So what made September so special? In truly historic terms, ServiceNation launched a national and groundbreaking campaign, elevating the conversation about citizen service to a new level. For those who are unfamiliar, ServiceNation is a coalition of organizations dedicated to strengthening our democracy and solving problems through civic engagement and service, of which Commongood Careers is a proud member.

Kicking off the campaign on September 11th in New York City, Senators Obama and McCain set aside partisanship to speak together at a Presidential Forum about the importance of service and their views on how to expand its impact.  The following day, the ServiceNation Summit brought together hundreds of leaders – nonprofit and for-profit CEO’s, elected and appointed government officials, army generals and celebrities – to discuss and embrace the future of citizen service.  But the rubber really hit the road on September 27th’s “Day of Action,” during which more than 2,700 service events were organized across all 50 states to showcase the power and potential of service.

The month also brought some of the most powerful legislation in decades to expand and improve service opportunities when, on September 12th, Senators Kennedy and Hatch introduced “The Serve America Act” with co-sponsorship from Senators Clinton, Obama and McCain.  When many policy efforts grind to a halt during an election cycle, waiting to see what the election will bring, it is tremendously encouraging to know that the next President of the United States has already endorsed this sweeping and important reform.

These developments are likely to have a profound impact on the workforce of the nonprofit sector, as more and more people are introduced to service and earn marketable experiences working to those ends.  Particularly in response to conversations about the sector’s impending leadership crisis, there may be few more effective strategies for increasing the talent supply than to expand national service programs like City Year, Public Allies, Civic Ventures and Teach For America.

Finally, it is also worth noting that this work represents some of the absolute best tenants of social entrepreneurship – innovating new approaches to addressing social problems, pursuing audacious goals, measuring impacts, and building powerful cross-sector coalitions.  As is often the case with successful examples of social entrepreneurship, and as was certainly the case during ServiceNation events, I found myself thinking daily about Margaret Mead’s often quoted observation: “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.”

As a citizen of the world and on behalf of all of us…. thank you ServiceNation!

On October 8th, the Stanford Social Innovation Review will host a conference called Online Giving Marketplaces: Changing the Face of Philanthropy. I’m thrilled to see these platforms finally getting the attention they deserve. I’m also delighted to be moderating one of the panel discussions. Over the years I’ve paid a lot of attention to online giving sites—GlobalGiving, Kiva, NetworkForGood, GiveIndia, HelpArgentina, DonorsChoose, GiveMeaning, and GreaterGood South Africa, among many others (check out socialactions for a mashup of more than 30 platforms).

Why do these sites matter? Because they represent giving that’s faster, more global, and boasts multi-media interactivity? Or is there something else, something more transformative, going on here? Why are these sites proliferating, and what differentiates them from each other?

These platforms are important beyond just their speed and glitz factors in several ways.  They enable small gifts to be aggregated—by the donors—and they let donors manage portfolios of their giving. This is a baseline for ultimately getting to more strategic giving. Second, online giving platforms provide a potential source of data about giving trends and patterns, in something approximating real time. Third, they could provide a common backbone for donation transactions. Fourth, they are positioned to gather real feedback and input from people within funded institutions, as well as the people who benefit from them (see GreatNonprofits for more on this possibility). Fifth, they might serve as early warning signals about issues or giving patterns. Sixth, there are already emerging connections between “online giving platforms,” “social investors,” and “social stock exchanges”—so it only makes sense that new metrics systems, reporting tools, and portfolio assessment tools will come next. Seventh, these sites are specifically set up as marketplaces with buyers and sellers connected by interests; this framework is distinct from the way nonprofits and donors usually talk about themselves, and one that has both advantages and disadvantages. Finally, we have not yet seen real interconnectivity between online giving platforms and “offline” donor services. Is this next, and what might the results of such partnerships look like?

The speakers at the Online Giving Marketplaces conference, who include the founding executives and board members of several of the sites named above, will surely add their ideas to this list.

Updates: The conference has been moved to a larger venue; the original site sold out. (You can find information on logistics here.) If you can’t attend, but have key questions you’d like to ask, send them to me, at and I’ll do my best to get them asked. I’ll report answers via a blog post.

Levin emphasized the importance of bringing education to America’s students now, noting that KIPP does everything it can to make learning and teaching both fun and productive. “One of the things we want to do is make sure that every kid has a chance to work toward their own future,” he said. 

“We can think of education like steroids for our kids’ futures,” he said.  And while the analogy garnered some laughs, KIPP’s record shows that it really is improving kids’ futures astronomically.  It isn’t steroids, but commitment, dedication and hard work on the part of students, teachers, and families that give KIPP’s kids the boost they need. 

Only one question remains: When will the “Colbert Bump” kick in for KIPP?

This year, over 1,000 projects were submitted, which has since been narrowed down to five projects. We are thrilled to see that two Commongood Careers clients—DonorsChoose.org and Kiva—are amongst the top five nominees!

