Patrick Shaw’s Weblog

Happy 2009! I thought I’d let you know that NPower Seattle is merging our blogs into a single account, which you can find here: http://community.npowerseattle.org/npowering/

You can expect to see all of my postings about Salesforce, Plone, Websites, Databases and more -as well as viewing great tips from Jon Frank (our Training Manager) and Dave Forrester (our Manager of Strategy and Planning).

So - update your bookmarks/rss feeds and other notifications, and I’ll see you on over at our new blog!

Patrick

I’ve been thinking a lot about the layoffs happening all over the world, brought about by a combination of the economic crisis and the ensuing environment of fear. I don’t have a great list, but a quick web search tells me that:

• Bank of America announced plans to cut up to 35,000
• WaMu: Most!
• Dell: 8.800
• Citigroup: 50,000

The list goes on and on. But nowhere am I seeing the rest of the story. For instance – what services are being cut to accommodate these layoffs? If there aren’t any service cuts, then I’m left with the impression:

• These agencies were obese – fat with people performing work that wasn’t needed
• These agencies are going to provide fewer services
• If these agencies don’t trim services – their product offering/customer service will drop

Maybe I’m wrong about all of these things. I’m keenly aware of step costs – you know – I can fit 10 people at the dinner table and feed them with a single turkey – but when I invite that 11th person – I need another turkey and another table – and I won’t utilize much of that second turkey or table. So – maybe it’s just that at that size – you can trim that number of people, go down a step, and be at business as usual, but with less business.

For years (and years and years) the nonprofit sector has been told that we need to behave more like businesses. And I think there is some truth to that – we should gather data and analyze it, we should evaluate our work, we should ensure that our overhead remains as low as possible and so on. Solid budgets, strong business acumen, salaries that are based on work product – the list goes on. In my career at nonprofits –I’ve found that most agencies are doing those things already. Maybe we can do them more effectively – but they aren’t absent.

So – how come I’m not hearing about nonprofits reducing their staff by huge margins? Is it because we aren’t fat? Is it because we’ve managed our growth well? Is it because we aren’t newsworthy? I know that some nonprofits are closing their doors, and still others are trimming entire programs. But I can understand both of those things – because a reduction in staff ought to mean a reduction in services provided. That means nonprofits are focusing on what they do best. But huge reductions in staff without an accompanying reduction in service? I’m mystified!

I just finished running the Seattle Half Marathon. It’s my third half marathon, and my 10th overall –and for grins, I thought I’d review my running log to see if different training patterns impact my speed.

Turns out –they do – by a LOT!

In both 1996, and 1998 I ran my speediest times.

And in 2006 and 2007 – a pair of my slowest.

I took a look at my total mileage for each of those years – and – no real surprise – here’s what I found:

• In 1996, I ran 1,487 miles.
• In 1998, I ran 1,215 miles
• In 2006, I ran 708 miles
• And in 2007, I ran 558 miles

Sure – I’m older – but I also trained at about half as much – and half of the effort resulted in a slower time.

So – what does this have to do with websites and databases? I think it means that you need to apply your effort to your outcomes. Here are some questions you might ask yourself:

• How much time have you devoted to fresh content on your website?
• How many new contacts have you entered in your database?
• Have you asked those new contacts to support your work?
• Have you reviewed your website traffic to see if you are attracting new visitors?

And – after each question – ask yourself how your results have turned out. I bet (just like my running) – if you didn’t add contacts, fresh content and so on – you didn’t do as well as you hoped.

In 2009, with a tightening economy – I think the smartest thing each of us can do is to tie concrete efforts to the results we want to achieve:

• If you are a fundraising professional – write more grants and ask more individuals for gifts. (Actually – ask for those individual gifts FIRST – studies show that corporate and grant funding is harder to get in a recession)
• If you manage communications or messaging or outreach at your agency – ensure that your website has fresh content, that you link to relevant sites (and ask them to do the same) and regularly review your site traffic to figure out how to do better. In short – write and publish great content more often!

