Hildy Gottlieb Last month, Creating the Future passed a huge milestone – the one year anniversary of our first board meeting. You can see the minutes of that first meeting here (as well as all the minutes of all our meetings here) Like most people, our board members tend to focus on the long list of what … Read more
Third Sector New England – and its CEO Jonathan Spack – know a thing or two about change. In 1998, after almost 40 years in operation, what was then the Massachusetts Health Research Institute underwent a complete transformation to become Third Sector New England. More than just a name change, the organization went through a … Read more
Want to free up your board’s time to talk about making a difference in the community? The easiest way to do that is to use a Consent Agenda. A Consent Agenda is a tool that can eliminate as much as ½ hour or more of reviewing what has happened in the past – things the … Read more
Being in start-up mode can feel overwhelming. Most startups have lots of ideas but little cash, which means that hiring staff to do everything that needs to be done often feels impossible. No wonder founders express frustration and burnout! One thing we know about frustration and burnout, however, is that the answer is almost always … Read more
Note: There are no spoilers in this post. Because seriously, it’s an action movie! Watching The Avengers this weekend, it struck me – whether one is working with an internal team, a community coalition, or a board of directors, at some point we have all seen the likes of Iron Man, Captain America, Black Widow, … Read more
Even when the leadership of an organization has vowed to engage transparently in everything the organization does, occasionally circumstances will require that a discussion be held behind closed doors. Because Creating the Future is doing its best to engage openly in all its decisions and actions, this is a very real issue for us! At … Read more
In our April immersion course, consultant Anne MacKay posed this brilliant thought to the group. And I confess there has not been a day since Anne flew back to Canada over a week ago that I have not thought deeply about its implications. What if you don’t have to worry about being financially supported, because … Read more
As a start-up, we are doing so much all at once, that we just realized we never published our “WOW” list for last year! We hope this list inspires you to want to learn more about ALL our programs, and more importantly – to get involved! 2011 Program Successes 2011 was the first year that … Read more
(This is part 2 in the continuing story of Creating the Future’s Philanthropy R&D Lab. For Part 1, click on this link.) If you’ve been following our adventures at Creating the Future, you know that a big part of what makes this work effective is back-casting – reverse engineering the future we want for our … Read more
Reality check: No one cares about your organization. If that’s a bit of an overstatement, it’s not by much. Yes, if you are the founder of a social enterprise, you obviously care a lot about the organization. And if you’re the owner of a socially conscious business, or the CEO of a traditional nonprofit – … Read more