We’re good at gathering, in person and now virtually, and sometimes we’re even good at following up, but the ties that are needed to connect and nurture various efforts over the time they may need to come to fruition are often weak.  What skills, models and infrastructure do we need to strengthen our on-going ‘connective tissue’ that will better enable us to strengthen our collective impact?

I came from some great conversations during Skoll Week in Oxford early this year thinking that there needed to be more attention to the ‘in between’ of in person gatherings and discussions. I thus organized and co-facilitated a session in NYC during UN Week in September 2026 on this topic.

Some key questions we set out to discuss

• How do we turn promising conversations into sustained collaboration?
• How do we keep momentum for collaboration in between the in-person gatherings?
• What helps a collaboration remain useful when the initial energy fades?
• What can we do without more external funding?
• How can we impact eco-system thinking – making a significant difference in how things are done?
• Where might tension arise that we should be aware of and manage?

During the discussion, although we tried not to dwell on the challenges, we did highlight some:

• It’s not always clear that we all mean the same thing when we say ‘collaboration’. We need to be clear about why are we collaborating.
• There are so many factors that encourage competition. How do we limit competition among the collaborators in the competitive environment in which we operate (more elbows down and less elbows out)?
• We are usually ‘transactional’ – ‘we need this’; we need to change the paradigm so that we are relational and make the time for building relationships.
• It’s hard to take off our organizational hats long enough to actually meet each other at what we can do collectively as opposed to what we feel we need to do to sustain our own organizations.

We shared some ‘works well’ that we have learned

• Focusing on a small number of things we could do together helped us to keep momentum and not get overwhelmed by all that we would like to do. “Let’s just agree to start doing X together”.
• Sharing values is extremely important, and periodically re-anchoring in the common purpose.
• Think intentionally (and cross-sectoral) about collaboration – who should we be having a conversation with? We questioned our assumptions and tried not to automatically assume that a group wouldn’t be a good partner.
• Individual trust leads to organizational collaboration.
• It’s okay that collaborations evolve over time – acknowledge the shift and where it’s going. Individual members exiting is okay as is a full winddown if that is where you are and momentum can no longer be sustained.
• Recognize that people/organizations can play different roles – not all need to be as active; other actions to support the group’s purpose and goals can be equally helpful.
• An exploratory network beginning to collaborate example that was shared. The group agreed to: (1) Develop a coherent voice and amplify each other; (2) Share what meetings they plan to be at so they could have small in-person meet-ups; (3) Share information (4) Analyze what is working and what isn’t about the collaboration and discuss what to do when conflict comes up.

More from the Civil Society and Testing Change project  (2013-2024) that some of these lessons came from.

And then we brainstormed some new ideas:

• Underscoring what we share, and our humanity (especially in an increasingly digital/AI world) can help with building trust.
• Tap those who are skilled at listening for ‘good alignment’ signals when looking for potential partners.
• The first step should be creating community and then agreeing on ways to hold each other accountable. When you have those committed to each other and the group’s purpose, the accountability will be more durable.
• What are each partners strengths and weaknesses? Articulate what we bring to a collaboration as well as weaknesses.
• Develop guidelines about how to compete when partners may need to (as noted above in challenges, we do exist in a competitive ecosystem) so that it strengthens trust and transparency.
• Consider having different goals for different stages of the collaboration (for example initial, then fundamental/on-going).
• Acknowledge what you will do together; and what you won’t. A helpful metaphor: Climbing a mountain.  You all want to get to the top together, but you may take different paths and go at different speeds.
• Look at what we can realistically share to build trust such as some back office operations or knowledge gained from webinars, attending conferences, or feedback from donors. Another example was sharing information about feedback from funders so we all have more equal opportunities.
• Make the value of relationship building more explicit. “This stuff matters.”  What is the language/messages to use to raise its value and gain more support?  If we can make collaboration a higher priority/value in our own organizations, it would allow us to dedicate more time with fewer external resources.
• Part of aligning expectations is meeting people where they are and modifying our own expectations and assumptions of what needs to happen.
• There are different roles that can be played. Not everyone needs to participate in the same way.  We need those who ‘think out loud’ together as well as ‘quiet allies’.  Don’t expect the same energy from everyone.
• Create a comfortable, fun environment so people enjoy working together.

