CCDA in Philadelphia--The Leadership Challenge

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I will speak to the Tools For Transforming Communities group at Pomona First Baptist Church in Pomona on Thursday, September 21, 2006; 6:30 - 9:30 PM. I'll give a 75 minute version of the same workshop in Philadelphia at the Christian Community Development Association confernce on Friday, September 29, 2006 at 2:45 PM. If you are going to be at the CCDA conference, come and see me at the workshop. I will arrive at CCDA in Philadelphia after 6 PM on Thursday, September 28. I leave early morning on Saturday. If you'd like to meet with me or talk about governance give me a call or leave me a message on this blog.

After I gave this talk to the Los Angeles T4TC group in Los Angeles last week, I got this message via email from one of the participants:

I wanted to mention that I really enjoyed your training on Thursday night. I thought it was one of the better ones and am hopeful that we can still get you for another board session. I went through my board hell back in 2001 and it struck me that it would probably have never happened had the board had a written set of policies.

My workshop in Philadelphia is titled: Board Leadership - Goverance Excellence

What does a real board do? A real board needs to know its job and have the right tools. Real governance is the highest level of organizational leadership. The job of governance is about values, vision, empowerment of both the board and staff, and the strategic ability to lead leaders.
Friday 29-Sep - 2:45-4:00

Please come by and see what we can learn together.

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Book Titles about Christian Community Transformation and Development

Welcome back! These titles are recomended in World Vision's internal literature about community transformation which are foundation to the Tools for Transforming Communities work that I do in Los Angeles and Pomona.



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Book Resources for the Christian Faith Based Community

Welcome back! The conversation was about the theological foundations for churches to be involved in community transformation and development. Someone mentioned Robert Linthicum's books.



I will put up some of the other publication links soon.

UPDATE: Amy Sherman was at our discussion group in Charlottesville.




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Daring to Lead by CompassPoint

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Daring to Lead study[links to a pdf]: A study by Compasspoint Nonprofit Services and The Meyer Foundation of executive leadership at community-based nonprofits might be of interest to you. It is "based on nearly 2,000 surveys ... [and] provides current data on executive turnover, compensation, career plans, and retirement. It also explores leading causes of executive burnout--in particular, widespread frustration with boards of directors and funders."

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Value of Volunteer Contribution

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According to Independent Sector, the average value of volunteer hours for non-profit organizations is $18.04 per hour in 2005. There is more detail

Further information on wages for specific functions and skill areas can be found at the US Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics.

What can you do with this kind of information? Here is a start:

Charitable organizations most frequently use the value of volunteer time for recognition events or communications to show the amount of community support an organization receives from its volunteers.

According to the Financial Accounting Standards Board, the value of volunteer services can also be used on financial statements-- including statements for internal and external purposes, grant proposals, and annual reports-- only if a volunteer is performing a specialized skill for a nonprofit. The general rule to follow when determining if contributed services meet the FASB criteria for financial forms is to determine whether the organization would have purchased the services if they had not been donated. Accounting specialists, may visit FASB's website for regulations on use of the value of volunteer time on financial forms: http://www.fasb.org/pdf/fas116.pdf.

You may need to give your accounting professional this kind of information, especially if they do not already specialize in nonprofit accounting.

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Some interesting books that I'd like to read

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I have clients who are all over this topic in a way that has immobilized them for some time.



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World Vision ad banned in England

Welcome back! Timely story about soccer as World Cup 2006 fires up in Germany on Friday.

If you are in the advert business (as the call it in the UK) you would be glad that your work gets attention. It is just hard to imagine what the British Advertising Clearance Centre's (BACC) ban on the airing of World Vision's new TV advert would accomplish. Apparently it was found to be "unfair to football." You can read about the advert here, and see it here.

It is good to work with the likes of these controversial people.


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Good to Great for nonprofits

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I had the opportunity to read Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap... and Others Don'tby Jim Collins with folks at MEDA a couple of years ago.

Now, on a recommendation from friend and fellow blogger Rudy, I will order and read Good to Great and the Social Sectors: A Monograph to Accompany Good to Great which addressess the nonprofit sector and addresses whether or not the business model is the solution for nonprofit sector organizations.



According to Collins, “…the inherent complexity [of nonprofit organizations] requires deeper, more penetrating insight and rigorous clarity than in your average business entity.”

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Comparing Accounting Software for Nonprofits

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I am often asked about entry level accounting or fiscal management software--either entry level or how to move to something more specialized to solve a special need or issue. This article, A Few Good Accounting Packages: Nonprofit consultants recommend accounting software packages, from techsoup.org, confirms what I have told many of our clients and expands the list of potential products and lists some features and benefits of the various products.

