Episode Transcript
[00:00:06] Speaker A: Welcome to the Leadership Window podcast with Patrick Jinks. Each week, through a social sector lens, Patrick interviews leaders and experts and puts us in touch with trends and tips for leading effectively.
Patrick is an LSI certified leadership coach, a member of the Forbes Coaches Council, a best selling author, award winning photographer and professional speaker.
And now here's Patrick.
[00:00:34] Speaker B: Happy 2021, everybody. I know you just, it couldn't come a moment. I mean, this was like everybody's dream, right? Let's get to 2021. Well, now we're five days in. How you doing?
How are those New Year's resolutions going so far?
Here's one thing I will say before we introduce our guest and get into this. I learned this a long time ago about New Year's resolutions. I'm not for them, against them, do them, whatever. I definitely set goals at the beginning of the year. You've probably heard me say on this show before that New Year's day is my favorite day of the year. I love a new year. I love a new start. I definitely am a big planner. All that good stuff. Here's what I know. Whether you call them resolutions, goals, commitments, I don't care. Whatever philosophy of leadership there you want to espouse, if you find that a day, two days, five days, six weeks, six months into a year, you have, quote, blown it.
Don't think that. Just restart it. I learned this, that this was a power. This is a power we have.
We get to restart any time we want on our goals and commitments. What is it about January 1 that makes it this obligatory thing that if we don't get it done, we don't get it done, you can restart those. So if you feel like I've already blown it, you know, whatever it is, the exercise goals, the reading goals, just start over. And if you want to adjust the goal, guess what? You have the power to do that. You're in control.
All right, we're going to move on with it. I'm really excited about this episode. I have been a guest on Greg's show, Greg Nielsen. We met at the Blue Ridge Institute, which our listeners are already familiar with because a number of our guests are members of BRI, and so they know it's a sort of a special family. And Greg and I are both there as not as nonprofit CEO's anymore, though we both have that in our resumes. We're now on the other side of the equation, helping as many nonprofits as we can achieve excellence and do great things. And so we're there as consultants and really more importantly, we're there as Ridgers. It's a family. But Greg Nielsen is in, in his own right, an experienced nonprofit CEO, which I love because he brings context to the table. He has practiced what he preaches. He has been in the crucible of actually executing. So he knows what he's talking about. But now he is a consultant, and he's committed to helping leaders in nonprofit organizations excel. He has earned the prestigious board source certificate in nonprofit consulting, which, by the way, the nonprofit listeners on our show know what board source is. I'm in the middle of a doctoral program, Greg, and I've probably cited board source materials as much as anything else in my literature review. They're the real deal. So Greg has been around the circles where this stuff is really, really working. He was previously the CEO of the center for Nonprofit Excellence, and I won't go into all that. I'll let him talk about that if he wants to, but just did a lot of amazing things there and leadership development programs that he helped shepherd and lead. He is a military veteran, which we, of course, greatly appreciate. And he also, we're going to talk a little bit about what a person with a law degree from Notre Dame is doing in nonprofit consulting. So we'll talk about that a little bit. Everybody has their unique journeys and sort of how we've gotten to this place. But Louisville, Kentucky is home. And in 2016, Greg was named a 40 under 40 honoree by the Louisville business first publication. And. And I do appreciate him bringing me on his show here a while back. Might have been last year or earlier in this year. I don't remember when. But anyway, Greg, welcome. Can't wait to talk with you. I know we share a space in some ways together. Fortunately, there is plenty out there for all of us to do and then some. But I love what you're doing, and I know you've been a big hit at Bri with your materials, and I've been excited about the show. So welcome and happy new year.
[00:05:08] Speaker C: Patrick, I appreciate you welcoming me onto the podcast. I really enjoyed our conversation last year on my podcast. It was phenomenal meeting you at BRI last year when we were able to be in person back in 2019.
And I'm also a huge admirer of your work as well.
[00:05:25] Speaker B: Oh, thanks. It was an interesting year at Bri. The lights went out, the power went out right before my workshop.
[00:05:32] Speaker C: Remember, I was about to lead a breakout.
[00:05:34] Speaker B: I know, I know. And that group is so amazing.
Greg, isn't the Bri family amazing? We just pivoted. We found a way we worked it out, and the power was out a good portion of the day, and we kind of waited around, and then we figured out, all right, some of this stuff we can do without lights and sound, and some of it we can't, and we'll just, yeah, it happens. It was like, almost like a little tiny microcosm precursor of 2021 or 2020 and what we were going to have to do to pivot there. But anyway, I know that your workshop got rave reviews, and the BRI family just kind of knows you now as, as one of our own, which is really cool that way. It's what BRI is all about.
What have you been up to since we last talked? What's sort of new? What's the, what's the bulk of your time spent on these days? What's going on?
[00:06:31] Speaker C: You know, Patrick, the bulk of my time has always been spent working directly with nonprofit executives and boards. I do a tremendous amount of board development work, board transformation work, and then where that also dovetails into strategic planning and developing strategies for organizations and general organizational development. As you mentioned, I have a law degree, which has come in handy a little bit in 2020, as we've seen a significant number of organizations begin to explore collaborations and sustained collaborations up to and including mergers. And so that's been a part of, been a part of my practice in 2020.
[00:07:10] Speaker B: That's a great skill to have to bring to the consulting world, because I know that a lot of times when I'm in meetings with boards or staff, a lot of times legal issues come up, can we do this? Can we do that? A lot of them come up around advocacy. You know, what, what's, what can we do within the 501 C three realm in terms of lobbying and, you know, having a public policy agenda, those kinds of things.
And, of course, sometimes it's personnel issues, sometimes it's toxic board issues that bring legal things into play. So that's a great skill to bring to the table to at least have some background knowledge.
[00:07:46] Speaker C: One of the things that I enjoy about my legal background and bringing it to the work that I do is it's not just about resolving the legal question of can our organization do x or can we do y? It's about how does that reflect who we are, what our values are, what is the culture that we want to create in the organization. I tell organizations there's a difference between what you can do and what you should do, what you can do, and what you may want to do. So I like the ability to bring those different perspectives to the table and allow the organizations to really delve into their values and who they want to be and the culture they want to create.
[00:08:24] Speaker B: Wow, such good stuff. So you mentioned spending a lot of time in, and as I do, too, with executives and with boards, and I spend a lot of time also with staff teams, which I know you do as well, other than 2020 being, you know, you and I are obviously are both doing a lot of virtual work.
