Read Endeavour’s Letter to the Editor (re: “Using knowledge brokering to improve business processes,” McKinsey Quarterly, January 2010) and the authors’ reply to Endeavour at mckinseyquarterly.com or the McKinsey Quarterly Facebook fan page
Abstract
Knowledge retention and sharing can be a significant challenge for organizations in the non-profit sector. Due to variability in volunteer retention and the scarcity of resources for volunteer and business process development, the approach of seeking external ideas from people in a variety of industries, disciplines, and contexts (Davidson & Billington, 2010) can prove to be invaluable as well as prudent for non-profits.
A recent McKinsey article, “Using Knowledge Brokering to Improve Business Processes,”talks about how private sector companies are applying open-source thinking to improve a range of core business processes. This Conversation Starter article expands upon Endeavour’s letter to the editor on the McKinsey article to discuss how Endeavour has been using knowledge brokering within the broader organizational framework to improve consulting processes and outcomes. Has your non-profit organization been using knowledge brokering to improve its processes and impact? Do you have success stories and lessons in knowledge brokering to share?
Toronto, Ontario – Endeavour Volunteer Consulting for Non-Profits (Endeavour) announced today an equivalent of $600,000 in consulting grants to eight non-profit organizations in the Greater Toronto Area for its Spring/Summer 2010 projects. The grants enable non-profit organizations that otherwise cannot afford consulting to receive assistance to help them improve their performance and community impact.
Today’s announcement will bring the value of Endeavour’s management consulting services to $2,325,000 by October 2010, representing over 29,000 hours donated by Endeavour through 32 projects [Footnote]. Instead of receiving a monetary grant, each client is matched with a consulting team for a six-month engagement. The teams are comprised of professional and student volunteers representing diverse expertise and experiences.
Alex Gill, Endeavour board member who runs a non-profit consulting and charity management firm, Mendicant Group, and teaches non-profit management and corporate citizenship at Ryerson University, said, “The private sector uses professional consulting all the time to improve, focus and learn. Unfortunately, this is a resource that many non-profits cannot afford. That’s why I am proud to support and mentor teams from Endeavour. The organization provides enthusiastic, professional volunteers who can help non-profits address many of their consulting challenges, and that’s a situation where everyone wins.”
More non-profit organizations are using social media to reach their constituents and to achieve their goals. While Endeavour has been successful in raising awareness and support through social networking sites like Facebook and LinkedIn, our recent social media survey results indicate there are opportunities for improvement.
How do you think non-profits can better leverage social media to engage their communities and fulfill their mission? What social media tools and practices have you used? What other strategies have you seen being used successfully in the non-profit sector? Do you think Endeavour should start using Twitter?
Last month, we conducted an online survey to help us better understand how effective we have been in using social media to engage individuals in Endeavour’s network. The survey results, summarized below, are being used to guide us in improving our social media strategy to support the continued growth of Endeavour’s network and our work in supporting non-profits.
A total of 161 individuals responded to the survey. Of 150 respondents, most identified themselves as a potential volunteer (33%), a former or current volunteer (27%), or a potential non-profit client (16%).
Endeavour’s network frequently uses social media for professional purposes, primarily to expand their professional network (73%), to keep in touch with former colleagues or contacts (59%), and to share information, knowledge and opinions (42%). Nearly half use social media for professional purposes a few times per week.
A little more than half of survey respondents are aware of Endeavour’s Facebook group created in 2007, currently with 316 members. Of those, half are members, and about half of the members visited the group in the last three months. Staying up-to-date with Endeavour was the most common reason given for joining the Facebook group.
With my first project with Endeavour almost complete, I wanted to reflect a little on the accomplishments and lessons learned from my experience over the past several months.
As a novice with volunteering, I was very excited to join Endeavour last year, and that has not changed at all. More than ever I believe that this group serves an important role in helping the non-profit sector grow and operate in a very competitive market.
In terms of personal value, where do I start? I have been able to build upon so many useful skills, learn about the management consulting field, as well as the non-profit sector, and interact with many different people of varying backgrounds and interests. To list all the benefits I have gained through this experience would take more space than I have here. But here are a few…
Non-profit organizations provide much needed services and programs in social services, the environment, the arts, and so much more. Their work benefits everyone in our communities, and is only possible with the public’s support. Most of the money non-profits raise goes to program delivery, but some also must go towards administrative costs.
Should non-profits operating expenses be supported by a portion of our donations? How have your or your friends’ perspective on the issue of administrative costs changed over the years? Have you ever declined donating to an organization because of reported excessive administrative costs?
By Kelvin Lui
University of Toronto B.A.Sc. Engineering Science Student
Endeavour Consultant
My thoughts to those suffering in Haiti.
As we watch the aftermath of the destruction on TV, many of us have responded by donating to various charities.However, I saw something on CBC News a week ago which bothered me. A person being interviewed cautioned viewers to be careful when donating to charities.Based on her research, she felt that some charities/non-profitsincur high administrative costs.Her underlying logic was that a charity with high administrative cost is less worthy of public support.
I would like to provide a much-needed counterargument to this manner of thinking. It pains to use the Haitian disaster as a starting point, but when else does the subject of donating to a non-profit organization cross our minds on a daily basis?In my opinion, we should appreciate the fact that a portion of our donation is spent on administrative costs, whether it is for the Haiti disaster or for local charities, because these “costs” are what enable the non-profit organizations (NPOs) to deliver their services.
We should not base our donation decisions on the percentage of administrative costs an organization incurs, but rather on the magnitude of the positive impact that it achieves.By considering whether or not to donate to a NPO implies that we trust the service it provides.If this trust has been established, should we not also trust their management to best allocate our donations to maximize the impact of their services?
