ChangeThis
ChangeThis is our weekly series of essays from today's thought leaders that are meant to evoke conversation by bringing forth new and unique ideas.
ChangeThis
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Blog / ChangeThis
The Expectant Non-Profit: A Guide for Navigating the Healthy Growth of Organizations
By Porchlight
"Non-profit organizations can be fragile things. In the beginning, they need a lot of tender loving care. But just because you make it out of that first rough year, don't expect smooth sailing. Fewer than 50% of all non-profits make it to their 5th birthday! Not exactly a mortality rate to be proud of. Just like new parents often need a 'how to' book, so do new non-profit CEOs. So here it is, a guide for helping your organization flourish and live well into old age ... "
Categories: changethis
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Blog / ChangeThis
Calling All Leaders
By Porchlight
"High-Stakes Leadership has a ring of drama, for good reason. When risk is great and uncertainty low, missteps can have catastrophic results. When we think of high-stakes most of us can name the obvious situations. Too often, we think that people who lead in high-stakes matters are special people. They are not. You do not need to be a special person, with super-human powers and nerves of steel as the examples in this manifesto will show. What do you need? Courage, character, judgment, and fortitude."
Categories: changethis
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Blog / ChangeThis
Archaic "Best" Business Practices Toxic to Resilience, Innovation, and Change (Plus, What To Do Instead!)
By Porchlight
"The concept of 'best practices' is no protection against toxic practices. Most of these 'Best Practices' have never been validated, and some are particularly toxic themselves—whether that is in how they develop strategy, lead people, or change an industry. Most are marketing hype invented by a consultant company. Of course, everyone wants to have the 'best' way to work. But by what standards?"
Categories: changethis
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Blog / ChangeThis
Creating Change from the Inside-Out
By Todd Davis
"You may have heard the phrase that people are an organization's greatest asset. As a human resource director for many years, that philosophy guided my professional decisions. But after 14 years as a Chief People Officer, I see things a little differently. I've learned that it's not only the people who determine an organization's performance, it's what happens between people that makes the greatest impact on effectiveness. Your organization's ability to achieve sustained superior performance depends on the nature of the relationships inside it: how well people work together, how respectfully they treat one another, how carefully they listen to customers and suppliers, and how leaders model the type of behavior that attracts, retains and develops the best talent. In the end, it's the collective behavior within an organization's culture—how most people act most of the time—that is an organization's greatest competitive advantage."
Categories: changethis
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Blog / ChangeThis
Think Bigger! Change Your Thinking. Change the World.
By Porchlight
"Most people don't think big enough, which could be the biggest factor limiting their success. And, yes, that includes you. Ponder that for a second. Sure, there are lots of outside forces that could be holding you back—I am certain you could come up with a laundry list. And I am not saying those impediments aren't real. But, what I am saying is that one of the main things that is probably holding you back is inside you, and not some outside force."
Categories: changethis
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Blog / ChangeThis
Giving Voice to the Voiceless
By Porchlight
"My son is wise beyond his years, even if from the outside you might have a different perception. Below is Payam's full message written on the alphabet board, it took about five minutes for him to spell it out letter by letter: "I WANT TO THANK EVERYONE WHO SEES THIS AND BEGINS TO SHIFT THEIR PERSPECTIVE TO HAVE MORE BELIEF IN ALL OF HUMANITY." How many times have we been told not to judge a book by its cover? How often do we fail and completely judge others based on what we think is "normal" or acceptable? How do we know what they are thinking or feeling, if they are not able to tell us in the ways that we are used to? Why do we presume to know their cognitive levels or what they will be capable of in life? Who are we to judge?"
Categories: changethis
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Blog / ChangeThis
Why We Need a Take Our Daughters to WORTH Day
By Porchlight
"The Take Your Daughter To Work Day movement has succeeded. Girls today can enter any professional they choose. They can start their own businesses, advance their careers, and assume leadership roles in their organizations. We have achieved so much. But our work is not finished. I think we have new work to do. It is not an option to stand by passively as the first generation of digital native girls comes of age and struggles—feeling isolated, unworthy, under pressure, and filled with doubt. That is why I propose we update the Take Our Daughters to Work movement with a Take Our Daughters to WORTH Day."
Categories: changethis
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Blog / ChangeThis
Someday is Not a Day in the Week: Create More Meaningful Work ... Now Not Someday
By Sam Horn
"The premise of this manifesto is, as my millennial friend Jackie put it, 'What if work didn't have to suck?' What if, instead of accepting a toxic work situation and/or waiting for it to get better, we took personal responsibility to make it better? What if there were ways to make work more meaningful right where we are, right now? The good news is, there are career hacks you can use to create meaningful work so it's more like you want it to be. And you don't have to win the lottery to do it."
Categories: changethis
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Blog / ChangeThis
There Are No Strangers Here: A Rising Tribe Lifts All Boats
By Sally Haldorson
"Maybe my story wasn't a big story. I hadn't begun a new company, or invented a new product. I hadn't yet written a book. I didn't have as prominent a voice or as large a platform from which to speak as some of the others. But I did truly believe that my story was emblematic of the cumulative work all feminists have labored under with every act that inches us toward equality, and emblematic of the struggles all professional women face as we labor toward our dreams. I had my life, and I had my work, and I was simultaneously blessed and burdened by the effort to maximize the potential of both."
Categories: changethis, managing-directors-cut
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Blog / ChangeThis
Why You Should Hire a Futurist
By Porchlight
"A quiet revolution is underway. It is as unanticipated and stealth as the internet and social media once were and just as ubiquitous. Every day our knowledge about the future grows more precise, and this is transforming how modern leaders lead. Think about it. A few decades ago we didn't know if a person was predisposed to Alzheimer's, baldness, or lung cancer, when a country's currency was on the verge of collapse, or how close a rogue nation on the other side of the world was to a viable nuclear warhead. We didn't know which automobile parts were likely to fail first, second, and third, or when a hurricane would make landfall, or whether our credit was sufficient to secure a mortgage. But today, we do. We have more data about future outcomes than ever before, and this has armed leaders with a heretofore unprecedented power: the ability to adapt before-the-fact. That's right. Today's successful companies are no longer adapting to changes in the environment, they are changing the environment to which they must adapt.
Categories: changethis
The original idea behind ChangeThis came from Seth Godin, and was built in the summer of 2004 by Amit Gupta, Catherine Hickey, Noah Weiss, Phoebe Espiritu, and Michelle Sriwongtong. In the summer of 2005, ChangeThis was turned over to 800-CEO-READ. In addition to selling and writing about books, they kept ChangeThis up and running as a standalone website for 14 years. In 2019, 800-CEO-READ became Porchlight, and we pulled ChangeThis together with the rest of our editorial content under the website you see now. We remain committed to the high-design quality and independent spirit of the original team that brought ChangeThis into the world.