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Volume
Six, Number Six (August 2005)
"What we have loved, others will love, and we will teach them
how."
–W.
Wordsworth, from "The Prelude"
NOTES FROM READERS
What you think
Happy Labor Day! Hope all is well for you as the school year (my new year!) begins again.
From reader (and Rockford College alumnus) Pat Read, these kind words in response to last issue's note about the Panel on the Nonprofit Sector: “ Thanks again for these wonderful notes – they always inspire me to think about issues that are so important in my own life and to our world. You may not be aware that this Rockford alum has been serving as the project director for the Panel on the Nonprofit Sector and we really appreciate your words of support for our work. You are absolutely right that accountability must be a focus for all organizations and we hope our report does indeed spur the kinds of organizational and community conversations you advocate.
In our work with Congress, we need to demonstrate the support of as many nonprofit leaders and organizations as possible and we are inviting individuals and groups to sign on to the panel's report at www.nonprofitpanel.org. I hope you (and maybe even Rockford College ) will choose to sign on to the report, and that you will also encourage others to do so.” We have, and I encourage all Notes readers to sign on!
Occasionally, I (or my colleagues) refer to items from previous issues of Notes. If you have not been a subscriber previously, and wish to review our conversations, past issues of Notes are available online at www.jgacounsel.com . The website version of Notes also includes helpful hyperlinks to sources for purchasing or subscribing to the various publications mentioned in Notes. I thank my friends at Johnson, Grossnickle & Associates for their many years of abiding support for our reflective practice.
REFLECT ON THIS
American revelations (and myths)
I heard historian Neil Baldwin talk about his recent book, The American Revelation (St. Martin's Press, 2005), on a 4th of July radio show. His intriguing thesis that there are essential ideals in American history that need to be explored and used to galvanize beliefs in pursuit of a unifying focus for our thoughts and lives struck me as provocative and worth further study.
The book lifts up ten idealists (from John Winthrop to George Marshall) and the ideal that Baldwin believes each of them contributes to the American saga. For example, Winthrop, the English Puritan leader and Massachusetts Bay Colony governor in the 17th century, invoked the idea of America as a “city on a hill” in a sermon he gave in 1630. Three hundred and fifty years later, Ronald Reagan was summoning the same language to describe his ideal of America as a beacon for the rest of the world. Agree or not with the concept and its use (either historically or in recent years), Baldwin's point is that these historic ideals have played (and continue to play) a core role in defining the American character.
I think Baldwin offers a helpful construct for challenging Americans to understand their common history. The ideals he presents are based in our past and whether or not they have continuing relevance is at least worth some deliberation and conversation among the American citizenry. If we don't find these ideals compelling, then let's find others that inspire us to reflection and action.
I especially enjoyed considering the impact of three of Baldwin 's idealists.
The first was Thomas Paine's argument for common sense, his belief that the independence of the American colonies was emblematic of the struggle of all humankind for self-determination. Paine argued that God had created humans with the capacity for self-government, but that over time this human capacity had been stolen by monarchies and despots. The colonies' efforts for independence became a symbol for Paine of God's original intention. Paine argued brilliantly from the local to the global, finding in the American struggle the basis for realizing all that was inherently right about the human condition.
The second was Ralph Waldo Emerson's belief in self-reliance. It is difficult to deny the impact this idea has had on American attitudes and practices for almost two centuries. Emerson's notion of self-reliance begins in introspection, isolation, and non-conformity. It does not deny a social role for individuals, but premises a healthy society as the result of cultivating individual self-reliance. Emerson becomes the patron saint of rags to riches America, building a practical foundation that helped to define generations of industrial and civic innovation.
The third (surprise, surprise) was Jane Addams and her guiding belief that “the sphere of morals is the sphere of action.” Addams, through her writings and life's work, illustrated the distinctively American ideal that it is in the concrete situation that we face moral questions and are obligated to act upon theory. Whether at Hull-House in early 20th century Chicago or on the world stage in her struggle for peace, Addams fought social ills where she found them, with her neighbors, both local and global. This pragmatic approach to life in the world is evident still in our country, whether in the best of our service to each other or in those moments when we fail each other.
As with all revelation, these ideals are strands of a compelling myth – in this case, the myth (meant here in the best sense of that concept – a narrative that brings coherence and meaning to our lives) of America. The question is, of course, how well we live up to these ideals and the myth that undergirds them; or whether, in fact, the myth remains viable and meaningful for our country in the 21 st century.