Some key take-aways

• If you are thinking about collaborating going forward, be clear in what you want to collaborate for – align expectations with potential partners.
• Build relationships before moving quickly to collaboration.
• Focus on just one or two things you can start doing together.
• Cooperation (eg sharing information) can be a useful precursor to collaboration (on a project) which can be harder.
• Have some regular initial meetings to establish the practice of working together (these can be virtual and/or in-person).
• Have someone or a core group who will keep the group on track.
• It should be enjoyable and fun so people will want to stay engaged.
• Recognize when it may be time to wind down.

Follow-up from the session

So what’s the next step in continuing to build on these conversations and ideas?  Here are some that we are exploring:

1. Virtual ‘World Café’ – this variation of the World Café method would have a few of the people who were at one session take the information that had been shared to a new session (wherever it may be – in person or virtually) so it can be built on.
2. Identifying some exploratory collaborative efforts and learn together.
3. Conversations on social media around topics such as different concepts/types of collaboration.
4. A google doc or website so learnings can be more accessible to others

Stay tuned so we can continue to learn together!

When the Ground Shifts

As we are all well aware, there are many things that are changing in our world and in the professional environments in which we engage.  An extremely important part of navigating these changes is being in community with others who are also focused on these challenges, and from whom we can share ideas and provide each other with positive energy.  Here are a few ideas from recent conversations and readings.

From conversations during 2026 Skoll Week:

• We need to balance a pressing sense of urgency with the time to develop relationships/partnerships.
• Look to ancestral knowledge – stand firm in your own identity, especially when it’s challenged.
• Remember whenever the impact may seem small, it’s significant to those that were helped. “It mattered to that starfish”
• Adaptive organizations get through challenging times by: 1) Listening– where can we best be of help? 2) Strengthening the community’s norms and values; 3) Raising up lived experiences that allow for resilience in challenging times; 4) Build with existing systems and practices; 5) Keep the joy.
• When you think no one is coming to help you, you become more independent and resilient.
• Build accountability into collaboration to minimize tensions that may come up.

From the Lusoma Gazette 

• “Cracks” in the social sector system can also be opportunities.
• How can external and local funding sources be complementary in a more diversified funding strategy? Long before the language of ‘philanthropy’ arrived, people were pooling harvests, burying the dead with dignity, educating one another’s children, and rebuilding after disasters. The work ahead is not to introduce giving where none exists. It is to strengthen, connect, and protect what communities already own. Community Philanthropy Toolkit
• Do you have an honest answer to the question – is our organization built to deliver on our strategy?
• Share decisions among the team so when the hardest decisions come, the muscle memory is already there. It doesn’t make the decisions easier, but it does make them shared.  It gives you the ability to sense check not just the ideas but each other, to have stamina and to hold steady through the inevitable resistance to change. ~ WomanKind co-executive directors.

As the world changes at a rapid pace our organizations must be agile.  We need the ability to respond to sudden changes, to anticipate those that can be seen coming, and to know when to lean into strengths and when to pivot in new directions. Here are some strategies. Some of them may be ‘reminders’, others may be new ideas to consider, or resources to enhance your own approaches.

A changing world and unpredictability

• Strengthen relationships – as the African proverb goes: if you want to go fast, go alone; if you want to go far, go together. It has never been more important to have partners and focus on nurturing those relationships.
• Know your and your organization’s moral compass – when an organization is faced with a lot of competing pressures, having a strong consensus among leaders and staff will make the job of those who speak for the organization easier, and enhance its credibility.
• Strengthen ‘sense making’ skills – In a hyper-divided world, thoughtful conversation starters can help build desperately needed bridges. This is not new (It’s all about the questions) but an even more important strategy in the current moment. Irene Gujit and Judy Oakden provide some examples in a recent article: What are you seeing? What are the exceptions to the generalizations? What is surprising about what we are seeing or not seeing? Read more here.
• Use scenarios as one tool to take your organizations through the process of anticipating trends and strengthening the organization’s agility. Here are some examples: Scenarios Impact Works Associates – INGOs to 2038 and Thrive scenarios for resilient leaders Deloitte 2020

