May 15, 2017

Sometimes Seth Godin makes me cheer and laugh or dance around the room in anger.

Sometimes he makes me want to cry. Wanting to cry now when I re-read this blog: “Who Cut Down the Last Tree?” On Easter Island, they cut down all the trees (for fire, homes, etc.) And eventually the people all died. Extinction. Read Jared Diamond’s story of Easter Island. And I’ve ordered Diamond’s book Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed.

Seth isn’t focused on the last tree. He focuses on the next-to-the-last tree. And he asks the age-old question: Where was everyone? Was anyone watching the destruction of something important. Was anyone worried about what this said about the people who cut down the next-to-the-last tree? Was anyone in the society bothered or questionning or demonstrating or speaking out or fighting or?

Yes. This blog was trending back when it was first posted in April. But I like to talk about things later. When I’m afraid people might have already forgotten.

Seth talks about culture in the blog. I talk about organizational culture regularly. And as Peter Drucker once said: “Culture eats strategy for breakfast.” (Or was it lunch? Who cares which meal!)

Where is everyone? That’s my question. People in society stopping the next-to-the-last tree in our society. (Tom always tells me I’m too pessimistic. That so much has changed and is better. Yes, sure. But it’s also awful and getting worse. And actually, Tom is feeling pretty bad these days.)

Fundraisers and CEOs  and board members and…stopping the next-to-the-last trees in their organizations … from mission to governance to fundraising to organizational culture. Whatever. Self-destructive through ignorance, energy, evidence-based fact, whatever…

Okay. Enough.

Filed under: Leadership

About Simone Joyaux

A consultant specializing in fund development, strategic planning, and board development, Simone P. Joyaux works with all types and sizes of nonprofits, speaks at conferences worldwide, and teaches in the graduate program for philanthropy at Saint Mary’s University, MN. Her books, Keep Your Donors and Strategic Fund Development, are standards in the field.

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