A breath of fresh air on problem solving

This is such an amazing article by Hildy Gottlieb at the Creating the Future blog that I decided to post it in its entirerty without any commentary. Let me know what you think.

Are you Ending or Beginning by Hildy Gottlieb

The world is filled with problems. We keep trying to end those problems, but despite our tremendous efforts, they are still here.

In the U.S. alone, we have seen 40 years of “wars” on drugs, on poverty, on terror, on illegal immigration. But with all the dollars and time and effort we have spent trying to end this or that, the world is still filled with problems.

Around the globe, people have spent billions and trillions of dollars, trying once and for all to end many of our planet’s problems. Smart, caring people have dedicated their lives to figuring out every approach imaginable for ending the pain in our world. We have created prevention programs (the ultimate in problem-solving), and we have lately seen a whole slew of “blueprints to end” this or that - hunger, homelessness. And so we now have “blueprints” to end what the “wars” could not end. We are trying, desperately trying, working so hard, so long, so ceaselessly, to end the bad things that cause pain.

And despite our well-intentioned and well-thought-out efforts, we keep feeling like we are not getting anywhere.

And the reason we feel like we are not getting anywhere is because we are, in fact, not getting anywhere.

But then, we have not been aiming at getting anywhere. We have instead been setting our sights directly at our problems. And as happens when we give that much energy to anything, it grows. Yes, it grows.

We have aimed all our energy at our problems, and they are thriving under our attention.

So what is a caring citizen of the world to do?

Ending Something Bad vs. Beginning Something Incredible
The answer is, caring citizens, to stop aiming all our efforts at ending our problems. Seriously.

Instead of aiming all our attention and energy at what we DON’T want, let’s instead aim at building incredible, building amazing.

Let’s stop aiming our work at ending something bad, and let’s start aiming that work at building something good. Let’s aim at building an incredible place to live - an amazing community, an amazing world.

Think about it. We certainly cannot create an amazing place to live without addressing in some way the problems we have today. But unlike the “then what?” of problem-solving, aiming at amazing IS the “then what”!

A community that is compassionate, wise, healthy, vibrant - a community that nurtures artistic expression, that brings out the best in us rather than simply trying to suppress the worst in us.

A world full of people who react from our human potential for wisdom and compassion, before reacting from our animal instincts for survival.

No need to aim at ending anything at all. All we need to do is aim at beginning something incredible.

Start with your own organization’s planning. Are your plans reacting to your community’s increasing demands and needs, trying to end something bad? Or are they aiming at a great beginning - building an amazing place to live? If you plan for building an amazing community, you will address your community’s needs on the way to building “amazing.”

Are you creating a prevention program, aimed at preventing something bad - ending it once and for all - perhaps preventing / ending diabetes, heart disease, obesity? Or perhaps preventing / ending teen pregnancy, high school drop rates, gang violence? Or are you instead aiming at a great beginning - building a healthy community in all ways, a vibrant, resilient, nurturing place to live, where diabetes and heart disease and teen pregnancy and gang violence are addressed as one of many “to do” items on the road to building that healthy place to live?

Now look inside your organization. Are you reacting to internal problems, perhaps considering a Capacity Building initiative? Are you hoping you can get enough funding to address the area that happens to be on fire this year? Or are you aiming those plans at a great beginning - planning for overall health and strength for all your organization’s efforts? If you plan to make all your efforts healthy and strong in every way, you will address those problems on the way to building “amazing.”

And what about your board? Are you aiming your board development efforts at problem-solving, to finally put a stop to those nagging issues of recruitment and fundraising, succession planning and financial planning? Or are you aiming your board at a great beginning - tapping its immense potential to move forward not only the organization, but your mission and your vision for a better community / a better world? If you are encouraging and inspiring your board to its very highest potential, the board will address its problems along the way to building “amazing.”

And don’t get me started on world events! Are we aiming at ending a war, or are we aiming at the greatest beginning of all - building peace? Those two scenarios could not look more different. If we end the war on the way to building a peaceful region, a peaceful world - now that would be aiming at building “amazing” in every way we could dream of.

It all comes down to one question:

Are we aiming at an ending or a beginning?

Are we aiming all our energies and resources at ending something bad,
or at creating something incredible?

If you want your work to be inspired, if you want to encourage and inspire others to that work, and if you want to tap on the highest potential we all have to accomplish incredible things, my money is on aiming at beginning something incredible - aiming at building “amazing.”

But more importantly, if you want to address your community’s problems, once and for all, stop trying to solve those problems. Stop aiming all your energies at an ending. Start aiming instead at a beginning - the beginning of building an amazing, vibrant, energized, nurturing, caring and compassionate place to live.

We are creating the future, every minute of every day, whether we do so consciously or not. What amazing tomorrow will you begin building today?

