Future Hope Column: What Makes a Good Organization?

By Ted Glick

This was the question I was recently asked by a young person whom I work with in a New Jersey group. My immediate thoughts: 1) having money, and 2) an internal culture of the group which values listening, mutual respect, democracy at its fullest and not just effectiveness but community building.

On reflection, I explained that the money one is a two-edged sword. On the one hand you ultimately can’t do anything if you don’t have financial resources. But on the other, when amassing lots of money becomes a primary goal, it’s pretty easy for a group to lose sight of its principles, get on the slippery slope of compromise after compromise to not turn off rich people, private foundations or other institutional financial sources.

From my years of organizing, going back to 1968, I would say that a group which clearly understands its mission, does a good job articulating its demands and program, and is together as far as its internal culture will always find enough money to operate. Maybe there won’t be as much as desired, but a good organization will find ways to adjust and/or step up its fund-raising efforts to achieve more positive results.

What are some practical examples of a healthy internal culture?

A key one is the role that a meeting facilitator, sometimes known as the chair, plays when going through a group’s agenda. A main role is to encourage as many people as possible to speak and, at the same time, prevent long-winded people—usually men—from speaking too long. The ideal to strive for, rarely met, is for everyone in a meeting to speak about as much as everyone else. That would be a sign of a very healthy group.

But this isn’t enough. A facilitator, and really all in the group, should be saying what is needed to move the group toward decisions which reflect where the group as a whole, or a large majority of it, is at. As important as it is to have a healthy, democratic process of discussion, equally important is that timely decisions are made which allow people to follow up on them after the meeting is over. Otherwise the group morale and effectiveness will suffer.

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Source: tedglick.com