. Use an online tutorial from the IRS to learn about the IRS regulations that govern what documents a nonprofit must make available to the public and read these FAQs from the IRS about public disclosure requirements. But also realize that state law may require nonprofits to provide copies of other documents. Read about the importance of transparency in the nonprofit sector.

The Donor-Grantee Trap: How ineffective collaboration undermines philanthropic results for society, and what can be done about it. A guide for nonprofit leaders, their boards, and their donors.

Scarce resources (both money and time) are routinely wasted in the critical linkage between donor and grantee. As a consequence, our communities—the causes and constituents we are trying to serve—are being unnecessarily shortchanged.

What’s needed is more effective donor-grantee collaboration, so that philanthropists and the nonprofit organizations they support can get the absolute most from every scarce dollar they invest.

Reduced to the essentials, there are three imperatives of true collaboration—for which both donors and grantees must share responsibility. They are:

• Resource it Right: Make sure that the grantee has what it takes to get the job done.
• Pursue Partnership: Develop shared goals and a productive working relationship (which demands a certain level of strategic clarity and a reasonable “cost-of-capital” burden on the grantee).
• Get Better Together: Create the necessary conditions for learning and continuous improvement.

These imperatives appear simple; experience has shown, however, that following them almost always requires confronting—and overcoming—some deeply ingrained dynamics, assumptions, and behaviors.

The Donor-Grantee Trap details each imperative in turn. It is written for nonprofit executives, their boards, and their major donors. Based upon and excerpted from the book Give Smart: Philanthropy That Gets Results, by Thomas J. Tierney and Joel L. Fleishman, it is also supplemented with content from several related Bridgespan articles, which reflect The Bridgespan Group’s extensive field experience working with both donors and their grantees.

Download: The Donor-Grantee Trap

Board Cafe,
Jan Masaoka, 11/13

When we reviewed various the dozens of evaluation instruments sent in by Blue Avocado readers, we found that nearly all of them had these attributes in common:

• Most reviews used a checklist form (rather than narrative)
• Most focused on ED’s actions and behaviors (rather than on organizational performance)
• Most relied on input from board members only (rather than include input from others such as staff, funders, clients, art critics, etc.)

Although we feel that evaluations that are narrative, focus on organizational performance and contain elements of a 360 degree evaluation are better ways to evaluate executives, we also realize:

• Without a checklist of some kind, the ED evaluation most likely won’t take place
• Evaluation of organizational performance is complex and is more likely to arise from executive evaluation than to occur before it, and
• Input from others in and outside the organization is more appropriately focused on organizational assessment, not as narrowly as on ED evaluation.

Most importantly: despite the fact that board members may have little to go on and not much experience with ED evaluation, it’s still important to have the evaluation.

Perhaps the most important thing we learned from executive directors about the value that did emerge from evaluations is that the discussions — if held in good faith — result in better-aligned expectations and goals for the organization and for the executive.

As a result, we adapted instruments to:

• Give board members the chance to reflect (and discuss) not only on the executive’s performance but on the performance of the board and of the organization
• Spark discussions between the executive and the board (rather than to sum them up)
• Give the executive the opportunity reflect and learn (if so inclined)
• Provide a basis for salary and fire/keep decisions,
• Lead to alignment and clarification of goals and expectations.

Process

A. The board should assign a small group or one person to managing the ED’s evaluation. This can be the officers, or a task force created for the job.

B. The ED should go over the process and instrument(s) with that committee prior to the start. This can be as simple as an email or as deep as a group discussion about goals of the evaluation.

C. The board can collect the information from respondents. Rather than compile an “average,” it’s imporant to report how many board members marked “outstanding,” how many marked “needs improvement,” and so forth. Having all board members mark “fine” is quite different from half of them marking “outstanding” while another half mark “improvement needed.”

D. An executive session of the board (perhaps 1 hour without any staff present) to discuss the survey results and comments in general.

