The Challenges for NGO Leaders - Coursework Example

 Non-profit Sector Module Paper 5 Globalization is a call for unique learning structure for nonprofit organizations as each continuous to exist in pursuit of its goals to meet societal needs. In as much as these organizations have commonality in terms of projects,culture, and structure, the need for the nonprofit sector to merge not only with each other but with the government and private institutions as well is emergent in order to be more cost efficient in serving communities in face of the economic depression. Having mentioned economic depression, resource allocation and mobilizationbecame more challenging since the global financial crisis started in 2007. Leaders in organizations have to constantly learn and adopt in order to sustain the operations of the organization whether by reorganization or merger. In forging partnerships with other organizations and institutions, one leadership challenge is on accountability that includes compliance with transparency, reporting and evaluation procedural requirements, and sustainability measures. Many of the international NGOs have strict reporting and evaluation tools like the use of logical framework analysis to assess objectives and outcomes with measurable results. However, such has become a burden to smaller NGOs that uses simpler reporting methods and most often than not the staff are left with more paperwork to do which limits their implementation time in the field (Roberts, Jones and Frohling, 2005, p. 1850). Transparency is very important to ensure donor agencies or development partners that funds are allocated and disbursed properly, the struggle is that the standard accounting practices of community based NGOs are different to that of larger NGOs that normally require receipt attachments even for smaller expenses and in a third world setting, receipts are only for the larger business that can afford to pay licenses and taxes to the government. The second challenge of NGO leaders is on “defining the role of organization” (Roberts, Jones &Frohling, 2005, p. 1850) which pertains to its vision, mission and goals or VMG as it is commonly called. The VMG is what defines an organization, its purpose of existence, what it wanted to achieve, and the concretesteps it will take to achieve its desired results. In most of the large funding international and national nonprofit agencies, the issues and sectors they wanted to support are already well defined and are mostly angled only towards a specific cause. In contrast, the implementing local NGOs are handlingmulti-issues that are concerns in their community. In the desire to seek partnership with other organizations to help support sustain their programs, some implementing NGOs are forced to redraft their VMG just to fit with the requirements of the partner agencies. Such changes often times lead to general confusion among the NGO employees and other stakeholders. In this instance, the management has to be very keen in communicating changes to sustain community and employee participation for a successful execution of the projects. The third challenge for NGO leaders is related to capacity building efforts. Capacity building is an essential activity of an organization to support the growth and skills development of all its employees. In large projects however, international partners usually send technical advisors or consultants or hire temporary project staff to handle some of the extensive operations in a project. Other calls for the leaders usually members of the Board of Trustees or high level managers to a technical training abroad in order to fulfill the technical assistance that is within the contract premise. However, such arrangements only estranged majority of the employees and the community in handling the programs. Further, it is creating dependency to the capacitated few instead of promoting autonomy and self-sustenance for the entire organization when capacity building is done within the organization’s employees. The challenge for the leaders is to be able to adhere to the policies of partnership that does not limit the technical developments of the NGO employees who truly know the issues of the community. The last probable challenge for leaders is the “spatial strategies” (Roberts, Jones &Frohling, 2005, p. 1852). Local, national and international NGOs have set preferences on geographical bounds of partnership and operations.This is normally done to extend services to the areas in accordance to the regulations of the partner agencies and is called priority areas. However, the priority areas of the partner agencies may not match the geographical coverage of the communities that are in need of development assistance. In such instance, inequalities in service can occur as some communities are left without assistance while some receives more than is intended. The NGOs in this situation are sometimes forced to adjust their priorities as well which could greatly affect the programmatic objectives of the organization. Given the aforementioned challenges, leaders in the nonprofit sector must have the ability to achieve balance while adapting to the changing needs of the organization and its environment. Accordingly, there are four types of NGO leader, the paternalistic, catalytic, managerialist, and activist (Hailey, 2006, p. 2). The paternalistic leader establishes kinship relations with the people at work that is patriarchal or matriarchal. This leader can inspire loyalty and close relationships with staff due to the familiarity bond among them. The catalytic leader promotes and implements changes with their ability to delegate work-loads, to develop internal leaders, and to do strategical analysis on change and development. This leader is active in forging alliances while balancing priorities alongside with organizational values and individuality. The managerialist leader is best known for its ability to establish structures and systems while managing the workforce roles and responsibilities. This leader is a good fundraiser and contractor and is very professional in meeting deadlines. The activist leader “are highly motivated, often charismatic, and typically focused on a single issue” (Hailey, 2006, p. 7). This leader has the ability to engender the workforce or the community to be actively passionate on an issue thru provocative messages. Whatever type of leadership there is in an organization, it is imperative that the leader responds to the needs of the organization, to the community it serves, and to its partners must be efficient enough to maximize the use of scarce resources. Self-development or knowing oneself is one path for a leader instead of just attending development skills training. Self-development enables a leader “to be versatile in order torespond to different situations differently, rather than responding to all situations in the sameway” (Kaplan, 1994, p. 4). A leader must be able to see in the context of the workforce in order to understand their concerns and be able to create strategies that would influence their behavior and address their concerns and needs most specially during phases of reorganization. Because of increasing outputdemands due to partnerships or merger, leadership in an NGO must be delegated throughout the organization by building social relationships. This strategy will help build ownership and commitment from the workforce because they were involved in the decision making process. Sense of purpose and good working relationship is also built as the workforce felt trusted and empowered to be involved beyond their contract roles and responsibilities. Building social relationship and participation is important in the NGO sector because a leader is not just measured on his attainment of targets but on the solid relationship he/she has built over periods of time. It is worth noting that rapid turnover of employees in an organization projects a bad image that can hinder potential partnerships for community projects. An NGO leader needs to be responsive to culture and context or “the ability of the individual’s diagnostic skills and judgment toknow what style to adopt and when to adapt their style to suit the circumstances” (Hailey, 2006, p. 13). This trait is much needed most specially when an NGO is in partnership with a donor with tight requirements and schedules as it can have a negative impact on the leaders and entire organization. The NGO leader in the midst of globalization must also display high level of competencies and characteristics that can generate trust and confidence from the partners, workforce and general public. This can be done by demonstrating high emotional quotient or self-awareness, social awareness, self-management, and ability to handle and manage different kinds of relationships from different walks of people. The roles of leaders in an organization are crucial for its success and failure. Thus, it is important to have leader who has the ability to foreseecircumstance, create strategy, communicate objectives and strategies, empower people, create opportunities for employee growth, able to identify, process, and apply appropriate strategies and tools, and energize people thru open communication and mirror leadership. Lastly, a leader should have the will to learn, fail and experiment. This means use of new technologies, development of new strategies, innovations of current tools and procedures, and willingness to adopt success stories of other organizations based on applied science or professional knowledge. This way, the leader would be able to analyze new trends, track new developments, and identify options to respondto the demands of the changing environment. Reference Harley, John. (2006). NGO Leadership Development.A Review of the Literature.International NGO Training and Research Center [PDF document]. Kaplan, Allan. (1994). Leadership and Management. Community Development Resource Association [PDF document]. Roberts, S., Jones, J., &Frohling, G. (2005). NGOs and the Globalization of Managerialism: A Research Framework.World Development Vol. 33, No. 11, pp. 1845–1864. doi:10.1016/j.worlddev.2005.07.004. Read More