Pro Bono and Obama

By Aaron Hurst on July 2, 2009 1:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In his first six months in office, President Obama has spoken at length about service, social innovation and professional responsibility.  They are some of the core means for achieving his domestic agenda. He sees them as part of how we address issues in our society on a systemic basis.

Service is about volunteering, but it is also about a mindset where one is giving of himself to help the collective.

Social innovation is about the notion that government can't solve problems alone and that we cannot continue do things the same way while expecting different results. The President sees innovation in the nonprofit sector as critical to an effective government and society.

Finally, professional responsibility was a major theme of criticism surrounding the Wall Street melt down and executive compensation. While the President believes in capitalism, he also feels that business professionals must hold themselves accountable to more than just the short-term bottom line.

Pro bono service is the intersection of these three priorities we've seen President Obama espouse. Pro bono allows business professions to provide social innovators with their skilled service while also constructing an ethic of professional social responsibility in these careers.

By inspiring the adoption of the pro bono ethic and investing in the infrastructure of its field, the President can find a rare synergy where one single effort can have a tremendous multiplier effect.

In Treatment

By Aaron Hurst on June 26, 2009 1:17 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I am totally addicted to HBO's "In Treatment".  I must have watched 20 episodes in 7 days the other week.

Like "The Office", the show is an import remade for American audiences.  This one comes to us from Israel, which is not surprising since it is about therapy, the Jewish pastime.

It is a drama but riffs off of a sitcom's 30-minute format and the nightly news' daily schedule.  Each day of the week we watch another patient of Paul--a therapist working out of a Brooklyn brownstone. We get to sit in on their sessions and follow their personal dramas as they unfold each week.   

Monday is a lawyer who wants to be a mom but can't find a man. Tuesday is a student battling cancer. Wednesday is a family in the middle of a divorce. Thursday is a CEO worried about his daughter serving in Africa and a crisis at work. On Friday we get to see Paul with his therapist.

I have done my share of therapy.  I have also worked with three executive coaches in my career. They are different experiences but have some interesting similarities. I got to wishing there was a sister show about executive coaching.

Not only would it be very entertaining, but it could help remove the stigma of using an executive coach and provide insight to managers about effective management and leadership.  Shows like "Nanny 911" help parents realize there are worse parents out there than themselves while also allowing them to pick up some helpful tips. The show I am envisioning could be a safe way for people to learn how to be more effective and sane.

In Treatment + The Office + The Apprentice + Nanny 911

If we carbon copy the format for '"In Treatment", here is a potential lineup for season one.


Monday: A mother of a small child works as a middle-manager and faces glass ceiling in her company where management is nearly all male.  She wrestles with her frustration at work and guilt around not being home.

Tuesday: Rising star at a consulting firm does a pro bono project and begins to think about a career change and the roles of his values at work.  He begins dating his nonprofit client and realizes that things aren't as black and white.

Wednesday: Entreprenuer facing the ups and downs of a rising start-up. She co-founded it with another person and they struggle to work together. One is motivated to build a great company and the other to build a great product.  One is a people person and the other has interpersonal issues.

Thursday: Hospital administrator who struggles with balancing business and the needs of the patients. Her father becomes a patient and makes her question her priorities.

Friday: On Fridays, our executive coach goes to therapy with Paul from "In Treatment" and talks about her own battle feeling on the sidelines and wonder if she should go back to working at a company instead of just coaching.

Of course there would be twists, romances and drama tossed in to keep it fresh.

Matt O'Grady Day

By Aaron Hurst on June 18, 2009 7:41 AM | Permalink | Comments (11)

Guest Posting by Matt O'Grady

Tomorrow, June 19 is Matt O'Grady Day at the Taproot Foundation. All our offices will be closed, and staff has the day off. The holiday celebrates my wedding last year on this date, which was among the first same-sex weddings to be legally performed in California. Of course, this is the greatest honor I've ever had in my somewhat sordid career - who else do you know whose employer declared an official holiday in their honor?

