Strategy

Tips for planning in rotten times

Three tips for 2009 from the smart folks at McKinsey.

How are you using your strategic plan?

A new study by McKinsey finds organizaiotns are assessign their progress on a monthly - if not more frequent - basis. More than 80 percent of executives say their strategic-planning processes look different this year compared with last withthe biggest change a more rigorous approach to approving projects and capital spending, presumably with an eye toward managing cash carefully. Read the report.

Should you shut down your nonprofit?

Here is a link to a new article by the Fieldstone Alliance on this tough topic. "Going Out of Business: Why When and How to Do It Gracefully"

Books well worth reading

Jim Phills from has published a terrific book on strategy called "Integrating Mission and Strategy for Nonprofit Organizations". It is is available through the Oxford University Press.

Another good resource is "Strategic Management for NonProfit Organizations" by S.M. Oster also though Oxford University Press (1995).

Collins, Jim Good to Great and the Social Sectors: A Monograph to Accompany Good to Great Harper Collins 2006 – A small book with a big impact. While Collins has now decided here is, after all, a big difference between for and not for profits this one is well worth the read, plus people will ask if you have. I prefer the book Good to Great.

Collins and Porras Built to Last: Successful Habits of Visionary Companies, Harper Collins, 1994. I prefer this earlier work. Makes you realize you have what it takes.

Drucker, Peter Managing the Nonprofit Organization Harper Business Press, (1990). A classic to do list.

Letts, Ryan and Grossman High Performance Nonprofit Organizations: Managing Upstream for Greater Impact, Wiley Nonprofit Press (1999). One way to look at how you operate.

Here are some classics:

High Performance Nonprofit Organizations: Managing Upstream for Greater Impact (Letts, Ryan and Grossman, Wiley Nonprofit Press, 1999)

Managing a Nonprofit Organization originally published in 1990 this classic has been updated (Wolf, Simon and Shuster, 1990)

Managing the Nonprofit Organization (Drucker, Harper Business Press, 1990).

Tzu, Sun The Art of War –in the public domain, 6^th c BC. My mentor Mario Cuomo made me read this and I never regretted it.