Song lyrics (lesson in engagement)

I have heard the song “Even Flow“ from Peal Jam so many times. I sing along, I like it!

But it never connected emotionally until I was sitting in church listening to a message about "getting off your Donkey", where they incorporated the song.

The message at church was all about how to turn empathy into action through compassion tied to your Faith. We all know the story of the Good Samaritan. Jesus uses this story to illustrate the need for all of us to STOP and be the hero. There are moments in our lives where we have the opportunity to STOP and help, make an impact, change a life.

But how often do we let the moment pass because we are too busy? I was intrigued and spurred to thought by the message, I know there have been countless times my life, my busyness, made me miss an opportunity to be that HERO!

My thoughts drifted to my work at The Cara Program. I love working at a place making a real and lasting impact on homelessness and poverty. I feel like I am making a difference and giving back! Just as I was connecting emotionally and understanding intellectually to the church message, the band came out. They started playing "Even Flow" from Pearl Jam.

Suddenly it hit me, the song is about a homeless man. As the lyrics appeared on the screen, each one connected with me and dug deeper. The context provided by the church message, combined with the power of the song, really connected with me.

I didn't just hear the lyrics, I connected with them:

Freezin', rests his head on a pillow made of concrete, again

Oh, Feelin' maybe he'll see a little better, set a days, ooh yeah

Oh, hand out, faces that he sees time again ain't that familiar, oh yeah

Oh, dark grin, he can't help, when he's happy looks insane, oh yeah

Even flow, thoughts arrive like butterflies

Oh, he don't know, so he chases them away

Someday yet, he'll begin his life again

Life again, life again...

The song had real meaning, brought clear visuals and spurred new thoughts.

• How many times had I heard "Even Flow" and missed the message? 
• How many other songs have deep meanings drowned out by my humming along? 
• Even though I work at a nonprofit, do I miss opportunities to be a Hero? How many times do I walk by a student at Cara and not talk to them?

This led me to think about engagement overall.  I wonder how many of the powerful stories we share about our orgs, our impact, or our work get missed just like song lyrics.

• Do people listen, hum along and enjoy it, but miss the impact? 
•  Does the way we tell our stories cause people to just walk on by just like the first two people in the story of the Good Samaritan? 
• Do we provide enough context and framework before talking about our work? 
• Do we work to engage people in understanding why we do what we do before showing out impact?

So how do we shift our song lyrics from something we sing along with to something that connects and spurs to action?

Please no #twerking for my birthday. Rather #TwerkingWWJD.

Sure everyone is talking about Miley Cyrus and her VMA performance (if you call it a performance). But I just get flustered when I think about it.

Why do women have to behave like that and dress like that to be a star?

By giving Miley and others who came before her attention, what are we teaching our little girls?

If we only talk about female performers who misbehave, are we only encouraging our daughters, nieces, granddaughters or any other little girls to follow in their path?

A little background, my daughter loves Dance! But I must admit, I was hesitant to let her get involved in Dance. So many of the costumes girls are encouraged to wear are just inappropriate. period. I don't even want to talk about the makeup and dance moves.

So we were excited to find a Dance program for our daughter through our church which integrated Faith and Worship into the experience! Little did I know the dance program would become a separate nonprofit and my wife would end up being the Executive Director! But that is besides the point.

My daughter blossomed and loved dance, even though her first performance was more singing and clapping than real dancing. Dancing as a form of worship has been an enormous part of my daughter's life and it has impacted countless people. My daughter has been able to share her faith through her artistic talent, what a gift!

So when we attended our early competitions, my fears were realized. Girls across so many of the other dance teams were encouraged to wear the costumes, cake on the makeup and resort to dance moves to win while sacrificing harder choreography, complex dance moves and simple enjoyment of Dance. I was not comfortable at these competitions.

Now I see so much of our media and entertainment focused on shows stressing how little girls can only succeed in arts if they participate in this #Twerked up behavior. We have Dance Moms or Tiaras and Toddlers teaching parents all about how to win in arts competition and how to push their children. sad.

I am saddened to see all of this.

What would have happened if Miley and those that went before her had the chance to learn their art as art? Or if they did learn it as an art where did it go wrong? If they had included Faith and worship in their expression of art, who would they be today?

But at the sametime, I am encouraged by the set of parents involved with Leap Of Faith Arts Ministries where my daughter dances. These parents get it. They talk about values, modesty and encourage dance to be as worship! They see their kids enjoying the arts as it is meant to be, a way to express yourself.

The parents at Leap of Faith have supported the org as it worked to find a location, secure its 501c3 nonprofit status and now face a staff transition. It is so amazing to see these parents put their kids first and grab on to a mission.

