Hello, fellow nonprofiteers. As we head into the holiday season with a collective “Oh no, not again,” reaction to the omicron variant, this is a time for reflection. It is also a time to look at each other (in person or in small boxes on a computer screen) and smile and say, “Gosh, you are a really good nonprofiteer doing really good things. Thanks for that.”
I have the great joy of being the Board President for a nonprofit here in Milwaukee called the Peace Learning Center. We are in the midst of some changes, with a new Executive, a new Program Director, and new board directors, so I asked the whole team and some guests to come together in person and start talking about the future of our organization. With thanks to Bader Philanthropies who hosted us, we had an event that marked the first time many of us had actually seen each other in person. That’s a great example of how strange our world has become.
Since we have so much change going on I thought we should start the retreat by looking at our mission statement. This is often where I start a retreat, “unpacking” the mission statement. I like people to climb inside the mission and understand what it really says – who is the target of our work, what do we want for them. This is not to change the mission, but to arrive at a shared understanding of it.
But then it hit me. I actually really do not like the term “mission statement,” and think we need to change it.
When you hear the word “mission,” what do you think of? I guess the generally accepted definition is that a “mission” is a task that a person or a group is charged with accomplishing. To me, I think of it either in a military or a religious context.
In the military sense of the word, the task is assigned to one or more fighters to accomplish something related to the “enemy.” It is safe to assume that the task, the mission, is generally not to go and play a game of darts over a beer or anything friendly like that. Usually, that task has some harm associated with it – blow up a headquarters, attack a squadron, or something like that.
The religious “mission” has very positive feelings associated with it now, representing a congregation’s outreach to help people or a community in need. But think back to the California missions, for a moment. Not nice places. The friars who established and had them built were charged by the Spanish to enslave the local Indian population and eradicate their culture and language. This involved torture and a host of cruelties ultimately reducing the population of native people in the area by close to two-thirds.
I have often quietly accused some nonprofit leaders of adopting a missionary approach to their work. I accuse them of having the best intentions but ultimately approaching their work as “I’m going to save those babies.” Which assumes that the family or community where the babies are cannot adequately take care of them.
The concept of these missions is that one person or a group has a right, nay the requirement, to do something to or for another person or group. It assumes a power dynamic of privilege and that the person or group with the mission has been charged with this task by a higher authority. Of course, there are other definitions and connotations for the word “mission,” but it begins to have too many negative ones for me, and I think it is time to change it.
None of these are what I hope for and what I admire in the nonprofit sector. Remember the famous description of us by de Toqueville? He is quoted as saying something along the lines of when Americans see someone or something in need, that there is a problem, they go about addressing it out of the goodness of their heart. “I have seen Americans making great and sincere sacrifices for the key common good…when needs be, they almost always give each other faithful support.” How do we capture that spirit of selflessness, of generosity when describing what nonprofits do?
In the meeting I had with the team, two of us came up with the same idea as replacement: “Statement of Purpose.” This implies the reason why the nonprofit exists, the intention for creating or continuing the nonprofit’s work. You may disagree, but I do not see a power dynamic in that concept. It is merely the “why we do what we do” which the mission statement is supposed to be about.
Peace Learning Center’s “purpose” is to build peace in all communities by sharing the values of nonviolent conflict resolution.
So, fellow nonprofiteers, are you with me on this? Maybe you have an even better phrase and I’d love to hear about it. In the meantime, gosh, you are a really good nonprofiteer doing really good things. Thanks for that. What is your Statement of Purpose?
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