Pressures to redefine ‘political’

• When politics push to the forefront of daily life, even ‘staying out of politics’ as a leader can come across as a political choice. Writes Noa Gafi “The question isn’t whether to engage with politics — it’s how to do it authentically, in alignment with your business strategy and values.”  That’s why knowing your organization’s values and moral compass is so important.

Re-orienting how we see the world and our potential collaborators

• Reflecting on her 10 year journey with We Robotics Sonja Betschart shares: “I had to let go of many of my underlying urges to control, to interfere, to “right the wrongs”. I had to remind myself how to always first take a step back, listen, and re-think.I had to learn to fully trust the infrastructure and always be true to the directionality set, even if they defeat my pre-set certainties and realities.  You can see more of her 10 year learning posts here.
• Finding yourself a peer group sharing similar challenges or some ‘accountability buddies’ can help you to stay on a new path when the old habits try to pull you back (as they inevitable will :).

I have had an evolving relationship with the concept of ‘scaling’. I first started using the term (pivoting from ‘international outreach’ into the business realm of ‘scaling’) via an Ashoka conference in 2010. In 2011 I started a Global Scaling Community of Practice on wikispaces. (When wikispaces went out of business I continued to curate articles on re-envisioning the concept of Scaling on my website here).

Around this time Roxanna Samii provided a useful and simple definition that still holds, although we don’t always focus on what this sentence is actually saying: “Scalability is taking something good and adapting it to context and circumstance.”

In May 2014 I wrote a piece on Scaling Deep. I re-envisioned the concept to focus more on relationship building that would encourage roots to go deep before they spread wide.

Some of the key concepts I outlined in 2014 still hold. They include:

• Context – Instead of starting with the approach that something worked well in one place, label it a ‘best practice’, and look for ways to scale it, let’s start first with an analysis of why it worked well in a particular location/context and try to identify what aspects might be replicable (and what might not).
• Partnerships/Collaborations (co-creation) – For something to successfully transfer from one location to another, and be sustainable over time, it needs to work in partnership from the very beginning with those in the area we might hope to transfer it to.
• Customization – What is core and what can be customized? The historic approach to scale up focused on trying to transfer most of what worked somewhere else. We are now seeing that allowing for maximum local customization will make the reiteration more sustainable.
• Time and Sustained Commitment– Effective scaling in my experience always takes longer than we think.

“In 2015, the J.W. McConnell Foundation in Canada decided to wade into the murky waters of scale to provide some depth and clarity. They delineated three types of scale as important parts of the social change process: up, out and deep. This was an excellent contribution and gained currency in some parts of the social sector, such as with evaluators. However, eight years after it was developed, McConnell’s frame remains little in use today with the field.” This quote was taken from “Words that Shape Social Change” – exploring the evolution of the scaling concept. ~ Jara Jean Coffey and John Kania

Where are we more than a decade later?

Although as noted in the above quote, re-envisioning scaling still hasn’t received much ‘mainstream’ traction, after around 2017 we started to see even more focus on questioning the traditional concept of scaling as ‘bigger is better’. Here are some examples:

• It is a truism that the scale of India’s problems requires solutions of commensurate scale. However, prioritising scale over every other consideration—equity, justice, dignity, even relevance—has innumerable costs. Questioning Scale as We Know it ~ Ingrid Srinath
• Achieving scale that is sustainable and impactful is an emerging, interpersonal process, not a solution. Success is only possible when the power to choose, to shape the systems and processes of the program, and to hold others accountable begins with those closest to the problem. The solutions lie with them. Scaling Up is a Process Not a Solution, ~Tom Murphy
• The importance of the work being rooted in context, having an awareness of power and working with power dynamics. ~ Scaling Deep report based on interviews with Ashoka fellows and others working on systems change