Has the essence changed any for you, though? So, I mean, we're delivering it on Zoom rather than in person and those kinds of things. But has anything, and I'm really thinking of this just kind of off the cuff right now. I'm even thinking about my own experience. Has the essence of your work or their work changed as a result of all this?
[00:09:08] Speaker C: I would love to have your perspective on this as well, but one of the things that I've noticed in 2020, particularly during the pandemic, is that a lot more of my work has been around relationships and it's been more relational. There are organizations, whether it's staff teams or whether it's board teams, that whether it's the stress of the moment or whether it is the fact that we can't be face to face, there seems to be some more tension running through organizations, some conflict that maybe was always present in the boardroom or maybe was always present in the staff dynamic, but seems to have come to the fore in 2020. So a lot more of my work has been navigating really complex, difficult relationships during a trying, stressful time. And sometimes that shows up as board governance work or sometimes it shows up as a request for team building among the staff. But I've noticed more relationship issues coming to the fore in 2020.
[00:10:07] Speaker B: Well, I agree, and there's no doubt that emotions have played such a huge part in what's going on in our world and in our work. And, yeah, I think that's interesting. As you're talking, I'm thinking back on some of the situations that I've been exposed to in some of the organizations. At first, leaders were struggling. How do I maintain relationships? Like, we can't get together anymore. I can't walk down the hall, even and talk to my staff like I used to.
You know, when we can't get our board together in person, how do we engage them? And so at first it was that, and then the other things started happening. But people have been dealing with working from home when they're not used to it. And, you know, that's thrown a real big. A lot of people feel like home is sacred. I don't like to mix work and home, and that's messed with emotions, having to improvise in so many different ways. I've had a lot of clients or a lot of organizations feel like they're stressed because they can't serve all of the clients that they should be serving because of this. And so our emotions come into play. And one thing that strikes me is I've always thought that in leadership training, we don't talk about emotions enough. We talk about framing and strategy and models and leadership principle this and principle that. But it's about people. And when you're talking about people, you gotta have that emotional intelligence. You have to have the ability to center yourself as well as help kind of bring others around. And I've always said that these, what people call soft skills of leadership, are anything but. Is that your experience? I mean, that's really the heart of leadership, is how we interact with the people we work with.
[00:11:52] Speaker C: And I don't know that it's ever been more important or more challenging than it is right now. Patrick, you know, you look out at what's going on in the world, what's going on in the country. There are so many things that are, have the potential to divide teams, whether they're staff teams or whether they're board teams. You know, we had a politics and elections, and we've had issues of racial justice this year. We've had the pandemic. There have been so many obstacles put in the way of leaders that have the potential to divide teams that it's really been more important than ever for leaders to be connected to their own emotions, first and foremost, but then also to connect it to the stressors that are going on in the lives of those that they're serving and those that they're working with.
[00:12:39] Speaker B: We used an interesting word there just now, obstacles.
[00:12:42] Speaker C: Yes.
[00:12:43] Speaker B: And I think in, obviously, in many ways, these things are obstacles.
But I'm finding that some of the leaders that I'm coaching have figured out how to turn those obstacles into stepping stones.
You mentioned the racial conversation in our country over the past year, since the George Floyd incident. This stuff has always been here. But obviously, this elevated the conversation to a new level again in 2020. And for some, that's been maybe an obstacle. It's been a barrier. It certainly has been a distraction for some, a stressor for some, and for others, it's been, hey, finally, we have, here's a launch pad. Here's something we can use. Here's something we can actually leverage and really the pandemic has been the same way it has in my business. I'm doing things that I at least would have been another year or two getting to, like this podcast, for example. So, you know, some of these things, some of the obstacles in our lives can really be stepping stones if we can figure out how to. How to convert them to that. That's easier said than done.
[00:13:53] Speaker C: Obviously it is, and we've certainly seen it. As you mentioned, I'm based in Louisville, Kentucky, where we had the Breonna Taylor case this year. That has really divided the community. It has, you know, it has brought needed issues to the forefront that we've needed to have this conversation for decades. But when you stack some of those stepping stones that you mentioned on top of one another, it can feel overwhelming for nonprofit leaders, for, for, for everyone in the community. It can feel overwhelming unless you're able to, as you said, reframe it, turn it into an opportunity to embrace some of the difficult conversations that we do need to have.
[00:14:34] Speaker B: Yeah, well, look, running a nonprofit is challenging on its own, without a pandemic and without racial tension and without a doubt, without a divisive, toxic electoral season.
It's hard enough. So let's focus on that for just a minute.
[00:14:51] Speaker C: Okay.
[00:14:52] Speaker B: I know that one of the things that you work on and some of the things that you helped with at BRI is talking about boards. And as a CEO of a nonprofit, there might not be any more challenging space than to engage your board. And I don't mean that in a bad way, like, you know, boards are bad or anything like that. It's just. It's a challenge because it's leading up, and when you've got a staff, you know, you're leading with some authority and you're leading with presence, and, you know, you've got more influence and control over what's going on inside the organization. But when you're leading a board, who's leading you?
That becomes more difficult. It's more people. You got to get everybody together. And so I know you spend a lot of time on the board and how the board functions.
I'd love to just, you know, in the short time we've got, maybe pick your brain a little bit on what are the sort of key tenets, you know, if. If our listeners could walk away with, well, when I'm, you know, maybe I'm thinking about starting a nonprofit or getting into nonprofit, or maybe I'm about to become a CEO or I want to be one day or maybe I want to serve on a board. Maybe I've been asked to serve on a board, or I'm serving on a board. What are some of the things that you would share as here are some of the keys to success or effectiveness or the things to pay attention to in order to make a thriving, effective, nonprofit board of directors or board of governors. And I'll just start there and just open it wide up to you because it's a big topic. I know we could do ten episodes on it, but it is.
[00:16:27] Speaker C: But, Patrick, I love what you said about how the board is kind of a unique creation in the nonprofit space. I think one of the reasons why all of us struggle sometimes to lead a board is that there's not always something in our background that has prepared us for that.
