Picks of the Week: March 7 - 13, 2010

Website of the Week -- ArtsLab

ArtsLab is an in-depth three year learning and technical assistance program offering a diverse set of activities designed to strengthen small arts organizations. The program brings together eight nonprofit arts groups in northern Minnesota and eight in urban Minneapolis/St. Paul to share ideas and study best practices. ArtsLab provides peer learning seminars or “Labs,” one-to-one consulting, distance learning and modest grants to support the work undertaken through ArtsLab. This unique capacity-building program focuses on four dimensions of capacity: Leadership Capacity, Adaptive Capacity, Management Capacity, and Operational Capacity. Go to: http://www.artslabonline.org/about.


Publication of the Week -- Leading Across Boundaries: Creating Collaborative Agencies in a Networked World, Updated and Expanded Edition by Russell M. Linden

From the publisher: In our complex environment, nonprofit organizations and public agencies must work together collaboratively and cut across organizational boundaries if they are to solve today's tough problems. Leading Across Boundaries offers a stimulating and highly accessible guide for leaders of nonprofit and governmental organizations who want to develop successful and lasting partnerships. Written by Russell Linden, an expert in the field of organizational change, this important resource shows how to make collaboration work in real-world situations. Linden explores the interpersonal and organizational forces that can inhibit collaboration and offers strategies for overcoming these often daunting challenges.
Created as a companion to Linden's Working Across Boundaries, this book is filled with illustrative examples of collaborations–both successful ventures and those that have failed. Leading Across Boundaries offers public managers and nonprofit leaders a wealth of new material, case studies, and instructive international examples. In-depth case studies–drawn from education, health and human services, law enforcement, finance, intelligence agencies, the arts, and other fields–are available online. Click to preview this book on Amazon.com.


Trend of the Week – 2009-2010 Fundraising Trends

Campbell & Company conducted a national survey of the preliminary 2009 fundraising results of nonprofit organizations, their comparisons with 2008 results and their plans for 2010. Key findings included:

• Over half of all organizations (51.7 percent) reported an increase in 2009 totals over 2008 compared to only 38.8 percent that noted a decrease and 9 percent reporting the same.
• Several respondents commented that foundation and corporate donations were lower and there were fewer individual donors, but with more gifts per donor and lower gift amounts. Others noted that specific donors “really stepped up and gave more knowing that some donors could not give as much in 2008 and into 2009” and that “the elephant hunt continues.” Some organizations also cited government contracts as a significant source of revenue increases.
• During the fourth quarter, nearly two-thirds (64.4 percent) of all respondents showed an increase in funds raised year over year, while only 25 percent decreased and about 10 percent stayed the same.
• Fourth quarter fundraising remains a key component in total annual fundraising results: over 40 percent of all respondents raised between 21 and 40 percent of 2009 totals during the fourth quarter, about 26 percent raised between 41 and 60 percent of their totals and 16 percent raised more than 60 percent of their total. Only 15 percent raised less than 20 percent of their total during the fourth quarter.

For more information, go to: http://www.campbellcompany.com.


Resource of the Week -- Nonprofit Management Education Database

Roseanne M. Mirabella, Ph.D of Seton Hall University has compiled what is no doubt the most complete listing of university based nonprofit management training and education programs – 299 programs to be exact. Results are available by state and much much more. Go to: http://academic.shu.edu/npo/list.php.


Tech Tip of the Week -- Copy Formatting in Word

A previously published tip Fast Formatting covered using format painter (the paintbrush icon) to copy the format of text. Since I am a fan of shortcut keys, and sometimes format painter seems a bit erratic when using it to repeatedly copy the same format, here's how to do the same thing using shortcut keys:

• Click on the text which you want to copy a format from
• Press Ctrl+Shift+C (copy format) to copy the text formatting of the area where the cursor is located
• Select the text you want to copy the format to and press Ctrl+Shift+V (paste format)

This method is even more flexible than using the paintbrush. You can paste the format as many times as you want, since the format copy is saved in a memory area like the clipboard, and still do other things in between copies. And it appears to work in all versions of Word.