Managing and Leading Nonprofit Organizations

10Leadership Strategies for Effective Teams

Your success as a nonprofit leader and manager depends on several factors. As we discussed in earlier chapters, you need to develop your leadership practice, build a leadership toolbox, and utilize strategies that will help ensure that your organization's culture is strong. You will also want to help build a generative leadership practice across the organization in which individual employees are afforded the capacity to engage in leadership behavior within their role. Employee engagement also serves to build success, and the systems you use must help weave all these elements together.

Key is the ability to develop and support the presence of a high‐quality team within the agency. High‐quality teams are teams where individual employees have committed themselves to work together to advance the mission and vision of the organization. A high‐quality team is committed first and foremost to the agency's mission and vision, followed closely by a commitment to support each other in realizing the work of the agency. The success of your leadership will rise and fall based on the strength of your team. The stronger your team, the more effective you will be in your role as a nonprofit manager and leader. Given this, it is important to take time to explore strategies to develop and maintain a high‐quality team.

To be clear, everyone wants to have an effective team. Who can argue the importance of having a team that will go the distance, help where ...