If you are an AMEX cardholder, you can cast your vote at: http://www.membersproject.com/

If you are not a cardholder, AMEX invites you to show your support by sounding off about your favorite nominated projects at: http://community.membersproject.com/category/Discussion-Board/3

The PSAs feature City Year corps members in meaningful moments that convey the impact they have as young people engaged in citizen service: tutoring in schools, mentoring students, cleaning up neighborhoods, and ultimately working together for a common purpose.

“The more you learn about City Year, the more you are inspired by the energy, passion and optimism that shine through everything they do,” said Brian Hayes, creative director, Arnold.  “We hope that these new ads convey this feeling and motivate more young people to get involved in the program.”

The PSAs will be shown almost 2,500 times as part of Comcast’s three-year commitment of $27 million to City Year. 

The award recognizes organizations with a wide range of missions and visions, but all of those awarded are making significant change in their communities.  Winners this year include ACCESS, “for its commitment to provide economic and social services to Arab immigrants, Arab Americans, and non-Arabs alike, while breaking down the barriers of linguistic and cultural differences;” Native Americans in Philanthropy, “for its work to promote, facilitate, and celebrate philanthropic giving to Native communities, while providing professional development opportunities and support for Native Americans working in the field of philanthropy;” and The Twenty-First Century Foundation “for its efforts to facilitate strategic giving for black community change, working with donors to invest in institutions and leaders that address challenges within black communities across the country.”

The National Leadership in Action Award Program promotes high-level performance of philanthropic institutions and nonprofit organizations and the award honors innovative approaches to connecting resources of time, money and expertise to the philanthropic work of communities of color.

For a full list of recipients or to learn more about the award, click here. 

Among the calls to action for our next administration are:

1. Expand innovation incentives and free them from the earmarks and conditions that have blunted past initiatives. Adequate incentives, coupled with rigorous accountability, would remedy this.

2. Use influence over state and local policy to sweep away regulations that hamper innovative thinking, such as caps on the number of public charter schools allowed and excessive restrictions on how teachers are trained and credentialed.

3. Continue the strong push of two efforts already underway. One is the move toward a common set of standards for what students should be expected to know and be able to do. Then, to make shared standards work, a national data infrastructure must be built to assess educational progress.

This op-ed also featured the outstanding work of other Commongood Careers partners such as KIPP, Teach for America, and New Leaders for New Schools.

Read the full article.

Last week, Team Commongood Careers enjoyed the good fortune of being able to hold our annual retreat in beautiful new boardrooms and training spaces within the offices of City Year and Citizen Schools.

They say everything happens for a reason.  In this case, not only were City Year and Citizen Schools able to provide some great space to meet our logistical needs, but it was also a tremendous inspiration to be discussing sector-wide impact in the national headquarters of these two outstandingly successful and entrepreneurial organizations.

And if you don’t already know all about these two leaders in their fields, please check them out and help us return the favor by doing all you can to support their efforts.

City Year unites young people of all backgrounds for a year of full-time service, giving them the skills and opportunities to change the world. As tutors, mentors, and role models, these young leaders make a difference in the lives of children and transform schools and neighborhoods across the United States and in South Africa. More than 1,500 corps members serve in 19 City Year sites across the United States and one site in Johannesburg, South Africa.

Citizen Schools has built a creative and effective learning model that addresses community needs while building student skills through hands-on experiential learning activities. Citizen Schools operates a National Network of apprenticeship programs for youth that connects middle school students with adult volunteers in hands-on learning. At Citizen Schools, students develop the academic and leadership skills they need to excel in school, build self confidence, get into college, and become leaders in their communities. Citizen Schools currently enroll 2,000 middle-school students and engage 1,500 volunteers at 30 school campus sites nationwide.

Tenacity will be honored by the USTA during Arthur Ashe Kids’ Day at the US Open this year as the featured National Junior Tennis League organization. Attracting over 30,000 adult and youth spectators, Arthur Ashe Kids Day honors tennis legend Arthur Ashe and continues his mission of using tennis as a means to instill in kids the values of humanitarianism, leadership and academic excellence. To see the coverage, tune in to CBS Sports TV on Sunday, August 24th, from 12 - 1:30 PM (EST) for the Arthur Ashe Kids’ Day national broadcast featuring a short video on Tenacity.

We congratulation our partner Tenacity for being recognized on this special day that celebrates the importance of shaping and encouraging youth in the classroom, on the court, and in the community. 

The article also highlights the work of Teach For America, teachNOLA, and New Leaders for New Schools and shows incredible images of students of Langston Hughes Charter School.

We applaud the tremendous effort of New Schools for New Orleans and its supporters to further the transformation public schools in New Orleans. 

Net Impact, an international community of new leaders who use business to improve the world, is currently conducting a survey to inform a report on MBAs working in the social sector. Participate in the survey

Plus, Foote cites some impressive stats, for example that about 10 percent of Yale, Georgetown and Harvard seniors apply to be a part of Teach For America’s corps of world-changing teachers.  She also writes about the realities of the challenges facing America’s education system and how Teach For America is offering solutions. 

Encouragingly, the article notes that many of Teach For America’s alumni are inspired by their experience to do more.  Foote points out that KIPP, whose impressive education successes we recently blogged about, was started by Teach For America alums. 

