As someone who has the opportunity to work with a number of nonprofits, I am a fan of the GiveWell blog, particularly its focus on performance management, and wanted to call attention to a recent post on the necessity of honest feedbacks for and in nonprofit organizations.
While a number of the nonprofits I've worked with are skilled at performance management, others struggle with the concept that dispensing candid performance feedback and direction to employees is somehow at odds with their charitable mission.
Holden makes the central point that a climate of unfiltered feedback and a willingness to accept and learn from criticism is key to advancing the mission. His open letter to nonprofit employees is rather harsh and blunt in parts, but his points are important to consider (and he is willing to turn the mirror of truth back on himself and his initiative as well). In the letter, he asks and then addresses the question of why people choose to work for a nonprofit organization:
I hope the answer is that you care more about making the world a better place more than just about anything else. If that's right, then consider how helpful criticism - all criticism, regardless of tone - can be to your mission. Unfiltered criticism is the best way to get others' perspectives on what you're doing, which unless you're already omniscient is hugely valuable information. If you get offended by criticism to the point where you fail to learn from it - or worse, get demoralized - this is hurting the people you're trying to help. So don't
Working out can be painful and unpleasant (granted, I'm largely speculating here), but any aspiring athlete who skipped it would be a joke. The mental equivalent is learning from criticism, and if you're putting yourself forward as a person who can use others' money to improve the world, you'd better be ready to put learning and improving first, and your feelings second (or twelfth). So here's my advice to you: seek out as much feedback as you can, push people to be honest, and get so used to negative feedback that its emotional impact wears off (leaving only the educational impact)...
If you find yourself unable to do this, I have only one explanation: that helping people isn't the core of your motivation. That you care more about your short-term emotions, day to day, than about the good work you're trying to do. That you've chosen nonprofit over for-profit not because you want to improve the world, but because it's a nice, cuddly atmosphere where you will never be challenged.
I don't endorse the idea that criticism is always best delivered raw and unfiltered; I think delivering negative (and positive) feedback is a skill worth investing in (as part of a broader performance management effort) - yet, it is also important to remember that a willingness to call out and discuss performance issues is a necessary first step to improvement.
A tough message perhaps, but one that gets to the important point of why driving performance and accountability through feedback (which includes constructive criticism as well as positive reinforcement) is absolutely key to pursuing a tax-exempt mission.
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