To that end, I find it valuable to read alongside Baldwin's survey of American ideals the words of fellow Americans like Wendell Berry, who in his essays collected in Citizenship Papers (Shoemaker and Hoard, 2003) suggests that we must learn to distrust the prevailing myths; that we must encourage conversations among all humanity so that the diversity of experience and perspective can always be on our minds; that peace and a peaceable economy require deliberate action; and that defining the “we” in the Declaration of Independence's “We the people” requires constant vigilance.
What a fascinating discourse we might have around these aspects of our common lives.
Common Work
I have long used “common work” as a phrase to describe my vision of philanthropy. In fact, longtime reader Michael Luck (head of advancement for the SUNY system) recently recalled my session a couple of years back for some of his presidential colleagues. He writes, “ We still have campus presidents muttering about fundraising as being "Common Work." I am still not sure whether they are still trying to convince themselves or others.” Success!
In my work here at Rockford College, I have expanded my use of common work to describe the nexus between personal responsibility and common purpose. In my opening convocation address earlier this fall, I offered reflections on the concept and reprint here excerpts from that address. You will note my efforts to develop a conceptual framework about the college's future work using the themes of covenant, stewardship, and vocation – familiar territory for readers of these Notes, but not so familiar to those we serve!
[Common Work: Our College's Legacy and Destiny, August 26, 2005]
Our legacy
Earlier this summer, several of us attended the funeral of Janet Colman, Rockford College class of 1937, daughter-in-law of Howard Colman, whose name graces our library, and mother of Charles Colman, who currently is the chairman of the Rockford College Board of Trustees.
Janet Colman loved Rockford College and she gave time, wisdom, and philanthropic gifts to show her love. But, more than what she gave back, Janet Colman showed her love of this college by how she led her life; through her public commitments, her abiding relationships with friends and fellow citizens, her concern for the well-being of our city and region. Janet Colman believed in common work, a phrase I have used often since I came to Rockford College, to describe the dynamic of individual citizens (of our college, our community, and world) working together to achieve more than they might achieve alone. Common work is that remarkable nexus at the heart of a healthy community between genuine personal responsibility and self-integrity and the call of common purpose and cause.
The fact that Janet Colman believed in and committed herself to common work did not surprise me because that commitment is at the heart of her college's legacy as an institution that has, since its founding in 1847, sought to educate students (first women, and then men and women) to recognize that the privilege of being educated in this college carries with it the obligation to place that education in service of the wider world. That privilege and obligation are one way of describing common work – we have always educated students to make a living and a life, while challenging them to see how education is inextricably bound up with engagement with fellow citizens to create a better world.
I celebrate Janet Colman's life for its shining testimony to our college's most valuable legacy – common work.
I have studied and sought to practice common work throughout my adult life – it is the core value of my life and work in the world – it is my calling and it was given voice, if you will, in large part through my study of Jane Addams. So when I came to Rockford College several years ago, it was my deeply-felt expectation that I would find a college infused with the spirit of this remarkable person, whose philosophy and life's work at Hull-House in Chicago are firmly grounded in her sense that we all share a democratic social ethic that is both “a rule of living as well as a test of faith.” (Addams, Democracy and Social Ethics, 7) A social ethic, in other words, that calls us to common work.
I found the spirit of Jane Addams here – in our faculty, students, staff, alumni, and trustees – and it has been a source of real joy for me to witness the myriad ways in which the legacy of common work has played a role in the life of the college throughout its history. It is not a straight line – nothing in the realm of democracy is a straight line – but it is an abiding rule of life that has defined our aspirations as a college community to educate students for life in the world. Read the various histories of the college and you will find tales of conversations and relationships and curricula and student activities that, even as the world around us changed and new generations of students came here to study, were grounded in a commitment to education that transforms lives and changes the world. Education that calls us to common work.
[I then shared my parable about Jane Addams (see Notes 3:3, April 2002), along with an outline of the key principles of common work, adapted from my “Thanksgiving: Five Theses on Service above Self,” published in the last issue of Notes (6:5, June 2005)]
Common work and the future of Rockford College
It is meaningful to explore the legacy of a college like ours. We are but the current generation of those who have been entrusted with this legacy and we are obligated to consider its continuing role and relevance to our work together. What difference does it make that common work has been a part of the academic mission and social compact of Rockford College for almost 160 years? What does it mean for those of us gathered here today?
