The Year Ahead

 
I am always delighted when friend and colleague MARILYN HOYT sends along her take on what's ahead. This is the third or fourth such report I've shared. Comment here or write Marilyn directly at hoytmarilyn@gmail.com.
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Resilience is more important than brilliance

Luke Johnson, The Entrepreneur

Financial Times, 11/6/13

Informal Personnel Study looking at Job Volatility:  Thanks to the 85 of us who reported on their current position and the past 2.  High points were:

1)      Most of us did not change jobs during the recession…and yet, we often saw ourselves as outliers if we stayed put.  Not so! 

2)      We often saw our job descriptions expanded as others were laid off or left. Now, new hires are getting new jobs and we still have these expanded jobs. (True of business too)

3)      When left jobs, we often began grantwriting/consulting. Now, many of us are going back to jobs.  Those at/near retirement are most consistent in staying freelance. 

4)      Those who stay a long time in one institution (10 years +), often have a bad experience after a move. We need to pace ourselves nimbly if we want to career-build with moves.

5)      For-profit colleagues often cross into fundraising from marketing and communications or their own small businesses.  We fundraisers transfer among non-profits serving similar constituencies or into government.

Trends:

Foundations generally very much on the uptrend.  No sign that they’ll go back to pre-recession priorities.

Corporations not particularly.  They are distracted by the larger story of global CSR where there is no pressure for philanthropy, are still giving nearly ½ of their recorded philanthropy in-kind, continue interest in having their employees volunteering as part of their internal motivational and leadership development programs, and are under a lot of pressure to make sure their giving brings value back to their brand, leadership and/or bottom line.

Individuals.  Annual Funds are holding if not growing. Major gifts are tracking the return of stock profits and our ability to invest in building relationships. Social media delivers much more measurably as a brand raiser than a fundraiser.  Cause Related Marketing may make more sense as it doesn’t tend to require so much time on our side:  222.conecomm.com/2013-social impact. Don’t get lost in fads!  Keep watching the studies.

Government:  Still so volatile.  Network, network, network in your region and field.

Fads:  The fad of the moment is “technology.”  Since we’ve so traditionally worked without much technology or data, investigating these tools is a good idea. But technology does not replace relationships in our business or anyone else’s…and it’s hard to find efficiencies too.

Watch business…they got us into this, and are beginning to illuminate what data does and does not do.  A full year ago, the New York Times put a shot over the technology bow by placing two articles top-of-fold on page 1 of the Business Section:  (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/11/business/in-new-year-errors-mount-at-high-speed-exchanges.html and http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/11/business/electronic-records-systems-have-not-reduced-health-costs-report-says.html)

To get my grey cells perking on how to harvest and use data, I was impressed with an article in the December 2013 Harvard Business Review: You Might Not Need Big Data After All – Learn how lots of little data can inform every day decision making.  http://hbr.org/2013/12/you-may-not-need-big-data-after-all/ar/1

On the other side of “hard” is where special things happen.

Kasim Reed, Mayor of Atlanta

 National Public Housing Museum conference hosted by the Ford Foundation

10/17/13