Pass It On
By Kristine Ellis

You never know when a good idea will come along. Consider Kevin Wilde, vice president and chief learning officer for Minneapolis-based food manufacturer General Mills. Wilde was out running one day when he came up with an idea for supporting executives in the nonprofit sector. Since General Mills was already bringing in nationally recognized speakers for internal leadership development, why not ask them to stay over an extra day and offer free leadership forums for community leaders?

"Most nonprofit organizations can't afford to bring in the professionals we bring in to train our leaders, but they are hungry for the exposure," says Wilde. "At the same time, I've found that the consultants would love to give back to the community, but they don't have the time to organize something. So this is a beautiful win-win."

Wilde's idea proved to be a huge success. In 2004, General Mills hosted four Community Leadership Forums, one each quarter, with 100 participants each. That schedule continues in 2005.

The General Mills community forums are just one way that learning professionals are supporting their communities by passing on their skills and expertise. Some do it through formal programs, others by sharing their skills as volunteers. Either way, they are meeting a need that will only grow. If training and development budgets are shrinking in the corporate world, they are miniscule to nonexistent for many nonprofits. Plus, the nonprofit sector is facing the same leadership crisis being felt by for-profits, as the exodus of retiring baby boomers approaches.

"Unfortunately, training—and anything else that isn't direct program service delivery—gets characterized as overhead," says David Simms, managing partner of Boston-based Bridgestar, a nonprofit organization that works to strengthen the nonprofit sector. And when budgets are tight, overhead is first on the chopping block.

Keep it Simple

Organizations participating in the General Mills forums range from the United Way to a Hmong cultural center, the Girl Scouts and the Minneapolis Police Department. While the level of training and development that each participating group can offer its staff varies, Wilde stressed that the forums aren't intended to replace these programs or even serve as leadership development.

"It isn't that we are going to train them to be good leaders," Wilde says. "We assume that they already are good leaders. These are very talented people, but like everyone else, they need to be energized every once in awhile. So our idea was to offer something that inspires them with new concepts and skills, and then reconnect with them again three months later on another topic. That has worked very well."

One of the few requirements for participation is that no leader attend alone.

"We ask that they come with at least one, if not two or three, other executive team members, because the whole idea is that they be able to go back and be able to do something with what they've learned," Wilde explains.

That caveat has been well received by participants. For instance, the entire six-member senior management team of the Girl Scout Council of Greater Minneapolis (GSCGM) attended all four sessions last year and signed up for this year's programs as soon as the schedule was announced.

"It gives us a common language to talk about the topic of the day and a jumping-off point for making changes," says Shelley Jacobson, CEO of GSCGM.

After attending a forum on leadership competencies, for example, individual team members rated themselves, each other and the team as a whole. "The process revealed what we need to work on as well as where we are strong," says Jacobson. "I think it has also made a huge difference in how the remainder of the staff views our planning process and our decision making."

While Wilde believes that he has stumbled on a simple model with huge dividends for helping the community, there are pitfalls to be avoided. First, it's important to make sure that participants understand that their participation will not affect their funding. Some participants in General Mills' program are also funded by the General Mills Foundation. During a focus group in the planning stage, community leaders warned Wilde that any perception that they had to participate in order to keep their funding would be harmful. As a result, Wilde has stayed away from formal tracking or measurements that might be wrongly interpreted.

Wilde also emphasizes that the consultants and topics need to bridge well to the nonprofit world. "I heard a horror story from one of the nonprofits of someone trying to teach them Six Sigma. I think the big caution is to not get too heavy-handed with this. Just put it out there and see what comes to you," he says.

Fill the Gaps

Learning and development professionals don't have to depend on their workplace programs to share their skills. As a part of their leadership training, about 400 General Mills supervisors and managers serve as board members for nonprofit organizations, and more than 70 percent of all employees volunteer in some way.

Willie Johnson, a performance development consultant in the dedicated contract services division of J.B. Hunt Transport Services in Lowell, Ark., is a prime example of how a single individual can make a difference. Johnson began volunteering at the Jones Center for Families, a community center in nearby Springdale, Ark., a few years ago. He now serves on the board of directors for the center's Community Enrichment Opportunities for Lifelong Learning (CEO) program and teaches customer service, conflict management, presentation skills and other business classes two or three times a quarter. "There are a lot of nonprofit organizations out there as well as smaller for-profit organizations that don't have training budgets," he says. "We do a lot of training at J.B. Hunt; volunteering my services through CEO is a way for me to give back to the community and help these organizations take advantage of what I know."

