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Summer learning workshop-1
This document summarizes a workshop on using social media for nonprofits. The workshop covered how to build a social culture within an organization by being transparent and letting go of some control, and emphasized simplicity in social media strategies. It discussed establishing social media policies and operational guidelines. It also stressed leveraging existing networks rather than taking on all the work internally. Attendees reflected on applying the lessons to better communicate their missions externally in a networked way.
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Summer learning workshop-1
- 1. The Networked Nonprofit:Workshop 1Social Culture, Transparency, and SimplicityBeth Kanter, Visiting ScholarSocial Media and Nonprofits, David and Lucile Packard FoundationNovember, 2010 – Summer Learning
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- 5. What we’re goingto cover today …..10:00-10:30 Introductions, Icebreaker, Networked Nonprofit Overview10:30-11:00 Social Culture11:00-11:20 Simplicity11:20-11:30 Reflection and Book Raffle
- 6. Share PairsIntroduce yourselvesand your organizationsHow is your organization currently using social media?What is your organization’s worst social media challenge?What is your organization’s best social media accomplishment?Photo by Franie
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- 8. What is aNetworked Nonprofit?
- 9. Why become aNetworked Nonprofit?
- 10. Complex social problemsthat outpace the capacity of any individual organizationPhoto by uncultured
- 11. In a networkedworld, nonprofits need to work less like thisSource: David Armano The Micro-Sociology of Networks
- 12. And more likethis ….With apologies to David Armano for hacking his visual! Source: The Micro-Sociology of Networks
- 13. Social Culture: Not Afraid of Letting Go Control
- 14. Social Culture: EveryoneUses Social Media To Spread Mission
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- 16. What resonated? Whathave you thought about before?
- 17. Let’s explore twothemes …. Social Culture
- 18. SimplicityTheme1: Social Culture
- 19. Loss of controlover their branding and marketing messagesDealing with negative commentsAddressing personality versus organizational voice (trusting employees)Make mistakesMake senior staff too accessiblePerception of wasted of time and resources Suffering from information overload already, this will cause more
- 20. The Black SmokeMonster on LOST
- 22. Share Pair: What are the conversation starters your organizations needs to have?
- 23. Leaders understand thepower behind the tools ….Video
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- 29. Is there amarketing or communications tactic that your organization is using and needs a joyful funeral?What would you say before you bury the body?
- 30. Do experiments tosee what works
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- 37. Steve Norris, ex-ToryMayoral contender, says: “I think the National Theatre should have a Compulsory Demolition Order!”
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- 42. Two guiding principlesin social media are to Be Human and Be Honest. Had the National Theatre adopted either policy, they might have done themselves a service.
- 43. How does yourorganization deal with mistakes? Share an example of a mistake that ended up being a valuable organizational learning experience?
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- 46. Are you aFortress or a Sponge?
- 47. Do we haveto share everything?Flickr by uncorneredmarket
- 48. What if thedefault was everything organization did was open, what would keep private?
- 49. Your organization hasa social culture if ….Treats skepticism as a conversation starter, not stopperLeaders understand the power behind the toolsLeaders are open to reverse mentoring if neededDescribe resultsTry it and fix it approach vs blame gameValue learningTransparent work style
- 50. Reflection:How social isyour organization’s culture?NOT AT ALLVERYSomewhere in between? Flickr photos by heydee and intherough
- 51. Codifying A SocialCulture: Policy Encouragement and support
- 52. Why policyis needed
- 53. Cases whenit will be used, distributed
- 54. Oversight, notifications,and legal implications
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- 56. Identity andtransparency
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- 59. Judgment andcommon sense
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- 69. Policy examplesavailable at wiki.altimetergroup.comSource: Charlene Li, Altimeter Group
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- 73. Testing the policies: Refining, Educating
- 74. Operational guidelines needto be specific and include examples
- 75. You want meto start Tweeting too? Simplicity: From scarcity to abundance …
- 76. Simplicity: Focus onwhat they do best, network the rest
- 77. Simplicity: Leverageyour networks …Flickr photo by vmaiden
Editor's Notes
- #2 http://www.flickr.com/photos/bike/190157514/sizes/l/in/photostream/
- #3 I wear many hats these days. I’m the CEO of Zoetica, write Beth’s Blog, and Visiting Scholar for Nonprofits and Social Media at the Packard Foundation
- #7 http://www.flickr.com/photos/franie/471300085/What do you want to learn today about social media strategy?What’s your burning question?What’s one thing you know about social media that you can share with others today?