No one has gone to school. No one has a degree in board leadership. I was a political science based. Others may have been psychology, sociology. We all have different backgrounds. Board leadership was not part of our training for most of us. And so it is a unique skill that you have to develop and you have to invest in and you have to grow in over time. But I do think there are tenets. There are basic premises of good board leadership. Where I usually start when I, when I talk to a board is around a concept of habits. And I know in your coaching role, you probably deal with habits quite a bit for leaders. But I think, just like leaders do, boards have certain habits. You know, as an individual, I have good habits, I have bad habits. And the key for me is understanding, or for a board to understand as a team, what are those habits that are working for us that we want to memorialize and turn into traditions for our board, and what are those habits that are somehow holding us back, that we want to break? And that's a great starting point if you're working with a board, is to have a conversation and ask the board to write up on the board, up on a whiteboard, make a list of what do they see as the habits of their board team, and which ones would they put in the column of habits they want to memorialize into traditions, and which of those habits would they want to break because they're somehow causing dysfunction or holding the organization back? So that concept of habits is where I usually start the conversation around effective governance.
[00:18:21] Speaker B: Well, so a perfect place to start. And you're right. It's also where we start as individuals.
I made a little tongue in cheek remark there, and sorry, I spoke over you when you said that board members, they come to a board not really having experience or knowing how to serve on a board, but many of them think they do because they bring to the boards their corporate experience, and they think that what works inside their company is what they're supposed to bring to the nonprofit board. And that's how, you know, it's, it's my way, because many of these people are used to running the show in their businesses. They walk into a meeting, this is how we do it. And a nonprofit board does it differently and has to do it differently. And so a lot of these habits are just personal habits that people bring from their own businesses. Do you agree?
[00:19:10] Speaker C: I do, and I'll take it one step further. I think that sometimes what I hear from board members is they compare their current board assignment, their current board team that they're on to other nonprofit boards that they've served, and every board is different. It's just like saying, you know, five years ago, I was a player on the Los Angeles Lakers basketball team, but today I'm a player on the New York Yankees baseball team. There's not necessarily a one to one correlation there of the way those teams function. Are every team, every board is going to be a slightly different experience.
[00:19:42] Speaker B: That is a great point, and it's one for our CEO's to pay attention to as well, because we'll hear, I'm guilty of it. When I went from Danville, Virginia, for example, to Lancaster, Pennsylvania, same role, different organization, I was guilty of saying, well, in Danville, in Danville, we did that. And there's a benefit for having experience, and it's why they hired you. And, yes, maybe there's some great practices, but leaders have to be careful with that, because in a community, you hear that and you go, look, we're tired of hearing about, this is not Danville, Virginia. Okay? Like, do you know where you are now? You're not there anymore. We're not in Kansas.
And so that's a great point for not only board leaders, but for staff leaders as well. To think about how often we say that and not just say it, but sometimes it's not transferable. Just because it worked somewhere doesn't necessarily make it transferable. It's a great point.
[00:20:41] Speaker C: Thank you. And, you know, I like to. I like to think of board experiences, and this was certainly the case for me as it's, it's both an art and a science. Right. You know, when I was a first became a nonprofit CEO, I had no board experience. I had no experience leading a board. And what did I do? I did the same thing most leaders do. I read as much as I could, I picked up as many books as I could, and I thought, okay, this is how you run a board. This is how you lead aboard, when in reality, that might be the science of it, but there's also an art to it, as you mentioned. It's managing up. It's managing people. It's bringing people along. It's managing, you know, one of the things that, and I've worked in both the for profit and the nonprofit spaces, one of the unique aspects of the nonprofit sector is the number of different stakeholder groups that you have to bring along. You know, you have board members, staff members, volunteers, donors, foundations, philanthropic partners, those that you. All of those groups have to coalesce around a common vision in order for the organization to reach its potential.
[00:21:42] Speaker B: Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Well said. So, habits are one of the things, let's figure out what are the ones we want to keep and what are the ones that might not be helping us a whole lot moving forward.
We have to get intentional about our habits, and the first thing is to call them out, be aware of them. But then you got to figure out, well, you have to replace a habit with something, don't you like, what's the behavior we're looking for? How do you help boards incorporate the real difference maker? Which is, okay, now we have to actually do something differently.
[00:22:15] Speaker C: So what I talk to boards about is, there are five habits of healthy boards. And I have to preface this by saying that this is not prescriptive. So this is not a. I'm not providing boards with a roadmap of, if you do X, Y, and z, you will automatically be a dynamic, healthy, high performing board. It's really about, these are the five tenets of healthy boards. Now, let's talk about how we customize those to your culture, to your team. And so the first habit of healthy boards is they have a clear understanding of expectations, meaning everyone around the table knows, what does it mean to be part of this team?
Part of that is attendance. Part of that is committee service. Part of that is, what do you expect of me as a board member? The clearer we can be about that.
That's what starts to build that foundation of healthy teams, that foundation of healthy governance.
[00:23:15] Speaker B: And I would say that that starts at recruiting, but it actually starts before then, does it not? I mean, you got to start. You have to be clear about what it is you want and need on your board.
[00:23:27] Speaker C: Same as you and I, Patrick, none of us would have accepted a job that didn't come with a job, a job guide, right? Or an expectations document. If I went to go and interview at General Electric or UPS or Sony or anywhere else, and they said, you know what, Greg? We want to hire you for a position. We want you to join our company. There's no job description. We're not telling you what department we want you to be a part of, but we just want you to join our company. None of us would put our career in those hands. It's the same thing with nonprofit boards. A board member has to understand, what are the expectations that you have of me? What support are you going to provide to help me meet those expectations? And then how am I going to be held accountable? So I think within that defining expectations habit, those are the three key questions to answer for board members. What do you expect? How are you going to support them? And then how are you going to hold them accountable?
[00:24:24] Speaker B: Well, we could wrap this entire episode up and just stay on that one single topic and have plenty to say.
And I will say this.
It. Unfortunately, in my experience, most of the time, it doesn't work that way.
And here's why. So many nonprofits are almost desperate for board members. It's like, we'll do anything to fill the seat. So we pick up the phone, we call someone. We think we would love to have their name on our board. And, you know, maybe we get a buddy to call them and say, hey, you know, we need to come over and serve on this board. And, yeah, you don't have to do much. We'll probably meet six times a year. You could probably skip three of those. And, you know, if you want to serve on a committee down the line, that'd be great, but you don't have to. We don't do any fundraising on our board, so don't worry about that. You know, we. It's like we recruit board members by telling them they don't have to do anything, right? And then we want them to do something. And so the expectation alignment isn't there. What they were told to come in is not what they're now being asked to do. Or worse yet, the whole board just looks at each other and goes, this isn't a very engaged board. Like, I'm not fulfilled in that. So, I mean, is that your experience? And I know not. I don't. I don't mean to, I don't mean to just smash the whole sector here, but that's a lot of board recruiting. I did a YouTube episode on that, and I have people going, oh, my gosh, you nailed, like, that's exactly how we used to do it, or I had even some. God, my gosh, you really slapped me in the face with that one. Because that's how we do it. That expectation has to start at the very beginning, and we lay out this really low bar, do we not?
