3 Leadership Lessons from a Recent Speaking Engagement
Helping nonprofit leaders understand new tools and approaches that can support their strategy, culture, and success never gets old for me.
Last week, I had the pleasure of speaking at the Sarkeys Foundation Southwest Leadership Forum in Oklahoma City.
In two hands-on sessions over two days, I had the opportunity to share with and learn from nonprofit leaders seeking easier, better, more effective ways of working. Some of my key takeaways from last week:
Keep Iterating & Refining
In my first session on Monday afternoon, a nonprofit executive asked me a great question that enabled me to add a slide - and a few talking points - in my Tuesday session to clarify the times in which one-page strategic planning is most helpful and how different sized organizations can use it in different ways. Presenting two days in a row gave me the opportunity for rapid iteration that led to greater clarity - something that might be harder to do in a single session speaking environment.
Prepare Your Environment to Support Your Success
While I’ve spoken at a number of digital events in recent years, this was only my second in-person speaking event with hearing aids. Dealing with microphones, in-room AV, and how best to manage audience questions or competing amplification from neighboring rooms all take some planning and practice, as well as good communication with the event team. Everything worked out great and the prep paid off.
Be Here For the Humans
At every event I speak at, the people are the very best part. My gratitude to Kim Henry, Natalie Carns and the whole Sarkeys team for inviting me to spend time with your amazing grantee organizations in Oklahoma. I had the chance to chat with so many wonderful nonprofit leaders as they were having aha! moments or were thinking through how they can best serve their communities and the people who power their organizations.
Huge thanks to Becky Endicott, CFRE and Jon McCoy, CFRE for your work to curate an amazing group of speakers in partnership with Sarkeys - but even moreso for your friendship and our great conversations while I was in OKC. Your joy, candor, generosity and humanity shine through in everything you do.
It was also amazing to be in community with so many friends I’ve met online over the past few years, fantastic speakers who I have been wanting to meet in person, and brilliant experts who were new to me and are now new friends.
Community is so critical in this work - because as cliche as it sounds, we truly are better together.
And when we share our knowledge, our tools, our lived experience to benefit others, we keep getting closer to the kind, just, accessible, free, compassionate world we’re all striving for.