To understand “administrative costs”, we must first look at NPOs’ role in the bigger picture.
As an international MBA student and Endeavour volunteer, I was delighted to have the opportunity to co-lead Endeavour’s workshop at the 2009 GLOBE International Management Conference with fellow Endeavour executive, Wasib Muhammad.
The two-day GLOBE conference, hosted by and at York University’s Schulich School of Business on November 13 and 14, 2009, focused on the need to have an international perspective to succeed in today’s global business world. One hundred business students were selected from across Ontario to attend the conference, which offered delegates the opportunity to hear keynote speakers such as Francoise Faverjon-Fortin, VP of Export Development Canada, to understand Canada’s growing place on the international stage. Along with the international tone, the conference promoted the spirit of social change, with keynote speaker Marc Kielburger of Free the Children addressing the importance of making positive contributions to society.
In the spirit of social change, Endeavour was invited to lead a workshop offering students insight into how the practice of management consulting can be used to give back to the community; seventy delegates participated in Endeavour’s Case Simulation. To highlight the importance of having an international perspective in our consulting work, we featured an Endeavour project that required understanding of the client’s international market. Read the rest of this entry »
A few weeks back my consulting team had the opportunity to meet with our client for our mid-term presentation. She graciously opened her home to us for this meeting, the purpose of which was to ensure that our consulting engagement was on track with our original statement of work. So, on a brisk Sunday morning in early December, our team of six meandered from our corners of the GTA and convened with our client in her North Toronto home. Little did we know that what was to be a standard PowerPoint slideshow with discussion would turn into a most interesting adventure.
We began our presentation with freshly brewed coffee and steeped tea, and mid-way through the presentation we were treated to freshly baked banana bread. As we progressed through the slideshow and were entering into productive dialogue about the direction of the project, our engagement manager’s ears perked up, and with eerie intuition, proclaimed that there was a tow truck outside our client’s home, towing her vehicle. How she came to this conclusion given that we were all engrossed in the presentation, our client’s feedback, and of course, the fresh baked banana bread is unknown to us all. Now we were all concerned with the fate of our vehicles. We rushed outside to find a city tow truck setting up to tow her car straight to the pound. With some quick jockeying of the vehicles, we were spared the tow truck, but not the fine. While it seems an odd anecdote to share, given the complexities for consulting, it is a most poignant analogy for the challenges that management consulting presents. Read the rest of this entry »
Endeavour Announces Spring/Summer 2010 Volunteer Recruitment in Partnership with Careerify
December 28, 2009
Toronto, Ontario – Endeavour Volunteer Consulting for Non-Profits (Endeavour) today announced a volunteer recruitment partnership with Careerify, an online social networking website that allows users to search and apply for jobs, while also building their professional network. This partnership begins immediately with today’s launch of Endeavour’s Spring/Summer volunteer recruitment campaign.
Andrea Wong, President of Endeavour, said, “A number of Endeavour’s applicants are new graduates looking for a job or experienced professionals looking to change careers. By applying for Endeavour’s volunteer consulting opportunities through Careerify, they also have the opportunity to build their professional network and learn about jobs that might be a good fit. Our partnership with Careerify not only helps us connect with candidates, but also allows our candidates to connect with potential employers.”
Having received over 300 volunteer consulting applications for Endeavour since 2007, Diana Wong, Vice President of Volunteer & Client Relations at Endeavour, also welcomes the online recruitment solution. “This year we saw a huge increase in applications. We screened nearly 200 applications for only 60 volunteer positions in 2009. Careerify not only simplifies the recruitment process for Endeavour, but it also helps our organization gain exposure to a non-traditional audience through posting and referrals on a job website. This can lead to a more diverse pool of highly-qualified applicants for Endeavour,” said Diana Wong.
The title of a recent letter to the Toronto Star, “Business approach doesn’t fit”, caught my eye, and I was pleasantly surprised to learn that it was written by one of Endeavour’s board members and advisors, Alex Gill. Alex shares his concerns about “the troubling approach taken by Charity Intelligence toward identifying efficient charities” in response to the November 25, 2009 column by Carol Goar, “Holding charities to business standards”.
In her column, Goar tells readers that “just in time for Christmas giving”, Charity Intelligence has released its 2009 recommended list of charities that offer donors “the biggest bang for their buck”. We learn that twelve Toronto charities that made it onto the list are well known with influential corporate/institutional backers. These charities do excellent work and deserve recognition, but as Goar points out, “so do many small, grassroots voluntary organizations that will never win a Charity Intelligence seal of approval. They change lives in ways that can’t easily be measured. They know their clients personally and take the time to listen to them. They don’t aspire to be big, businesslike or competitive. Some charities deliver services efficiently. Others mobilize citizens, strengthen communities, combat indifference and solve problems in ways that defy market analysis.”
How to keep your head above a snowballing holiday schedule
It’s mid-December. Panic has sunk in. If you’re a student you might still be neck-deep in exam review material, wondering fuzzily if the half bag of candy canes behind your monitor counts as both your last and next meal. If you’ve joined the rat race you probably spend the A.M. commute wondering how to cram limitless tasks into a finite number of hours, the P.M. commute wondering what errands and chores you can postpone until the weekend, and your Monday lunch break wondering how you missed the festive season’s memo about your weekend being cancelled.
The yuletide time of wonder is upon us. Rejoice! And might I suggest — that we just pause for a moment and take stock(ings). Here are some tips that little elves would like to share.
By Wasib Muhammad
