Pro Bono Consulting Event
Yesterday was a relatively unusual day for me. I woke up, got ready and headed to a speed consulting event for non-profits. I've participated in speed networking events, but never a speed consulting one -- this was organized by Taproot Foundation.
I came across Taproot plus a few months ago, when a friend and I were looking for ways we could get engaged with non-profits, outside of what we already do at work. A while back they sent an email about this event, and I applied for it, and luckily it all worked out - including my being able to take a day off from work.
Apart from some pretty funny confusion about which table had a purple sign and which one had a blue one (a LOT of us got confused), it was a smooth experience from the get go. There were nine non-profits and three consultants at each table (also nine I think). The third person at our table didn't show up, so it was me and another woman (let's call her S) tag teaming it. There were three areas of focus for the sessions and people's skillsets were aligned to these -- marketing, finance and human resources. A few days earlier Taproot had emailed us blurbs about the organization and the challenges they were facing, but of course, that was a very tiny glimpse into the organization.
S had been to a few of these events before, and it was a treat to be partnered with her. I thought we had complementary approaches and I appreciated how she prompted the non-profit staff to articulate what they wanted at the end of the 45 minutes. Let's face it, 45 minutes is not a lot of time but it is enough time to start a conversation or brainstorm an idea.
It has been a minute since I've worked with a smaller non-profit, and meeting with three different organizations that were small to medium-sized was very interesting. Each of them did fairly unique and niche work, but the challenges they faced fell in similar organizational buckets, especially around people.
We spoke a lot about appreciation, recognition and professional development for staff in a resource-crunched setup, about dysfunctional boards and work gossip which demotivates others, about recruiting and engaging volunteers and board members. I have what I call pre-event blues, where I often regret signing up for most things but land up enjoying myself. This was no different -- the time flew, it was easy to put my cellphone away, and it was a good reminder of all the good work people are out their doing.
I want to be completely straightforward and acknowledge that one day or one session isn't necessarily life changing; I don't like to overstate impact. But I think this will only push me more to find a project that I can support via Taproot plus.