E. Relaying the information to the executive: by the board chair or another assigned member or two.

F. The executive’s chance to respond (in person or in writing) to the full board.

G. The review and the response (if there is one) are placed in the executive’s personnel file.

Tip: Involve HR to make sure the review takes place. Most supervisors would not complete reviews of their staff if there were not someone from HR reminding and nagging them. An HR or finance staffperson can keep reminding the board officers that a review must be completed for the executive’s personnel file and that salary documentation must be provided.

Please do not use any of these templates “as is.” Instead, use them as a basis for forms that are relevant to your organization’s circumstances:

What about 360 degree evaluations?

Every few years it’s very helful for a board to get a sense of how its executive — and the organization as a whole — is experienced by volunteers, visitors, patrons, clients, members, funders, collaborative partners, and others. A 360 degree evaluation takes a good deal of time (not only from the board but from everyone who is asked to give input), and it makes the most sense to use the opportunity not only to learn about the CEO, but about the organization.

Please click here to see a Blue Avocado article on 360 degree organizational assessments.

Other data

Many organizations also have established goals and objectives for the year, such as number of enrollments, visitors to the art gallery, decrease in euthanized animals, and so forth. There may also be data available such as average rating score for workshops conducted by the organization, ticket sales, attendees at annual fundraising lunch, etc.

Measuring organizational performance against such benchmarks is tremendously helpful, as is measuring performance against an updated job description. However, there are limitations to over-relying on such benchmarks:

• There may be external reasons why performance did not meet benchmarks, and those gaps may be more productively addressed in a broader context than the annual review of the CEO.
• A great many organizations do not have such organizational performance benchmarks, nor does the executive have a recently-updated job description. It’s necessary to have an evaluation tool that does not require these to be in place.

The role of judgment

No one every has enough information to do a perfectly informed, “objective” evaluation of anyone. If an executive evaluation results in substantive discussion about organizational goals, organizational values about how work is done, and how the board and executive can both do better, then the evaluation “worked.”

Click below on the Attachment to download the form in Word to make it easy to modify.

Our thanks to the many anonymous Blue Avocado readers who contributed to this article, as well as to Nancy Aleck, Kathy Booth, Steven Bowman, Marsha Caplan, Douglas Ford. Krista Glaser, Amy Heydlauff, Lyn Hopper, Trudy Hughes, Jeanette Issa, Shalom Black Lane, Kristen Larsen, Peggy Liuzzi, Dan Lozer, Diane May, Pat Moore. Paul Rosenberger, Erin Ryan, Penelope Sachs, Kate Stephenson, Lynda J. Timbers, Connie Zienkewicz. I hope we didn’t miss anyone! Special thanks, too, to reviewers of this article: Trish Tchume (Young Nonprofit Professionals Network), Liz Heath (Sound Nonprofits), Rick Moyers (Meyer Foundation) and Tim Wolfred (CompassPoint Nonprofit Services).

Jan Masaoka is editor of Blue Avocado, and author of the Best of the Board Cafe, available here from Amazon. She has been an executive director and board member and experienced both bad and good evaluations from both ends. And lived to tell the tale.

See also in Blue Avocado:

• Evaluating the Executive Director (Part 1 to this article)
• Firing the Executive Director
• How Much to Pay the Executive Director

The 2012 presidential election will be here soon, and it’s time to start thinking about your nonprofit’s plan for registering, educating, and engaging voters. This webinar, presented by Nonprofit Vote, will cover when, where, and how to incorporate voter engagement activities into your work. Nonprofit Vote’s final webinar of 2011 will start you thinking about next year’s general election and how your nonprofit can maximize your impact with the resources you already have. Register online today.

Learn effective tools on the web to fund your nonprofit, cause, or campaign and increase your visibility online. November’s Media Maven Lunch will teach you to redesign and manage your online fundraising efforts with Jacob Colie of Stagecoach Digital

More Useful Video

Host Lauren- Glenn Davitian speaks with Rebecca Gurney, Executive Director of YWCA of Vermont, Inc., Dr. Dan Balón, Director of Diversity & Equity with the Burlington School District, and Dr. Denise Dunbar, Community Member active in Racial Equity issues on the Power of White Racial Identity.