But Matt O'Grady Day isn't really about me. It's about the step forward society took - however faltering that step proved to be - when California's Supreme Court ruled that equal protection under the law applies to all, regardless of sexual orientation. Since that brave step was taken, California voters decided to write discrimination back into our constitution, and the same Supreme Court upheld their right to do so. In the same ruling, they also upheld my marriage, along with the 18,000 others that were performed last summer.

As a result, we now have three classes of citizens in California: First Class Citizens, including all heterosexuals who may marry and receive all the benefits provided by California law, as well as more than 1,000 distinct rights bestowed in federal law. And we have Second Class Citizens, including me, who enjoy state benefits of marriage, but not the federal ones. And we have a sorry Third Class of Citizens: Gays and Lesbians who can't get married at all. This is clearly unsustainable, as well as inherently unfair.

My sister-in-law is a fundamentalist Christian. She blessed my marriage, yet at the same time expressed opposition to same-sex marriage in general. A few weeks ago, she sent me a note. She had just seen the film, "Milk," and it changed her perspective entirely. She had voted to ban same-sex marriage last November, she wrote. But if she has the opportunity to vote on it again, she would change her vote.

I look forward to the day when the Taproot Foundation revises its policies and drops Matt O'Grady Day. Not because I'm not loved here anymore, but because my sister-in-law and everyone else in this country get so far past all this nonsense about restricting marriage that having a special day celebrating the achievement just seems passé.

But until that day comes, we have work to do in advancing society. So join me in taking tomorrow off to celebrate and rest up, then let's all get back to work fresh on Monday pushing society forward.


Steve Van Landingham, his mother Jeri Boone, San Francisco Supervisor Bevan Dufty, Polly O'Grady, and Matt O'Grady celebrate after Steve & Matt's wedding at San Francisco City Hall, June 19, 2008.
 

Pro Bono Takes Tokyo

By Aaron Hurst on June 1, 2009 6:58 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Last week I heard from our friend, Ikuma Saga, in Tokyo who has been making strides to kick off a Service Grant Program in Japan since 2005. They've completed 17 projects and currently have 6 underway. 190 pro bono consultants have offered to contribute their time to do pro bono for nonprofits.

Service Grant Tokyo recently held a launch party to officially announce their newly acquired nonprofit incorporation status, exhibit their Board's commitment to their work, expand their network and promote pro bono. It's exciting to see people across the world get equally riled up about the role pro bono can play in society. Congratulations to Ikuma for all his hard work and for the success his efforts have seen in the last few months on bringing pro bono to Tokyo.

The Board members who are leading the pro bono movement in Japan include:

- Kaneto Kanemoto, CEO of OK Wave
- Yoshiko Ikoma, former Chief Editor of Marie Claire Japan
- Hajime Nakano, VP of Arc Web
- Eriko Kawabuchi, Executive of Idee
- Naoki Yoshioka, CEO of Unplug, llc.
- Ikuma Saga, Founder of Service Grant Tokyo & Director of Earthday Money Association

For those of you out there who speak Japanese, here's a link to the Service Grant Tokyo site with an example of one website they made pro bono.
 
Here are some pics to share from the celebratory launch party for pro bono in Japan at a MUJI Studios space:

New Nonprofit Language

By Aaron Hurst on May 19, 2009 11:50 AM | Permalink | Comments (5)

EcoAmerica, a nonprofit marketing firm based in the nation's capital, has found that we need new language to save the environment.   The firm accidentally released their findings to the media which resulted in more likely media attention that the report would have garnered normally.  The New York Times published an article about the report on May 2nd which outlined some of the recommendations.

According to the Times, the old language of global warming is no longer effective.  It has too much baggage and doesn't align well with the motivations of the American people.  The nonprofit suggests that we move to a discussion of "our deteriorating atmosphere" and speak about our efforts to "move away from the dirty fuels of the past."

Karl Rove would be proud.  The progressive front has finally learned how to use language as a tool for social change just as he did a dozen plus years ago for the Republican machine.