- #8 I’ll be talking about a couple of themes from my book, The Networked Nonprofit.
- #9 It isn’t a nonprofit with an Internet Connection and a Facebook Profile …Networked Nonprofits are simple and transparent organizations. They are easy for outsiders to get in and insiders to get out. They engage people to shape and share their work in order to raise awareness of social issues, organize communities to provide services or advocate for legislation. In the long run, they are helping to make the world a safer, fairer, healthier place to live.Networked Nonprofits don’t work harder or longer than other organizations, they work differently. They engage in conversations with people beyond their walls -- lots of conversations -- to build relationships that spread their work through the network. Incorporating relationship building as a core responsibility of all staffers fundamentally changes their to-do lists. Working this way is only possible because of the advent of social media. All Networked Nonprofits are comfortable using the new social media toolset -- digital tools such as email, blogs, and Facebook that encourage two-way conversations between people, and between people and organizations, to enlarge their efforts quickly, easily and inexpensively.
- #10 http://www.flickr.com/photos/nicmcphee/422442291/Problem statement: Explosion in size of nonprofit sector over last twenty years, huge increase in donations and number of foundations, and yet needle hasn’t moved on any serious social issue. A sector that has focused on growing individual institutions ever larger has failed to address complex social problems that outpace the capacity of any individual org. or institution to solve them. Our interest and passion is in solving these problems.
- #11 Problem statement: Explosion in size of nonprofit sector over last twenty years, huge increase in donations and number of foundations, and yet needle hasn’t moved on any serious social issue. A sector that has focused on growing individual institutions ever larger has failed to address complex social problems that outpace the capacity of any individual org. or institution to solve them. That’s why feel strongly that nonprofits need to work more like networks.http://www.flickr.com/photos/sorby/258577150/http://www.flickr.com/photos/uncultured/1815645413/
- #13 Solution: Networks of individuals and institutions that reduces the burden on everyone, leverages the capacity, creativity, energy and resources of everyone to share solutions, solve problems. This changes the definition of scale for social change – was institutions now networks. The transition from working like this to this – doesn’t happen over night, can’t flip a switch
- #15 Pratham Books – mission to get high quality children’s books to rural villages in IndiaEveryone in their organization is using social media to spread missionA few months ago, they blogged about a newspaper article about a group of young people in Kolkata who collected books for kids in a rural village.A board member offered to donate money to cover cost of books for the kids to make a second trip.They contacted the newspaper to get the kids names/cell phone numbers, but no luckTheir entire board is using Twitter – as well as the staff – so they started tweeting they were looking for the cell phone numbers of these kids.Within a half hour the message was Tweeted and retweeted, and within a day they got the cell phone number and within the weeks the kids did a second run with the books in their BoiGari – Book Van ….
- #16 In our book, we interviewed traditional institutions in the process of transformation – like Red Cross, Humane Society.The transition of how a nonprofit goes from institution to looking like and working more like a network is what our book is aboutThe transition isn’t an easy, flip a switch – and it happens – it takes time I want to quickly share a couple of themes …
- #17 I’ll be talking about a couple of themes from my book, The Networked Nonprofit.
- #18 http://www.flickr.com/photos/45825575@N03/4289957595/Kate Scadding
- #20 http://www.flickr.com/photos/24443965@N08/3639694353/
- #21 So what happens is that we treat this skepticism like the black smoke monster on LOST – we’re afraid to have those difficult conversations that gets us to a social culture.
- #22 How many LOST Fans? Pick your boggyman – the blob, the attack of the killer tomatoes
- #25 Andy Bales Union Rescue Mission
- #26 There is also a need to describe your social media strategy in terms of the value – how it will help you reach your goals. Many leaders are “yellow thinkers” – that is they need to see the results laid out in advance before they will say.Pre-school California – there is also a conversation about value – and that happens by connecting social media strategy to communications objectives.
- #27 Rewards learning and reflectionTry it and fix it approach – fail fastAppreciates individuality and that does not indicate a lack of professionalism or caringTrusts staff to make decisions and respond rapidlyIt is more important to try something new, and work on the problems as they arise, than to figure out a way to do something new without having any problems.”
