Here's what I learned about leadership in 2019. I hope it helps you!

In the age of Fundraising Climate Change, leadership at nonprofits is needed more than ever.

However, what I learned last year is that leadership is NOT about ‘managing’ people, bossing them around, or being a tyrant and it ISN’T about showing people how great YOU are either.

Instead, it’s about helping coachable people that have passion and character become great.

It’s about supporting them as they pursue worthy goals that align with a company’s mission by making sure they feel secure as they grow and achieve.

It’s about helping them get the best out of themselves so they do more than they ever imagined they could do.

It’s about listening and having empathy for them as they struggle to make progress.

It’s about putting them in positions so they can succeed (while avoiding setting them up for failure by making them do things they don’t want to do, mostly because they aren’t good at doing them).

Then, it’s about giving them autonomy and letting them master their roles (no micromanaging!).

And most of all, leadership is about laying out a vision they can believe in, so they gain an opportunity to feel a sense of purpose as they build something meaningful that is bigger than themselves.

HAPPY NEW YEAR! I’m going to work on continuing to put these lessons into practice. I hope you will too.

NOTE: To learn more about Fundraising Climate Change and what you can do to prepare for it, consider the following items:

Podcast episode

7 data points that prove Fundraising Climate Change is real

Free report: Fundraising Climate Change – And what you can do about it

Free webinar recording: Fundraising Climate Change – And what you can do about it