It’s been some time since I’ve written about Net Neutrality - you can see those earlier posts if you’d like (and you should).

In short, though - it goes like this: Does your internet provider (think of the folks that manage your pipe to the internet - ATT, Comcast, and so on) have the right to prioritize or otherwise limit the content that you wish to view or publish when using their pipe?

This has been a hotly contested (and often not very nuanced) debate. Some consider the internet (no matter how you are connected) as an integral part of free speech - and that it shouldn’t be censored. And providers feel like they bear the burden of managing all of that traffic - so they feel that they should have the right to say what kind of traffic, and when.

Over the past three years there have been multiple attempts made to solve this via dialogue and legislation - and it looks like it is back in the news.

(You can read parts one and two over on my blog)

I was able to get to several sessions at Dreamforce - they were organized  by role - so  - SF administrator, Marketing Exec, CIO and so forth. I also wanted to make sure I had a chance to visit with the folks from the Salesforce Foundation, here other nonprofit agencies tell their stories, and so on. Here are a few highlights

• I was able to hear about Green For All, a project using Salesforce with the help of our friends over at ONE/NW. Terrific to hear about how they are using Salesforce. The speaker from Green For All did spend a LOT of time evangelizing their mission, which was too bad - I wanted to hear more about how Salesforce was making a difference.
• I also attended a great session on SEO, or Search Engine Optimization. The presenter from Google was terrific - and it turns out they Google offers more tools than I knew of for analytics, for A and B testing and for otherwise testing and adjusting your site for better search rankings.
• And I heard another terrific session about change management - one agency (very large) actually used Salesforce to manage the cultural change in their agency as they moved to a consolidated CRM solution. Terrific to hear how they accomplished that, as well as to see some of their Salesforce customizations.

I also went to the Nonprofit meet and greet, the nonprofit Salesforce Users Group, and the birds of a feather lunch - terrific to meet our peers and others in the Salesforce community!

(You can read Dreamforce Part One on my blog, too)

The other big news at Dreamforce this year resonates with my work in the nonprofit sector. Marc Benioff, the CEO of Salesforce, has always been vocal about his philanthropic efforts, and coined a term for how to implement  -it’s the 1-1-1 model  - each 1 represents a percentage of what Salesforce is giving away:

• Time
• Equity
• Product

So  -it was pretty terrific to be in a room with 9,000 other folks, and to have the two keynotes (Larry Brilliant, Executive Director of Google.org, and Malcolm Gladwell, author of "Blink", "The Tipping Point" and a write for the New Yorker magazine) focus on the importance of corporate philanthropy and thinking in a new way.

Larry Brilliant was first up, and ended his presentation "today is a good day to save the world".  Along the way, he talked about how Google.org has adopted a similar model as Salesforce.com (1-1-1) and highlighted some of the ways that Google is making a difference. Key to their success is leveraging what they know about technology - so it’s no surprise that some of their mapping tools have been put to use to spot early outbreaks of disease.

He was articulate, passionate, and- best of all - optimistic about the future. And, in an echo of some of the remarks made by Marc Benioff - he stated that ideas, flexibility, and entrepreneurship are as important as giving money.

He received a standing ovation when he was done speaking, which I found delightful - I’d have expected that at a nonprofit event - but at an event evangelizing tools to help you better connect with customers?

Malcolm Gladwell followed. In a quirk of coincidence, I had coffee with him about an hour before his presentation, and he cheerfully provided a quick overview. It’s connected to his newest book, which hits the shelves in two weeks.

In any case, he was equally eloquent, and outlined three areas where as a community we miss the mark on maximizing human potential, or as he calls it in his book, capitalization. (I’m paraphrasing here - I was listening and not taking notes, and the book isn’t out yet!)

• Economics matter
• Stupidity does too
• Hard work matters most of all

In the first instance, sometimes it is simple economics that prevent people from reaching their potential, or what Gladwell describes as their human capitalization. He highlights a community he visited where no boys went to high school. Turns out they had to cross a gang line to get there - so they just didn’t go. It IS economics.

