October, 2006 -by Peter C. Brinckerhoff

This Month's topic: Advocacy

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Websites of the Month

Here are my recommendations for websites of interest on this month's topic: Advocacy

www.afj.org/nonprofit/	The Alliance for Justice's Nonprofit Advocacy Site. Good information.
www.fieldstonealliance.org/	Fieldstone Alliance's catalog of publications on lobbying, advocacy and social change. (Disclosure-Fieldstone publishes some of my books.)
www.clpi.org/	The Center for Lobbying in the Public Interest. Great stuff if you are doing or considerint lobbying.
www.ombwatch.org/npadv	OMB Watch's resources for nonprofit advocacy
www.learningtogive.org/papers/index.asp?bpid=40	A good paper on advocacy for nonprofits
www.independentsector.org/programs/	Independent Sector's resources for advocacy

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Organizational Advocacy
This is a topic that is near and dear to my heart. Organizations that are mission-based, and the people that work for them, should be passionate about their cause. That passion should carry over into at least some level of advocating: advocating for change, advocating for more education about the issue, or simply exhibiting the joy and passion you have for your cause.

There are, of course many levels of advocacy, and different people have different comfort levels about interacting with others on what my might be called the scale from conversation to education to outreach to convincing to prostletyzing. And that's OK. Individuals have to come to their own decisions about how they advocate: by example, by writing, in person, in you face, and everything in between.

The same is true for organizations. I suggest that your staff and board have discussions about what you feel you are doing to advocate for your cause, and how you may want to change/ramp up that advocacy issue.

Remember this: Advocacy should be about mission, but it sometimes can conflict with the wants of our funder. That having been said, good advocacy is often the enabler of new services/programs/income. You and your board need to balance the need to advocate with the provision of existing mission.

Here's a list to consider for advocacy:

1. Have half of your board be advocates for your mission --- people who passionately believe in the mission. These people will keep you honest to the first rule of nonprofits "Mission, Mission, Mission!" The other half of the board should be business people, who will keep you focused on the second rule of nonprofits: "No money, No mission!"

2. Consider more providing more community education on your issue. Whether it is formal classes, brown bag lunches, or changes on your website (see the Tech area), having more education available will increase the knowledge base of the community. Note: make sure to keep the information balanced...don't try to hide opposing views: people just have to use a search engine to find them, and you'll look like you are a censor.

3. Teach people how to advocate for themselves. For example, if your board has a policy against direct lobbying (or you've reached your IRS limit), having well educated voters who call/email/write their elected representatives (on their own) is a great thing. You can publish the names/addresses/emails of you elected representatives, and let people know where to register to vote.

4. Your organization can join selected advocacy organizations. This helps keep you in the information loop. Remember that simply joining certain organizations carries a message, so pick carefully.

5. Keep lines of communications open. If your organization is fair sized, consider hosting a discussion lunch two or three times a year for all the organizations in your community that deal with your mission issue.

6. Discuss your organizational position on certain issues with the staff and board. Make sure that staff understand their role in letting people know the organization's policies, and how to differentiate their position from the organization's (if there is a difference).

Many nonprofits staff and board feel that simply doing mission is advocacy enough, and that's fine. Other organizations will want to go further, speak louder, educate more, and push their issue in front of the community. The choice is yours, but it should be an active choice.

B

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If you found this hint helpful, there are lots more management, marketing, and technology ideas for you in the "Ideas" section at www.missionbased.com. Check them out--they're free.

And, remember to take a look at the Mission-Based Management Blog.

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My recommendations for texts on Advocacy are shown below.  The listing below has the best books (and really ALL the books) in this area.

The Fieldstone Alliance Publication Catalog on Advocacy, Lobbying, and Social Change

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How can Tech help with Advocacy
In addition to email communications, I think that there are three specific things you can do to better advocates through technology:

First, you can set up a part of your website for education. I like to call this "The Reading Room". It's a place where readers can download documents, policy papers, research, and see books on the topic at hand. A 30 minute search online (particularly through Google Scholar) can identify a number of these. If you list books, give people links to Amazon or Barnes and Noble so that they can look inside the book.

Remember to read the entire article before you post it, to assure it is not offensive or derogatory. And, as I said in the Management Tip, I favor providing information that shows a variety of sides of an issue.

Second, investigate the use of social networking sites (think MySpace) for putting together groups of people who are concerned with your issue. Listserves have pretty much been replaced my these sites for people under 30, and they are popping up in more and more specialized form, for business people, scientists, etc. If your organization can sponsor a group, you may well draw a younger set of supporters.

Third, consider an organizational blog. You'll need a good writer, who knows the issues well and is willing to blog at least 3-4 times a week to keep it current. You can let  your community know by newsletter or email that the blog is up, and then if the writing is good, the readers will increase steadily. Blogs can be used for observations and comment, for giving readers a headsup about an issue or new publication, and in general for keeping connected. You can have a blog for free, and there are a number of places online to start. Check out blogger.com
It's the tool I use, and I find it easy and flexible.

One more caution: whatever you put online is there forever. I always assume what I write in an email will be read aloud in front of 10,000 people the next day, and that what is on my webpages or blog will show up to haunt me in 5 years. So think before you post.

If you found this hint helpful, there are lots more management, marketing, and technology ideas for you in the "Ideas" section at www.missionbased.com. Check them out--they're free.

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Below you'll see the date, location, and topics of public training I'm scheduled to do in the next few months. For more information on a particular speaking engagement, get in touch with the contact person listed in the right hand column, or email me.

For more information on my availability throughout the next 12-18 months, available topics, sample agendas, and fees go to www.missionbased.com/training.htm

Date	City	Topic	Contact
10/05/06	New Paltz, NY	Nonprofit Stewardship	Council of Community Services of NY State Kelly Mathews kmathews@ccsnys.org
10/06/06	Quincy, IL	Mission-Based Management	United Way of Adams County Cheryl Waterman cheryl@unitedwayadamsco.org
10/11-12/06	Couer D'Alene, ID	Developing a Life Long Learning Organization	NISH NW Regional Meeting Susan Milstein smilstein@nish.org
11/01/06	Lake Tahoe	Trends in Nonprofits	IACCA Mary Quinn quinn.mk@gmail.com
11/03/06	Hilton Head, SC	Ethics in Nonprofits	NISH SE Regional Meeting Debbie Ignatz dignatz@nish.org
11-09-10/06	Portland OR	Intro to Marketing	NISH Deborah Atkinson Datkinson@nish.org
11/15/06	Bonita Springs, FL	Mission-Based Management	Community Foundation of Collier County Mary Ellen Barrett mbarrett@cfcollier.org
11/17/06	Altoona, PA	Mission-Based Management and Marketing	AFP of the Allegheny Mountains Joe Scialabba scialaj@dioceseaj.org
11/29/06	Hartford, CT	Nonprofit Stewardship	Connecticut Association of Nonprofits

If you found this hint helpful, there are lots more management, marketing, and technology ideas for you in the "Ideas" section at www.missionbased.com. Check them out--they're free.

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