[00:26:07] Speaker C: We do. And I've been guilty of it in the past, as well, which is why I feel so strongly about setting expectations as the first pillar of a healthy board. Because what we don't want to do is recruit our own dysfunctional.
[00:26:19] Speaker B: Right.
[00:26:19] Speaker C: It's amazing how many times we look back, as you said, a year down the road, and we say, well, I don't have a. My board's not fundraising. My board's not showing up. My board's not doing this. And we think back to how we recruited those individuals. Instead, let's reframe the way we set those expectations and the way we recruit board members. Why would we not go out and tell a prospective board member, you're going to work as hard as you've worked on any other nonprofit board. We're going to ask you to lead a committee. We're going to. We're going to try and grow your leadership skills. So at the end of your board tenure, you're a better leader, both on our board and in your private life, in your professional life, than you were when you stepped forward. Why are we not trying to develop the skills, talents of our board to energize them? Right. So rather than just filling a seat, we're providing something for our board members that's transferable to their own professional development and their own professional growth. I think that's something that energizes potential board members rather than demoralizes or deflates them before they even show up.
[00:27:25] Speaker B: I saw. I got a.
I don't know how many people got this, but I got one of these LinkedIn messages from an organization inviting me to be. To apply to be on their board. And I know you and I both know some members at BRi who do this. They actually put out board applications and get people to apply to their board, not go beg people and see if we can just dig up anybody from some brand name to come sit on the board. And I got to tell you, looking at the application and what they were looking for and what they wanted, I thought, oh, I could do that. I started to get excited, and by the way, I didn't apply, but not because of that. I almost did. I almost applied just because they inspired me to want to actually perform. And they gave me a signal that they're not just looking to, to just fill seats. They're looking for people with some qualifications that are going to bring that and are going to grow as a leader, as you say. So I love that. So, yeah, setting that expectation up front, I think is really clear. What else?
[00:28:32] Speaker C: And I think that the word you just used is a critical one, and it's inspire. Right.
We want to have an inspired staff. We need to have an inspired organization in order to generate excitement in the community and among our supporters. That should transfer to our board as well. If we don't have an inspired board, there's an automatic disconnect there in the organization, which then leads into the second habit of healthy boards, which is recruiting intentionally. As you mentioned, there's a lot of different ways that organizations out there recruit board members. What I tell nonprofit leaders and specifically board chairs and nominating committees and board officers, is you should be able to look around the table, your board team, and for each individual, you should be able to identify in one to two sentences why that person is there. What are the unique skills, talents, perspectives that that person brings, such that if they weren't on the team or if they didn't show up to that month's meeting, we would be lesser as a team. We would be missing something vital to what we need as an organization to move forward. If I can't identify for you, Patrick, why you're a member of, of the team and why I've asked you to devote your time, talent, treasure to our board.
We've missed the boat.
[00:29:51] Speaker B: That's good.
[00:29:51] Speaker C: And conversely, if I'm a board member and I feel as though there is a specific reason why I've been asked to be on this team, why my presence is necessary at the board meetings, I'm a lot less likely to skip out. I'm a lot less likely to look at my watch at 05:00 at night and say, you know what? I know that board meetings at six tonight, but I'm kind of tired. I'd rather go home rather than go to the board meeting.
[00:30:13] Speaker B: Yep. Man, so good. And you and I are in lockstep on this because, as you said, it's no different than when you're on a staff. When you're an employee, you want. And, you know, going back to we, I refer a lot to self determination theory, the idea that everybody wants a sense of autonomy, a sense of mastery or competence, and a sense of relatedness to the mission and the leadership. And what you're talking about here is board members need to feel that, too. You know, some sense of decision making, some sense of mastery and competence. I come here because I'm bringing something unique and valuable to the table, and certainly a sense of relatedness to the mission and the organization, a sense of purpose. And, boy, if we think about those things just like we do when we're hiring for a staff team, for a culture and who we want on that team, man, that's really good. And what a great exercise for an organization to go through to think about each board member and why they're there. That's really good.
[00:31:12] Speaker C: I like to give your listeners a takeaway, and it's a really simple activity. I do it all the time when I'm facilitating a board retreat, is pair your board members up, just get in groups of two, and have one person in the group identify, why am I on this board? No more than one to two sentences, what is the reason why I'm on this board? And then switch the pairs and ask the other person to identify why that person that they're facing, they're sitting across from is a member of this team. By the end of that exercise, everybody is a lot clearer about why they've been asked to join the team, or conversely, if they couldn't articulate it, that they need some more clarity. That's an individual that you need to spend a little bit more time with and bring them into the fold of the team.
[00:31:55] Speaker B: They'll also get to know each other a little bit better that way. And I hear a lot of boards say they want. That they want more of that connectivity with each other. So I love that. And I don't know where you got it, if this is a phrase you came up with, but I got to come back to it a minute because it made me chuckle. And yet it's so true. You said recruiting our own dysfunctions, and that phrase just really bit because we really do. Again, back comparing that back to the, you know, back to the employee space. We do that a lot, too. Leaders often will hire their own dysfunctions. Certainly happens with a board as well. I just love that term.
[00:32:34] Speaker C: I like it as well. It's a good one.
[00:32:36] Speaker B: So we have expectation, we have a recruiting. What's the third habit?
[00:32:41] Speaker C: The third habit is orientation. How thoughtfully do we as leaders orient new members to our team? Again, all equally applicable board and staff.
No one, as we said, no one shows up to a board understanding what are all of the dynamics of this team that I'm a part of. The faster we can get someone comfortable with what it means to be a member of this team, the faster they are able to make a contribution. So what we know, and you referenced boardsource earlier, boardsource does an annual study of board governance. What we know is from the data, year over year, is that organizations that have a formal written orientation process for new board members statistically perform a full letter grade higher. Their board members are more satisfied. What we know from the literature is that a board member that doesn't have a thorough orientation, on average, takes between nine and twelve months before they report feeling comfortable enough on the board team to make a significant contribution of themselves. So the question for nonprofit leaders is, can you afford to wait nine to twelve months before you get some sort of contribution of time talent from a new board member, or is your mission so imperative that you need people to hit the ground running? You want new team members to be a part of the team from day one?