And in the second case, he highlighted how many of our rules (when you are eligible for playing on a soccer team for instance) and how that date factor appears to be the biggest contributor to success on soccer - not talent.

And in the final example, he told us about the hard work of Kenyan distance runners - and how maximizing effort (in this case a million kids running 10-12 miles a day) has produced most of the greatest distance runners of all time.

Gladwell also received a standing ovation, and well deserved. He closed by exhorting us to examine how economics, paying attention to rule making (and the assumptions we have about such items) and  most of all to hard work  -could make the world a better place by maximizing potential for more people.

All told, it was a pretty terrific 90 minutes.

Dreamforce was terrific - I haven’t been to a for profit conference before (I suppose that tells you something about my commitment to the nonprofit sector) so I was struck by both the size and the amount of goodies. Post meetings, there was great tasting snacks, there were a LOT of people there (about 9,000) and vendors were giving away nice things to attract customers, too.

Here’s part one - some notes about new features and partnerships:

• Facebook and Salesforce.com. This might sound like an odd partnership, although if I were the folks at LinkedIn, I’d be nervous. The long and short fo it goes like this: You can build applications in Salesforce that integrate seamlessly with Facebook. For instance, I might create a job posting in Salesforce, and using that integration with Facebook, evangelize that job description to my friends. And if any of them click on that link - they’ll be filling out the job application on Facebook - but it is really a window into my Salesorce account. The idea is that a business can begin to leverage social networking for things such as job opportunities and more.
• The 2nd big announcement was partnership with Amazon.com. Most of the nonprofit users we work with are using the CRM features of Salesforce to track donors, volunteers, clients and other items. What many don’t know is that Salesforce also offers a platform (called Force.com) which lets software developers use the Salesforce infrastructure to built applications that run on Salesforce servers (or as they would say "in the cloud"). The partnership with Amazon promises more of that, but with some twists. Amazon offers some similar services (they offer flexible storage and pay as you go computing power) - and the integration means that folks that don’t want to learn the Salesforce coding language can still use those services. For instance, I could use Salesforce to manage contacts, a PHP tool hosted on Amazon to manage a website, and Amazon to process payments.
• The final product announcement was Force.Com Sites - essentially, using the tools I mentioned above to create a website landing page from within Salesforce. It could have any visual design that you wish, but would be powered by your Salesforce data. I’m most excited by this element - some of my nonprofit customers may not need a deep content management system, and this might provide a very affordable solution for them.

Stay tuned for additional reports, including presentations by Larry Brilliant (google.org) and Malcolm Gladwell (author and NY Times writer).

I’m a guitar player -and when I’m not here at the office, I occasionally play for local musicals. Last week, I was a substitute guitar player for "Big River" (it’s a terrific show - Huck Finn set to music!).

Anyway - being a sub means that you don’t have a lot of time to rehearse with the rest of the band -and that can be challenging -they’ve been playing together for several weeks, and they have learned the rhythm of the show, the cues, and, more importantly - have worked out some nuances of musical language that help them communicate quickly and in shorthand.

So - on my first night, the piano player gives me the signal to start a song, and I did. And she whispers a musical term to me which didn’t resonate -she wanted a slightly different kind of guitar chord - so I played a variation. I was still the only instrument playing - and it was NOT what she was looking for! She tried another term, and I adjusted again - and that didn’t work either! By then, though - I’d played three different version of that chord - and I knew what was most likely the chord she wanted, so I played it. Whew. And the show went on!

During intermission, we chatted about it and had a good laugh, because here’s the thing: She was telling me exactly what she wanted, and I was playing exactly what she asked for! But - because of the subtle differences between the way a guitar player approaches a chord and the way a piano player approaches a chord, combined with a different set of musical influences, study and experiences - our terms didn’t match.

And that can easily happen here at work, too. Many of our customers use words and descriptions that are particular to their practice - whether fund raising, serving customers, helping manage their volunteers and more. And we have to assimilate that information, and turn it into a database that works, or a website that renders. So a "top donor" or a "soft credit" or a "housing report" or a "rotating image" or a "calendar" can all mean different things to different people - and we have to find a way to make sure that we’re all talking about the same thing!