Leap of Faith is more than a building, a staff person or an org, it is a statement to the world saying we believe there is more to Art than winning a competition or becoming famous. Our artistic talents are a gift from God and should be used to worship Him.

So for my birthday, I want the attention moved from #Twerking to #TwerkingWWJD. What What Jesus Do about Twerking?

To show your support, either share this post, leave a comment, create your own blog post or just tweet using #TwerkingWWJD in September (my birthday 9/9).

We would also appreciate any support for Leap Of Faith Arts Ministries, visit the website or donate now.

I will leave you with this video which wraps up my thoughts about Dance Momz. Enjoy at your own risk.

Go BIG or go home (is mission the price for BIG though?)

As a teen every summer I spent a week at a camp meant to build values and leadership. My first years we had about 60-75 people. You had the chance to meet everyone. It was a close knit group and there was no hiding. This small group of people changed my life. I fit in.

But leadership wanted bigger impact and more kids! They had big plans and the only way to get there was more money and more kids.

My first few years, we had to earn our way to camp. We had to complete volunteer hours, attend fundraisers and be active in our local club.  But since we earned our way there, it meant so much more. We felt a sense of ownership in making the camp the best possible experience.

To get the bigger numbers quicker, you no longer had to earn your way. The hope was to get kids there, then show them the way. But the kids were not invested, they were there to have fun.  Suddenly there were more problems, which led to more rules. This of course led to more kids trying to get around the rules. All sense of trust and responsibility was lost.

With the rapid growth also came crowd mentality over individual expression. With the increase in attendance came a shift of ownership, now the staff had to be in change, just to keep control. It was no longer our responsibility to have a good experience. The staff now had to entertain us and if isn't fun, the staff were blamed.

In my opinion, mission was the price we paid for growth.

I often wonder if this is a common challenge for nonprofit technology staff. 

Do we look to increase efficiency, build capacity, innovate, help staff, and expand our organization through technology without considering the impact on our mission?

As technology staff are we connected enough to the mission to know the impact of our projects and plans?

NPTech Career Thoughts

For my 15 year anniversary, I pictured some celebration, some recognition. I looked forward to a lifelong career with a big retirement celebration. I had seen so many of my mentors achieve this.

I grew up attached to a cause, an organization I loved. I believed in the mission (and still do, just not sure they do), I put my career in the hands of the org.  My career plans centered on how I could best serve the organization and the best role available for me to have the most impact.

Lesson learned the day I was laid off for a second time within days of a vacation and only weeks from my 15 year anniversary. And not just me, over the years it was other family members, friends and colleagues.

Here is the trap I see so many nonprofit staff end up in. We are part of a cause we are truly devoted to. We love our organization. We have a meaningful and real relationship with our co-workers. Saying we are like family is an understatement. So we do everything in our power to make an impact. We roll with the punches and our job morphs, shifts and changes. We adapt and do whatever is needed from us. But often it requires us to ignore our own career and only focus on our job.

When you are hired, there is often a fairly clear job description and set of expectations. But as time passes, you pick up additional work, your role blends with others, your duties may completely shift from where they started. You become a jack of all trades just to fill any holes in your org, you step up and make it happen! You are an integral part of the org and you have no idea what they would do without you.

But while you are becoming the jack of trades for your org, you may be losing your career path and your ability to get the next job.

The first time I was laid off, my job was unique, different and had a title which didn't represent what I did. So when I started to look for a new job, my resume was hard to follow and understand. I didn't have a clear brand for myself. My experience and job title meant very little to the hiring nonprofits. I had made myself valuable in my job, but not my career. I had not taken time to take care of myself. In the end, my work was only valuable to the org, it was not transferable.

So my job search was a long one. And each time I got close, it was always the same  thought, "we like you and have an awesome set of experiences, but it just doesn't fit our opening."

There seems to be a disconnect around expecting staff to fill needs in our org and mission as needed, while hiring with strict qualifications. We want existing staff to pitch in across the org or grow with the org. But then when we hire, we look to fill a position, we look for a set of defined experiences and skills to fill a specific purpose. 

So on one hand we push staff to work beyond their job description, but we only hire people with experience specific to a job description? So we often wouldn't hire the staff we have doing the job they have?

When I did get my next job, I was very deliberate about building a network, a personal brand and getting experience in a skill set which was transferable and valuable in the job market. Since I knew I couldn't trust the org to look out for me.

You might be thinking, Steve, you seem so bitter. But you couldn't be more wrong. I am so thankful for where I am and what I have experienced and learned. It is sort of like the country song, unanswered prayers.

