You know the right way to do things, so why can't you do it?

Big day of beating your head against the wall learning

Last week I spent a lovely day with my friends from CSPRC at the Spectrum conference. It was a fabulous day full of eager nonprofit communication types looking to better themselves, their skills and their organizations. I did a talk on how not to create boring web content. It was fab, of course, but I told my audience something that I totally believe to be true: you are smart and capable and you know darn well what it takes to make compelling web content. So why can't you do it?

The frustration of a conference like this comes from learning a bunch of new stuff, getting all fired up, bringing it to your organization and having it die right there. It is hard to upsell new ideas from within an organization. So I am telling these smart, wonderful folks what they already know. The problem is, they aren't the ones I should be talking to. It's the people NOT in the room who really matter. The exec directs and board members that shy away (or hide in fear) from ever doing anything too controversial interesting.

Truth is, I can teach you how to tell your story better, but if your organization fears change, it is never going to go anywhere. Again, we have the Biggest Loser theory of change. Change behavior to change thinking. And that usually doesn't work. Those new ideas (behaviors) mostly die right there in the front lobby of your office because your organization has the same way of thinking. 

What I want to teach you all is how to upsell a change in thinking. How to convince those in charge that being brave and courageous communicators will attract people to you, not drive them away. That's what we need. I know that my fine counterparts in nonprofits know they need to be interesting, compelling, strong in message, but man oh man how to you convince that buttoned up board that it is okay to do that?

Instead of teaching you how do do things differently, I am going to teach you how to think differently and in turn, how to teach your organization to think differently. This will lead you to put those new ideas in place. Without a shift in thinking, new ideas or ways of doing things are an exercise in frustration.