Free book because you are fabulous!

Two years ago this week, Rosetta Thurman and I released the book “How to Become a Nonprofit Rockstar”. It has been a wild ride ever since. We’ve traveled from New York to Hawaii and from Indiana to Texas on the Nonprofit Rockstar book tour. If the tour has missed your town (Alaska, I’m looking at you) or if you’d like us to come back (Hawaii, you complete me) then contact us here. We’ve talked to young professionals groups, Chambers of Commerce, EPIP chapters, United Ways, community foundations, and universities.

None of this would have happened without YOU. You went to bat for us on conference planning committees, you encouraged your staff and students to read the book, and some of you baby boomers even bought copies for your nonprofit career-bound kids. You tweeted nice things, wrote book reviews on Amazon, and you even nominated us for a book award.

For one week only (October 29th to November 2nd), we are giving you a free electronic copy of “How to Become a Nonprofit Rockstar” ($19.99 value), when you use this link. You will receive a complete PDF of the book, as our way of saying thanks for being such a nonprofit rockstar. Get one for yourself, your co-workers, your neighbor in graduate school studying nonprofit management, and your book club. Spread the love and tell your friends on Facebook and Twitter. Last year, we gave away 650 copies of the book, with your help we can double that number this year.

Impatient Optimist

I usually don’t review books but I am a big fan of Bill Gates and was excited when I heard that there is a new book about Bill Gates’ thoughts on business and philanthropy. Impatient Optimist: Bill Gates in His Own Words  is a new book edited by Lisa Rogak. Bill Gates made his name in business but in his second act, he is tackling big hairy goals like eradicating malaria and reforming the U.S. education system.

I think that Bill Gates’ impact through philanthropy will someday vastly overshadow his work in technology. Here are a few of my favorite qutes from the book.

“Why isn’t there outrage, absolute outrage over this issue (disparity in the educational system)? Why aren’t there protests every day, I don’t understand. Why wouldn’t this activate people the way that it during the Civil Rights Movement?”

“The world is getting better, but it’s not getting better fast enough, and it’s not getting better for everyone.”

“I’m an optimist. I think this is a wonderful time to be alive. There are so many opportunities to do things that were impossible before.”

What's Your Platform?

During this election season, there is a lot of talk about political platforms but how much thinking have you done about your own platform to share ideas? Whether you are a program assistant at a community center or the CEO of a foundation, you probably have big ideas about how to solve the problems that you see in the world. If you didn’t, you probably would have picked a different field to work in. The best idea for change in the world doesn’t mean much if no one hears about it, except for you and your cat.

This idea of branding and building a platform for do gooders has been keeping me up at night. My greatest frustration is that all of the great marketing goes to the dumbest ideas, e.g. the marketing muscle that went into Snookie’s book “It’s a Shore Thing” (no link purposefully given because I am trying to save all of our brain cells). Where is that sort of marketing might when it comes to the recent college grad who is building a performance company to use improv to bring public policy ideas to life or the author who is breaking the mold on what a donor looks like or the organization that is building a nation-wide green economy by seeing residents of the inner-city as a solution, not the problem? Since they don’t have million dollar marketing budgets and prime-time commercials, I thought it was time to build a do-it-yourself movement for good idea marketing. I’ve built a branding book of the month club to help all of us spend some extra time building our brand. Not so you can be the next reality tv star but  so your great ideas can get the light of day. Learn more here. 

Innovation and Impact Forum

Last week I had the pleasure of attending the Innovation and Impact Forum for Black Male Achievement that the Open Sociaty Foundation hosted in New York City. Hundreds of funders, practitioners, goverment officials, and academics came together and talked about what is working to strengthen Black men and boys in the United States. Too often we focus on the challenges but it is nice to be able to spend time celebrating what is going right.

The Headwaters Foundation for Justice has been the host of the African American Leadership Forum for the last few years and it is great to see that the success of that work isn’t an abberation but that is part of a larger movement across the country to support successful outcomes for African Americans. Below is a link for a panel from the conference.

What Winning Looks Like in Black Male Achievement from Open Society Foundations on FORA.tv