Due to lack of state funding, the school’s future was uncertain just a few weeks before it was to open.  Fortunately for Hartford and its students, local figures like Connecticut Governor Jodi Rell, Hartford Mayor Eddie Perez, and the Hartford Foundation for Public Giving came forward to champion Achievement First’s cause and energize donors to help get the schools ready for the fall.

With Achievement First’s success in education, it’s no wonder so many in Hartford were ready to step forward to support the organization.  A recent report shows that students at a similar school in New Haven, Conn. performed an average of 56 percent higher on all sections of the state test than their peers in non-Achievement First schools in that city.  Now that’s putting achievement first!

That’s where the article recognizes organizations like Kiva and DonorsChoose.org.  The article advises: “if you want to exercise the kind of control that deep-pocketed philanthropists enjoy, consider donating to one of a new breed of charities that allow donors to browse descriptions of specific projects online and fund them, in whole or in part. “

Both Kiva and DonorsChoose.org use the Internet to connect individual donors directly with recipients of the donation, whether through Kiva’s microloans or DonorsChoose’s donations to classrooms.  They champion diverse causes, but they’re both doing what’s great: helping people exercise their philanthropic spirit, no matter the size of their bank account. 

Washington Post education columnist Jay Mathews recently wrote an article about KIPP’s focus on finding the cause for any drop-outs from its schools and its continuing research on learning how its graduates are doing once they reach college.  He highlights the importance of KIPP’s dedication to looking at the data to achieve results. 

And achieve they do.  The article also notes that in addition to being much more likely to graduate high school and go to college than their non-KIPP school peers, middle school students who completed four years at KIPP increased their average math achievement level from the 40th to the 82nd percentile and their reading level from the 32nd to the 60th percentile.  Dare we say “KIPP up the good work”?

Pride partners throughout Latin America use social marketing tools to change attitudes and behaviors critical to conservation.  Rare provides the tools, along with in-depth training and technical support as its local partners launch two-year Pride campaigns that have resulted in truly impressive results.

One Pride program alum, Martin Castillo Paniagua of Mexico’s National Park Service, helped lead a campaign that grew knowledge of one area as protected in the target community from 35 to 98 percent.  You can read all about his and other Rare Conservation success stories here.

The grant will allow for at least 500 students in 2008, 750 in 2009, and 1,000 in 2010 to participate in the BELL’s highly effective Summer program in New York City.  The program, which helps to strengthen reading, writing and math skills, has been so successful that over 95 percent of children enter their program at the “failing” level advance to a higher academic performance category and at least 75 percent of them go on to achieve “proficient” or “advanced” levels in core skills.

Plus, Earl Martin Phalen, Co-founder and CEO of BELL, notes that the students on average gain four to six months worth of education during BELL’s six-week program.  What student wouldn’t want the equivalent of six month summer vacation?  With growing support, learning programs like BELL make summer a great time to achieve. 

We recently blogged about our involvement with ServiceNation, a national campaign promoting voluntary citizen service. The ServiceNation campaign will officially kick off with a national summit Sept. 11-12, in New York City.

On the evening of September 11, the Summit will open with a presidential candidates forum on citizenship and service. Senator John McCain has agreed to participate, and Senator Obama may agree to attend as well.

Then, on September 27, ServiceNation will stage a nationwide Day Of Action, with hundreds of events across America celebrating the power and potential of voluntary citizen service.

ServiceNation truly has the potential to transform our nation, and Commongood Careers is committed to helping drive this incredible campaign. But we can’t succeed without your help and your involvement. 

As a first step, you can help us let our leaders know that we are ready to become a ServiceNation by taking our service poll, and submitting a question to be asked at the Sept. 11 presidential candidates forum. (To inspire you, ServiceNation will select up to five of the best questions and offer the authors a ticket to the event!)

Take the poll at: http://www.bethechangeinc.org/servicenation/take_action/poll/careers

We hope that you are as excited by the potential for ServiceNation as we are, and that you will join us in this bold campaign. 

Last week, the Akron City Council gave the go ahead for an agreement between OneCommunity Akron Mayor Donald L. Plusquellic to create a network that will provide wireless Internet connectivity in an 11-square-mile area of the city.  The agreement puts into action the first $250,000 in matching funds from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation’s $500,000 challenge grant.

Akron will also be the new home of the OneCommunity Knight Center for Digital Excellence, which provides resources to spread broadband access programs so that communities can fully participate in today’s digital world. 

A little while back, Alice Lunsford, Teach For America’s Director of External Talent Recruitment, told us about some opportunities for entry-level jobseekers at her organization.  She said that “[Teach For America] is filled with people who are passionate about their work and working in a smart manner toward measurable goals.  It’s the culture that I think makes it a great place to work, especially coming out of college.” (Read the whole article here.)

That sounds to us like CollegeGrad.com had it right when they chose Teach For America for the top of their list!

Service Nation , an effort headed by Be The Change Inc. , is building strong foundations. 