Johnson uses the same content he uses in his J.B. Hunt training courses and adapts them to each group of participants. "They sign up ahead of time, so generally I'll call and talk to them so I can tweak my classes to fit the audience," he says. His commitment makes him widely popular.

"People love his classes," says Grace Donoho, director of education and grants administrator for the Jones Center. "He knows what is going on in the workplace, he knows the latest training techniques, and he has an engaging personality. We have staff people here at the center who have taken every class he's offered." Because the courses are offered in the evenings, most come on their own time—and more often than not, they bring their co-workers with them the next time.

Since Johnson began volunteering at the Jones Center, he says, J.B. Hunt has become a strong advocate as well, both by supporting his activities that sometimes take him away from the office during the day and by becoming a sponsor of some of the activities held at the center. "All of the data show that people like to work for companies that are out there doing good," says Bridgestar's Simms. "The companies end up with a more engaged workforce."

Training Future Trainers

At King's Daughters Medical Center (KDMC), in Ashland, Ky., training skills are passed on via KDMC's designation as an American Heart Association Community Training Center (CTC). In this role, KDMC provides free CPR, advanced cardiac life support and pediatric advanced life support courses for instructors and students alike.

In 2004, KDMC trained more than 8,500 community members—far more than the national average of 1,500. Its success stems from a renewed effort launched in 2001, after a change in the direction of the program and stricter procedures resulted in a loss of nearly 150 instructors. "When I started with the training center in 2001, we did not have a very good working relationship with many of the emergency services providers," says Neil Cooper, coordinator of CTC. "There had been some miscommunication about changes coming from the Heart Association, which wanted us to focus more on community education."

To change those relationships, Cooper and his team began with an aggressive instructor solicitation and training program stressing the values of integrity and excellence. An integrity reality check was needed because, unfortunately, some of the previous instructors simply issued or re-issued certifications to certain people rather than requiring them to complete the training to earn the designation. "The value of excellence expressed our intent to provide the best class possible to get the best possible outcome for the patient on the other end," Cooper says.

Other changes—such as posting all notices, class schedules and updates on KDMC's Web site rather than mailing them to instructor's homes—also helped to strengthen the program. Today, CTC's reputation draws participants from southern Ohio, northeast Kentucky and western West Virginia. In fact, at least one emergency medical services group, which had applied for its own training center status rather than work with KDMC, has since returned as one of CTC's 27 training sites. "We quit soliciting for instructors and training sites in 2002, but since that time we have been inundated with requests from agencies and individuals wanting to sign up," says Cooper.

Training sites now include EMS agencies, community fire departments, other medical centers, vocational schools, private industries and National Guard units. In fact, one National Guard leader trained by CTC is now stationed in Kosovo, where he is training other NATO forces. "We heard that a European NATO group told [the National Guard leader] that they were shutting down their own training operation and wanted to come to his because they were impressed with his training," says Cooper.

KDMC also has other community education programs. "Last year, well over half of our team members volunteered their time to do more than 100,000 health screenings in the community," says Susan Graham, organizational development director for KDMC. "It really comes down to the philosophy of the organization, which is to take care of our community, our customers, and do whatever it takes to get that done."

Give for Goodness' Sake

Bridgestar's Simms says there are more than one million nonprofit organizations in the country, and 90 percent of these organizations have revenues of less than a million dollars. The competition for those dollars is intense, and as the Girl Scout Council's Jacobson points out, there is a domino effect under way. "As there are more and more government cuts, there is more competition for the individual, corporate and foundation dollar," says Jacobson. "Many people are willing and able to provide funds for agencies that meet immediate basic needs, but in times like these it is easier to forgo prevention. So for prevention agencies like us, it is tough."

Given the current economic climate, both funding and knowledge-sharing support can be critical. "It's my personal mantra that the success of our country and our communities is intricately locked to the success of the nonprofit sector," says Joe Cavanaugh, CEO of Youth Frontiers, a Minneapolis-based nonprofit that works with area schools. Cavanaugh is an enthusiastic participant in the General Mills community leadership forums. "The socially responsible corporations in this country are very generous with funding from their foundations, and that is extremely valuable to nonprofits," he says. "But the other issues critical to the success of nonprofits are talent, leadership and wisdom, which is why I believe that what General Mills is doing is so visionary. The nonprofits are rooted in their communities, and their missions are critical to the community's health and well-being. All resources need to be rallied in their support."

Reprinted from Training Magazine

Kristine Ellis is a freelance writer for Training. edit@trainingmag.com