This new eco-language is right on.  It moves beyond radicalism or boomer politics and makes a critical issue easy to consume.  Now, we need to do the same thing for the whole progressive platform--starting with the word "progressive".

Taproot Foundation works with hundreds of nonprofit organizations across the country every year and find that we continue to see the same old language, which is ineffective in most cases, being recycled.  It is old and tired.  Perhaps more importantly, it just doesn't resonate with a new generation.

There needs to be a whole new framing of a wide range of issues from foster care to homelessness, from volunteerism to vegetarianism.   These issues also need to be designed to fit together into a broader ethical frame that can hold them all together.

The work of getting this new language defined is significant but doable.  The hard part is working with all the nonprofit organizations, politicians and community organizers (hate that term) to adopt the new language and framing.  This requires real leadership and influence.

How can the Taproot Foundation use our network of hundreds of nonprofit clients to be a part of this change?

URL Squatters

By Aaron Hurst on May 12, 2009 1:08 PM | Permalink | Comments (8)

I am at my wits end and need some advice.

I am working with a nonprofit that just selected a terrific new name and now needs a URL to use as the address for their website.  There are two great domains that would work but are already owned by other folks.

Neither of these owners are using the domains.  They are just sitting there unused.  The nonprofit is willing to pay real money for the rights, but they simply won't respond.  Based on a little research, it looks like one of the owners may be in jail.  The other one is just stubborn (we assume).

URLs are real estate, and people have rights to own real estate without being forced to sell.  What makes this different is that the domain name is ".org" and that the real estate is not being used.  It is like having a nonprofit that is willing to build low-income housing on an abandoned lot, but the owner won't take the fair market value for it.  Criminal.

Should there be an eminent domain law about .org URLs that are vacant lots?  They are needed to serve the public, and it is in the public's interest that they not remain as vacant lots if there is a buyer willing to pay the market value as defined by a third party.

While we wait for Obama to pass this new law, does anyone have a suggestion for how to address this frustrating situation?

The Death of the MBA

By Aaron Hurst on May 8, 2009 2:52 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

In an earlier blog post  I wrote about an article in the New York Times that described the change in the prestige of careers and how careers in the public sector may have surpassed jobs in consulting and on Wall Street as being at the top of the list.

Upon further reflection, it brought me back to a conversation that I had with my father when I was still in college and he was in graduate school at the University of Michigan getting his PhD in Higher Education Administration.  What occurred to both of us in the conversation over a dozen years ago was that professional schools are not organized effectively.

MBA programs are the ones that offer the best education and training in management.  It is really rare to find a program in health care management, higher education administration, nonprofit management or related fields that comes even close to providing the training as an MBA.
 
The curriculum in these areas simply isn't as evolved -- it is in business that management has been studied tirelessly because it is where the skills have been economically rewarded.
 
The other issue is that other degrees for nonprofit leadership are harder to sell as relevant to other fields if you decide, like most people, to switch careers at some point down the road.

An MBA provides the best education and a degree that is valued in almost every profession.  I counsel professionals seeking a master's degree that going with any option other than an MBA will result in fewer practical skills, a less valuable network and may prove worthless in five years when they decide on a different career path.

So, why I am singing the praises of the MBA degree in a post about its demise?

We need professionals in every field that can manage people, projects, programs and organizations. The specifics for each field are secondary to these core management skills.  As more and more of our top talent seek careers outside of corporations, the MBA schools need to adapt to recognize that their value lies not in teaching business but instead in teaching management.  The Harvard Business School needs to become the Harvard School of Management.

This should also become the organizing principle for professional schools. Management should be the common curriculum and the specialized fields should be secondary (not the other way around as it is today).

You could get your MM (Master's in Management) and then get a "minor" (or have a track) in a specific field of interest like health care.  It could also be designed so that every 5-10 years you could return and add an additional minor to reflect a career switch or new interest.

This model would better meet the needs of professionals today and therefore make professional schools more effective.

AmeriCorps on Steroids

By Aaron Hurst on April 29, 2009 3:08 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

President Obama last week signed legislation that will expand the AmeriCorps program to 250,000 people.  That is the equivalent of two college towns suddenly unleashed to fight poverty across the country.  Amazing.