I want to sketch three charges to our community that I believe are central to our taking responsibility for the legacy of common work.
First, we must seek to renew the covenant between the higher education community and the wider society.
The language of covenant, so deeply ingrained in our religio-cultural heritage as a country, is not necessarily familiar or evocative for 21st century Americans. Simply put, a covenant frames the promises made between various parties and provides the common context for holding each other accountable for keeping our promises to each other.
When I talk about the covenant between the higher education community and the wider society, I am talking about the historic public service mission of colleges and universities to educate students for roles, not only as professionals and learned people, but also as good citizens and public servants. This is the promise we make to the wider society. Have we kept our promise?
University of Minnesota professor Harry Boyte challenges us to consider just that question in his recent Everyday Politics: Reconnecting Citizens and Public Life, in which he illustrates how we have lost a vision of what he calls our obligation to public work; genuine political work that isn't about parties and ideological differences, but about work together to engage each other in conversation, to build healthier neighborhoods, to serve our country.
Our legacy of common work challenges all of us to think about how Rockford College (and the rest of the higher education community) can keep its promise with our democracy to educate citizens who will lead and serve in these public roles – no matter what they choose as a career or profession.
The challenge to renew the covenant between our college and the wider society leads me to two strategies:
First, we must do the work that I have proposed to consider the mission of our college and to create a statement of the mission that captures our values and aspirations for Rockford College. Before we can genuinely engage the wider community, we must know what we value, what we stand for, and what we promise. There is so much wonderful work going on here on campus right now to explore our mission and I look forward to the fruits of our reflections on why we exist and who we serve.
And once that self-reflective work is complete, we must join in a conversation between our college community and the wider community we serve about our common goals and aspirations. This sort of conversation – and it must be a genuine conversation, a rare occurrence in contemporary America – offers us the opportunity to create what sociologist William Sullivan has called a “public philosophy” of education for our democracy. These sorts of conversations will bring together citizens with common needs and aspirations and enable us to develop a common vocabulary and sense of purpose for education in our democracy. I can imagine no nobler task for our college in the years ahead.
My second charge is that each of us accepts responsibility for stewardship of the gift of common work.
Stewardship is another of those long-lost concepts that I believe still has relevance for informing our work as a college and a country. Stewards, as you might remember from your scriptures, were servants (slaves, actually) who were entrusted with managing the households of the rich. In other words, stewards were responsible for taking care of other people's stuff!
It is pretty clear to me that the concept of common work is counter-cultural in 21st century life. These days, it's more about entitlement and rights and apathy than it is about privileges and obligations and moral passion. But, like it or not, the gift of common work is ours to tend, to pay attention to, to steward. This gift does not belong to us, but it is our responsibility to keep it strong and safe and vital. We cannot hide it away and hope no one notices. We must share it with each other and the wider community so that the vision of our founders and our ancestors might be realized again in our time.
What does that mean for us? I think that it means, above all, that we recognize the critical importance of the link between education and engagement with the world. We are a remarkable college, educating students both in the traditional liberal arts disciplines and in the professions. We learn together how to make connections between theory and practice, between reflection and action, between the classroom and the world. We learn, in other words, how to be what MIT professor Donald Schön has called “reflective practitioners.”
I find reflective practice a compelling description of the expectations we have of all our students. Our current mission statement tells us that we educate students with a firm foundation in the liberal arts, and extend that foundation through professional and practical experiences. We recognize and celebrate the ways in which education prepares us for an ongoing and mutually supportive dialogue between ideas, theories, value systems, and history, and the experiences, relationships, and engagements of practice. Schön also calls it reflection-in-practice and describes the dialogue as artistry. Rockford College is educating all of you to be artists, in this sense; to see the meaning, beauty, and power of reflective practice.
The challenge is that this artistry you learn here is not necessarily understood or practiced by the wider citizenry. One of my favorite political stories is about Adlai Stevenson, favorite son of Illinois, who, while running for president in 1952, was on a whistle stop train tour. At one of the stops, a member of the crowd shouted out, “All thoughtful Americans are with you, Adlai,” to which Stevenson is purported to have replied, “That won't be enough, I need a majority.”