And in 2025 we see some of the following discussions clearly focusing on local customization, control and impact:

This report advocates for a shift toward decolonial scaling practices that prioritise local values and challenge colonial dynamics in humanitarian innovation. This means moving beyond one-size-fits-all frameworks and embracing community-centric indicators like collective wellbeing and relational impact over purely quantitative metrics. ~ Reimagining Scaling, Start Network

“The path forward isn’t about scaling faster. It’s about deepening our roots—together.
Let’s co-create funding practices that are not only effective—but ethical, inclusive, and grounded. Let’s make space for movements to breathe, adapt, and lead on their own terms.
We’re honored to walk alongside others in this global shift. The future of resourcing is not only about how much we give—but how deeply we listen.” ~ Sita Supomo LinkedIn post

“Anyone involved in impact programming knows that even the most scalable programs need just the right political, geographic, social, cultural, [insert human dimension] conditions to thrive.” ~ Oluwatamilore Oni LinkedIn post

I am looking for an alternative to scale. Maybe the word is something like impact “density” but overall, I am looking for wellness. Stronger organizations producing on the ground impacts that are dense – committed to ongoing learning about their wellness. Ten feet deep rather than a mile wide. ~ John Brothers LinkedIn post

In a world obsessed with scaling, we forget that transformative change happens in relationship, not just replication… When we prioritize reach over depth, we bypass the slow, relational work of accountability. Depth asks us to stay close to the histories we inherit, the communities we affect, and the responsibilities we hold. ~ Sahibzada Mayed LinkedIn post

In conclusion, the basics I wrote about in 2014 still hold (context, partnership/collaboration, customization and time) but some things have also changed or taken root for the better in the past decade:

• Scaling for growth – bigger is better – is not always as assumed as it once was but is being questioned more broadly in the ‘scaling ecosystem’ and being re-envisioned in positive ways.
• Ways to evaluate progress, that is not just about quantitative metrics, are being developed including community-centric indicators like collective wellbeing and relational impact.
• There is a greater focus on power dynamics and how effective partnerships and guiding structures need to be developed at the very beginning stages of a scaling effort and time then given for building and nurturing trust.

As effective change always takes place over multiple years, a review of scaling efforts that have been initiated over the past few years with re-envisioned approaches could be a useful addition to our collective on-going dialogue and learning.

 

I recently participated in two discussions on the important topic of organizations maintaining financial sustainability.  Here is some of the learning shared:

Internal work

• Having a ‘north star’ (especially when times are tough) helps to keep everyone on the same team and maintain focus.
• Know your ‘know’ and ‘no’ – what is your expertise and where are your gaps?
• Be clear about who you are as an organization. What position do we occupy and what do we offer? What can’t or shouldn’t we do? How do we align with others? Be strong in your ‘why’s’
• Know the stage your organization is at re: the type of funders you approach (eg big funders have bureaucratic check lists that may be hard for smaller organizations to navigate).
• Good internal work is needed to prepare the organization for effective partnerships – financial or otherwise. Last minute consortia to apply for funding can have a hard time sustaining themselves.
• Strengthen your story and storytelling skills – recognizing the importance. How does oral storytelling fit in? Board members can be helpful storytellers
• Recognize that it takes money to raise money (third party validation might help board to understand this) – how much do we set aside for this?
• Bring staff from different areas into proposal generation and conversations with funders. It’s good teamwork and helps internally, but funders also notice.
• Be careful of fundraising for the sake of fundraising – what impact do we want to have? How do we bring impact about? And for how long do we continue?  Worth discussing your ‘end game’.
• Learning to say no – not all money is a good match.

Building and nurturing relationships

• It is never too early to build relationships – funders are people – they like stories that resonate with them and do business with people they like. Relationship building needs to be authentic.
• People don’t focus on how much you know until they know how much you care.
• In cultivating potential donors, seeing work first hand can be incredibly important.
• Ask early funders to introduce you to others.
• Know when to ask in a relationship – the timing is often key (especially for a potential large donor).
• Appreciation goes a long way.
• If you need funding quickly, focus on funders who can turn around funding quickly.
• If it’s not currently a good alignment for potential funding, ask who they recommend you talk to.