The Great Generational Divide or the Cross-Generational Solution to Work Satisfaction?

I have been in what some people would call a “generational rock and a hard place” for the last few months. I am a young person in the foundation field and one of my passions is helping young people learn how to advance in the philanthropic sector but one of my professional duties at the foundation is managing a project on older adult civic engagement. A big piece of this project is figuring out how to keep baby boomers in my community engaged as they begin to retire or change careers. Talk about competing priorities. On one hand I know how important it is to keep baby boomers engaged, on the other hand I am hearing from young people on a daily basis that they can’t advance because baby boomers won’t leave the philanthropic sector and make room for young people to advance. I have finally realized that this isn’t an “either, or” proposition. Baby boomers at foundations and in the nonprofit sector as a whole have great expertise that they contribute to the field but they have created positions for themselves where they work 80 hours a week and refuse to take vacation (or sick days for that matter), with the idea that “this whole place would fall apart without me”. Young people want more responsibility but would also like to have a life outside of their job. There are lots of explanations for why this is but one of the most probable that I have heard is that Gen X was raised as latchkey kids and saw the family sacrifices that their parents had to make to slowly climb the career ladder. They also saw their parents lose their pensions in mass layoff and Enron scandals, so they know that the old paradigm of work hard for the same company for 40 years and retire is no longer realistic.

What if a new way of working was created that still kept baby boomers engaged but allowed them to reduce the number of hours that they work so that they could keep health benefits and stay involved in a career that they love? What if this same new way of work allowed Gen X the flexibility to spend time with their families or take on a second job (to pay down the massive student loan debt that so many have)? If we started thinking of the program officer position (of any other foundation or nonprofit staff member for that matter) as a collection of tasks that can be completed by one or many people depending on the time available for each worker. How much more effective would a foundation be if instead of one program officer, they now had three sharing that same 80 hour a week position? The foundation would now have 3 times as many connections in the community, 3 diverse perspectives on how to solve social problems, and 3 great ambassadors for the foundation’s work.

What refinements (or significant changes) do you think are needed to create a foundation workplace that is supportive for multiple generations?

Knowledge Sharing in the Field

In my last post on advice to new foundation staff, I said that there isn’t a handbook that tells you how to be a good Program Officer, that doesn’t mean that there aren’t a lot of tools along the way that will make your job a lot clearer. One of this blog’s readers, Donald, suggested The Insider's Guide to GrantMaking by Joel Orosz as a good starting point for new grantmakers. I have found Grantcraft’s articles to be very useful as well.

There is a lot to be said for written resources but there are also the “unwritten” rules of grantmaking. These are the rules that exist in the heads of our boards and presidents. Rules in this category are things like “we don’t fund that type of organization”, or “we can only invest our endowment in traditional investments, not community development projects”. One of my purposes of creating this blog was to begin to bridge the generational gap that exists in the field of philanthropy. Part of that generational gap is the younger generation’s lack of experience doing the business of grantmaking. There is a lot that can be learned in this job by experiencing it firsthand. You make an unsuccessful grant, you learn from that experience and make a better grant next time. But another part of this gap is more experienced grantmakers not taking the time to share the lessons that they have learned. Until we learn as a field to share our lessons learned within our organizations, and more importantly throughout the field, we will never make true progress on the issues that are impacting our society.

First Time Visitor Guide

It can be a little bit overwhelming to visit a blog for the first time. On some blogs it may feel like you are entering mid-conversation. This guide is my attempt to help you get a sense of the topics that I include in my blog so that you can be an active participant in this small corner of the web.


Blog Description

This blog covers issues of generational change in the philanthropic sector and more broadly trends in philanthropy. This is a wide range of topics from how professional training programs in philanthropy are creating a younger applicant pool for foundation positions to how Google is revolutionizing the concept of philanthropy. We are in a unique period of time where baby boomers are retiring and Gen Xers have made it clear that they are not content with keeping the status quo in the nonprofit or foundation sectors. I believe we are in an important period of rapid evolution in the philanthropic field, which is very significant for a field has been traditionally stagnant (or based on years of history and tradition, depending on your perspective). I will use this blog to document that evolution.


Interaction

Working at a Foundation can be very consuming work that narrows your focus to only the grant proposals that come across your desk. I write this blog because it expands my focus to trends that are larger than the community that I work in but that will have significant impact on that same community. It also helps me think through and learn about the topics that I write about. Interacting with readers and other bloggers about these topics really helps to expand and clarify my own thinking. I want your thoughts about these issues as well. The real benefit of reading about topics on the web is the blurred line between audience and author and the real exchange of knowledge that happens when many people provide their perspectives. Comments are very much welcome.

Now that I’ve introduced myself, why don’t you briefly introduce yourself in the comments area below. Who are you, do you work in the philanthropic sector, and why are you interested in trends in philanthropy?