[00:34:02] Speaker B: Yeah.
Okay, back to staffing.
[00:34:07] Speaker C: Yes.
[00:34:07] Speaker B: How do we orient our staff? And a word that I know that you, I'm sure you use this with your boards and teams, too. The difference between orientating between orientation and onboarding.
[00:34:19] Speaker C: Yes.
[00:34:20] Speaker B: So orientation typically being when people hear orientation anyway, a lot of people think that's that two hour timeframe where I give them the bigger three, big three ring binder and I show them what's in the tabs, and here's the roster of the rest of the board members and the staff, and here's our bylaws, and here's the strategic plan, and here's the budget for the last twelve months. And we tell them a little bit about what we're doing, and then they walk out and they're, they're now oriented. Right, versus an onboarding, where there's a continuum of, as you say, development. We're trying to develop these board members so when they walk out, they're richer for the experience as well.
Talk a little bit about how boards can move from that two hour. Here's the binder and here are the PowerPoint slides to true onboarding, where I'm integrated into the board in a way that's meaningful for me personally as well as the organization.
[00:35:14] Speaker C: I encourage leaders to think about orientation not as an event, but as a process. Sometimes we think about orientation and we think about it as, that's what I did on January 2 from 02:00 to 04:00 with my new board members. That's an event, right. That was a dissemination of information. Orientation instead, is a process. It's building the types of relationships necessary so that you, as the, as the executive director, feel comfortable with the new board member, and the new board member feels comfortable with their teammates on the board, as well as key staff members. And that may take, you know, two days, four days. That may take three months, but it's a process, and it's likely to be different for each board member. The. The phrase I use repeatedly when I work with boards is your challenge as an executive director. Your challenge as a board chair is to put individuals in a position to be successful. And as a leader, I don't know enough about my new board member to put them in a position to be successful if we haven't built that relationship over time. If I don't know you, Patrick, if I don't know your unique skills, strengths, what really energizes and inspires you about our mission, it's a lot harder for me to put you in a position to be successful. And conversely, I'm much more likely to miss along the way. I'm much more likely to do something that causes you to be less engaged in our mission.
[00:36:39] Speaker B: Yeah, that's really good. We think about those kinds of things sometimes when we're thinking about donor relations.
You know, we talk a lot about connecting donor interests to organizational mission. We don't always do that with board members.
I agree. I think that's an interesting alignment.
So orientation is the third. What's the fourth habit?
[00:37:01] Speaker C: The fourth habit is governing effectively. That's what we think about when we think about nonprofit boards then coming together in committees, coming together as a board of the whole. But it's broader than that. It's what, how well does this team manage their governance function? Have they established specific decision making processes that are effective for the team so that we don't get stuck in the mud? Do we have a solid definition of consensus, or how are we going to make decisions moving forward?
Do we understand what is the role of the committee structure and how aligned are those committees to the strategy of the organization and the needs of the organization at a particular point in time? I see a lot of organizations that have governance that is stuck in 510, 1520 years ago, when in reality they're trying to manage a situation and a landscape that's unique to today. So I think it's about making sure your governance functions are flexible enough to be responsive to the needs that you have right now.
[00:38:09] Speaker B: As you talk, I'm thinking the term governance.
I mean, what a loaded term. Such a big term. And so many people just aren't even sure what it is, again, to a whole episode on governance. But I'm thinking about a book that's a seminal piece of work that a united way executive peer of mine down in south Louisiana tipped me onto when it first came out. Governance is leadership.
Richard Chait and a couple of others, I forget their names, but where they talk about the three modes of governance being fiduciary, strategic and generative.
And I think that, and I know board sources, done some research on this because I've looked at, I've referenced it.
I did an informal study for my book on strategic planning a couple of years ago where I surveyed 100 nonprofits across the country and asked them, among other things, I'm going to cut this really short because we've talked about it before, among other things, about how they spend their board time and how often they meet and how much at the strategic or generative level do they stay. And 86% of the organizations reported that their boards spend less than half their time at the proper level.
That in their meeting time now, not counting committee work and those kinds of things, which I understand is where a lot of it needs to happen. But in, in board meeting time, the average, the average meeting was an hour long. The average number of meetings in a year was 6 hours. And so do the math. Less than 3 hours a year that your board is spending at the strategic level, you know, and that can't be good governance when you're spending your time. So talk about habits. I'd love to know a little bit more on this. Number four here on governing effectively is how do you discipline a board and create a culture of utilizing your meeting time to its max?
[00:40:17] Speaker C: I think that that's a great point. Funny story for you. I wrote a, wrote a blog article. It was the most downloaded blog article I've written in 2020. And the title was reimagining nonprofit board meetings. Because I think sometimes you're absolutely right. The challenge is that we get so bogged down in accomplishing business and feeling as though we have accomplished business that what we do is we copy and paste the same agenda month after month.
[00:40:45] Speaker B: Absolutely.
[00:40:45] Speaker C: And you and I have both probably been part of those meetings. It starts with the call, the opening, the welcome to the board meeting, the ratification of the minutes, executive director's report, and so on and so forth. Instead, I encourage leaders to reimagine what are your board meetings look like? And I give leaders a framework of four points. Let's throw out the board meeting, and let's talk about four specific points that you want in every meeting. Number one is we want to celebrate progress. So something has happened in the organization between the last time this group got together and today, that is worthy of celebration. Let's start the meeting off by inspiring people. Let's talk about something. And notice I said, celebrate progress. We're not waiting until we have cured cancer. We're not waiting until there is no homelessness in the community. We're celebrating something good that's happened. Number two is we want to discuss challenges.
This is a discipline for executive directors and board chairs as they come up with the agenda. What I found is that when we have this extended executive director report, ten minutes, 1520 minutes, it encourages the executive director, and I certainly did this when I was in their shoes, to simply download information. This is my one time where I have a captive audience with the board, and I'm going to download every challenge that's in my head and everything that has happened since we last met. Instead, let's think about it from a different perspective. If our executive director and our board leaders meet in advance of the meeting and identify what are the two or three most critical challenges that we're wrestling with as an organization, that we need the input of the board on two or three. And then step three in the agenda is let's brainstorm solutions together. As I said earlier when we talked about recruiting, there's a reason why everyone is around the table. There's a reason why we need them to show up for the meeting. And this is it right here. We're talking about the two or three most critical challenges we're facing this month, and we're going to engage the board in identifying solutions this month to a narrow set of questions. So it's not going off into left field and into right field, talking about 30 different topics. Instead, we're taking what's most important now, and we're identifying solutions and then committing to actions moving forward. It's a chance to keep the board at an appropriate strategic level, keep them out of the weeds, by identifying what are the two or three most strategic issues that are present for us.
