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Quitters Sometimes Win

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I quit.

At this time in 2012, I had had it with my job. I’d been the Director of Planning at an anti-poverty agency in Somerville, Massachusetts for nine years.

In that time, the job had changed. It had started out as writing–in grant proposals, newsletters, and direct mail appeals–about the difference the agency made. It ended up being collecting and reporting data to help state and federal agency try to keep our whole program from losing its funds.

That was not the job for me, and it never would be. So, I stayed long enough to put out some fires, to document what I did, and to work through Christmas week so the people who actually celebrated the holiday could get some time off. Then, I quit.

The Dip, by Seth GodinYou would think I’d love Seth Godin’s book The Dip: A Little Book that Teaches You When to Quit (and When to Stick).  I thought so too. But I was wrong.

Out of a 75-page book, here’s what Godin said that I found worthwhile:

  • “Never quit something with great long-term potential just because you can’t deal with the stress of the moment.”
  • “Quitting [when you’re at a dead end] is better than coping because it frees you up to excel at something else.”

That’s what I did when I left my job. I could never be great at data collection and reporting. I can be great at communications (and teaching you how to communicate better). So, I quit…and I’m becoming great at what I do.

But the title of the book is a lie. It doesn’t teach you when to quit and when to stick. It just says that if you can’t be “the best in the world” at what you do, then do something else.

What’s wrong with that?

  1. There’s no reliable way to know if you are in “the dip” before your sales (or other numbers that measure success) start to rise, or if you’re in a cul-de-sac. You can make your best guess. But you will never know if you would have succeeded by hanging on longer, or if you would have succeeded by quitting earlier. You have nothing to compare it to. You only live once.
  2. Godin says the only way to succeed is to be “the best in the world” at what you do. He qualifies that by saying it’s subjective–but even so, he’s wrong. Plenty of small businesses do well by being great at what they do and accepting their market share. Enough is as good as a feast.
  3. Success and sales are not the same thing. Even if you’re in business, don’t you hold something more dear than your numbers? (If not, I don’t want to be married to you!)

In the nonprofit world, it’s even more clear. You don’t quit on your clients. Being great at finding people housing but ignoring the fact that they don’t have the income to pay for it is not strategic: it is ineffective and immoral, both. You have to help them find the income (even if it’s not your organizational strength) or get a partner who will do so, You can’t just walk away.

I tried to find a way to like this book more than I do, because I have enjoyed so many of Seth Godin’s blog entries.  Ultimately, though, I quit.

 

The Nonprofit Marketing Guide, by Kivi Leroux Miller: a review

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Kivi Leroux Miller feels your pain.  And she wants to help.

Kivi Leroux Miller

Kivi Leroux Miller

You work at a nonprofit organization.  Either it’s too small to have a communications department or nobody has recognized the need to market what you do until now.  You’ve recognized the need, but you feel daunted.  There are so many things you could do…and the so-called experts want you to do all of them yesterday!

Where do you get started?  How much can you do?  What will work best for your group and its cause? You don’t need theory or grandiose notions.  You need a friend who’s been there and can guide you through the process. Kivi wants to be that friend.

Throughout this book, you will hear great advice that you can put to use right away.  If you love the idea of a “quick and dirty marketing plan,” this is the book for you.

Be warned, though: “quick” is a relative term.  There are no magic wands to wave and no lamps to rub to get a genie to do the work for you.  This book will give you a good sense of what you need to do to be ready to plan and of all the resources–mostly time–that you’ll need to turn that plan into reality.  Knowing all that ahead of time will reassure you.  You’ll be able to see the road ahead.

As you go on reading the book, I predict that you’ll stop feeling daunted and start feeling excited.  You’ll see that (in Miller’s words), you can do it yourself without doing yourself in.  The later chapters of the book offer excellent advice on how to organize your efforts, how to take advantage of outside help when you need it, and “where to spend your limited dollars and where to scrimp.”

In other words, all the things you’d ask a trusted, wise advisor if you could sit down with her over lunch?  They are either in this book or on her blog.  Spend some time with each.  Then get started.

Social Media For Social Good, by Heather Mansfield: a review.

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You work at a nonprofit organization. Perhaps you even lead the organization. Your group has a website, an email list, maybe even a Facebook page (because everybody tells you that you have to have one). In the back of your mind, though, you have the nagging feeling that other groups are doing more, or better, with social media. You wish you had a tech-savvy friend who really gets it about nonprofits who would sit down and explain to you what the heck is going on.

Heather Mansfield is your new best friend. In Social Media for Social Good, she lays out what you’re likely doing now (and how you can do it better), what else you can do now, and what you may want to be doing soon. (Just to show you how friendly she can be, in May 2013 Heather published 33 Must-Read Updates to the book. I wish more how-to authors would do the same!)

What you’re probably doing already is what the author calls Web 1.0. You took written materials and photos you had on the shelf, posted them on the web, and left them there for people to find (the “static web”). Maybe you even got around to updating them on a semi-regular basis and supplemented them with an e-newsletter (the “broadcast web” described in the 33 Updates). Web 1.0 is still crucial. If you do nothing else, follow Heather’s suggestions on how to improve them. (You will find examples and checklists at the end of each chapter to make it easier to put her suggestions into practice.)

We are already well into the age of Web 2.0, the social web. Read the middle section of this book to figure out how to be social online: it is a new skill set for most nonprofits and it can be learned. Read this section also to learn what you could do for your mission with Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and photo and video sites like Instagram and Youtube. Are you blogging? Blogs are the quiet powerhouses of social media. I strongly recommend you read that chapter.

Since this book came out in 2011, the world has moved quickly on to Web 3.0, the mobile web. Today, over 40% of the people who view your website or read your email do so on a mobile phone or a tablet like the iPad. You have to make your organization accessible and attractive to them, or else you’re losing a lot of the benefits of being on the web in the first place. Read this section for tips on how to get those people checking their mobile phones on the subway to check in on you.

Your tech-savvy friend might also be so enthusiastic, she tells you more than you want to know. Heather does that sometimes. This book also has some of the “you must” intensity that true enthusiasts bring to their subject. If you’re a cynical reader, you might wonder if, in this book (and even more in the 33 Updates, and in the highly informative webinars that Heather offers), she’s not proselytizing for more jobs for people like her.

I read the book in a different light. Heather Mansfield strongly believes in your organization…AND in the power of social media to help you change the world. It truly pains her that you’re not taking advantage of the tools that are out there. She also points out that early adopters of new media learn how to use them best, and they’re best positioned to learn the next wrinkle when it comes along. That makes sense, but not every organization has the capacity of CARE, or Partners in Health, or NPR. You have to figure out what your organization can do. So, accept her help, and use your own judgment. But stretch yourself a little. If there’s one takeaway message from this book, it’s that social media will create new possibilities faster than we think, and we need to be ready to take advantage of them.

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