With thanks to: Cynthia Appenteng, Jacqueline Asiimwe, Dana Francois, Amanda MacArther, Rashida Petersen, Olasimbo Sojinrin and Megan Sparks

Although collaboration is always an effective approach (as the saying goes: “If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together) in times of disruption like we are currently living through, collaboration can be not only an effective strategy, but a lifeline.

There were three workshops during Skoll Week in Oxford that I attended where the benefits and challenges of collaborations were discussed.

In a session focused on a re-imagined democracy participants shared some lessons learned from a collaboration of traditionally risk adverse funders:

• There can be safety in collaboration allowing participants to take risks they wouldn’t take on their own;
• Collaboration among those that have seen each other as competitors doesn’t come easy, but some early successes can demonstrate the value.

From a session on pathways to sustainability:

• Know your ‘know’ and ‘no’ – what is your expertise and where are your gaps?
• Be clear about who you are as an organization. What position do we occupy and what do we offer? What can’t or shouldn’t we do? How do we align with others?

And at a session that week that I co-facilitated we discussed some practical challenges to collaboration and shared some lessons learned:

• With disruption also comes opportunities for new collaborations;
• The importance of articulating the value of collaborating to key stakeholders;
• Expand your networks and where you look for partners;
• You may have some false tries before finding the right partners;
• Clarify expectations;
• Stick with your own organizational values even as they may be challenged;
• Put effort into ways to keep the collaboration together and maintain momentum;
• Not all support is financial – the knowledge exchange and transfer between collaborators has a value as well.

Participants in all these sessions emphasized that collaboration can be hard and efforts have to be intentional and sustained, but with effort and some risk the benefits can be great.

We are indeed living in challenging times.  The covid pandemic challenged us and our organizations in one way, the current change in the US administration is challenging us in another.  External changes (eg political shifts, global health emergencies, natural emergencies, AI and other new technologies) are coming at an increasing pace and there is a growing need to balance planning with agility to deal with external factors.

It is hard to change.  We are used to traditional ways of doing things. Among those is having strategic planning as an item ‘we check off’ rather than more regular strategic thinking time. Thus, to become an agile, adaptable learning organization it is important to be intentional about how you might do this in order for the organizational mindset, culture, and ways of operating to be more adaptable and ready to deal with change whenever it comes.

Here are some ideas for meeting the current moment:

• Stay focused – The news can be overwhelming. What is most important to your organization and the ecosystem it functions in?
• Stay practical – What in your organization needs immediate attention (eg more diverse funding, staff and stakeholder morale, better ways of dealing with external challenges, etc…) What is your organization best positioned to do to help others?
• Find and nurture your collaborators and allies – Disruptive times are not a time to go it alone. If you have good partner relationships, strengthen them.  Look for new collaborators where you may need help.
• Consider diverse time frames – Focus on the short-term as you need to but don’t neglect organizational change that will strengthen you going forward. Disruption can also present opportunities.
• Keep your organizational values – Disruptive times challenge our values, pressuring us to go in directions that may not be the ones that will preserve organizational integrity. Have the uncomfortable conversations and recommit to who you are as an organization.
• Understand the impacts of disruption on mental well being – Although external disruptions will impact some more than others, it creates stress for all of us which we inevitably bring into our work world. This makes it especially important for leaders to recognize this and provide staff with the flexibility that is needed to protect their well being.