- #28 Rewards learning and reflectionTry it and fix it approach – fail fastAppreciates individuality and that does not indicate a lack of professionalism or caringTrusts staff to make decisions and respond rapidlyhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Vo4M4u5Boc
- #31 http://www.flickr.com/photos/wwworks/3058182308/Social media is transforming how nonprofits do their work and relate to external audiences. Strategic use of social media allows organizations to reach new people and bring added value to social change-driven work. A social media strategy is a powerful way to spread your advocacy messages, attract new members and donors, and increase awareness of your brand throughout the community. But how do you get started?A best practice is thoughtful experimentation…. but what fun is that to do it alone? Remember those hands-on science experiments in elementary school? Well, that’s what we’re going to be doing together – hands-on experiments, low-risk, high learning. This is an intimate, laboratory for a maximum of 12 like-minded, children-focused organizations in California.
- #38 Steve Norris, ex-Tory Mayoral contender and adviser to Boris Johnson, says: “Not only do I not want the Southbank Centre to be listed — I think the National Theatre should have a Compulsory Demolition Order!” The Londoner, however, has a soft spot for Sir Denys Lasdun’s National. So there.
- #45 http://www.flickr.com/photos/stuckincustoms/444790702/Fortresses work hard to keep their communities and constituents at a distance, pushing out messages and dictating strategy rather than listening or building relationships. Fortress organizations are losing ground today because they spend an extraordinary amount of energy fearing what might happen if they open themselves up to the world. These organizations are floundering in this set-me-free world powered by social media and free agents.This trajectory changes when organizations learn to use social media and actually become their own social networks.
- #46 The opposite of Fortresses, Transparents can be considered as glass houses, with the organizations presumably sitting behind glass walls. However, this isn’t really transparency because a wall still exists. True transparency happens when the walls are taken down, when the distinction between inside and outside becomes blurred, and when people are let in and staffers are let out.University of California Museum of Paleontology, “Introduction to Porifera,” http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/porifera/porifera.html (accessed on May 21, 2009). Opening the Kimono in Beth’s Blog: A Day in the Life of Nonprofit Social Media Strategists and Transparency,” Beth’s Blog, posted August 3, 2009, http://beth.typepad.com/beths_blog/2009/08/opening-the-kimino-week-on-beths-blog-a-day-in-the-life-of-nonprofit-social-media-strategists-and-tr.html (accessed September 30, 2009).
- #47 How many are more like fortresses?
- #48 http://www.flickr.com/photos/uncorneredmarket/370672187/“You cannot be fully transparent all the time because you need to give people a safe place to have the discussion without disrespecting others.”Not black and white – line the Esther Dyson Story at Transparency CampWhat is TransparencyTransparency isn’t black and white. It is very tempting to grade organizations as either transparent or not. However, transparency isn’t quite that simple, it is a sliding scale of openness that changes upon the circumstances and needs of an organization and its network. Organizations certainly need to be open to people on the outside, easy to enter, understand, and navigate. However, this does not mean that every conversation, every piece of paper, every decision, needs to be open to everybody. “You cannot be fully transparent all the time because you need to give people a safe place to have the discussion without disrespecting others.”This black and white notion scares a lot of organizations. Their is definitely a need for a safe place for private conversations – but I our default impulse is to do things in screen – is to build a Robert Frost mending wall. I wonder what it would be like if the default was – everything is open and you had to decide what should be closed?
- #51 http://www.flickr.com/photos/heydee/240653254/http://www.flickr.com/photos/intherough/3781583774/in/photostream/
- #53 They also know that in order to have more impact, they need to scale. They wanted to go beyond having social media be a silo in the communications department, and through the Target experience they realized the value of employee use of social networks/social media. They worked on a social media policy, guidelines and an operational manual so that anyone working in affiliates as well as national could be ambassador on social networks. The guidelines also extend to volunteers. The overall policy is encouraging, not controlling. The operational handbook gives them specific steps, examples, and tips for being effective.
- #56 Testing of the policy – and there may be things that you didn’t think
- #59 Focus on what you do best, network the rest
- #60 http://www.flickr.com/photos/vmaidens/4634423822/sizes/l/in/photostream/
- #61 Amy Boroff (@njdevmgr), development manager for Junior Achievement of NJ in Princeton [emphasis added], discovered one of her new Twitter followers was Kate Specchio (@ecsfoundation), co-founder of Morris County-based The Emily C. Specchio Foundation. Through their tweets, Amy recognized the potential for working together. They continued to communicate on Twitter in real-time, after working hours, to learn more about each respective organization. After several weeks, JANJ submitted a proposal to ECS for funding for an inaugural event: the Women's Future Leadership Forum. The ECS Foundation accepted the proposal and granted funds to help support aspiring female high school students become future leaders.
