Your Role, Your Passion

Perhaps you have accepted an invitation to sit on a community board or participate in a committee. Perhaps you and your friends want to crank up a new society. Perhaps a valued organization seems to be failing and you feel the need to contribute to its revival.

Because you care passionately that the world will be a poorer place without this society or organization, you now have a responsibility. Since you are the one who may soon see a worthwhile course of action, you are the agent of change.

Does the word passionately ring true for you? The simple act of reading this e-book tells me you have a passion to convince people to behave differently.

The first ingredient in this recipe is your passion. You may have been recruited because your friends are involved and you have a skill that the group can use. If this is the situation, your interest will continue as long as the issues before the organization concern your special expertise. However, you won’t be happy and a full participant unless you care passionately about whatever it is that the organization is trying to achieve.

Look ahead to the section on Mission & Vision to determine if you or your friends are more interested in “doing things” or “applying my skills” than in what the organization is supposed to be achieving. The distinction between what you do and what the organization achieves is worth grasping before you proceed. When you have convinced yourself that your organization is providing a benefit that has value far beyond the cost (in money, people, time and resources), then you have the inspiration to make that happen.

Your organization is about providing some benefit or change in your community. Even if your friends and the leadership have not properly explored that concept, you need to know about it. Whether or not it is clearly articulated by the organization, you need to be able to articulate it for yourself. Now let me ask you, is that benefit (or change) worth all of the effort and other resources that you and your colleagues will contribute to produce the benefit? I hope you said, “Certainly!” If so, then I have no concern about your passion.

If your group is about like-minded people gathering because of a hobby or common interest, your response might have been a more thoughtful, “I feel that it is worth it.” That may imply passion.

If you are just starting out, you may wish to pull together volunteers, expect to raise money, and ultimately have an impact on your community. You may or may not plan to have paid staff.

The most powerful resource available to you is people. With enough people supporting your cause, nearly anything is possible. Most likely you want some money or have access to the things that money can buy. It is always easier to raise money if first you have a large army of support. If you are clear about the value of your project, and it provides the inspiration for enough people to participate with you, then finding the other resources you need is far easier.

Most of what follows has to do with the job of raising that army of support for your cause. There are some short sections on the important concepts of fundraising, but there are many other fine books on that subject.

If you are passionate about working to provide your community with a benefit—and with this book you decide that you have the capacity to achieve that benefit—you are about to make a powerful decision. Are you going to commit to producing that benefit? I hope you, and all the people who will join with you, will.