Cool Little Things

...back in my days as a writing teacher, I'd say that the greatest enemy of good writing is high standards. If you know you have something Important to say, and it has to be said Just Right... you're never going to get anything done.

Obviously, I haven't written in a while, and I'm blaming this on my desire to want to write something usefully synoptic about the three presentations I've been to in close succession: Ben Cameron at Drexel, Dan Heath at the Philadelphia Theatre Company, and Andrew Zolli at the AFTA conference this past weekend. Three great speakers whose ideas all converge... but that's going to have to wait.

Until then, here's one awesome thing:

Stanford on iTunes U. [http://itunes.stanford.edu/] .

You're going to need iTunes for this, but it's a set of free recorded lectures and presentations from Stanford business school faculty, including Dan Heath's brother Chip, about nonprofit trends. Look under "Social Entrepreneurship," which is Stanford-speak for "nonprofit." I've been listening to them on my walk to work lately. Yesterday it was "Improve Your Nonprofit Operations in Less than Two Months" with Heather Carpenter and Jennifer Chien. Good advice on basic steps for new/small nonprofits, though in truth, they sound a little like Marcie & Peppermint Patty. If you listen to the Chip Heath presentation on Made to Stick, listen for the example he gives near the end of the presentation about the monastery.

...and another awesome thing: www.idealware.org --more excellent advice on software for nonprofits.