In the on-purpose world, we still have organizations stuck in the twentieth-century thinking that the public donors do not want to pay for administration. Websites of many of these organizations are proud of declaring that they only get 10% for administration, the rest to core programming. Many think that it's larceny to allocate more than 10% or to some extent bad practice to ask for more. 

What we can glean from this based on leadership and management perspective, these organizations have no 

- capability of building up and strengthening their core processes 
- capability of securing and retaining great talent- a must to survive and thrive!
- capability to build strategically for the future
- see themselves as sacrificial conduits with their begging bowls every year
- always uncertain, tentative and highly disrupted by the larger forces around them
- cannot stand up for their principles, values, and commitments

They maybe good with their programs but they're not sustainable and even effective in the long run. If you're not taking care of your own house, how can you be the most charitable for all? 

Don't compromise your organizational sufficiency in the altar of public legitimacy.

At the next blog, I will share some of the strategies to get away from the 10% group. 

I was at the airport in August to pick my mom who was coming from BC. It should just be a straight-forward experience. It turned out that it was a complete nightmare.

The airline delayed the flight twice and by the we get there, the ground stewardess said that it just left the place of origin. So we waited a few more hours. After that, we were again baffled that the flight didn't show up in the flight screen. We went back to the airline station and inquired the exact arrival time of the plane. The stewardess said that the plane will leave at night, about 9pm. This was a confusing information. 

We checked again for the flights coming from BC but no flights arrived in the last 6 hours. We inquired again for the last time and another flight stewardess confirmed that the plane will be leaving by 9pm. So we drove home feeling drained and disappointed.

I got a phone call from my sister informing me that my mother's plane arrived an hour ago and she was sitting in the airport station!

What a big mess! The flight information didn't show the place where the last passengers boarded their plane. The stewardesses were not aware of flight data and to top it all, gave us the wrong information. This airline is the worst in delays, misinformation, and discoordination between its people. 

The lesson here is don't trust the information. Get it from the source from your travelling family member. Breakdown in systems and communications happen all the time in larger organizations. When this happens, customers have to rely on their smarts to get through all the muddle. If they don't know that their tail is missing, they would care less about other things. 

​

You need an energizer or icebreaker in meetings.
                It cuts the precious time for substantive issues that are needed to be discussed in the meeting. Who has a lot of time to sit down in meetings that take quite a long time to get to the real issues?

Mothers know best.
                Not really. At a certain point, mothers gradually relinquish that role of a know-it-all and respect the independence of their children.

Volunteer first before you can get a job in the organization.
                Not true. If you want to volunteer, fine, but keep your expectations real. Sometimes, it is not going to happen in a million years.

Opportunity comes knocking once.
                Not true. Opportunity is ever present in many things. Our challenge is to enhance our ability to see opportunities disguised as something else.

Don’t judge a book by its cover.
                Not true.  People spent thousands of dollars on book covers alone.  We judge things by the cover/appearance. 
​
Early bird gets the worm.
                It doesn’t follow. Some early birds get eaten because they are too early for the event.

Seniority rules.
                Not anymore. The society and its expectations about reward and recognition fall on those able to become a real asset to the organization, not just those who have been loyal but utterly useless.

There are many clichés about many things. Take time to analyze that they are not truths but sometimes meant to be excuses not to improve the situation. ​

The best organizations are constantly unlearning not just learning constantly.

There a big difference between those who are always challenging themselves versus those who are already feeling that they have reached and arrived. 

A few comments I have heard through the years where external help is rejected on the basis of: 


​If it's not invented here, it wont work.

We are pretty good at what we do. 

We have another consultant that we 're still working on.

We don't need another external person to know our problems.

The current Board or Executive will not support this intervention. 

Our Request for Proposal is our vehicle for getting help. 

Our priorities right now are very different from the last Executive Director.

We don't have a budget for this kind of exercise. 



All these are excuses and should not be seriously considered.

The best organizations do recognize that 'if there's a will, there's a way.'  Unlearning should happen before actual learning happens.  Bringing a resource is a matter of strategy and an asset that can be deployed when needed, not when the organization is in a critical condition.

Past success is never a predictor for future success. ​

​There are many ways bureaucratic organizations refuse to believe that the horse is dead and would try different approaches to prove to themselves that it's not so.

1. Appoint a committee to study the horse.
2. Create a training session to improve riding skills.
3. Increase funding to improve the horse's performance.
4. Visit other site to see how they ride dead horses.
5. Declare that no horse is too dead to ride.
6. Buy a stronger whip.
7. Increase the standards for riding dead horses.
8. Hire an external consultant to show a dead horse can be ridden.
9. Form a workgroup to find uses for a dead horse, if all else fails.
10. Promote the dead horse to a supervisory position or vice president.


Stop beating the dead horse in your organization.

This could be a rehashed idea, practice, or custom that are no longer relevant, valuable, and appropriate to the times.

The costs of reviving the old to account for the new versus creating new out of new experiences, discoveries, and insights are far greater. 

Consider investing in the right tools and mechanisms to get  to 'new ideas' and become better at attracting the right champions to it. 




Source: Another vision of the story may be found at www.abcsmallbiz.com/funny/deadhorse.html