Innovation Blog

"I joined the KFLA board because I wanted to bring an outside perspective and decades of human service experience – public policy, fundraising and practice – to the strong culture of the Kellogg Fellows..."

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Written by Jatrice Martel-Gaiter

Every organization is influenced by five foundational elements – 1) mission vision and values; 2) founding principles; 3) institutional story; 4) leadership and communication style; and 5) organizational culture. Of these five, organizational culture brings the greatest challenge because it eludes description.

Culture permeates everything. It influences basic decisions like where we buy our groceries (Safeway, Whole Foods, or the local co-op?), the people we hang out with, or which doctor we choose. Even where goods, services and circumstances are identical, cultural alignment through that “I can’t quite explain it, but this just feels right,” experience often determines our decision.

Articulating culture can be very rewarding, but it takes courage to engage in conversations about your core thoughts, feelings, behaviors and beliefs. Naming the un-named can stir up, for better or worse, old stories, ingrained habits and unquestioned rituals that can bring forward long stored emotion. Yet, as one client put it, “… knowing and naming our organizational culture allows us to determine due north. If we can’t clarify and articulate it for ourselves, we will remain adrift.”

A few weeks ago, I traveled to Biloxi, Mississippi to work with a coalition of community leaders who were helping local fisher folk rebuild their lives in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina and the oil spill. Those gathered couldn’t have been more diverse – Vietnamese refugees, African-American evangelical Christians, Muslims, Latinos and white folks whose families had been there for generations. They gathered for the purpose of strategizing around economic empowerment, but their work required digging up deeper truths and patterns.

As I considered how to support this group, I heeded the advice of my Hawaiian elders. I took my shoes off and walked on the ‘aina, the land, with my bare feet. Wisdom will always reveal itself when you are connected with the place you inhabit. After just a few minutes walking on the beach, I found something from the land itself that could help.

When the meeting began, I asked participants to hold out their hands. In them, I placed a piece of Spanish moss I had found near the shore. Spanish moss swaying in the trees is a true cultural indicator of the American South. I asked participants to reflect on the piece of culture they were holding, and share a word or two – beautiful, interconnected, deceiving (from a distance it looks prickly, but it’s actually quite soft to the touch), pervasive.

One man in his 50’s said with tears in his eyes, “I was born and raised here and I can’t remember the last time I noticed Spanish moss, let alone held and appreciated it.” Culture, often plain as the nose on your face may take an outsider to bring to the surface.

By drawing from the spirit of the place and the people, organizations of any size have the potential to articulate their culture. We are currently doing this with a statewide organization with thousands of employees as well as this small coalition of ten people in Biloxi. Despite the differences in size, scope and geography, the foresight and courage needed for leaders to engage in this process is considerable. As these organizations articulate and align their individual and collective thoughts, feelings, actions and beliefs toward their due north, they will be able to settle in for a smoother and more harmonious journey.

Copyright © 2013 by Elemental Partners, LLC. | Reprinted with permission
Click here for all previous articles | Find out more at elementalpartners.net

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Written by Kevin Fong

"Among the first lessons we learn as children is to play nicely and share. To be included, we must learn to cooperate. Then, in time, the lesson shifts to “the one with the most toys wins. Inclusion means acting and thinking in your own self-interest. For many, our lives become ruled by this latter lesson.

Two articles underscore this tenet. Eric Michael Johnson, from the University of British Columbia, maintains that humans are essentially coded to be compassionate and cooperative. Our ancestors only thrived when they worked together to hunt big game and gather food to sustain themselves. Those who acted selfishly were shunned. For millennia, these cooperative practices were upheld. But with the onset of industrialization, we have witnessed and participated in what Johnson calls “a society of vicious competition and inequality.”

Poka Laenui, a Native Hawaiian elder, activist and writer, describes modern society through the acronym – DIE (Domination, Individualism, Exclusion). “DIE,” says Poka, “pervades leisure, work, politics, and families, permeating everything we do. We assume our patterns are normal and defend them as natural.”

So how might we confront this modern misstep? Both men agree that we need to journey back to the source. Johnson refers to Darwin’s “The Descent of Man,” often used to justify survival-of-the-fittest antics as though they were natural and almost fated. Johnson claims that Darwin’s findings pointed to the contrary. “Those communities,” Darwin wrote, “which included the greatest number of the most sympathetic members would flourish best…” Therefore, evolution has less to do with survival-of-the-fittest and far more to do with survival-of-the-nicest.

Poka Laenui went back to the sources of his Native Hawaiian roots and calls it OLA ( which means life and health in Hawaiian). OLA stands for ‘Olu’olu (harmonious, non-dominating), Lokahi (seeing things holistically), and Aloha (caring, love). Poka writes:

The very deep culture of DIE must be replaced with OLA (however one chooses to express it). In a culture of inclusion, loving, caring and sharing… school tests would be taken by groups helping one another to get to the correct answers, rather than separating children and ranking one higher or smarter than the other after the tests.

If you were to look at your home, community, or workplace, which culture predominates – DIE or OLA? How does the culture you experience reflect your mission and values? What would it take to move toward a deep cultural shift?