Foundations of Compassionate Communications takes place on Saturday November 19th from 9 am – 6 pm in White River Junction. The purpose of the workshop is to:

• Free yourself from the effects of past experiences and cultural conditioning.
• Break patterns of thinking that lead to arguments, anger and depression.
• Resolve personal, public, domestic or international conflicts peacefully.
• Create social structures that support everyone’s needs being met.
• Develop relationships based upon respect, compassion, and cooperation.

Register online at NewEnglandNVC.org

Location: 5 S. Main Street, Suite 302; White River Junction, VT 05001

For more information: Call Pan at 802-659-0144. or register online

Cost: Donation Sliding Scale $45-$150.  No one will be turned away for lack of funds.

Myth #1: Multitasking is critical in a world of infinite demand.

This myth is based on the assumption that human beings are capable of doing two cognitive tasks at the same time. We’re not. Instead, we learn to move rapidly between tasks. When we’re doing one, we’re actually not even aware of the other.

If you’re on a conference call, for example, and you turn your attention to an incoming email, you’re missing what’s happening on the call as long as you’re checking your email. Equally important, you’re incurring something called “switching time.” That’s the time it takes to shift from one cognitive activity to another.

On average, according to researcher David Meyer, switching time increases the amount of time it takes to finish the primary task you were working on by an average of 25 percent. In short, juggling activities is incredibly inefficient.

Difficult as it is to focus in the face of the endless distractions we all now face, it’s far and away the most effective way to get work done. The worst thing you can do as a boss is to insist that your people constantly check their email.

Myth #2: A little bit of anxiety helps us perform better.

Think for a moment about how you feel when you’re performing at your best. What adjectives come to mind? Almost invariably they’re positive ones. Anxiety may be a source of energy, and even motivation, but it comes with significant costs.

The more anxious we feel, the less clearly and imaginatively we think, and the more reactive and impulsive we become. That’s not good for you, and it also has huge implications if you’re in a supervisory role.

As a boss, your energy has a disproportionate impact on those you lead, by virtue of your authority. Put bluntly, any time your behavior increases someone’s anxiety — or prompts any negative emotions, for that matter — they’re less likely to perform effectively.

The more positive your energy is, the more positive their energy is likely to be, and the better the likely outcome.

Myth #3: Creativity is genetically inherited, and it’s impossible to teach.

In a global economy characterized by unprecedented competitiveness and constant change, nearly every CEO hungers for ways to drive more innovation. Unfortunately, most CEOs don’t think of themselves as creative, and they share with the rest of us a deeply ingrained belief that creativity is mostly inborn and magical.

Ironically, researchers have developed a surprising degree of consensus about the stages of creativity and how to approach them. Our educational system and most company cultures favor reward the rational, analytic, deductive left hemisphere thinking. We pay scant attention to intentionally cultivating the more visual, intuitive, big picture capacities of the right hemisphere.

As it turns out, the creative process moves back and forth between left and right hemisphere dominance. Creativity is actually about using the whole brain more flexibly. This process unfolds in a far more systematic — and teachable — way than we ordinarily imagine. People can quickly learn to access the hemisphere of the brain that serves them best at each stage of the creative process — and to generate truly original ideas.

Myth #4: The best way to get more work done is to work longer hours.

No single myth is more destructive to employers and employees than this one. The reason is that we’re not designed to operate like computers — at high speeds, continuously, for long periods of time.

Instead, human beings are designed to pulse intermittently between spending and renewing energy. Great performers — and enlightened leaders — recognize that it’s not the number of hours people work that determines the value they create, but rather the energy they bring to whatever hours they work.

