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First, you’ll need to reflect on what happened. Maybe you removed funding restrictions, began making grants quickly, clarified your strategy, ensured that everyone knew your top priorities, swiftly executed, and developed innovative partnerships. Or your team learned how to use Zoom and other new technologies.
Then you’ll need to learn from those reflections. Consider that it’s not just the specific effort that matters, but it’s also the ways that your team had to change to make these efforts work, like becoming more agile and innovative.
Finally, you can act on this new knowledge by more broadly applying it to things like decision-making processes or professional development.
Getting Started
Use the following seven questions when you find yourself saying, “What just happened?” They can help you begin to make sense of who you were, who you are and who you want to be.
1. What did we do differently during this crisis? What was the result? Maybe you had a paper grant-making process before and then switched everything online, resulting in a faster giving cycle.
2. What did we put in place before the crisis that helped us later? One of my clients switched to online payments in January. It was a smart move and, in retrospect, incredibly helpful when the new reality hit.
3. What do we wish we had done before the crisis? Maybe your culture didn’t have enough trust built in to allow people to work from home. As a result, you had to set up all the components, from policies to technology, on the fly.
4. If we could do it all over again, what would we do differently? Did you fail to communicate with your grantees early and often, leaving them in uncertainty as they scrambled to make decisions?
5. What new things did we try that didn't work so well during the crisis? Let’s say you waded into an area that wasn't closely related to your mission or your expertise. Then you realized that others were better equipped to lead that effort. Don’t beat yourself up for the mistake. Congratulate yourself for taking risks and moving quickly. Only next time tighten your focus and reach out to collaborators when efforts you care about move beyond your scope.
6. What new practices do we want to maintain? Think carefully about this one, especially those that you might see as temporary but that dramatically increase your effectiveness. For example, can you continue removing funding restrictions and trusting your nonprofit partners with core support grants?
7. How can new ways of working be applied elsewhere? This is when you examine specific actions and efforts with a 30,000 foot lens. Did you have a program officer who did more than anyone else to stabilize and support the grantees in her portfolio? Try to figure out what behaviors made the difference and apply those more broadly.
Your unique answers to these questions can become your new best practices or "the new you." Next comes the trickiest part. You’ll have to embrace these new best practices and make them part of your DNA, when everything will be attempting to pull you back into your old ways. It's a matter of slamming the door behind you and sealing all the cracks to keep from falling back into old habits, a scarcity mindset, inertia and more. By doing this, you'll emerge from this crisis transformed. Not only that, but you’ll position yourself to strengthen the civil sector when it needs you the most.
Hoe verhoog je als filantroop of filantropisch fonds je impact tijdens de corona-pandemie? DDB-Expert Kris Putnam gaf de antwoorden in een drukbezocht webinar: de opname ervan is nu kosteloos te bekijken.
Kris Putnam-Walkerly is een van Amerika’s invloedrijkste filantropieadviseurs en experts op het gebied van ‘transformational giving’. Ze behoorde de afgelopen jaren steevast tot een de top 25 Philanthropy-sprekers in de VS en is de auteur van het onlangs verschenen “Delusional Altruism”. Deze bestseller werd gerecenseerd door filantropiekeener en -publicist Edwin Venema: klik hier.
Putnam over haar ‘corona-webinar’: ‘Gedrag dat financiers tegenhoudt, wordt vaak uitvergroot in moeilijke tijden. Grijp deze tijd om uw manier van geven te veranderen - en deze verbeteringen te handhaven lang nadat de crisis voorbij is - om meer impact te bereiken en de verlichting en het herstel op lange termijn te ondersteunen die mensen nodig hebben.’
Dit webinar is gemaakt voor alle soorten filantropen - individuele donateurs, stichtingen, programma's voor het geven van bedrijven, giving circles en familie offices - die niet alleen op zoek zijn naar manieren om door deze crisis te navigeren, maar ook om hun filantropische effectiviteit te vergroten .
Wilt u het webinar terugkijken, dan is alleen een online-registratie voldoende: klik hier.
Wilt u de recensie lezen van Putnams laatste bestseller 'Delusional Altruism'? klik hier
