Nonprofits have a history of advocating for social change

By Kelly Otte

The Tallahassee Democrat (FL)

In the four years I've been writing this column I have talked mostly about nonprofit management and board governance. Having high-performing volunteer and professional leadership is the difference between organizations with good ideas and those actually making impactful strides towards accomplishing their mission.

I view effective and efficient management as strategies for achieving the greater good. For me, the greater good is in working to change the way our society views issues important to me. I'm proud of my work as a nonprofit manager, but I'm more proud of my work as a social change agent.

I came to nonprofit work because I had been volunteering in battered women's shelters in Nevada and Virginia. In 1986, I was completely outraged at the lack of institutional and legal concern for women being killed by their boyfriends and husbands. My first mentor, Dr. Alice Twining, in Norfolk, Va., told me I could earn a living while working to change the way society viewed battered women and their children. Then she hired me for my first paid position in a nonprofit.

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