Rather than systematically burning down our reservoir of energy as the day wears on, as most of us do, intermittent renewal makes it possible to keep our energy steady all day long. Strategically alternating periods of intense focus with intermittent renewal, at least every 90 minutes, makes it possible to get more done, in less time, more sustainably.

Want to test the assumption? Choose the most challenging task on your agenda before you go to sleep each night over the next week. Set aside 60 to 90 minutes at the start of the following day to focus on the activity you’ve chosen.

Choose a designated start and stop time, and do your best to allow no interruptions. (It helps to turn off your email.) Succeed and it will almost surely be your most productive period of the day. When you’re done, reward yourself by taking a true renewal break.

Next month, the Harvard Business School Executive Education Program will host “Governing for Nonprofit Excellence” on its Cambridge Campus. The four day event is for voluntary members of nonprofit boards looking to enhance their leadership skills.

The event includes several discussions on various topics, such as the changing dynamics between boards and CEOs, the revamping of governance systems to maximize success, and guiding organizations in the measurement of organizational performance. The goal of these sessions is to challenge each participant to examine his or her role on the boards they serve and think about how to increase organizational effectiveness.

You can learn more about the event here.  Scholarships are available.

Sustaining Resources – It’s Not the Economy is slated for Wednesday November 16th (3 – 4 p.m.) and presented by David Sternberg. It must be these tough economic times that have hampered our fundraising results, right? Well, perhaps, but not likely. It may be that you’re not using a well-rounded fundraising approach that deploys the right human capital in the right way. This is how you ensure annual sustainability.This webinar will offer practical ways to blend annual giving with major gifts and planned giving, providing more than simple strategies. You’ll learn how to get a higher fundraising performance from your board in the fundraising process.Ideal for development directors, CEOs, and board members (especially development committee chairs), this training will have a focus on medium and small nonprofits.

Don’t miss: Webinar 101: Cultivation Events That Your Board, Friends, and Colleagues Will Rave About! on Thursday, November 17 from 3:00-4:30

More coaching resources at Common Good Vermont:

• Watch: Interview with Mark Furnari
• Why Should NPO ED’s Consider Coaching?
• Watch: Interview with Susan Palmer, Executive Coach
• Results of VT NPO ED Coaching Survey & Upcoming Coaching Circles

Storytelling is the most powerful means we have of connecting with our donors, volunteers, and other stakeholders. It’s how we make the unimaginable problems we address real, specific – and solvable. It’s how we connect our work to not just the minds, but the hearts of our communities.

Digital storytelling can help us do all this in profoundly new ways, and while it used to be very expensive to use these tools, that’s just not the case anymore. In an era when your mobile phone can double as a digital camera, and becomes a triple threat when it records video, every nonprofit can use online tools to tell amazing stories.

In this issue, we highlight some of the very many ways you can use digital tools for storytelling – from pictures to video to blogs to visual design. We hope you’ll find inspiration in the articles here – and that you’ll share your work with us as well.

Also, since data visualizations have emerged as a great way to tell your story, you should check out our 3-part webinar series, “Becoming a Data-Driven Nonprofit“. Not only is it free (thanks to the generous support of Google), but we’ll spend an entire session on tools and tactics for creating great visualizations.

Don’t miss Beth Kanter on Analytics and StoryTelling, Darian Rodriguez Heyman on Viral Storytelling and Danny Debonis on Crowdsourcing Campaign Videos.

Better yet, subscribe!

Is your nonprofit growing and needs to add staff members? Or does your organization need to back-fill an existing position? These resources shared by your colleagues on IdeaEncore can give you guidance and advice.

If your nonprofit is getting ready to hire its very first paid employee, Nolo Press’ publication Hiring Your First Employee – A Step-by-Step Guide ($14.99) could be invaluable for finding that key first employee, with the enthusiasm and commitment a small nonprofit needs. Austin City College’s Staffing Manual includes checklists and other helpful resources for executive directors and board members during the recruitment and hiring process. The Bridgespan Group has also recently shared their Top 10 Tips for Running a Good Nonprofit Hiring Process.