Habitat for Humanity just joined the movement, whose goal is to engage 1 million Americans in a year of full time national service by 2020 and inspire a culture of civic service nation-wide.  Habitat’s added support makes the list of organizations backing Service Nation 100 strong.  Support for the movement is impressive and expansive.  The organizing committee includes entrepreneurial organizations like College Summit, Teach For America, Year Up and many more.

Service Nation aims to engage the country in a dialog about national service.  Keep an eye on them as they set forth bold goals for national service in America at their Service Nation Summit Sept 11-12 this year.

The national Read for the Record effort is designed to build awareness for America’s crisis in early childhood education and Jumpstart’s role in solving the crisis by breaking the world record for the greatest number of children reading the same book on the same day.

While the campaign’s spokesperson LL Cool J wasn’t there (see him voice his support in this YouTube video) the party did boast a few celebs, including Boston Bruins player Bob Sweeney.

This year’s Fellows will tackle issues as wide ranging as community improvement, economic development, education, the environment, health, human rights, and legal advocacy.

Since 1987, Echoing Green has invested $27 million in more than 450 leaders to make a difference in lives all over the world.  This year’s promising Fellows will be an excellent addition to Echoing Green’s impact.  Congratulations and best of luck to the 2008 Fellows!

Neil Armstrong Elementary’s 4th and 5th grade students grew over 5,000 marigolds from seeds that they planted at school. By growing and selling the marigolds in the past year, the Neil Armstrong Elementary students funded over 20 teacher proposals on DonorsChoose.org, resulting in over 2,500 hours of instruction to over 600 students.

This coming year, they are hoping that their efforts will have an even greater impact.  So far, they’ve met over half of their $10,000 goal.  Visit their challenge page to see their progress, an adorable photo of the class, and how you can help them out!

Venture philanthropy is getting quite the buzz, from MBA campuses to nonprofit conferences. This model of taking a business-minded investment approach to funding new organizations offers a viable alternative to traditional grantmaking, and allows emerging nonprofits to obtain the capital they need to get off the ground and scale their programs.

An innovator in venture philanthropy, New Profit Inc. has helped some of the nation’s most entrepreneurial and effective nonprofits get off the ground and grow to achieve huge social impact. New Profit provides multi-year financial and strategic support to a portfolio of social entrepreneurs working in education, youth development, workforce development, and other areas.

New Profit is also the main driver of America Forward, a coalition of more than 60 social entrepreneurs and high-impact organizations that have come together to present presidential candidates and policymakers with a new and transformative way to solve the difficult social problems facing our nation.

Are you looking for way to get in on the ground floor of this amazing organization? New Profit Inc. is currently seeking a Portfolio Analyst to join its team. The Portfolio Analyst is an essential role that encompasses a broad set of responsibilities requiring analytical skills, project management capabilities, and general research abilities.  This person will work closely with the New Profit Portfolio Management Team, representatives from New Profit portfolio organizations and other relevant external stakeholders. Read the full job description.

For the past several years, we have been honored to help facilitate hires at several West Coast-based organizations, such as Kiva, TechSoup, Room to Read, Craigslist Foundation, Breakthrough Collaborative and Springboard Forward. As many of our national partners are focused on scaling their programs and operating sites across the country, we’ve also been able to help support the regional growth of the Nonprofit Finance Fund, College Summit, City Year and others. Helping these amazing organizations has inspired our own expansion into the Bay Area.

Heading up the office as Regional Director is Missy Longshore. Missy brings nine years of experience in nonprofit organizations and most recently served as the Business Development Manager at New Door Ventures. She served as a nonprofit management consultant at TDC after completing her MBA with a concentration in Public and Nonprofit Management at Boston University. Her prior nonprofit work in the Bay Area included work in advocacy, public television, and youth development. Missy can be reached at mlongshore@cgcareers.org or 415-531-3998.

Joining Missy as a transplant from Boston is one of our senior Service Managers, Kevin Flynn.  Prior to his work at Commongood, Kevin was with National TenPoint Leadership Foundation, working with high risk and gang involved youth to reduce violence in the most underserved neighborhoods in cities through the country. Kevin holds a bachelor’s degree in English from Boston College and is a board member of the Boston chapter of Young Nonprofit Professionals Network (YNPN).

Hitting the ground running, Missy and Kevin are already hard at work supporting our existing West Coast clients, connecting with new organizations, developing connections with local talent pipelines, and generally enhancing our nationwide capacity for social impact. Keep your ears open for exciting workshops, programs, and networking opportunities made available through our new office.

Thanks to all of the talented individuals and dynamic organizations that have made this growth possible. We are so excited to help to create even more social impact from our new office on the West Coast!

No, this is not guacamole gone bad. Blue Avocado is a new online magazine created by and for people who work and volunteer in community nonprofits. According to the Director and Editor-in-Chief, Jan Masaoka, Blue Avocado’s “aim is to engage and support the people of community nonprofits, the ones who do the heavy lifting in building social justice and strong communities, and who create and drive the ideas that change our world for the better.” Standing features include of the publication include:

• Lead investigative journalism article
• Board Café column for nonprofit board members
• Dear Rita in HR
• Real World Nonprofit Finance
• Personal Finance for the Non-Profiteer
• Headline News from the Field
• That’s Nonprofit Life

Blue Avocado offers a few ways for its readers to get involved, such as writing articles, spotting stories, posting comments on the site, and joining as a member. Check out the inaugural issue at Blue Avocado.