[00:43:13] Speaker B: Excellent.
I need to get the link to that blog article.
I'd love to see that. And, you know, I've done some similar work, too, and I do it in the form of questions, much like you've done with these, with these tips to do. And it's amazing how Greg's, how some of these simple things, a lot of the leaders I work with go, wow, this is so helpful, because we get so, we get so just embedded in the, I don't know, I guess our old habits that we sometimes can't see the really simple things that are in front of us.
[00:43:45] Speaker C: Well, Patrick, it's also about the pace of the work. I mean, I know you remember this as well. When you're leading an organization in nonprofit space, things are coming at you so quickly that it's hard to take some time to step back and to think, are my meetings serving the needs of our board, or are they contributing to some of the dysfunctions that, that we're experiencing? What would it look like if we did, if we ran our meetings differently? What would it look like if we revisited and revamped our committee structure? That sounds like a radical idea for some organizations, but you'd be surprised how effective it can be in driving engagement among the board team.
[00:44:23] Speaker B: Well, it's essential, especially when you're so, the strategic planning cycle, for example, you build a new strategic plan, and then you try to cram your existing committee structure and board culture and habits into that strategic plan versus saying, okay, new strategic direction, new strategic plan. What got us here won't get us there. How are we going to align ourselves for this strategic plan? Not for the last one, but for this?
[00:44:47] Speaker C: One of the concepts that I am attracted to the most, and I've seen it work really well for organizations, is zero based committees, meaning at the beginning of every fiscal year, when we're debating our budget, we're discussing our budget, we approve the budget, we know what our strategy is for the year, then we create our committee. So at the end of every fiscal year, we disband all of our committees and we reconstitute them at the beginning of the fiscal year so that they're in alignment with what our priorities are for that coming year. You know, we may know that we'll always have a finance committee, but, for example, we may not need a program committee in 2021, or we may not need another committee. There may be another ad hoc group or task force that we're going to need to, need to devote board attention and time to.
[00:45:34] Speaker B: Well, budgeting is the same thing.
We take the budget and we just, year after year after year, cut and paste the columns. And if we think we're going to get a little bit more, we think we're going to lose a little bit more. We spread that out in the baseline budgeting and we move on instead of aligning our budget as the story that's going to help us achieve our strategic objectives. And again, that's a, that might even be more of a radical thought for, oh, what a redo, the way we do our budget every year.
That would never work.
What's the fifth habit?
[00:46:08] Speaker C: The fifth habit is evaluating frequently. One of the things that we don't see often enough on nonprofit boards is a willingness to hold a mirror up to ourselves and say, honestly, with authenticity, what's going well, what's not going well, and where do we need to make some changes or corrections. So what we see in healthy boards is that that's not a scary process.
They're not afraid to, as a team, reflect on what do we do well, what do we not do well, and what priorities are we going to set for 2021? Right? So sometimes we hear a board and they talk about, we need to do everything better, or we need to be better at fundraising, we need to be better at governing, and better at recruiting and orienting. And we know that that's not going to happen, right. Because there's only a limit. There's a finite number of hours in the day. There's a finite number of hours that board members can devote to their service. It's much more effective to take a look in the mirror and see what are we doing well. And we can't prioritize everything. What are the two, three or four key priorities or key changes that we want to make as a board team this year? And there's two different types of assessment. You know, there's the assessment of how are we performing as a board, you know, as a holistic team. And then there's also an individual assessment of me as an individual board member. Where have I contributed the most? Where have I contributed the least? What am I struggling with? Where do I need a little bit more guidance or a little bit more professional development? And what would energize me the most in the coming years? So two different types of assessment and evaluation. But what we know is that healthy boards are not afraid to undertake that process. They're not afraid to look in the mirror and honestly reflect on what goes well and what doesn't.
[00:47:50] Speaker B: That's really good. Particularly, I think, the individual assessment, I don't know. You know, it's obviously quite subjective when you're evaluating yourself and someone else isn't evaluating you. And I don't know what tips or practices you might have in terms of anyone else evaluating board members, but at least if you're evaluating yourself, you have to pause and ask yourself, am I really contributing?
And the hope is that either you feel like there's more that you can do or you feel like I should release this seat for someone who the evaluation could be an out for some board members and sometimes they need an out, and it's not because they don't care. They're not good people, but they might be over committed. One of the things I've found is how many board members, oh, I shouldn't open this can of worms, but how many board members are serving on eight other boards.
[00:48:49] Speaker C: Right.
[00:48:50] Speaker B: That, you know, that that's, to me, not good governance. That's so almost the definition of conflict of interest when you're trying to serve on all these different boards. But that is why sometimes that evaluation is so powerful is because it does give you a chance to say, all right, how am I serving this board? So I love it.
[00:49:10] Speaker C: And as you said, it's also, you know, it's also an opportunity to work with a facilitator and structure the questions of the evaluation effectively, because, as you mentioned, board members, what we know are far more likely to be, they're going to be harder on themselves than the executive director is. I've done a lot of these evaluations.
[00:49:29] Speaker B: Same here.
[00:49:29] Speaker C: And overwhelmingly, the board members are harder on themselves than their fellow board members are on them or the executive director.
[00:49:36] Speaker B: Well, interesting. They're harder on themselves. So one of the tools that we use is they self rate 25 competencies of the nonprofit, some of which include their own. And what's interesting to me is that boards rate themselves lower than staff rates them, but the staff is tougher on the organization as a whole. So the staff is tougher on things like execution and metrics and talent and all these things. The board is tougher on board succession, board development, board engagement, board performance. Do you find that to be true?
[00:50:12] Speaker C: I find the same thing, and I think that's why some of the next level questions in an evaluation are almost more important. So we don't want the exercise to turn into board members beating themselves up or deflating their own morale. What we also want to get to is, as a board member, what was the most, where did you feel the most excited this past year? What experience did you have with our organization that energized you the most? What program or service or accomplishment that we had really spoke to you this year? Think about what you learn about your board members that way and then down the road, how does that impact your ability to further utilize their talents and put them in a position that's going to tap into those passions, tap into.