For staffing tech-related positions in particular, NTEN has published a great guide, Nonprofit IT Staffing: Staffing Levels, Recruiting, Retention and Outsourcing. CJW Consulting & Services has also shared Staffing Software-Related Positions ($20) for hiring the right person to manage your organization’s data.

Please share your handbooks, checklists and templates for hiring employees on IdeaEncore to help your colleagues at other nonprofits.

We’ve launched the Google for Nonprofits Help Center, a one-stop-shop where nonprofits can find support for the Google for Nonprofits Program and all associated products. Close to 50 new articles have been added to what used to be the Google for Nonprofits FAQ page. We have also cross-published relevant articles from the Google Apps, Google Earth, and SketchUp help centers. As such, the Google Grants Help Center has moved to the Google for Nonprofits help center. From now on, you can head to the Google for Nonprofits Help Center when you need support.

When I recently asked nonprofit experts in a range of fields—from fundraising to advocacy—to share the one book that has most influenced their professional lives, I had no idea what I’d hear back. I was thrilled to hear so many passionate stories about books that have made a huge difference in these folks’ lives. I’m sure that you, like me, are reading all the time—blogs, Facebook, e-newsletters and yes, books.

But what I heard from my colleagues (and know myself) is that reading a book is something different. That the fact of immersing oneself in a work that is longer, richer and frequently read in a distinct format (be that hard copy or an e-reader) is a unique experience. This immersion outside the day to day is highly engaging, energizing and refreshing on both creative and intellectual fronts. With that possibility in mind, consider these top picks for your reading list. One of them could change your life. Get your free copy here.

The results: Many of the respondents (25) were from Chittenden County (7) but there is an interest in meetings in Rutland/ Addison Counties, Central Vermont and the Northeast Kingdom. The majority of the ED’s surveyed are interested in coaching have explored leadership development in the past. They’d like to set aside time from their “pressing demands” to focus, in an ongoing way, on issues that face them, such as work/life balance (87%), holding staff (and board) accountable (64%) and making tough decisions (34%). Most folks are interested in morning sessions, citing “the earlier the better”.

We’ll announce the launch of the 2012 VT NPO ED Coaching Circles in December. In the meantime, please let us know if you’d like to attend (in either Burlington or Montpelier) by sending us an email—we’ll put you on the invite list! Coordinator@CommonGoodVT.org

More coaching resources at Common Good Vermont:

• Watch: Interview with Mark Furnari
• Why Should NPO ED’s Consider Coaching?
• Watch: Interview with Susan Palmer, Executive Coach

Common Good Vermont’s Lauren-Glenn Davitian speaks with executive coach Susan Palmer of Susan Palmer Consulting LLC.

Susan Palmer provides leadership development services through a series of structured conversations designed to help professionals achieve more of the results they seek. Coaching helps a leader make more powerful, informed choices and take more decisive action. Coaching topics  might include: strengthening management and decision-making skills, enhancing self-awareness, confidence and authenticity, expanding communication skills, improving time management, deepening leadership “presence”, clarifying action plans, and increasing job satisfaction by enjoying a healthier work/life balance. Watch here.

If you are interested in joining a 2012 ED Coaching Circle in Montpelier and Burlington, please send us an email at Coordinator@CommonGoodVT.org

More coaching resources at Common Good Vermont:

• Watch: Interview with Executive Coach Mark Furnari
• Why Should NPO ED’s Consider Coaching?
• VT NPO ED Coaching Survey Results
• Watch: Interview with Susan Palmer, Executive Coach

As a busy executive director of a Vermont nonprofit, it is easy to become lost in day-to-day decisions. Working with a coach helps me to improve my professional skills and to be a more effective leader, able to stay on mission and serve our community in the best possible way. – VT Nonprofit Executive

What is the one skill that all successful leaders require?