The Conference Board Research Working Group on Managing an Aging Workforce at Nonprofits, part of the Mature Workforce Initiative, is surveying boomers and experienced workers to better understand the key challenges (cultural, generational, intergenerational) they face, and which pathways they find most effective in moving to the nonprofit sector. They are also surveying nonprofit organizations to better understand how they reach out to this talent pool and which recruitment and “crossover” strategies work best.

If you are an experienced worker who has moved or wants to move into the nonprofit sector from a for-profit or government job, or if your organization has recruited and/or hired experienced workers from these other sectors, we invite you to participate.

Please click on the appropriate link below to complete the survey:

Employer—for nonprofit organizations
Job Seekers—for individuals seeking nonprofit jobs
Job Holders—for individuals who have transitioned into nonprofit jobs

For further information, please contact jill.casnerlotto@conference-board.org

Both sites also offer data on similar job titles. For the search above, data for job titles such as Individual Development Manager, Manager Community Development, Volunteer Manager, and Senior Manager of Strategic Partnerships were also listed and graphed at Indeed.

Each tool uses its own database of job postings to populate this information. Indeed Salary Search is based on an index of salary information extracted from over 50 million job postings from thousands of unique sources over the last 12 months. As new jobs are added each day, the Indeed Salary Search index is automatically updated with fresh salary data. Similarly, SimplyHired uses salary data from millions of job listings indexed by Simply Hired’s job search engine.

Please click the link to take the survey:
http://survey.confirmit.com/wix/p613715498.aspx?pid=300

Commongood Careers supports Civic Ventures’ efforts and sees this kind of research as crucial to the goals we share.  Please note that this study is being done for research purposes only.  Your responses will remain confidential, and you won’t be added to any mailing lists or be solicited for any reason as a result of the survey.  The survey results will be made public on the Civic Ventures website in June 2008.

Your experience is valuable to the field and your help is most appreciated.

Read the full report.

Read the full article.

Interested in learning more about social enterprise? Does your organization use market-based strategies to advance social change? Then join Commongood Careers at the 9th Social Enterprise Summit, hosted by the Social Enterprise Alliance.

9th Social Enterprise Summit
Building Networks - Forming Partnerships - Accessing Capital
March 9-11, 2008
Boston Park Plaza

Through this conference, get connected to this exciting movement for social innovation through:

• Meeting successful social enterprise practitioners.
• Enjoying tours of local social enterprises in Boston.
• Discovering double-bottom line organizations in your community.
• Attending any of 50 informative sessions on social enterprise strategies.

Social enterprises can do more together than alone, and the Summit will be an opportunity to discuss ideas for advancing the field and creating a more conducive climate for social enterprise. Be there, and tell your friends and colleagues.

Learn more and register.

Will portfolio work turn epidemic? Probably not, although its incidence is growing, according to recruiters, career coaches, and others who follow trends in work culture. James Weinberg, a recruiter for nonprofits, sees an uptick in those willing to work this way - and those willing to hire them.

More job candidates are asking Weinberg for part-time work, saying, “ ‘I’m trying to knit together a career’, or ‘I’d like to have multiple roles that will allow me flexibility,’ “ observes Weinberg, chief executive of Commongood Careers in Boston. Sometimes, executives work on a shared basis for several groups, splitting their time between jobs, he says.

Read the full article.

There is an ongoing debate in the nonprofit sector on what makes an organization a social entrepreneur. Forces for Good, a recent voice on the subject, provides a fresh approach to this topic.

To make the distinction between social entrepreneurs and traditional nonprofits, authors Crutchfield and McLeod-Grant spent four years researching the management techniques of hundreds of nonprofits.  Their findings target the management techniques of twelve nonprofits that they conclude are examples of high-impact, socially entrepreneurial change agents.  In their analysis of these organizations, Crutchfield and McLeod-Grant posit that these groups do not measure success through revenue increases, brand recognition or organizational chart sophistication.  Instead these twelve social trailblazers measure success by the change they are affecting in the piece of the world that they are attempting to improve. 

While old-school nonprofit management looks to governance, organizational structure, fundraising and other internally facing strategies to build a strong organization, social entrepreneurs focus their energy externally through six creative techniques.  These techniques (such as one that advises nonprofit groups to cross sectors and include for-profit partners into the execution of the mission) challenge traditional nonprofits to rethink goals and strategies in the execution of their mission. By exposing limitations and even flaws in traditional thinking, Forces for Good identifies commonly held myths about nonprofit management that are indicative of an outdated system of thought.