- #69 http://disruptology.com/10-social-media-tasks-for-summer-interns/
- #71 http://www.flickr.com/photos/notanartist/263545370/sizes/l/
- #73 http://socialmediatoday.com/content/6-ways-waste-your-time-social-medhttp://www.flickr.com/photos/inel/4160678255/ia?utm_source=smt_newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_caSocial Media Marketing is a helpful tool, but you have to be careful not to waste time on unnecessary and even harmful actions in your quest to make the most of this new tool. Here are six big time-wasters to be aware of:Subscribing to too many Blogs. I highly recommend that you subscribe to relevant blogs for your industry, but be picky, be realistic, and set an egg timer. The point is that you cannot be everywhere, you just can't. So choose your feeds wisely. Following blogs won't do you any good if you don't have time to read, understand, and respond when necessary. You may want to respond by sharing with others, you might join the conversation, you might need to adjust something you are doing based on this new information. So don't over do it, because if you read ALL the relevant blogs there will be no time to respond accordingly.Reading every Tweet, Facebook post, or Status Update. This is similar to subscribing to too many blogs. You want to follow them because they have good stuff to say, but once you begin to follow a big crowd you can't catch every little thing. So don't feel guilty if you miss some posts. I highly recommend making Favorites Lists (“Groups” in Facebook) so that you can make sure to catch everything that the most relevant people have to say. **Disclaimer: if you have time to read a ton, read as much as you realistically have time for. I think listening (reading) is one of the most important parts of social media marketing, but don't kill your productivity by reading all day long.Getting involved in too many different social media sites. Keep it to the sites that are most relevant to your immediate fan base. We use Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, LinkedIn, Blogs, & a few Forums. We post to a few main forums that speak to our industry. We comment on blog articles that are relevant and we can add some value to. We write our own blog, and we are maintaining our Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and YouTube profiles. There certainly are more options for us, but this is where we find our specific community interacts. Your industry may have a ton of forums but not a lot of bloggers. It is certainly industry specific. Don't be afraid to ask customers where they “hang-out”, and don't be afraid to try something, give it the appropriate time to see if it works, and then make your exit if you find it does not work for your needs.mpaign=newsletterChecking your social media too often. Block out specific times of day where you spend 30 minutes or an hour, reading and replying on your social media pages. Don't let the urge to hop over and check it every hour pull you under. Then the day is over and all you have to show for it is your social media posts and by then you are running out of good original work and content to talk about anyway.Following or Friending people who are not a part of your community. Do you automatically let anyone who asks you to be a friend, be a friend? Do you automatically follow any Twitter follower that follows you? This can be a humongous waste of time. Again, you have to be choosy. Don't let anyone who is not relevant to your business take any of your time or energy. There are many types of relevant people in this world; mentors, prospects, clients, industry experts, P.R. connections, local connections, you will have to make the final decision. The important thing here is to not let a bunch of spamming, get rich quick, time wasters get mixed into your community.Posting repeat messages or setting up automated messages. I know this sounds ridiculous that these two things actually waste your time, but let me explain. If you set up automated status updates through ping or an rss feed you are wasting your time and everyone else's. No one wants to read automatic status updates. Everyone knows they are automated, especially if they are following several industry giants and see the same thing posted, verbatim, over and over. Those messages are not personal and will send your followers straight to their Unfollow buttons.I have seen many companies on many occasions who have a slogan or an elevator pitch or a special claim to fame, use that message non-stop on their social media feeds. I have even witnessed updates like these containing the exact same typo they had in the previous version of it. I have also seen this status update posted multiple times in the same day! Talk about exasperating. Can you imagine in your twitter feed, over and over again all day “companyxyz: We're the home of the Award Winning Acme XYZ Thing-a-ma-jig!” Literally copied & pasted all day long? Not so good. #UnfollowHow do you keep from wasting valuable time while tackling your Social Media Marketing?
- #77 I’ll be talking about a couple of themes from my book, The Networked Nonprofit.
- #78 I wear many hats these days. I’m the CEO of Zoetica, write Beth’s Blog, and Visiting Scholar for Nonprofits and Social Media at the Packard Foundation