Stewardship of the gift of common work obliges us to see ourselves as missionaries for reflective practice; to recognize the core role that education plays in a strong democracy; and to advocate for access and opportunity for all citizens to enjoy the privilege of education so that they might participate fully in our common work.
[Examples include Jane Addams' Labor Museum, my Notes for the Reflective Practitioner – not everyone needs a Ph.D. in philosophy to be a reflective practitioner!]
Finally, I charge all of us to embrace our commitment to our calling as a college and its distinctive saga and crucial role in the world.
I had the privilege earlier this summer of spending time with my wife, Abigail, and twenty other college presidents and spouses discussing the links between personal calling or vocation and the missions of our colleges. It was a rare opportunity to engage in candid and provocative conversations about whether we were leading the “right” colleges, whether there was a good fit between personal commitments and institutional values, and how we understood and practiced leadership and partnership with our college communities.
I have mentioned to some of you already that one part of the conversation at the conference focused on what are called institutional sagas, compelling stories of a college's history and mission that are more than the usual marketing slogans and feel-good, happy ending tales we all like to tell. These are stories that share the good, the bad, and the ugly; that describe the wonder and value that arises out of the sometimes messy world of a college community. I had the privilege to tell Rockford College 's messy story.
And it is a messy story precisely because it is a story about common work, of individuals sometimes struggling, sometimes going backward, sometimes surprising themselves, often finding just what was needed to get the job done – and that is the story of our college.
Common work is messy business because it is the people's business, our business. It is the work of democracy, here on our campus, in our community, and in the world. And at Rockford College , we educate students like Jane Addams and Janet Colman and George Anderson and Lauren Poppen (and hundreds of others!) for democracy and common work. It is our legacy and destiny. It seems to be working!
PRACTICE THIS
Board counsel
I am a member of BoardSource, an organization devoted to building effective nonprofit boards (www.boardsource.org). The June/July 2005 issue of BoardMember , the organization's newsletter, included a very helpful set of “Twelve Principles of Governance that Power Exceptional Boards.” Intended as guidance for staff leadership looking to empower a board as a strategic asset and for board leadership as a vision for how a board can add lasting value to an organization, the principles strike me as well worth promulgating. So here goes…
• Constructive partnership – Exceptional boards govern in partnership with the chief executive, recognizing the interdependence of board and staff leadership and the need for trust, candor, honest communication, and respect.
• Mission driven – Exceptional boards keep mission, vision, and strategy as the basis for all decisions and actions.
• Strategic thinking – Exceptional boards pay attention to strategy and use strategic priorities as the basis for aligning agendas, shaping recruitment, and evaluating the chief executive.
• Culture of inquiry – Exceptional boards institutionalize inquiry and constructive debate, always seeking to question assumptions and base solutions on sound data and analysis.
• Independent-mindedness – Exceptional boards apply rigorous conflict of interest policies and put the interests of the organization above all else.
• Ethos of transparency – Exceptional boards ensure that all stakeholders have access to appropriate and accurate information about all aspects of the organization.
• Compliance with integrity – Exceptional boards promote strong ethical values and use various mechanisms (including audits and evaluations) to reduce risk and honor accountability.
• Sustaining resources – Exceptional boards link strategy to financial support and networks of influence.
• Results-oriented – Exceptional boards measure the organization's progress toward mission and gauge efficiency and effectiveness with peer analysis, return on investment calculations, and assessments of the quality of service delivery.
• Intentional board practices – Exceptional boards structure themselves to fulfill core governance duties and support organizational priorities.
• Continuous learning – Exceptional boards embrace the commitment to a learning organization, evaluating their own work in relation to organizational progress and value. Learning becomes an integrated aspect of board work.
• Revitalization – Exceptional boards energize themselves through planned turnover, leadership development, diversity of experience, and exposure to fresh perspectives.
How are your boards doing? I've set an agenda for my board work this year based on these helpful principles.
Creative benchmarking
I have the privilege this year of chairing the United Way Campaign for the Rock River Valley, a local effort that raises $5.5 million in our community for agency and community agenda support. One of the perquisites of this role is that I get to visit many workplaces in town to help launch company campaigns. While visiting these various manufacturing and service companies (places like UPS, Daimler-Chrysler, Amcore Bank, and Hamilton-Sundstrand), I have been reminded of how instructive it is to experience the cultures and practices of other organizations. From how I am greeted in a lobby to the pride shown by company employees to the various strategies these companies use to encourage employee involvement in community service, I have learned so much that is of value to similar issues we address at Rockford College.