Most non-profit leaders are faced with the constant challenge of optimizing resources. Optimizing resources demands MANAGERIAL COURAGE. Managerial courage is the ability to face up to people problems with any person or situation quickly and directly – a leader is not afraid to take negative action when necessary.  Managerial Courage is in short supply in the workplace. Why? Because most leaders operate in isolation and do not have this essential skill identified and modeled for them.

What benefits does a professional coach provide?

Coaches provide a number of benefits to the astute leader. The coach brings experience with many organizations, complete understanding of the benefits and responsibilities of leadership and understanding the courage and patience needed to lead a mission driven organization.

How does a coach work with an enterprising leader?

Coaches develop a relationship with organizational leaders, supported by a variety of tools, such as 360 Reviews and Professional Development Plans. Coaches also hold the leader to the vision and the path of their professional development. This is essential since it is easy to get bogged down in daily operations. Coaches structure intentional reflective time with their clients–time devoted to nothing else but their professional improvement. In this way, the coach can help leaders can make rapid progress in their identified areas of improvement.

How do you find a coach to suit you?

This can be done a number of different ways. I encourage leaders to network with peers, use the internet and above all realize that experience is what separates the good coaches from the great ones. Coaching as a vocational field is a relatively recent development with abundant certification entities, both useful and not. From my perspective, experience working effectively is what counts. In terms of a personal fit, it is like any other professional relationship, exercise excellent consumer practice and interview a few – there is no substitute!

More coaching resources at Common Good Vermont:

• Watch: Interview with Executive Coach Mark Furnari
• Why Should NPO ED’s Consider Coaching?
• VT NPO ED Coaching Survey Results
• Watch: Interview with Susan Palmer, Executive Coach

Trained as a mediator and a counselor,  has spent the last twenty-five years working with organizations and individuals to maximize potential and meet organization and personal goals. Through leadership roles in business, public service, non-profits, health care, real estate and consulting, he has gained the experience and knowledge necessary to work with a wide range of clients.

It has become increasingly clear that traditional governance models are inadequate to effectively respond to the challenges faced by many nonprofits and their communities. Yet most nonprofits and capacity builders continue to rely on these models, hoping that more training or improved performance will transform the way their organizations are governed, only to realize that the underlying problems remain.

In response to the need for new approaches to governance, a national network of practioners and researchers known as the Engagement Governance Project, sponsored by the Alliance for Nonprofit Management (the national organization of capacity builders), has developed a new governance framework, Community Engagement Governance™. The Engagement Governance Project has launched a national participatory action research project with pilot organizations from around the country. The research has produced some exciting results which are briefly described in this article.

Why New Governance Approaches Are Needed

Traditional governance approaches, based on corporate models and outdated, top-down “command and control” paradigms, still dominate the nonprofit sector. Within these models are strong, inherent demarcations between board, constituents, stakeholders and staff, with the executive director often the only link between the various parts of the organization.

This type of separation commonly results in the disconnection of the board and, ultimately, the organization from the very communities they serve. It inhibits effective governance and accountability. Moreover, the pervasive trend toward “professionalism,” with boards comprised of “experts” who may or may not be engaged with the organization’s mission, has tended to deepen the class divide between boards and their communities. Ultimately, these models prevent nonprofits from being effective – that is, responsive and accountable to the communities they serve.

Perhaps most important, the nonprofit sector should foster and advance democracy and self-determination. If a nonprofit organization is to be truly accountable to its community and constituencies, democracy must be at its core. Yet, the nonprofit sector has typically tended to replicate structures and processes that actually hinder democracy within organizations,impeding an organization’s efforts to achieve its goals and fulfill its mission.

Beyond the Board as the Sole Locus of Governance

Community-Engagement Governance™ is an expanded approach to governance, built on participatory principles, that moves beyond the board of directors as the sole locus of governance. It is a framework in which responsibility for governance is shared across the organization, including the organization’s key stakeholders: its constituents and community, staff, and the board. Community-Engagement Governance™ is based on established principles of participatory democracy, self-determination, genuine partnership, and community-level decision making.