Here are a couple of music inspired tips for better listening/interpreting/translating when working with customers:

• Take time to learn a bit about the people/agency for whom you’re working - you’ll get context that will help you translate better. In music, a jazz guitar player is likely to play a chord in a very different way than a rock musician - and knowing that in advance can help you arrive at the same spot!
• Don’t be afraid to try something new. I had to hit three chords before I landed on the right one -and I didn’t have time to stop the show and have a lengthy conversation. You can adjust your language and terminology on the fly. Asking "is this what you mean?" can be effective and attractive - and can help you keep your project moving!
• Seek transparency in your communications. "I don’t know" is a great answer if it is true. It’s even better if you can follow it up with an "I’ll find out!". If you aren’t sure - ask. Musicians (and customers) want you to get it right, and will take the time to lead you in that direction if you’re open.
• Be honest about your capabilities. I’m not very good at sight reading music, and I told the band that right away. That enhanced, rather than detracted - that gave them the information they needed to support my work. It bears repeating that it’s far better to exceed expectations than it is to miss the mark!
• Practice helps! I still have a lot to learn about music, and even more to learn about how to help nonprofits use technology effectively. But I won’t get better at either by osmosis. I need to practice the tools of my trade. That can mean reading, coding, being an end user, paying for help and more. People rarely advance by resting full time.

If you send bulk email to solicit donations, find volunteers, to keep your stakeholders up to date regarding how your agency is meeting your mission - then you should take a few minutes to review the update the Federal Trade Commission’s Can Spam Act.

The Can-Spam act is a set of regulations regarding sending unsolicited email. You’ll want to make sure that you are in compliance! Here at NPower - we recommend that you use a third party vendor such as Vertical Response to deliver your mail - vendors that specialize in delivering high quantity email messages generally can provide better deliverability AND tools that help you stay in compliance.

Here are some quick highlights regarding the update:

1. Single Opt Out. You must provide a method for subscribers to opt out with one click - no “confirm you address” and so on. You MAY provide both a “manage my subscription page” and a global opt out message, though.
2. You have to have a single “sender” in the “from” address that clearly identifies you - and that person is also responsible for including the unsubscribe link.

There’s a lot more in the Act, and you should read it to ensure that you and your agency are in compliance!

It’s easy to always be sure that we know what we know, right? A lot of the time, what we know actually IS true - and sometimes - we walk around with something that we “know” that isn’t true anymore, or maybe wasn’t true, ever. I remember when one of my nieces told me that dinosaurs were warm-blooded. I humored her for a bit, cornered my sister to ask what was going on at my niece’s school - and then found out later that my niece was mostly right - better science means that we get to change our mind, we get to “know” more about the dinosaurs. And it looks like warm blooded might be the better answer to know.

There are lessons here in the nonprofit world, particularly when it comes to measuring your successes and failures:

• Make the time to periodically review what you think you know, and check your assumptions.
  • Who are your top donors?
  • How much time do you lose when your team can’t update you website?
  • What is the total cost of a new database?
  • Does your e-newsletter get more hits when you send on a Wednesday or a Monday morning?
• Take a step back and ask if you’re measuring the right thing.
  • Is the total number of records in your donor database tell you what you need to know?
  • Perhaps you should be looking at the inactive folks in that database to determine why they are inactive.
• Is your database really as terrible as you think?
  • Maybe it’s a training gap that you can fix quickly and easily.
• Don’t be afraid to ask for advice.
  • We all can’t know everything, and we all make mistakes.
  • Decision making by committee isn’t always a great idea - but I’ve rarely been disappointed with information gathering by committee.
  • Cultivate people with a different point of view, set of experiences, belief set. You’ll learn something, and so will they.

I love to be right, don’t get me wrong. But you know what? I can change my mind to be right, and often times, that’s even better: I’ll have learned something, acquired new and better information, and will be better equipped to find “right” the next time -because I checked some assumptions, I measured the right stuff, and I asked for help!