Our work at Elemental Partners aims to practice an OLA-based culture through our organizational values, which include Lokahi. Our most challenging work helps to transform clients who espouse a DIE-based culture. While we stay up late wondering why we agreed to work with these clients, we also discover that they reconnect us why our work matters.
One of these clients said she chose to work with us because “You folks are a model of what we want to create here – trust, respect and the fact that you’re all so genuinely nice to each other.” Perhaps it’s time for us all go to the source and heed our earliest lessons: the secret of growth and prosperity lies in the survival of the nicest.

Copyright © 2013 by Elemental Partners, LLC. | Reprinted with permission
Click here for all previous articles | Find out more at elementalpartners.net

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Written by Kevin Fong

"Grace and Tom are two of the most effective leaders I know. But both of them have run up against issues with their teams.

For Grace, the challenge involved contending with rumors, each one more far-fetched than the one proceeding – Grace is shaking things up. She plans to resign. Grace will soon fire half the staff. While Grace knew who started the rumors, cultural taboos among the largely immigrant and limited English speaking staff blocked her from using direct confrontation.

Tom’s team got tripped up by unpredictability. One day a team meeting would run well and at the next, things would fall apart. “We couldn’t get any traction or momentum because we had to keep doubling back and re-explaining ourselves,” Tom reported.

I asked them both the same question – Whom do you trust? A great team consists not only of the people you work with, but also of the people you trust. When stakes get high and crisis looms, trust emerges as the differentiating factor. Even in mundane, day-to-day events, opportunities to build trust and strengthen a team are just as available as in peak moments. There is no need to wait for any time other than now.

Establishing trust that leads to great teams can happen when, from the beginning, people recognize its inherent rewards. Grace, for example, inherited an organization that thrived on suspicion. She worked hard to establish a new trust-based paradigm by shaping organizational values that recognized its importance. She found ways to integrate these values into her organization. Despite the rumors, she formed a core group of trusted and influential staff who had the capacity to stem the tide because, as one staffer reported, “Our values acted like a backbone that both framed and supported the behaviors that we aspired to.”

Earning trust comes in many different ways. When Tom asked his team what it takes for them to build trust, their answers ranged from “I always start from trust, because it takes too much effort not to,” to “I came from an environment where every action was judged.” Trust takes time and may, for some, involve passing tests. By recognizing that trust arises in different ways can allow individuals to accept their own way through. Indeed, through trusting themselves, they can show up better equipped to manage individual and collective interactions.

Building trust by speaking the truth proved to be a good solution for Grace. At one point, she was tempted to start a couple of rumors of her own… “just to give them a taste of her own medicine.” I worked with Grace to take another approach by sharing some advice from Pema Chodron, a Buddhist nun and author, who wrote: Fear is a natural reaction to moving closer to the truth. In that light, I encouraged Grace to ask the suspected rumor spreader, “What are you afraid of?” When she did, the power of her truth shined forth, and while the rumors continued, they lost their grip.

The truth behind an effective team is in building and sustaining trust itself. It can be learned, earned and returned in a few moments, or it may take years of hard work and diligence. But once it is attained, each of us can discover that a team built on trust can accomplish remarkable things.

Copyright © 2013 by Elemental Partners, LLC. | Reprinted with permission
Click here for all previous articles | Find out more at elementalpartners.net

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Written by Kevin Fong

We have been reworking the blog to be a valuable collaboration space and publication platform of, by, and for the Fellows. We’re asking fellows to propose a new title for our blog that reflects the value and purpose of this space. Add your thoughts to the comments section below.

Recently, the KFLA Network responded to the Trayvon Martin case to lead this crucial dialogue with provocative posts from our Fellows. Use the KFLA Blog to add your voice to the critical issues of the day.

“The stark reality is that the violent and hate-filled world we call home cares little about individual rights. It practices murder regularly and especially often on the basis of race, class and ethnicity, among other tragic and stupid rationales.”
-David Castro (KNFP-13) in The Audacity of Progress

in a society where we pin our hopes on charter schools for the privileged and spend less on schools that serve students of color … we threaten to reinforce the cultural divide in America.
- Larry Nyland (KNFP-07) in Building Bridges of Hope and Understanding

I also think about my own son. In 2013, my husband and I are still having to have the same discussion with our son that our parents had with us about how to survive in America. -Andrea King-Collier (FSPF-06) in A Mother’s Voice on Trayvon Martin.

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Written by Kellogg Fellows Leadership Alliance

"Did you see your rosters by state and cohort to help you reconnect? They include contact and specialization information so you can connect with old friends and initiate friendships and working relationships with those who live nearby or share your interests. Regional volunteers are helping Fellows organize casual gatherings. Thanks to all our volunteers!

Did you receive your roster by email? Do you need your point person’s contact information? See kfla.org/gatherings for additional information. Also, be sure to send any updates regarding contact, work or your specialization information to Christine at chofstad@kfla.org. We hope you are able to get together with other Fellows soon."

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Written by Kellogg Fellows Leadership Alliance