The Community-Engagement Governance™ framework helps organizations and networks become more responsive to their constituents’ and communities’ needs and to become more adaptive to the changing environment. Because no one governance model can fit all organizations, the framework was designed as an approach, rather than a model. This means it can be adapted to each organization’s unique needs and circumstances.

“Community-Engagement Governance™ in Action”: Action Research Findings

Nine diverse organizations are currently piloting the Community-Engagement Governance™ framework and adapting it to their constituencies, missions, stages of development, strategic directions and external factors. These nine organizations have a wide range of missions, annual budgets, developmental stages, constituencies and types of communities served, adaptive capacities and staff sizes. They include national, state-wide and community-based organizations, coalitions and networks.

Key Findings/Benefits of Using the Framework

Although the action research is continuing, several significant preliminary findings illustrate the benefits of this approach:

• Increased ability to respond to community needs and changes in environment; increased accountability to community
• Improved quality and efficiency of governance decision making: Increased strategic thinking, creativity and problem-solving ability
• Increased shared ownership of the organization’s mission and strategic directions
  An increase in new and more distributed leadership
• Improved ability to engage in deep collaboration with other nonprofits
• Increased visibility within the broader community
• Increased fundraising capacity and sustainability
• Increased transparency and community ownership, and more effective large-group decision making, through the use of social media and web portals
• Boards that are more engaged, passionate and transparent about their organization’s strategic direction and programs

We are looking for additional organizations who are interested in participating in the Community Engagement Governance Project. For more information about the project or the framework, contact Judy Freiwirth at Judy@NonprofitSA.com.

Judy Freiwirth, Psy.D. is an affiliated consultant with TSNE’s Executive Transitions and Organizational Transitions Programs and principal of Nonprofit Solutions Associates. She is a leading trainer and consultant in the area of nonprofit governance and board development, and has been a keynote speaker and trainer at many national and regional conferences.

On November 4th (Newport/ CCV from 9-11 a.m.) and November 18th (Morrisville/ CCV from 1 – 3 p.m.), the Community College of Vermont will present a two hour workshop to teach the basics of working with learners who have little to no computer experience. This workshop is designed for people who want to be able to both assist computer beginners in doing basic tasks – filling out forms, searching for information, opening an e-mail account – and explain basic concepts that are needed to learn more about computers and the Internet.

Whether you are a librarian, work in a senior center, work in community service, or simply want to help a family member this session provides a good foundation for a positive teaching experience. Recommended online resources for continued practice included.

There is no fee, but space is limited. Registration is required. Please contact: Mary Kay Dreher, Coordinator of Academic Services at the Community College of Vermont at the Montpelier Academic Center. Her number is 802.828.4060 and you can reach Mary Kay at  mary.dreher@ccv.edu

These workshops are an initiative of the e-Vermont Community Broadband Project.

Tune in on Wednesday, November 16 | 11a – 12p (Pacific Time) | 2p – 3p (Eastern Time) to learn about an exciting new tool to help nonprofit centers measure the economic, environmental, and community impacts of their shared facilities. Based on the findings of the nonprofit centers impact study, this toolkit will help you conduct your own evaluation for your center. > Register Now

Speaker: Roxanne Hanson, Director of Education and Consulting, The NonprofitCenters Network & Tides

Read the Executive Summary for Measuring Collaboration: The Benefits and Impacts of Nonprofit Centers

About the speaker: As Director of Education and Consulting, Roxanne Hanson leads technical assistance, project consulting, educational programs, and product development on nonprofit shared space and services. She has visited over 70 nonprofit centers in the U.S., Canada, and Japan, convening thought leaders and learning best practices in the field. Over the past five years, Roxanne has helped more than 100 emerging and established nonprofit centers think strategically about their operations and community impact.

Complimentary for NCN Members & Tides Center Projects | $40 for Nonmembers