I just love my job! Here is one of the 3,437,268 reasons why!
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For much of the past year I and many of us, likely all of us, in the non-profit sector have had FLSA looming over us. Emails, webinars, conference break out sessions, no matter where we were or what we were doing, it seemed a conversation about FLSA was right around the corner.
The amount of time and effort spent on something that was happening in the future seemed silly at times. I, as a non-profit executive, listened and even participated in a few of these conversations, but in the end it seemed a little fake to me. Sometimes I wonder if we are just looking for things to be stressed out about. I run a Boys & Girls Club with two locations and we have a Resale Shop. We have about 20 employees. We RARELY ask anyone to put in over time. What I believe, and what I tell my leadership team, is that overtime is always the result of poor planning or an emergency. I believe asking employees to work more than 40 hours a week does one of two things, and sometimes it does both of these things, it creates unhappy employees and it blows up your payroll. Now, perhaps the world disagrees. Perhaps the non-profit world has employees working MORE than 40 hours a week and is paying them wages where this rule would come in to play more often than I think. But if so, why? Do we really need this rule? U.S. District Judge Amos Mazzant III, a, federal judge in Texas, granted a preliminary injunction stopping the changes of the overtime provisions of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA). These changes, which were to take effect on December 1, would require paying overtime to most workers making less than $47,476 a year, roughly double the current wage threshold. Why not just have them NOT work overtime? What am I missing? Is this truly an issue? If it were, wouldn’t our turnover be thru-the-roof? At my organization we are expanding our hours of operation at our Resale Shop, to bring in more revenue so that we can serve more youth and with greater impact! We do this, of course, knowing that more hours, more payroll, will be needed. Should we have the current team members work those hours taking them from current levels to over 40 hours per week? No, we shouldn’t. Should we hire new team members to some of these new hours. YES! Is this NOT what we all do? Perhaps I am missing something, but to me I honestly do not need a law to tell me that working employees more than 40 hours at a low end wage is likely not the best ROI. The rule is dumb, in my never so humble opinion. I am glad the judge did what he did, and I expect it to not become law ever, but if I am wrong I am quite sure that it will have a grand total of zero effect on my organization. Am I alone? I would love your thoughts.  Leadership Thoughts on a Saturday Morning
Attitude is Everything We all work hard. We are all busy. We all fill our days up & act surprised when we do NOT get to the most important things….because we spent time REACTING to whatever the day or the week brought our way. I know that is the case for me at least. Last week, for me, was a great week….and last week was at the same time... was just dumb. Everything is attitude right? I could tell you 5 things that happened last week that made it remarkably positive. I could also tell you about 5 things that made last week….well...just silly. I had lots of plans for the past week, just as I will have lots of plans for next week. I do this goal setting, this planning for the upcoming week pretty much every weekend. I set my course, I make my plan, I create my roadmap for next week, next month, next quarter. That is what leaders do….one of many things leaders do, but still, a leader without a goal, without a plan, is no leader. Leaders lead and their plans & goals are vital to the actions they take to accomplish the tasks that need accomplishing. This morning as I started my day I logged online, turned on the local news-apparently it is too windy this morning for some hot air balloons to take off….tragic- and I read, or I at least skimmed, about 12 articles I saved for later reading throughout the past week. Using is the BEST way to do this by the way is the pocket app ...but that is an entirely other topic. I also checked my twitter timeline & twitter lists and said hello to some new twitter followers that added me overnight (go follow me @bgcjeff for work & @dadw4daughters for the most important stuff!) As I did this I had 3 main thoughts #1….what went well and what went….the other way last week #2….what I want to accomplish, this weekend and next week #3...what can I as a husband and dad can do to make my family smile a little more How I decide to lead, how I choose to act...I think perhaps those things will shape the answers to all 3 of those questions/thoughts. What is this thing we call leadership? Leadership is defined in many ways. I have always thought of it as based around actions...yours and those who agree to allow you to lead them. Leadership, it has been said, is about taking actions to create sustained, positive changes within an organization. The most meaningful way to demonstrate these skills is to passionately communicate your shared vision and practice what you, or your company, or your family, or whatever group you are leading, stands for. Leaders cultivate committed followers. They can be employees who strive to lead as well. They can be your kids who smile often and have an excitement for learning and for life. I believe that a question that must be asked, by me, of myself, is this: “What kind of legacy do I want to leave behind?” I deeply believe that EVERYONE has the ability to lead. They may not WANT to lead. They may not CHOOSE to lead. But that does NOT mean they can not. As the Executive Director/CEO of an organization I believe it is my job, my duty, my responsibility to show my team leaders that they can lead. As a father I am POSITIVE it is my job to show my kids that what they can do is only limited by their beliefs! WHAT IS IT ABOUT SATURDAY Why is it that on Friday night, on Saturday morning & on Sunday afternoons I seem to have my big picture thoughts? Why is it then that I think of my BHAGS-my BIG HAIRY AUDACIOUS GOALS!? Why is it then that I am my most creative. I think the answer is FREEDOM. Freedom from other people...and their wants and needs. Freedom to dive into my own head, my own thoughts and yes, my own dreams. We all need this. We must take time to recharge, to allow our thoughts to run wild. Otherwise we are just something else’s admin assistant. We lead when we are doing what we believe in, what we are passionate about. We react when someone or something needs us. And those things matter. Be there for your family. Be there for your business or organization. Be there for your friend, your neighbor, your social media followers, your fellow man. But, be there for your dreams too. Lead yourself as well as others. Carve out time. Put the headphones in-I recommend something live by Jared Leto & 30 Seconds to Mars like 30 Seconds To Mars Live in 2013 or City of Angels taken by me!- but the what you listen too almost doesn’t matter. Heck, nothing NEEDS to be playing in your ears. Just allow yourself to dream...to lead your life...and then follow the path. Anyway...that is my brain this morning…..as always…..whatcha think? Follow me on twitter @bgcjeff & @dadw4daughters Doing good work, especially in the charity/not-for-profit sector is no different than in business...you need a great team to do truly great things. In many aspects it is even MORE IMPORTANT to have a great team in the charity sector than it is in the for profit world!