At this scale we need to rethink the whole program and ecosystem needed to support them to ensure the results our nation needs.

Here are four ideas for how to support this growing army.

1) AmeriCorps is a well-known brand at universities and with folks entering the job market. We need to expand this reach to promote the program to mid-career professionals who are either looking to do a career change or a sabbatical.  To do this, AmeriCorps could market to career coaches and corporate HR departments. They will quickly spread the word. This will bring a needed influx of middle management into nonprofit organizations and also build a pipeline for leadership in the sector.

2) The AmeriCorps program will need to market to nonprofits much more aggressively. It should partner with the Foundation Center to do trainings for nonprofits across the country where they can help organizations understand all the ways they could leverage the program.

3) Much like the IRS has created an industry to help people and organizations file their taxes, my sense is that we will need a small industry to support AmeriCorps. The nonprofit sector does not have the capacity to manage this new influx.  We need intermediaries to help nonprofits design programs, apply for AmeriCorps grants, find the best people for the jobs and help a nonprofit integrate Corps members into their organization.  These intermediaries will need lobbying, grant writing, recruitment, program design and training competencies.

4) Speaking of armies, AmeriCorps would be an interesting re-entry program for returning veterans from the Middle East. It would enable them to continue to serve while integrating them into the domestic workforce.

So, there they are. Four ideas of how we can harness the exciting influx of AmeriCorps members.

Prestige and Nonprofit Careers

By Aaron Hurst on April 27, 2009 2:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I can't recall an article that I have read that gave me as much of a sense of optimism about our country as the cover story in The New York Times "Week in Review" section a couple of weeks ago about the shift in professional aspirations of college students (read article here).

We have heard for a while that this generation was more public-service oriented, but I had my doubts about how this attitude impacted action.  I worried that it was like the research that showed that people prefer to buy products from good corporate citizens but when it comes time to make purchases they forget these values as soon as they begin pushing their shopping carts.

The shift the article described that caught my attention was the shift in the prestige of careers.  Going to work on Wall Street or for a large consulting firm is no longer seen as being as sexy or as good of a way to impress your peers as it once was. Careers in public service, science and other professions directly related to addressing core global issues are the new "plastics" -- where the best of the best focus their talents.

For those of us from middle class families, prestige is typically more important than money in selecting careers (assuming you get paid a living wage that can cover your debt from school).  We all want to have our friends and family admire what we do for a living -- especially in a society where your occupation defines so much of your identity.

This is a sea change that will impact everything from the nonprofit sector to universities, to the government, to consulting firms who will now have to change their game to attract the best and the brightest.

I suspect and hope that pro bono service programs will be a big part of what makes this transition work.  If the top consulting firms can match the legal and architecture firms and make commitments that 1-3% of their billing hours are used for pro bono service to support public benefit organizations and causes, they are going to be in a much better position to secure and retain talent.

This will be a win for the firms and the nonprofits they serve. It will also be critical to building the capacity of nonprofits to absorb all the top talent who will be seeking full-time jobs in the public sector.

I counsel many of the top young professionals I meet to go learn their trade in the corporate community and then, once trained, to come to the nonprofit sector.  I argue that the nonprofit sector doesn't have the capacity to offer the kind of training and management support they could get at a company like McKinsey, and they will do more for society if they get that first and then make the shift.

The capacity of nonprofits to offer such training needs to improve to reflect the interests of this new generation and the scale of their desire to join the public sector.  We need to focus much of our pro bono service efforts on building the training and management capacity of nonprofits so that they can be that ideal first job for newly minted professionals.

The nonprofit sector must become an employer of choice, not just as a fantasy of well-intentioned students, but in the reality of the professional experience that comes from working for a well-operated nonprofit in your first years out of school.

National Volunteer Week Thank You

By Aaron Hurst on April 23, 2009 11:41 AM | Permalink | Comments (218)

To our pro bono consultants,


Consider this an interactive, virtual thank you card from all of us at Taproot Foundation.  

