Leading the way for the next generation of leaders is President-elect Barack Obama, who has described his formative work experience as a community organizer in Chicago’s South Side in 1985, when he was 23 years old. ...READ»
From a high-level perspective, partnerships become more sustainable for corporations when the very nature of collaboration is mutually beneficial. No one company has to re-invent the wheel and can also leverage dollars across multiple ...READ»
For-profit and nonprofit boards and their CEOs must create more ambitious and successful enterprises by recruiting board members from more diverse backgrounds and perspectives. Individuals who are accomplished and come from a variety ...READ»
Boards have a dual responsibility to ensure compliance, while also envisioning and achieving the organization’s greater potential. By “envisioning the greater potential,” I mean taking a time out from incremental thinking to ...READ»
Should Corporate Social Responsibility be a voluntary response to customer and societal demands? Or, if it is as important as many are suggesting, should it be a legislated requirement? On December 16, 2008, the Danish parliament ...READ»
Biggest lesson of 2008: Boards make decisions that determine the success or failure of our economy, increases or cutbacks in jobs, access to education, healthcare, and social services, energy conservation or waste, the future of ...READ»
Despite conventional wisdom that draws sharp lines between for-profit and nonprofit boards, I believe that they are fundamentally the same. Both for-profit and nonprofit boards have ownership responsibilities for their ...READ»
For-profit boards of directors bear much responsibility for the past year’s financial catastrophes. Nonprofit boards are accountable for global and regional organizations that need to address vital matters relating to the ...READ»
How do we make the world work for 100 percent of humanity in the shortest possible time through spontaneous cooperation without ecological damage or disadvantage to anyone? This is a question Buckminster Fuller posed to the world in ...READ»
“The era that defined Wall Street is finally, officially over. Michael Lewis, who chronicled its excess in Liar’s Poker, returns to his old haunt to figure out what went wrong.” “The End” by Michael Lewis is a smart analysis ...READ»
Corporate Social Responsibility reports almost never include data that supports the business case for CSR strategies. Unless business can tie the benefits of CSR to the bottom line it will be jettisoned during tough financial times. ...READ»
Too many nonprofits are missing out on the advantages of the internet in communicating their messages, galvanizing support, and serving the world. Businesses can add important value by providing guidance, expertise, and technical ...READ»
Last week I had the benefit of spending two and a half days with roughly 150 other “green” marketers, sustainability officers and other champions of our environmental movement. The event, called Good and Green, was organized by ...READ»
Listening carefully to businesses as they react to traumatic and volatile market news, here are my five predictions for corporate philanthropy in 2009:
Overall giving from the business sector will be even with 2008 in spite of ...READ»
One side-effect of this dreadful economy is that people seem more mindful than ever of the needs of others and what matters most. Tis the season for “good giving.” Here are six holiday gift ideas for doing good by giving ...READ»
Nonprofits tend to see volunteers as necessary, but not strategic. Attitudes towards volunteerism are simplistic and out of date. The result? A loss of 1.9 billion hours of labor year to year. Corporate Volunteer programs can remedy ...READ»
There are over a million nonprofits in the U.S. alone, most of which would be thrilled to have the talents of business people who bring experience, expertise, and fresh perspectives, as well as a willingness to contribute funds and ...READ»
Successful companies continue to enthusiastically embrace Corporate Social Responsibility and Corporate Volunteering as core strategies to combat lean economic times.I always thought “self-employed” had a sort of glamorous ring to ...READ»
Usually a blog is one person’s perspective on a topic such as society – this blog will be a reverse blog: society’s view on what the “new blog of the next 10 years should be”.
A few hundred leaders gathered today in ...READ»
I was pleased to see Metropolis Magazine again discuss the platform of sustainable design in the online article called Whirlwind Tour. This courageous town is Greensburg, Kansas whose citizens have embarked on a forward journey ...READ»
“Community-development banks, credit unions, and other CDFIs – a mixture of faith-based and secular, for-profit and not-for-profit organizations – constitute what might be called the ‘ethical subprime lending’ industry. ...READ»
This past week, I was in Boston for the GREENBUILD show and had the benefit of joining USGBC President, Rick Fedrizzi and This Old House host Kevin O’Connor for a reception at a current This Old House home in Weston, ...READ»
President-elect Barack Obama understood the subtle difference between utilizing volunteers to achieve an objective, and embracing volunteers as the objective. He created free space for collaborative efforts. The interests of the ...READ»
Good or bad, the past eight years have marked an explosion of interest in corporate social responsibility (CSR) from all sectors of society except from the US government. Even the UN, which has been often considered slow to act, has ...READ»
A big lesson learned from the past year’s corporate meltdowns is the role of governing boards in leading and minding the business. Funders who seek to invest their dollars in nonprofits will be wise to choose organizations whose ...READ»
