Last week in Costa Rica, my surfing instructor shared some of the best life - and leadership - wisdom I've heard in a long time.

Walter's teaching style was a great fit for me.

Before we got in the water, he demonstrated how to carry the board, choose a wave, prepare to catch it, and the mechanics of popping up to standing.

Then, we went out into the water, and he had me practice - quizzing me along the way.

This week, my sister and I are on a “sister vacation” that we’ve been planning since July.

Getting here was its own adventure, with several cancelled flights and other mishaps.

Still, we worked it all out and have enjoyed settling in, the change of scenery, and the time to relax and cultivate some space for reflection.

This morning, we woke up to some unexpected news.

Sometimes, strategy conversations get stuck because we’re so busy debating details that we’ve lost sight of the bigger picture.

Here are 3 critical questions that often get missed during nonprofit strategy and planning conversations.

If your executive team and Board haven't tackled these already, add them to an upcoming agenda now.

When we think about our annual plans - or even New Year's resolutions - so often, we focus on new starts.

New projects we'll kick off.

New priorities we'll focus on.

New habits we'll adopt.

New starts can be helpful.

But creating the kind of focused attention that helps us, our teams, and our organizations move in the right direction isn't just about starting or adding things.

One of the most powerful strategic moves you can make as a leader is to decide what you'll stop doing.

I don't know about you, but after returning from the holidays, my inbox is intense this week.

My email and social media feeds are chock-full of messages about setting new year's resolutions, how to perfectly plan the year, getting those goals, and lots of other high energy and expectations for what 2024 will become.

As a strategist and advisor, I frequently talk about how important it is to have a vision or direction for where you're headed.

But I have a confession to make.

If you’re thinking about the kind of energy you want to bring into this next year, here’s a little inspiration from my 8-year-old.

Recently, Seth Godin wrote about valuable contributions and the fact that so many leaders and organizations don’t actually know what value they're creating.

It’s an important read, no matter what industry you work in.

The word value itself has become so overused that its meaning is entirely subjective.

In the nonprofit world - for organizations large and small - we tend to see "value" as "impact."

But our value may come from an entirely different place.

Throughout my 20 years of advising and supporting executives across a variety of industries, here are 3 common traits that the best leaders share.

These traits set them apart, help them retain talented team members, and set their organizations up for success.

The hardest part about learning to swim in the ocean is getting past the breakers.

You might be a great swimmer in a pool.

But if you're not used to the relentless rhythm of waves breaking at the shoreline, it's easy to get caught up and thrown around in the churn.

You get knocked down, and before you can catch your breath, another wave pulls you under.

The thing about breakers is that they're ever-present and relentless.

The same is true of the day-to-day challenges of organizational leadership.

Last night, my husband and I did an escape room in complete darkness.

If you're an escape room lover, you'll know that this is unusual.

So many of the strategies for solving puzzles in typical escape rooms require the ability to look around, observe patterns or connected problems, and literally see ways to put puzzles together or decode mysteries.

We've done escape rooms many times, but never one like this.

And it was clear from the moment we walked in that many of the strategies we were used to relying on - ones that had helped us successfully complete dozens of rooms before this - were not going to work here.

Here’s what we had to do to win as a team.