 I could not be in a better place in my career! I love where I work, all of my past experience is proving valuable every minute of every day. I am diving in again, head first. I am more than uber excited to be a part of a cause I have a heart for, poverty and homelessness. I am immersing myself in my job and giving it everything I have. In less than a year on the job, I am more at home here than any job before it. I completely trust that the org is as interested in me and my career as they are interested in the mission and org.

But I think it is important for me to be open and honest about my nonprofit work experience. I have met numerous people entering the nonprofit career track and countless more who have been in nonprofits longer than me. But I cringe a little when I hear them talk about their job, I just wish they could see what I see now.

Don't let your job turn into a string of sacrifices and become so focused on daily needs causing you to ignore your own needs. This isn't good for you or your org, neither of you will be happy in the long run. 

So a word of advice, things happen, are you in a place to take care of your career when it does?

(behind the scenes - my faith and trust in God played a large role in this journey and my success, however, that is a post for another day. I know He had a hand in guiding me in this direction and getting me here.)

A 6 Year Technology Roadmap. Are you crazy?

As I approach 9 months at my new job, I am getting closer to completing a 6 year Tech Roadmap.

I have told a few of my IT colleagues and many of them say the same thing: Are you crazy? How can you plan 6 years into the future. Tech changes way to fast. Or I get the question about how do I have time to do that? Well. I make time, go back and see my post about urgency versus priority.

What is a Tech Roadmap? I don't even know if it is a real term. But here is what I mean. It is a summary of the overall direction and identifies what we will focus on.

I am not planning every IT project and every step for the next 6 years. I am just setting a direction for our course. If you only do planning once a year, you will end up making progress. But if you put together enough straight lines with small turns, you can still end up going in circles.

Things will change. I don't expect everything in my Tech Roadmap to go perfectly according to plan. Staff will leave, budgets will change, priorities will shift, etc., but you still need to know your long term direction.

Think of it like your career:

• You go to school, to get the right degree in anticipation of getting the "right" job. You talk to counselors and get expert advice. 
• You read up on the job market. So you make plans and set a direction. 
• You have a life plan! 
• Then college life happens as you try to live out this plan. You start to have life experiences, things happen. 
• But hey, you stick with that degree, cause it's still what you want.  
• Then you get the first job, which is where plans usually change. 
• Suddenly it isn't what you expected or you stop planning because you are too busy working

This is where I hope our Roadmap helps. The Roadmap will provide long term direction, while allowing for a typical annual Strategic Technology Plan. How do you know if your one year plan is the right one without seeing how it fits over the next few years? How do you know your large projects are in the right order? How do make the big decisions in technology?

Some examples of what is in my Tech Roadmap. 

• Move from a heavy internal network to hosted solutions where appropriate
• Move from data repositories to workflow management tools
• Move from scattered internal communication to centralized, easy to access intranet
• Move from a stable-secure network to a tested, documented, monitored network
• Move from limited tech policies to governance in data, process and tech planning

The tech team brainstormed these types of directions for all of the different areas of Tech we will focus on. Then we thought through some of the initial projects for the first 2-3 years. We also examined where we need to shift culture, influence staff, build competencies, etc.

Then we shared this with our CFO as an early draft, not a completed, format, finalized document. It was meant to spur conversation, which it did amazingly well. We had deep conversation and thought through impact. 

Why 6 years? Well it started as a 5 year plan, but one of our amazing Technology Advisory Board Members suggest we match our Roadmap to our Tech Replacement Cycle which is planned at 6 years for some of our network equipment.

Anyway, if you ever want to debate the value of my 6 year roadmap, I am open to it.

#14NTC is not a social media conference, bring back the TECH!

Let 2014 be the year Technology returns to the Nonprofit Technology Conference.

Social Media, Marketing, Fundraising and Communications are all important. But they get plenty of attention. 

For years I have done my best to stay out of the "vote for my session cuz it is the best and I am popular" tweets, posts and general campaigning for sessions. My sessions tended to make the cut because people found them valuable and voted on them without me hyping it up.

But this year is different. Here is some of the feedback that is listed on the NTEN website about what people are looking for:

More than 70% of 13NTC attendees surveyed identified as either managers or directors at nonprofits. More than 60% of that number also identified as intermediate or journey-level learners. When asked what kinds of content they're specifically looking for: 

• 53% indicated they'd like to see an emphasis on technical how-tos
• 50% indicated they'd like to see an emphasis on programmatic uses of technology
• 40% indicated they'd like to see an emphasis on management strategy

So here I am campaigning for sessions. Here are the ones I would recommend you take a few minutes to vote for. And if possible take time to go through the IT Track.