Today we honor our pro bono consultants from coast to coast for National Volunteer Week, or as we call it, National Pro Bono Week!  Since 2001, you have collectively provided $49 million of pro bono services to over 800 nonprofits nationwide and we are grateful for your commitment.  

We don't award money to nonprofits; we award something far more valuable--your talent and time.  You are truly the life force of Taproot Foundation and we realize every success we have is ultimately due to your great work and dedication.  To our over 4,000 current pro bono consultants--thank you all for using your gifts and skills to give back.  We are so proud to have each of you as part of our team.  

Please take a moment to reflect on your tremendous accomplishments highlighted below.  We encourage you each to leave a message of thanks to your fellow "Roots" in the Taproot Foundation family.  Think of recognizing your project teammates or even pro bono consultants in other markets you've never met before!  Together, you represent a powerful network of innovative professionals dedicated to solving problems.  Whether you know it or not, you are advancing the pro bono movement in the U.S., inspiring others to join, and serving as an invaluable resource to nonprofits nationwide.

We look forward to another year working with all of you to continue strengthening more nonprofits and communities.

Thank you all for making pro bono service a priority.  We couldn't do this without you.  

Look at all you've accomplished in the last year!  
(Since National Pro Bono Week 2008)

Bay Area Pro Bono Consultants

This is where it all began.  As our founding market, you have been there since the beginning, in 2001.  Thank you for continuing to be such a strong foundation upon which we can grow.

1,394 current pro bono consultants

In the past year...
106 projects completed
$4,670,000 of capacity building services donated!


New York Pro Bono Consultants

In 2004, Taproot Foundation officially became a "national" organization thanks to all of your hard work on local projects.  Donating your talents at such a critical moment in our history enabled us to take a leap and expand.  Now you've brought us to the cover of the New York Times and NBC Nightly News online.  Thank you for helping us see what more was possible.

1,002 current pro bono consultants

In the past year...
77 projects completed
$3,270,000 of capacity building services donated!

Chicago Pro Bono Consultants

Since 2006, you've made "pro bono work" as Chicagoan a notion as deep-dish pizza.  As the founding Midwestern market, you have helped us pilot new ideas for our Service Grant program, being a hub of innovation for Taproot Foundation.  Thank you for helping us strengthen our model.
 
729 current pro bono consultants

In the past year...
55 projects completed
$2,370,000 of capacity building services donated!


Seattle Pro Bono Consultants

Your commitment to service is so off the charts, you are the first market to ever be honored with an official benefit concert!  Since 2007, you've been strengthening local nonprofits and people have noticed, like KEXP radio and the Puget Sound Business Journal.  Thank you for proving that pro bono service is something to talk (and sing) about!

441 current pro bono consultants

In the past year...
26 projects completed
$1,010,000 of capacity building services donated!

Washington DC Pro Bono Consultants

Happy one-year anniversary!  What better way to spread the pro bono movement nationwide than by bringing it to the nation's capital?  Thank you for helping us set roots in the capital and expand our mission to a truly national level.   

271 current pro bono consultants

In the past year...
6 projects completed, 19 in progress
$270,000 of capacity building services donated!
$950,000 of capacity building services to be donated!

Los Angeles Pro Bono Consultants

As our newest market, in just a few short months you have already accomplished so much.  Without even having permanent Taproot Foundation staff on site yet, you self-organized a giant kick off event, a networking event and truly hit the ground running!  Thank you for your energy and excitement to get started.

162 current pro bono consultants

In the past year...
7 projects in progress and more on the way!
$365,000 of capacity building services to be donated!

Boston Pro Bono Consultants

Since we are suspending operations in Boston, your continued dedication to service is especially important now, as we complete our remaining projects.  Thank you for ensuring our nonprofit clients in Boston continue to be well-served.  We look forward to returning to Boston in the future, coming back stronger than ever.

318 current pro bono consultants

In the past year...
17 projects completed
$755,000 of capacity building services donated!