Here are some ideas for being a more adaptable organization going forward:

• Nurture a culture that encourages on-going learning and adaptation and embraces change. This calls for intentionally allocating time for reflection and discussion, not just ‘doing’. You might want to analyze what your current culture is and perhaps co-create with your team what you would like your culture to be in order to be more adaptable.
• Allocate some regular leadership time (at board and staff meetings) to discuss changes in the external and internal environment that may be impacting the organization and/or specific goals you have.
• Leaders/managers need to provide their team members with time to reflect and learn so that this is part of their performance goals – a ‘must do’ activity, not just one that falls by the wayside when the day to day is business is too demanding (for isn’t that always the case?!)
• Make space for what may be uncomfortable but are necessary conversations. This may include developing your leadership’s comfort and skills in leading/facilitating challenging conversations.  Be open about discussing failure so you can learn from it.  When team members share their failures, be encouraging so others will feel comfortable doing the same and learning can be shared.
• Change can seem overwhelming especially if it is in a very different direction than you have been used to going, so don’t try to do too much at once. Focus on changes that the team can get behind and initially on the easier ‘wins’.
• Create some structure (even a simple one) that keeps people on a strategic learning path (and not falling back on old habits).  Empower everyone to hold each other accountable.
• And as with any change process, celebrate your successes! It will keep up your team’s morale and provide momentum for further learning and adaptations.

Some learning from the covid pandemic

For almost three decades! I have been writing about engaging internationally. There was a group of NGOs that were already operating internationally in the mid-1990’s (when this story starts :) but in the NGO world there was a burst of new energy to engage more internationally, much of it fueled by the ability to connect virtually before or after an in person visit. And for many professional societies (with primarily domestic members), international engagement was still fairly new for their organizations and happening in an ad hoc way, rather than strategically.

I believe change is incredibly important (it’s one of the reasons I like working with younger generations and in multigenerational efforts) but I also believe we have a tendency to recreate the wheel more often than we need to. This can steer our energies away from building on the foundation of what has worked in the past, to starting anew each time. With that in mind, here is some of what I (and other colleagues) have learned about what has changed and what (good) has remained constant about engaging internationally, pulling from writings over the past 30 years. Building on strong foundations can help us put our energy and resources into creatively customizing what the rest of the structure will look like.

For organizations/associations/networks engaging internationally:

I. Some Constants

The question of ‘why’ you want to engage internationally and the value you will bring to your stakeholders should always be central.

“Have clear reasons for why you are considering international engagement. What goals are you trying to achieve? Is international expansion the best way to do so? Who else is doing what you want to do that you might be able to partner with? Are there other ways to achieve the impact you are looking for?” ~ Bonnie Koenig, International Engagement for Impact in a Changing World, 2015

“An association [NGO] considering operating [or expanding] internationally should first assess whether or not it makes sense to do so…ensuring that the expansion matches the organization’s values and that the organization’s culture is ready to adapt to the changes of operating internationally is an important part of any expansion consideration.” ~ The Association Guide to Going Global, ASAE, 2024

Commitment to organizational change.

“To effectively broaden the focus, associations [and NGOs] must change their entire approach to management by adopting a global mindset.” Associations and the Global Marketplace, Kimberly Svevo-Cianci, ASAE, 1995

“Significant change takes time and it will only succeed if there is a commitment throughout your organization or network. Otherwise directions may change every time there is a leadership or senior staff change.” ~ Bonnie Koenig, 2022

Some planning – Although efforts may start ‘ad hoc’, to be effective long-term organizations need to switch to some planning and structure at some point, discussing the what, how, and when. Are you ready? What needs to be in place to maximize success? How will you implement? Evaluate?

For your organization’s international initiatives to be most effective, they must advance its general mission, meet specific objectives and strategies, and be well integrated into the overall goals of the organization. What do you hope to accomplish? How quickly should you move ahead? ~ Bonnie Koenig, Going Global for the Greater Good, 2004

Learning from others – the concept of ‘case studies’ is a long-standing one, how can we learn from each other?

“From grassroots organizing to high-level advocacy and resource allocation, leadership in the nonprofit sector can cover a range of roles and responsibilities. As such, the teaching cases in this section intersect with many of our topics, allowing students to explore all the skills and complexities of public leadership as they pertain specifically to the world of nonprofits and NGOs”. ~ Harvard University case studies, 1999

External factors (eg geopolitical shifts, political conflicts, global health emergencies, climate change, AI), although they differ, will always be important factors to consider.