1. Requests for Proposals: Making RFPs work for Nonprofits and Vendors
2. An Introductory Session on CMS, CRM, and other Three Letter Acronyms
3. Tech Planning Smack Down! Tactical Vs. Strategic Vs. Missional
4. Data Governance - 10 Steps to Building Yours
5. Tech Tools for NPTechies
6. It's not the software, it's you. Process Mapping.
7. Cloud Migration and Integration Workshop
8. From talking about data to actually tracking your data: The right technology for Data-Informed Nonprofits
9. Playing it Safe: Keep your network secure with the 20 Security Controls
10. Manage Any Project Better

Please take a few minutes and vote for my Top Ten! Or suggest your tech session in the comments and I will check it out!

YMCA of Metro Chicago Facebook Resources and Case Study

This is a post I created back when I was at the YMCA of Metro Chicago, but thought I would re-share it here.

How do you get 50 authors prepared to manage 15 Facebook pages in less than 2 months with a team of 4 people? The YMCA of Metro Chicago faced just this challenge in the summer of 2010. There was a desire to get a presence established on Facebook in order to connect with our communities in new ways and do it quickly!

Our bigger challenge was managing the pages once they were launched. This case study will walk through the process we followed to get the pages launched and equipped the authors to manage them.

Below is a short summary or for a more visual representation view our YMCA of Metro Chicago Facebook Case Study Presentation.

YMCA of Metro Chicago Facebook Casestudy from Steve Heye

Our Challenge Our members and communities connect with their individual center and want information from them. But there are numerous obstacles in allowing our membership centers to take primary responsibility for their own pages:

• Membership center staff already fill numerous roles and have limited time to dedicate to new projects
• Experience with social media and online communities is limited in depth beyond personal experience
• Staff already struggle to get content created for our websites, newsletters and email communications
• Limited full-time staff at some centers and limited resources to pay part-time staff

Our Metro office had challenges of its own to overcome:

• Limited capacity to manage page for all centers, need to equip authors to create sustainability
• Brand management and YMCA information needed to be monitored and consistent across our channels
• How can we provide enough support to make sure the center pages are successful and what do we do if they aren’t
• Manage risk, possible negative interactions and uphold character values

Our Strategy The key to our success was the readiness of the authors, not the mechanics of the page. So with seven weeks to work with we decided the key was to establish staggered deadlines for the authors to meet and a focused one day boot camp.

Due with application	Due at Kickoff	Due before Boot Camp	Due before launch
Create Flickr acct Completed Application Create Facebook profile	Attend kickoff Communication samples 15 photos	Review Facebook privacy Write 2 status updates Marketing calendar	Fill in Facebook page October Mktg. calendar Document comment reply process Sign Author Ack.

While the authors were busy preparing their materials; Marketing and IT collaborated to get the Facebook pages configured and designed for all of the centers. Our approach was to get all of the pages setup identically to a point where they were ready to launch without involvement of the centers. We created guidelines of what could be edited and what should be left standard.

We wanted our centers to focus on the content, not the structure of the page. However we did give them the long term freedom to make changes once they were ready to support it themselves. This structured approach allowed us to gauge the readiness and commitment of each member center even before launch. It also helped set expectations for our Boot Camp.

Our Materials Once the authors were trained and the pages launched; the centers have primary responsibility for managing the page with limited support from Marketing and IT. So we needed to be very purposeful in providing them with the appropriate resources. We provided them with:

• Social Media Author Acknowledgement – In addition to getting their commitment to represent the YMCA appropriately, we provided clear expectations of the role
• Comment Escalation Resources – we shared the Air Force Blog Response Chart along with a Comment Escalation Flow Chart to clearly identify steps in replying
• Content Tips –Strategies for quality content and how to represent the brand
• Page Administration Guidelines – Parts of the pages that can be edited and disallowed Facebook Applications
• Marketing Calendar Template – Table structure to assist in thinking about how to post content across all communications and marketing
• Links to articles on privacy – Shared links on updating your personal Facebook profile privacy settings

Most of these resources are included in the Facebook Manual below:

YMCA of Metro Chicago Facebook Manual and Case Study from Steve Heye

Our Outcomes Aug 23, 2010 we launched our pages, before the end of the day we had our 25 fans to secure our vanity URLS and our authors were posting welcome messages. Over the next couple weeks our centers worked to promote the page to all of their staff to build up some initial fans. We placed the “find us on Facebook” button on all of our website homepages.

By the end of August 2010, we had over 1100 fans across the pages, 116 wall posts by authors, almost 1500 unique page views and some great early engagement. In October 2010 we began our mass promotion of the pages to our members through emails, newsletters, program brochures and more. As of Nov 2, 2010 we were up to 2,285 fans across 15 pages, with 2,618 unique views and 396 comments\likes on our content for October 2010.

Our authors have done a fantastic job moderating comments and posting content!