The Five Most Important Questions You Will Ever Ask About Your Organization

At a time when the need for more effective management and more ethical leadership are the moral equivalent of global warming, Drucker’s common sense and courage should be modeled by everyone who cares about doing things right and doing the right thing.”

Today, nonprofits understand that they need management all the more because they have no conventional bottom line.

This is not the kind of person who says, “There is a right way and a wrong way—and our way.” Rather, he or she asks, “What is the right way for the future?” and is ready to change. Finally, open discussion uncovers what the objections are. With genuine participation, a decision doesn’t need to be sold. Suggestions can be incorporated, objections addressed, and the decision itself becomes a commitment to action.12

Another reason to encourage dissent is that any organization needs its nonconformist.

out in the open

In essentials unity, in action freedom, and in all things trust. Trust requires that dissent come

the first-rate decision makers I’ve observed had a very simple rule: If you have quick consensus on an important matter, don’t make the decision. Acclamation means nobody has done the homework. The organization’s decisions are important and risky, and they should be controversial

Planning is not an event. It is the continuous process of strengthening what works and abandoning what does not, of making risk-taking decisions with the greatest knowledge of their potential effect, of setting objectives, appraising performance and results through systematic feedback, and making ongoing adjustments as conditions change.9

you have no results. And pretty soon you have no business. In a nonprofit organization, whether you call the customer a student, patient, member, participant, volunteer, donor, or anything else, the focus must be on what these individuals and groups value—on satisfying their needs, wants, and aspirations.7

The danger is in acting on what you believe satisfies the customer. You will inevitably make wrong assumptions. Leadership should not even try to guess at the answers; it should always go to customers in a systematic quest for those answers.