These experiences reminded me as well of an article that first appeared in the November/December 2000 issue of Harvard Business Review that described the concept of creative benchmarking, learning from other organizations about best practices for various organizational functions. I first wrote about the article in Notes 2-3 (February 2001) and thought it was worth reprinting it here – the first “classic” Notes essay! I hope you find the notion of creative benchmarking as intriguing and helpful as I have.
“Dawn Iacobucci and Christie Nordhielm, both professors at the Kellogg Graduate School of Management at Northwestern University, write in a recent issue of Harvard Business Review (November/December 2000) about their work on creative benchmarking. It is a fascinating article, full of good common sense ideas about how to compare our organizations and agencies with those whose businesses do not resemble ours.
They start from the customer's point of view. First, list each step of your customer's (read: client/student/member) experience from the initial recognition of need to the final follow-up after the interaction with them.
Next, determine which factors most influence the customer's perception of value at each step.
Finally, identify companies or organizations that excel at each factor—no matter what industry they're in. This process helps you identify relevant companies to study.
I recently asked a group of workshop participants to think about how people are welcomed to their organizations. I then asked what examples they could think of where welcoming guests was done well. One participant said that she thought churches did a good job of welcoming people (ushers meet guests and distribute programs; formal greeters often add to the welcome; someone may help you find a place to sit). We then explored how the best of what churches did to welcome guests could be replicated in our own organizations. And there you have a point of reference for creative benchmarking.
Simple advice for those of us who are always looking for best practices—no matter the source!”
PAY ATTENTION TO THIS
Resources for your reflective practice
I continue to be impressed with the work of sociology professor Paul G. Schervish and his colleagues at Boston College 's Center on Wealth and Philanthropy (www.bc.edu/cwp). Schervish's exploration of the moral biography of wealth is based on extensive interviews with major philanthropic donors, and is grounded in a thoughtful philosophy of philanthropy. A great example of reflective practice.
I am pleased that Good Intentions: Moral Obstacles and Opportunities, edited by David H. Smith (Indiana University Press, 2005), has recently appeared. My article on Jane Addams, democracy, and philanthropy (excerpted in Notes along the way) is in the volume, along with several other provocative essays about the ethics of doing good.
A poem for Labor Day
Here is a wonderful poem by Marge Piercy that celebrates work in the right kind of way. Happy Labor Day!
To be of use
The people I love the best
jump into work head first
without dallying in the shallows
and swim off with sure strokes almost out of sight.
They seem to become natives of that element,
the black sleek heads of seals
bouncing like half submerged balls.
I love people who harness themselves, an ox to a heavy cart,
who pull like water buffalo, with massive patience,
who strain in the mud and the muck to move things forward,
who do what has to be done, again and again.
I want to be with people who submerge
in the task, who go into the fields to harvest
and work in a row and pass the bags along,
who stand in the line and haul in their places,
who are not parlor generals and field deserters
but move in a common rhythm
when the food must come in or the fire be put out.
The work of the world is common as mud.
Botched, it smears the hands, crumbles to dust.
But the thing worth doing well done
has a shape that satisfies, clean and evident.
Greek amphoras for wine or oil,
Hopi vases that held corn, are put in museums
but you know they were made to be used.
The pitcher cries for water to carry
and a person for work that is real.
"To be of use" by Marge Piercy © 1973, 1982.
From CIRCLES ON THE WATER © 1982 by Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. and Middlemarsh, Inc.
First published in Lunch magazine. Used by permission of Wallace Literary Agency.
Subscription information
Subscriptions to Notes are simple to establish. Send me an email at president@rockford.edu, ask to be added to the list, and the listserv will confirm that you have been subscribed to the list. Please feel free to forward your email versions of Notes to others—they then can subscribe by contacting me. The current and archive issues of Notes are available on-line at www.jgacounsel.com .
Topics for the next issue (October 2005)
Between the real and the ideal – ethics as reflective practice
- Ordinary time – waiting, listening, paying attention
- A commonplace on politics
(c) Paul Pribbenow, 2005
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