While reading "The Networked Nonprofit," I was struck by its similarity to a volunteer recruitment strategy that we read about in 551 called "concentric circles recruitment." This volunteer recruitment strategy attempts to capitalize upon the personal and professional contacts of organization members to interest and enlist volunteers for that organization or cause. To me, Kanter, Fine, and a number of nonprofits have taken this concentric circles recruitment strategy to the next level by using social media and its infinite networking capacity as a tool to mobilize people for social good.
Indeed, social media like Facebook or Twitter have allowed nonprofits to substantially increase the amount of people and networks they are able to reach, and thus expand their pool of potential supporters, fundraisers, and donors. Even my own employer, Roberson, has dramatically sought to increase its social media appeal through Facebook, but have yet to post their audits or 990's online.
Thus far, I find the Kanter/Fine book very interesting, considering last semester we concentrated on innovation in nonprofit organizations, specifically social entrepreneurship. In the beginning of last semester I had a preconceived notion of innovation as a revolutionary or novel idea that would transform the way that an organization, group, or individual could achieve social change, a "reinvention of the wheel." However, by the end of the semester I came to the realization that most innovation is merely using existing ideas or technologies to initiate beneficial social change. Kanter/Fine's ideas concerning "Networked Nonprofits" are a future means for nonprofit organizations to advance their cause or mission and are indispensable to future managers in an increasingly computerized world.
I also think innovation is an interesting word in nonprofit area. It is not merely about invent new things which change people’s lives such as lamp bulb in late 1980s. For me, in nonprofit area, innovation can also be defined as causing new phenomenon based on existed ideas and technologies. So while social entrepreneurs feel that it is hard to be innovative in this world while many things are already invented and ideas raised, in fact these can all be considered as tools and foundation of being innovative. Noticing a problem that others neglect, or using existed ideas and tools to solve an old problem are both innovative actions.
ReplyDeleteVera Cordeiro, the founder of Association for Children’s Health (a case we read in 551 class in the book How to Change the World) said: “When we think about how to change the world, we think about big miracles, a lot of money, a lot of technology. We don’t need that. We need small miracles, every day and step by step. We can end poverty in this world. With the technology we have already, with the simply methodology that we need to transform the world and with the willingness to do that, we can change the world.” This is very true to me. Innovation is an awesome thing but it is not our destiny. What we need to do is to put effort into the things that we want to make change, and change them. If an existed idea can make changes in a certain area, let’s try it here.
I also agree that innovation involves the use of current ideas and means. The means, ideas, and technologies themselves are also innovations, creating further opportunity upon newly extant resources. This appears to create a cycle. To me, innovation, advancement, social change, and technological progress are closely related concepts. Semantically, we may use these words interchangeably in many contexts.
ReplyDeleteAs for the statement that innovation is not our destiny, I do not know about this. I would like to think that constructive advancement, rather than passivity, is programmed within us (from an evolutionary perspective). Some believe that we exist in our form today upon iterative genetic and environmental innovation. We and the world seemingly consist of information, ideas which we attempt to understand. Ideas are powerful and their acquisition has quite an encouraging effect. With a greater breadth and depth of knowledge and ideas, does innovation have a foreseeable end? If the past, present, and proximate predictable future incorporate advancement and innovation, does this not support the possibility that innovation is a human (or universal) quality? I still don’t know.