It is the people who innovate, the people who creatively work the problems and the people who make the difference. Growing a great team isn’t just important, it is EVERYTHING!!! Only by focusing on finding, hiring, training & retaining talent, are organizations truly able to even have a chance at fulfilling their mission! One person alone cannot deliver truly outstanding results. A team can do so much more!!! So here are 5 points for any non-profit leader to keep in mind as you create your team! 1. LEAD! The only way you can get there is to aim there. Decide what you want, what you need and most importantly what you EXPECT! Think about tomorrow. Think about next month! Remember that silly interview question “Where do you see yourself in 5 years?” Well, answer that question….and answer it often!!! And then… 2. SHARE THE VISION! Roxanne Spillett is the former CEO of the Boys & Girls Clubs of America. I have had the honor of hearing her speak and talking to her many times in my career. One of the things she taught me and many of us in the Boys & Girls Club movement was as the leader of your organization you are not just the Chief Executive Director but the Chief Executive Repeater! Talk to the team about the vision. Make it part of the every-day culture at your office. Say it so often the team giggles when they hear you say it. If the team doesn’t know where to aim the arrows who knows where they will hit! And if everyone’s arrows are not aiming in the same direction….well that is chaos not efficiency! How are you supposed to grow, serve your clients and raise the funding you need if the team is not all pointed in the right direction? Next... 3 .RECRUIT THE BEST! Talent is everything! With dedicated employees who have the skills and the enthusiasm you need no goal is unattainable! Interview lots of talented people. Hire many. Fire some. As has been said before “Hire slow, fire fast.” If they do not fit on your team you will know quickly. Don’t rush through the team building process! Have second and third interviews, let the candidates do a little pre-hire volunteer work, check references, triple check their social media accounts, and have them interact with key team members. And don’t forget to ask your current team members what they think. Not that long ago I hired someone that had a long time relationship with a current key employee. After the candidate got hired and CLEARLY DIDN’T work out I asked the employee why she thought that person didn’t work. She told me clearly she could have and would have told me it would have never worked. She had so much more information than I had….and all I had to do was ask! All that time, all the training, all of it could have been saved and applied elsewhere. And encourage the team members to do some of the recruiting. They know people that will fit in with your team. They ARE YOUR TEAM!!! And then... 4. TRAIN & MENTOR, and then TRAIN & MENTOR some more! There is NO REASON to not train your team! None. Go read the last two sentences again. Just do it. Spend the time. Spend the money! I once had a member of my board of director’s talk about how we should not spend money on training. “That is what we hired you for….isn’t it?” he would say. This was a well respected member of the community. He held local office. He ran a prominent restaurant in town. When he spoke, people listened. 18 months later when the 3rd manager of his restaurant left, and his turnover was through the roof the restaurant was a ghost town. But he won re-election. The point of me telling you this story is simply this, people will tell you this is where to cut the budget, that training is something you don’t need. They are wrong! Better to spend the resources to train someone and have them leave then have employees who do not get expert training on your team. TRAIN YOUR TEAM! And finally…. 5. HAVE NO TOLERANCE FOR THE PASSIVE-AGGRESSIVE TEAM MEMBER! Passive-Aggressive behavior CAN NOT be allowed to infiltrate your team. The easiest way to crush team morale is to allow passive-aggressive behavior to continue. When it pops up….and it will, you must stamp it out. The person who pretends to support the mission, or pretends to support the leader, but does things to sabotage the projects or dissuade team members from following the team goals is much more of a problem than the openly argumentative employee Warn them once, if it happens again they have to go. Sounds blunt, I know. Be blunt! Document the unacceptable performance immediately. Have the discussion. Make it clear, once a decision is made get on board or get off the bus! This is NOT to say that you want only yes people surrounding you. Healthy disagreement is a necessity for any team. But once the decision is made all team members must be helping accomplish the task! Keep these 5 points in mind and dream huge...and go do great things! As always I would love to hear your feedback. Tweet me at @bgcjeff and let me know your thoughts! I read a lot. Hours a day. Sometimes it is a book. More often it is an article that I clicked to from Social Media (Follow me on twitter @bgcjeff!!!)