Organizations that are engaging internationally need to anticipate, assess, and respond to a continuously changing world. Reviewing past trends can provide some clues to the future. And what are some of the emerging trends you might want to anticipate? ~ Bonnie Koenig, Going Global for the Greater Good, 2004

II. Some of What has changed

Balancing planning with agility to deal with external factors – timeframes for plans have become shorter to take this into consideration.

“[When] we are in uncharted waters, leaders must take decisive action to ensure their organizations are resilient.” ~ Deloitte Consulting Scenario Planning, 2020

From in-person to online communications, convenings and service offerings. (How to determine when to meet in-person, virtual or hybrid?) The 2020-2022 world wide pandemic period accelerated this movement.

“I am convinced that going forward we will be organizing more online meetings as well as those that integrate both online and offline attendees. Even though, as humans, we will still want to gather and meet each other in-person (and will periodically continue to do so), there are many advantages to incorporating virtual or hybrid meetings into our repertoire. They include: 1) Being able to include more people in the conversation; 2) Decreasing travel costs; and 3) Decreasing our carbon footprint.” ~ Tips for Hybrid Meetings, Bonnie Koenig, 2015

Redefining partnerships – partnerships are not new, and will continue to be an important way in which organizations can accomplish their goals, but how we partner has changed.

Based on feedback from our country partners, we think international NGOs can continue to add value. But this will require unlearning some of the old ways of operating, developing a better understanding of how local systems and regional contexts operate and taking on new roles and new ways of thinking. It will also require an adaptive learning mindset in which new models and approaches are tested, evaluated and adjusted — and sometimes jettisoned. ~ Gina Lagomarsino, Results4Dev 2018

Equity and power considerations – although talked about over the years, equity and power considerations have come to the forefront, especially in how global south and global north practitioners interact.

#ShiftThePower is a mobilizing force and movement of people and organisations around the world that seeks to highlight, harness, resource, legitimize and join up new ways of “deciding and doing” that are emerging around the world. Shift the Power, 2019

Learning from our mistakes and sharing them with others – as noted above, case studies are not new, but traditionally they focused on successes, leading to the fallacy that ‘success’ would often come more easily and quickly than it actually does. Over time we have gotten better at sharing and learning from tests, mistakes, failures and adaptation

It is painful for civil society organizations to acknowledge when we don’t meet our goals and objectives; it is just as painful to worry about how funders will react to such failure. The paradox is that we do everything we can to avoid these pains even though we all know failure is the best teacher and we have to be open and talk about our failures in order to learn.~ Admitting Failure ~2012

Skills needed – There is a growing set of skills that are needed to be successful in working internationally. Although basics like communication and organizational skills are on-going ‘staples’, skills like cultural competency, the ability to be a good, active listener, facilitating diverse groups, and being willing to ‘sit with discomfort’ have all increased in value.

“As a former executive director and now facilitating peer cohorts of executive directors, I’ve been thinking about what’s changed in leadership approaches over the years, what stays consistent and what resources can provide us ‘food for thought’ or practical ideas to try. The importance of some qualities such as ‘Respect for others’ and ‘Humility’ are fundamental. Other additional approaches [such as agility, empathy and comfort with discomfort] have been added.” ~ Leadership, Bonnie Koenig, 2024

 

Selected bibliography

Associations and the Global Marketplace, Kimberly Svevo-Cianci, ASAE, 1995

Going Global for the Greater Good , Bonnie Koenig, 2004

Back to the Future blog, Bonnie Koenig, 2011 https://www.goinginternational.com/2011/12/08/back-to-the-future/

International Engagement for Impact in a Changing World e-book, Bonnie Koenig, 2015

Leadership blog, https://www.goinginternational.com/2024/04/24/leadership/, Bonnie Koenig, 2024

The Truths that Remain blog, https://www.goinginternational.com/2022/05/02/the-truths-that-remain/, Bonnie Koenig, 2022

The Association Guide to Going Global, ASAE, 2024