The authors conclude that the twelve nonprofits in study focus on the end-goals of creating impact and improving society rather than focusing on building a secure, fiscally sound organization, as their traditional counterparts so often obsess.  The authors offer well researched and thought out examples of innovative approaches to management employed by these groups. The case for innovation and out-of-the-box thinking is also supported by the authors’ warning against reckless management based on wild idealism.  The success of the organizations featured in Forces for Good is instead a product of an unwavering management philosophy that postures mission above tradition.

BELL (Building Educated Leaders for Life)
Citizen Schools
Civic Builders
College Summit
DonorsChoose.org
New Leaders for New Schools
Points of Light Foundation & HandsOn Network
Reach Out and Read
Room to Read
Year Up

We are honored to help each of these organizations build stronger teams, scale operations, and ultimately create deeper impacts in the communities they serve.

Read the full list of winners.

From the article:

“...Commongood Careers, helps nonprofit organizations recruit, screen, and hire for jobs ranging from support staff to senior managers. It also provides career advice to job seekers, keeps a database of about 20,000 job candidates, and maintains online listings of job postings across the country.

Those services are filling a gap that has long hindered the nonprofit sector, which often struggles to fill vacant positions. Commongood specializes in working with rapidly expanding, high-impact, socially entrepreneurial organizations. And its low-cost, flat-fee search model is designed to make it affordable to even the smallest nonprofits, whether they need to fill a $20,000-a-year job or a six-figure executive position.”

Read the full article.

There are two irrefutable truths about nonprofit employment. First, it’s not the salary that attracts us to work in the nonprofit sector. Second, these wonderful nonprofit job opportunities often take us to cities that boast expensive living costs.  Being fully aware of this, every month Commongood Careers will pick a city in which one of our clients operates and we will hunt down the “nonprofit-salary-friendly” neighborhoods, restaurants, bars, grocery stores, cultural events and yes, even hair salons. These spots will be sure to keep you living the exciting urban lifestyle that your lawyer and banker friends enjoy while keeping your finances afloat. First stop, Boston … home of Commongood Careers!

Good Eating

A Russo and Sons – Located in Watertown, Russo’s is a grocery store that offers the selection of Whole Foods at a fraction of the price. Highlights include fresh produce, rare cheeses and a wide selection of gourmet groceries.

Volle Nolle – The historic North End in Boston is famed for its quality and quantity of Italian eateries that will fill your stomach while emptying your wallet. Volle Nolle breaks the mold by offering great pasta salads and delicious soups and panini sandwiches (try the Cubano). The quaint interior and low prices make Volle Nolle perfect for a quick lunch stop or a small dinner. 351 Hanover Street Boston, MA 02113

Good Culture

Institute of Contemporary Arts – Boston’s newest art museum by award winning architects Diller Scofidio + Renfro. Located on the waterfront, the design of the building rivals the artwork it houses. Enjoy the museum free of charge every Thursdays from 5pm-9pm. If you have kids under the age of 12, bring the whole family for free on the last Saturday of every month.

Museum of Fine Arts ­– With a permanent collection of over 1,400 European paintings and 1,900 pieces of decorative art and sculpture, the MFA, Boston never disappoints. Every Wednesday from 4pm-9:45pm, peruse the galleries and enjoy classics from Matisse, Monet, Renoir, van Gogh and Rembrandt at no cost.

Free Shakespeare on the Common – Summers in Boston are legendary for free outdoor events held in the Boston Commons and the Hatch Shell on the Esplanade. One highlight is the weeklong Shakespeare on the Common held in July. Free plays acted by professionals on a warm midsummer night prove that the Bard himself was right when he wrote that “all that glisters is not gold”.

Good Looking

Filene’s Basement – Though the famed Downtown Crossing shop is currently closed due to construction on the T that runs near it, Filene’s Basement, with stores on Boylston Street & in nearby Newton, MA still offers designer styles at Target prices. Though selection can be “hit or miss”, the “hits” make a visit worth its while. ()

Liquid Hair Studios – I’m no hair expert (my brother-in-law cuts mine in his basement), but Liquid is known for keeping other Bostonians looking sharp. Located on Tremont Street in the South End, this colorful and hip hair salon cuts costs as well as bangs. Though the décor is funky the stylists work to match your hair cut with your personality and lifestyle. With hair cuts and styles running from $25-60 you will have money left over to buy some shampoo.

Are you a Bostonian who thinks we may have missed some great-deal places? Please leave a comment on this blog and advertise your favorite places and events. Let the discussion begin!

(Please note: On our staff we have someone who scored a perfect 800 on the verbal SAT. Thus, we are well aware of the grammatically incorrect nature of slogans such as “livingood”. However we are also aware that sometimes cheesy catchiness beats proper grammar.)

In all organizations, diversity of experience and backgrounds has proven itself to be a vital success factor. This can be gained through many types of diversity, including racial and ethnic diversity. Diversifying a team’s membership increases the range of opinions, ideas and opportunities available in decision-making processes. This, in turn, will improve the quality of those decisions, the ease of new strategy implementation, and the organization’s effectiveness in meeting its goals.