Somewhere today I read that we are on our phones about 4 hours a day. (I will tell you where I read that in a bit) Without doing any research or fact checking I think that seems believable to me! I know I am on mine an awful lot! So as a charity exec and a fundraising professional this info has a lot of meaning to me. My organization's website has had a large overhaul over the past year. (Check the site out at www.bgchoodcounty.org) One of the things I was always mindful about when making changes was keeping the site mobile friendly. It is hard to know how successful I have been at that….but with unique visitors & page views up I am pretty pleased at this point. DonorDrive, a peer-to-peer fundraising platform you can check out at http://www.donordrive.com/ tells us that they saw mobile donations go up 47% in 2015. They also published for every dollar raised in 2012 over $10 was raised in 2015! Think about that! 10 times growth! And of the other Charity Executives I work with regularly very few in my local community do ANYTHING AT ALL to reach out to mobile donors. Should I be shocked at this? I am not. Should I take advantage of this and do my best to grab as much of the local donor market share that I can for my organization? Well...yes! In that article I read today on www.donordrive.com I read this, “Conclusion: Mobile is now the predominant way that your supporters are first arriving at fundraising pages. But even more importantly: your supporters are now comfortable with giving by smartphone. If you're not making pages mobile-friendly and making donating by mobile easy, you're losing dollars.” My conclusion….how is this news???? Are we in the non-profit/charity industry THAT FAR BEHIND??? I fear that we are. I welcome your thoughts. Tweet me @bgcjeff and let me know what YOU think. Today is going to be a good day! I get to meet at lunch with a former board member who recently reached out to me about her organization. She works as a pastor at a large church, and they want to continue to support my Club financially! Now that is a good email to read! :) (You can too by the way http://www.bgchoodcounty.org/donate.html ) After that I have the privilege of speaking to the Youth Development Professional Team of my Boys & Girls Club, The Boys & Girls Club of Hood County! www.bgchoodcounty.org and @BGCHoodCounty on twitter! Here are my notes for my time with them. I may even Periscope my talk with them, so follow me over on twitter @bgcjeff and at around 2 pm Texas Time (yeah, I know, some call that Central time, whatever!) I don't have the disease. The disease that is seemingly everywhere. The disease that steals from the person infected and everyone in their circle....and everyone in their circle....out to infinity!
The disease I am speaking of is Fear of Making a Mistake! FMM is a killer. a killer of dreams. A killer of people. A killer that must be stopped! The great Steve Jobs said this: “When you grow up you tend to get told the world is the way it is and your life is just to live your life inside the world. Try not to bash into the walls too much. Try to have a nice family life, have fun, save a little money. That’s a very limited life. Life can be much broader once you discover one simple fact, and that is – everything around you that you call life, was made up by people that were no smarter than you. And you can change it, you can influence it, you can build your own things that other people can use. The minute that you understand that you can poke life and actually something will, you know if you push in, something will pop out the other side, that you can change it, you can mold it. That’s maybe the most important thing. It’s to shake off this erroneous notion that life is there and you’re just gonna live in it, versus embrace it, change it, improve it, make your mark upon it. I think that’s very important and however you learn that, once you learn it, you’ll want to change life and make it better, cause it’s kind of messed up, in a lot of ways. Once you learn that, you’ll never be the same again.” I love this quote from Jobs. I am one of those people who believe's we are here for a purpose....and that purpose is to make a difference, to help, to leave a mark. That is why I love working for a Boys & Girls Club. That is why I love building a team. That is why I love building an organization. That is why I am typing these words. Comment below...tell me about your why. I have ideas.
You have ideas. Shoot, everyone has ideas. Here is a very partial list of a few blog and/or Periscope ideas I have. Please read thru them and give me YOUR thoughts. I will likely blog on all the ideas I list here. What I REALLY want to hear is what you want to hear about! So please, look thru the list and let me know what pops to mind. I really want to know. Blog post/Periscope Ideas Crowdfunding vs. Large Gift Donors #EveryAugustUntilACure The Ice Bucket Challenge is back! A career in the Third Sector My day/My Week as a CEO Board of Directors: Inspire Them, Manage Them, Deal with Them or....something else Your Mom Taught You Everything You Need to Know about Resource Development Series: Gratitude Using Twitter to grow your donor list Using Periscope to grow your donor list Why Starbucks is the best place to work Must follow Twitter peeps Must watch Periscopers Why Walter White from Breaking Bad could have been a great Resource Development Director What Jesus & Dan Pallotta have in common What The Walking Dead can teach all of us in The Third Sector Why an Alumni Hall of Fame is vital to your charity's future What you can lean from the Presidential Debates Back to the Future Series: How a Drive-In Movie Theater saved lives How collecting baseball cards helped me become a CEO How delivering pizza's was a great training tool How to use Netflix to get your next promotion Open The Toolbox Series: Khan Academy Now I want to hear from you! Pretty please? |
AuthorMy name is Jeff Bates. I have been with Boys & Girls Club's since 1993. I am currently the Executive Director/CEO of The Boys & Girls Club of Hood County. I am a proud member of the charity/non-profit sector! Archives
November 2016
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