Sunday, January 15, 2006

Evergreen Leaders drill down 1

Hmmm. It's been three weeks since I did a post.

I've been thinking about using my blog to drill down deep to the core of Evergreen Leaders. In my December 13 entry I told the story of EGL board member Tutuk Horning holding up a flower at the November EGL board meeting and saying, "I do not know how to describe the form and function of Evergreen Leaders."

Evergreen Leaders has a mission, "To give ordinary people the tools to help their groups thrive." But that's too vague. It doesn't describe the form and the function. Ordinary people is a little too broad. There are a lot of ordinary people in the world. Groups is a little too broad. There are a lot of groups in this world.

So let's drill down and see if we can discover gold--the form and function of Evergreen Leaders.

Let's start drilling by looking at who we are helping--ordinary people. I'm thinking about the people who are the lowest on the rung in businesses and nonprofits.

That's too broad also. Let's talk about the people who are on the lowest rung in nonprofits that provide services to the elderly and people with developmental services.

That's too broad too because that means we are aiming at two fields--the industry that cares for people with developmental disabilities and the eldercare field. In business terms that two industries.

It's so hard for me to choose one of those fields. Since I have the most experience with field that provides services to people with developmental disabilities, it makes most sense that we focus there. Also, we have two board membes who work in that field.

For the time being, let's assume we are going to focus on nonprofits who provide services to adults with developmental disabilities.

The next question: What function will we provide to the developmental disabilities field? What do they need that we can provide?

Okay, let me do a first draft: Our function will be to provide educatioanl tools that will make it possible for front line managers and workers to thrive on the job.

Ok. That's enough for tonight. It's a start. Now I need to get people to make comments and help with this Evergreen Leaders drill down.

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