Social and human service organizations have are particularly sensitive to ensuring ethnic and racial diversity because so many of these organizations serve a highly diverse constituency. In order to most effectively understand and respond to the needs of their clients and partners, social service organizations know that their staff should be reflective of the communities they serve. Some funding organizations have recognized the importance of these facts and have started to require staff diversity reporting among their grantees.

The social sector needs to continue to improve its workplace diversity, particularly at the senior management level. In order to achieve these goals, Commongood Careers makes several broad recommendations:

(1) Build a hiring pool of diverse talent through constant, year-round outreach to targeted communities and groups, instead of focusing on outreach only for open positions;

(2) Structure your searches so that you can allow a longer hiring window, possibly adding 2-3 months to a search, in order to ensure that every effort has been made to include diverse candidates in the final candidate pool, especially with senior level hires;

(3) Build an internal pipeline of diverse talent by hiring for diversity at lower organizational levels and then ensuring effective retention and career laddering to grow that talent into senior management roles.

Organizations that truly value diversity at all levels have proven to be the most successful at building workplace diversity. Making diversity an organizational priority in all areas, as opposed to focusing on diversity only in recruiting, will make your organization stronger on many levels and will enable you to attract and retain diverse candidates more effectively.

This is our second year supporting the conference and once again the conference organizers out did themselves—the event was a huge success. Serving as one of approximately 100 exhibitors, our team met and had wonderful conversations with women interested in fulfilling their personal and professional mission in the nonprofit sector.

Our team felt that the conference provided a fabulous opportunity for women to come together to hear from panelists expert from a wide swath of professions including financial planning, nonprofit management, marketing and communications. Commongood Careers’ very own Jana Reed spoke on the topic of “Leading Innovations to Advance Nonprofits”. Her remarks focused on talent and the need for talent in the nonprofit sector at all levels of the organizational chart. In reflection, we heard from many women that the day was inspirational and helped them to see the impact of their careers through a different lens.

Were you at the conference? If so, please share your thoughts on the day and comment on this blog! If you were there but missed Jana’s presentation, you can find related topics in our Knowledge Center. If you missed the conference this year, we hope to see you next year.

To address this challenge, Commongood Careers has a few suggestions:

1. Know the skill sets you seek. Create a list of common skills and competencies required for hires, both for specific roles and for all employees. If you build these profiles today, you’ll be better prepared when a position opens up in your organization.

2. Be able to connect quickly with candidates who possess those skills. Smart organizations are always “recruiting” to some extent; keep track of and keep in touch with any potential employees you may meet even if you’re not hiring for an open position today. Then, when it comes time to fill an open position, you’ll have a few leads in mind from the start.

3. Elevate talent acquisition planning to a strategic level. Your organization wouldn’t launch a new fiscal year without a budget, right? Planning for new hires is just as important. Build hiring plans, even if they are just forecasts or estimates, into your yearly planning process. A little work on an organization chart in advance will help to avoid hiring “fire drills” down the road.

Other suggestions for how nonprofits can best plan ahead for hiring? Let us know your thoughts by leaving a comment to this blog entry.

“A ‘Social Entrepreneur’ is one who pursues opportunities to create pattern-breaking social change without regard for the resources that she/he can currently control.”

She explained that where as traditional nonprofits had sought to meet community needs by institutionalizing support systems for those in need, social entrepreneurs generally endeavor to change the way the world itself works in an attempt to root out the primary causes of social ills. They will not rest until they have done this, and they will rarely stop to consider if they have the necessary funding, capacity, workforce or support to get something done. They just dive in and get to it.

“This month we attended 7 events starting first with the Social Venture Partners Conference in Seattle where we heard from Patty Stonesifer, Executive Director of the Gates Foundation and I sat in on a session on transitioning from the for profit to nonprofit sectors. From there back to Boston for two days in the office and then back to Seattle for the Action Without Borders, Idealist Career Fair. We connected with hundreds of jobseekers and presented two back-to-back Workshops on Finding a Great Job in the Nonprofit Sector. I left Seattle feeling exhilarated about the energy and interest from so many people with diverse experience and background—all interested in working in the social sector.

From Seattle I flew the red eye back to Boston to conduct two career advisories and then on to Los Angeles for the Independent Sector conference. The first day at the conference the Nonprofit Sector Workforce Committee met and our very own James Weinberg was nominated Vice Chair! The Committee focuses on three areas: general marketing of the sector; diversity in the sector; and student debt. The Independent Sector conference feels like old home week in that so many of our colleagues and partners in the sector come together to share ideas, best practices, and old fashioned conversation!

After Independent Sector, I joined my colleague Kasey in Portland, OR for the Action Without Borders Idealist Career Fair at Portland State University. Over 800 people attended the Career Fair, I presented one workshop on Careers in the Nonprofit Sector. The room was packed and people flowed to the hallway.