[00:50:59] Speaker B: That inspiration, man, now you're speaking my language when you ask those questions. What awesome, powerful questions. And by the way, I'll take them. I'll take a moment to say this to any CEO's listening going, ooh, ooh, can I get a list of those questions? Don't ask for a list of the questions. Generate your own. If you were to sit and think, if I were a board member, what should I be asking myself?
And you may come up with questions better than Greg or better than I would come up with. And while I love a good list of template questions to get you started, it really is about sitting and formulating. What are the questions we need to be asking right now that if we could answer, it would really propel us forward? So I love those questions that you're asking. Those are fantastic coaching questions for a board.
Let me ask you this, Greg.
This is a little bit of a loaded question. I'm sorry, because I have an answer that came out of a personal experience and I just kind of want to see. I think this is a case where maybe there might be more than one right answer. Who, in your opinion, is the, is the person most responsible for engaging the board effectively and making sure that board is engaged effectively?
[00:52:12] Speaker C: This may be a controversial answer, and I've had arguments and discussions with others about it. I think it falls to the board chair.
[00:52:19] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:52:19] Speaker C: I think that the, the pace of the team goes at the speed of the trust built up with the board chair. There are limits to what the executive director, what the CEO can do relative to driving the board. We talk about that concept of driving the board. In reality, board members are looking to their own team leaders for what is going to be the culture of this group. I go back to athletic analogies often, and I think about a, you know, think about a football team. They're looking to the quarterback, which is the board chair, a lot more often than they're looking to the coach on the sidelines. Right. The executive director is, is not of them. You know, it's a different position, it's a different dynamic. I really think that the, the leadership of the board sets the tone of how seriously do we take these expectations, how seriously do we enforce them? And are we going to have a culture of accountability on this team? It's just like coaches tell us in sports all the time. I can harp on. I can harp on the team over and over again, but once they take accountability that this is their team, this is their group and they're going to be accountable to each other, that's when the magic happens. And I think that's very similar with.
[00:53:34] Speaker B: A board that's good. I can't disagree with that.
I think the value of that approach, that philosophy of the board chair being the one is that it is peer to peer. It's just like when we go to a donor and we ask for a major gift, it's going to be more effective when a peer comes and makes that ask. Then when the CEO goes and makes that ask.
I had a board chair once tell me that I needed to engage the board more effectively as the CEO, and it ruffled my feathers a bit and rubbed me the wrong way. And I thought, no, you as the board chair are the person this should be you.
And I had to really reflect on it and think about it. And I kind of reached a point where I had to go, all right, I think maybe he has a point. And I came to frame it a little bit differently. I came to frame it as it is the CEO who's the. The person best positioned to do it because they have the continuity year after year. They know more about what needs to be done because they're in the trenches, on the ground sort of thing. And they're the one who is paid to spend the time to make sure that all that happens. That all being said, the answer may also be somewhere in the middle, as Joan Gary would say, the pilot and the co pilot. But I'm coming around to maybe it's both of those. You gotta work in concert, the CEO and the board chair together. And there's probably a case, I think there is a case for either one of those people being responsible. But here's the deal. Somebody's got to do it. And if your board chair isn't doing it, you can't afford to take a year. Well, we got a bad board chair. You know, it doesn't always work out. Not all boards chairs are created equal.
On the other hand, a board chair can do a lot of things that a CEO just can't do.
So I think it's an interesting discussion. I appreciate your view on that.
[00:55:35] Speaker C: It's the most critical relationship in the organization, the board chair and the CEO. It's one of the reasons why. And this might be another controversial take. I feel so strongly that the board chair's term should be at least two years as a nonprofit leader. When I first started out, my board chair's term was a year, and there's just so much turnover just at the moment. When we were finally building trust and rapport and had our cadence down, boom, I had another partner there. I think two years at a minimum gives two leaders, the chair and the CEO, an opportunity to develop the kind of trust necessary to lead the board in the way you talk about where we each understand, what piece of that ownership do we have? Are we accountable for, and can I truly trust and rely on my partner to own his or her share of the leadership?
[00:56:31] Speaker B: I think I agree with that because I wrote a blog a number of years ago called the it's my year syndrome.
Because when you, when you've got a new chair coming in each year, that chair, rightly so, wants to be the best chair the organization ever had. I want to make their mark. As I said, they bring their own corporate experience into the boardroom, and they think, okay, this is how we're going to do it this year. And your strategic plan needs to transcend all that.
The organization's mission and work needs to transcend that. The effective boards I've seen are ones that have really good succession in the leadership, meaning you come on, you, you take a leadership role, you sort of understand that you may be the chair and you serve as a vice chair, and then you serve. I like the two year term. I really do.
Some do it where the second year is optional.
We can do two years if everybody agrees, and it sort of gives you that out because people are scared. Oh, what if I get a bad board chair and I gotta have them for two years instead of one? And one answer to that is, well, don't recruit bad board chairs, you know, relationship and onboarding and habits and all these things that you're talking about. But, yeah, there's, I think there's more than one right answer to that. But I can't disagree with the idea of the, the one year term is, is perhaps more limiting than it is empowering.
[00:57:55] Speaker C: I think that you touch on a great point, and that is that one of the key roles of the board chair, talking about owning a piece of leadership, one of the key roles of the board chair is to make sure that there are enough development processes in place so that we're growing the next set of leaders. There is nothing more demoralizing for an executive director than when we get to the election time in the subsequent year. And when we say, well, who wants to run to be president or who wants to run to be vice chair? And everybody is looking down and no one wants to make eye contact. What message does that send to your leadership and your team? So a really good board chair pays attention to, how am I growing leaders throughout the board so that individuals feel prepared when they're called on to take up that mantle of leadership.
[00:58:44] Speaker B: Greg, I love that you said that a few weeks ago. We had on Michael Bryant from peak harvest Consulting. He's a John Maxwell coach and also a leadership systems coach. And his whole tenet was that leaders grow other leaders. So. And I talk about it in. I actually talk about it in three platforms. There's high individual performer. So I do my job and I do it well. Then there's high impact leader, where I'm empowering others to do their jobs well. I'm not the individual performer anymore. And then there's the. That higher level of leadership, where I'm not only empowering performers, I'm developing more leaders. The fact that you pull that over into the boardroom and put that on the board chair, I love it, because that is a leadership function. And I believe that a board is a leadership body as much as it is a governing body. They're ambassadors, they're visionaries, they're strategists.