Most of the clients with whom I speak, choose QuickBooks as their entry level accounting software. If your organization needs to develop a system for fiscal management, reporting you may want to consider whether QuickBooks Premier Non-Profit Edition 2006is right for you. Click through to the link and read some of the details.






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Compassion Capital Fund (CCF) Targeted Capacity Building Program

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The announcement for Targeted Capacity Building Grants for faith-based and community based organizations was released tody by the Department of Health and Human Services.

Organizations with the current group of sub-awardees, trainees, and coaching client organizations MAY qualify to apply for such a grant. Click on the title of this post to read the announcement and let's talk about the possibilities.

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What is Cultural Competency?

Welcome back! My own framework for what is cultural competence starts with this:

"Do to others as you would have them do to you."

--Jesus

"…love your neighbor as yourself."

--Moses
In a world of may cultures that is shrunk by communication, travel and migration, in order to reach across cultural divides we need to understand the point of view of other cultures around us.

Often talked about in academic circles and health care fields cultural competency, from Georgetown University's National Center for Cultural Competence:

Community Engagement

• Cultural competence extends the concept of self-determination to the community.
• Cultural competence involves working in conjunction with natural, informal support and helping networks within culturally diverse communities (e.g. neighborhood, civic and advocacy associations; local/neighborhood merchants and alliance groups; ethnic, social, and religious organizations; and spiritual leaders and healers).
• Communities determine their own needs.
• Community members are full partners in decision making.
• Communities should economically benefit from collaboration.
• Community engagement should result in the reciprocal transfer of knowledge and skills among all collaborators and partners.

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Meeting the Collaboration Challenge

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Financial Reporting and QuickBooks for Nonprofits

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If your organization needs to develop a system for fiscal management, reporting you may want to consider whether QuickBooks Premier Non-Profit Edition 2006is right for you. Click through to the link and read some of the details. If you are a World Vision CCF organization, you may want to talk to your coach/mentor to help you make the right decision.



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Yahoo Group Now Available

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You may now sign up for the World Vision CCF Yahoo Group. The CCF sub-award application and financial survey documents are available there for download.

You have to sing up and be approved as a member to access the information there.

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Ten Questions about Public Funding

Welcome back! If you are thinking about competing for public funding, check out the article--click to link to it:

10 Questions to Determine Whether Your Congregation is Ready to Compete for Public Funding

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Correction to Los Angeles Zip Codes that qualify

Welcome back! 90047 in Los Angeles is qualified to apply in a competitive process along with the others for a subaward grant. Here are some other details:

World Vision plans to make

• 20 to 25 awards in Pomona (zip codes 91766 and 91768) and South Los Angeles (zip codes 90008, 90043, 90047, and 90062)
• The range of awards will be $5,000 to $15,000
• Proposal Deadline is July 14, 2006
• Announcements planned September 1, 2006
• The sub-award grant period is September 1, 2006 through February 28, 2007

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World Vision Tools for Transforming Communities 2006 CCF Grantee Sub-Award Information

Welcome back! Theresa Lu was using information from this text in a handout that I used in the various orientation meetings in both Los Angeles and Pomona. This should help you conceptualize a project for the sub-award program.

World Vision in Los Angeles (WVLA) will provide several capacity-building grants to competitively selected grassroots organizations in parts of Pomona and South Los Angeles that participate in the Tools For Transformation project to help build their capacity to serve their communities.

The sub-awardees will be faith-based (FBO) and community-based (CBO) organizations that provide services including programs for the homeless, re-entering prisoners, children of prisoners, at-risk youth, addicts, elders in need, families transitioning from welfare to work, and healthy marriage programs. These sub-awards will increase capacity and sustainability by building infrastructure. Ideas for use of sub-award funds:

Capacity Areas and
Examples of Potential Sub–awards

• Leadership Development

Funds for board development training, volunteer training or development of standard operating procedures, succession plan development

• Community Engagement

Funds to support a process to develop cultural competency, community needs assessment or asset mapping

• Program/Service Development / Management

Funds to help set up evaluation / monitoring systems, training to enhance programs/services

• Organizational Development

Funds for a financial review or audit, assess financial/accounting systems, upgrade software and/or equipment, long range strategic planning, 501(c)(3) application, formal organizational audit

• Funding/Sustainability

Funds for a consultant to assess/recommend fund development strategies, to support a new communication / cooperative network among service providers

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Coming Soon to your computer screen!

Welcome back!

Watch here for upcoming information about how to join a Yahoo list serve so you can communicate wiht other CCF beneficiaries.

From Yahoo groups I will be able to upload the handouts from session and the application for subaward document. Please feel free to communicate by leaving a comment here.

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