After the event, Kasey and I jumped on the red eye and flew to Boston. I spent a few hours at Logan and then on to Washington DC for the Academy of Women Symposium at the Women’s Military Memorial at Arlington Cemetery. Commongood Careers was invited to participate in the conference and we were excited to accept the invitation. I was humbled and awed by the sheer intelligence and commitment the women I met have for the country. Many of the women I met want when they leave service to continue to serve the country by working in the social sector. I know that Commongood Careers will be helpful to them as they chart their path. “

For several reasons, we believe nonprofits would actually benefit from stating “BA or Equivalent Experience Required” (instead of “BA Required, Masters Preferred”) in their job descriptions:

(1) It’s more legally compliant. Requiring a BA can be construed as discriminatory. Stating “BA or Equivalent Experience” in a job description helps an organization stay compliant with hiring laws.

(2) It nets candidates possessing a range of experiences, not just a specific educational background. This strongly supports our tried and true best practice of hiring based on core competencies—such as qualities and characteristics gained through experience of all kinds.

(3) It fosters a diverse workforce. To many, attending college is not a path taken, either by choice or by circumstance. For those not attending college right out of high school, they may be starting their professional career earlier than most, thus gaining more on-the-job training from an early age.

But what does “or equivalent experience” mean exactly and how can a hiring organization best measure this requirement, especially in comparison to an academic degree?

What’s important is that candidates being considered for an open position have the right competencies—skills, knowledge, technical abilities, and personality characteristics—to succeed at a job.

In some instances, a specific type of educational background is required. This is certainly true of practitioners in healthcare organizations, for example. We’ve also found this to be the case occasionally in the fields of finance and IT. Even in these cases, however, it is typically specific coursework or certifications that are required, not a degree.

We want to know what you think about this topic. What are the advantages and challenges of stating “BA or Equivalent Experience” in a job description? Share your thoughts by leaving a comment.

Some members of the Commongood Careers service team recently decided to take the plunge and go paperless. However, in addition to the immediate benefit of creating less waste and saving more trees, our team soon realized some genuine work efficiencies resulting from going green.

“Instead of spending my time sorting through piles of applications, I now do all of my screening electronically in our database,” says Kevin, a Commongood Careers Service Manager, “The result is less time spent shifting papers around, and more time spent getting to know candidates for our nonprofit searches.”

“Besides saving time, going paperless has created less clutter in our office,” added Allyson, another Service Manager, “We now are mindful of our paper consumption. Paper can be an unnecessary use of space.” (How Zen-like of Allyson.)

If you have other ideas for ways to green the workplace, please leave a comment below.

If you have other thoughts or opinions about the topics addressed in the survey—specifically the values, expectations, and competencies of socially-driven jobseekers—please join the conversation by leaving a comment to this blog entry.

Now it’s your chance to voice your opinions to a wider audience here on the Commongood Careers blog. What did you think of the survey? What issues did it raise for you? What other thoughts do you have about the values, competencies, and expectations of nonprofit jobseekers that you’d like to discuss further?

Leave a comment below and let the Commongood Careers community know!

Are you one of those people? Contact us and we may be able to help connect you with some local opportunities.

Also, we are curious, what are the factors that would pull you toward New Orleans right now and what are the concerns that would make you hesitate? What type of assurances and/or support would you need to consider relocating to New Orleans if the right opportunity was available? What other aspects of life in New Orleans could benefit from an entrepreneurial approach? What innovative models from other organizations or cities could help? Leave a comment and let us know.

We attended YNPN’s kickoff event at the Revolution Rock Bar. Most of the other attendees were there to meet other people who work in their fields or network for new job opportunities. There was a genuine feeling of comraderies, and many attendees commented to us that this was really a one-of-a-kind gathering in Boston.

We also met some professionals interested in making the leap to the nonprofit sector. They saw this opportunity as a great way to speak with nonprofit professionals in an informal and fun setting.

We look forward to participating in more YNPN events and wish them the best in building a great network of young nonprofit professionals in the Boston area.

Join the YNPN Boston listserv.

We also met many organizations concerned with the need to develop nonprofit talent in Texas. A representative from the San Antonio Nonprofit Council shared, “Talent is a real need for organizations. We wish there were more resources devoted to connecting professionals and organizations.”

BELL (Building Educated Leaders for Life)
Citizen Schools
Hands On Network
Jumpstart
Nonprofit Finance Fund
Teach for America
Year Up

A very special congratulations to these organizations! We at Commongood Careers are honored to be helping to hire talent and build the teams of these organizations.

We know first-hand the value of employee referrals. Out of all of the searches we’ve completed in the past year, nearly 50% of placements have come either from the Commongood Careers network or the network of the hiring organization. When we begin any search, we reach out to our professional and personal contacts to explore their interest in a given position or to find out if they know anyone who might be interested. Besides drumming up buzz about a specific position, this strategy also helps us stay in touch with our networks and develop a talent pipeline.

Hiring interns is another effective way for entrepreneurial organizations to build relationships with developing talent. When hiring interns, it’s critical to make sure there is a valuable role an intern can play in your organization. Remember, interns are typically looking for meaningful work experience and exposure to the mission-critical aspects of your organizations. A summer of taking lunch orders or shredding paper is not a meaningful internship. Interns are typically bright and ambitious; employ these talented resources wisely and you may be surprised at what they can accomplish.