They're there to inspire and engage and empower. And I just love that if the board chair really wants to be a leader, you got to think about who are the other leaders coming behind you. I really appreciate that.
[00:59:54] Speaker C: Yeah, I think in my coaching, when I talk to board chairs, one of the questions that I like to ask them is, what will your legacy be? You know, whether your term is a year, whether your term is two years. When we look back on your legacy, what do you want that to be? And most of them, even if they don't have formal processes to grow, leaders on the board will say, I want to leave the organization in a better position than when I found it, and I want to help develop the board team. Instinctively, I think we want to grow leaders on our teams. We want to develop those skills. But it can be a really powerful conversation. When you ask a board chair, how do you want your legacy to be framed? What do you want people to think when they think of your term?
[01:00:36] Speaker B: That is so good, because then the CEO can help that board chair achieve that legacy. Yes. Too often, as the CEO, we're thinking, man, I just want your legacy to be that our organization survived you.
No, that's not what we. I love it. Yeah. Those conversations between the chair and the CEO long before they're the chair, though.
[01:00:57] Speaker C: Right?
[01:00:58] Speaker B: Need to happen again. We're back to relationships. My most effective board chairs in my. Well, actually, if I count interim work in my 15 years as a CEO, my most effective board chairs, as I look back, were the ones with whom I had strong, healthy, aligned relationships with.
[01:01:21] Speaker C: Absolutely. And I think it goes to. It goes directly to, how does an organization choose their board leaders? So this is, you know, this is something that might be controversial for some boards. I have some boards that tell me we, you know, the board itself is responsible for choosing its chair and its vice chair, and the CEO just has to. Has to deal with it. Right. But if we recognize that the most pivotal relationship in the organization is between the CEO and the board chair, why would you not want the input of your executive? Why would you not want the input? So as when I was a CEO, I was very clear that I didn't have the choice. Right. I wasn't the one who was picking and selecting the board chair, but I wanted my voice to be heard. I valued a board that would come to me and say, here's what we're thinking in terms of our succession planning for board leadership. Give us your thoughts on your relationship and ability to work productively with the slate that we're talking about or the slate that we're discussing. So it's about the respect to have a voice, understanding. You don't have the authority.
[01:02:24] Speaker B: Well, you know, it's back to leadership. Leadership and authority are not synonymous. It's about influence. And if, as the CEO, I have some influence in who my board is and certainly in whom our board chair is, then that's leadership, too. And if the board can't trust the CEO's point of view and influence to at least have a say in the matter, then you got a bigger problem anyway way.
[01:02:48] Speaker C: Absolutely.
[01:02:49] Speaker B: So, Greg, look, I want to thank you for the just, this is rich content that you're giving our listeners here, and I appreciate that you've, our conversation has enabled us to talk about leadership as well as governance. And, you know, this program is about leadership. So you've really put a great lens on this. Who were the, who are the leaders in your early life? This is a question I ask all my guests because it's just a personal curiosity as to how people formulate their positions on leadership, your point of view on leadership, and your values that you live out and try to live as a CEO and now try to help others who helped frame those who were the influencers in your early life or career that you would say really had an impact on your philosophy on leadership.
[01:03:40] Speaker C: I'm going to give you two, actually, one from my personal life and one from my early career, professional life, personally, it was my, it was my grandmother. So growing up, my parents both worked long hours, and I spent a lot of time with my grandmother. She was a, her husband, she was a widow at an early age, raised three kids on her own and ran her own business. So again, she was someone who was no stranger to hard work, was no stranger to accountability, and passed those values, the importance of leading with your values, onto me at a very early age and then switching over to the professional realm. When I started my career, my first role was as an officer in the army. I was stationed at Fort Knox. I was JAG officer. And one of the earliest influences on me was a civilian paralegal that we had in the office.
She had been there for 20 plus years. She was almost like a mother figure in the office office. But what really impressed me about her leadership was how quiet it was. She was the one who didn't need attention, she didn't need accolades, she didn't need the credit, but she just quietly worked behind the scenes to put people in a position to be successful. So sometimes it was pulling someone aside and saying, hey, you might want to consider this. Or maybe it was just being available as a listening ear to someone who was new to the office or was new to the new to the role. But it wasn't visible, it wasn't, look at me. It was very much behind the scenes. And so I respected that as a different form of leadership. I think sometimes, and particularly, this was true for me early in my career. When we think of leaders, we think of those who are out front, we think of those who are boisterous, we think of those who are making rousing speeches. Right. She showed a different form of leadership that I kept with me throughout my career as incredibly important.
[01:05:42] Speaker B: Both of those are examples of the idea that leadership is not all about some position and authority and some management role. I mean, we're talking about, you know, family members and people who have an impact in ways that it's sometimes even difficult to put your finger on. But the people that surround us, that make us who we are, those are great, great examples.
So, as we wrap this up, Greg, the last question, and again, one that I ask all my guests, if you had 10 seconds or 15 seconds to say, this is my number one principle of leadership that all leaders need to know and understand.
This is the Greg Nielsen leadership essence. What would that be?
[01:06:31] Speaker C: Two words. Be authentic. I think that that was something that I had to learn early in my career, was that you cannot lead others unless you know yourself, unless you really have a key understanding of who am I? What are my values, what do I want?
Who do I want to be?
And that authenticity has to come through to those that you're around, whether it's donors, whether it's staff members, whether, whether it's board members, people respect authenticity. And I think that the faster we can get to that level of self knowledge, self awareness, knowing that that's continually growing and evolving over the years. But I think that authenticity is probably the key leadership lesson that I had to learn in my career, and that has served me well.
[01:07:18] Speaker B: You know, it sounds simple, be authentic.
But we have to be intentional and we have to think. We have to pause every once in a while and say, is this really being authentic? Like it's not just a given? Greg, again, thank you so much. You have given so much. You've been generous with your time and your content with our listeners. Folks, if you're interested in getting in touch with Greg, I would highly recommend him. You can see why for board development, especially strategic planning, he's a man after my own heart, and he's out there doing really good work and helping organizations think at a higher level. Just go to nielsenconsults.com, nielsenconsults.com. The link is on our podcast page as well, and make sure you reach out to him next week. Fatima Gazala, a Maxwell coach, is going to talk to us about leadership on teams and building teams. Fatima is the president and CEO of full potential development consulting, and so we're looking forward to that. We've got Mark Pittman behind her the following week.
We're loving this, folks. We'll see you here next week. Lead on.
