Discovering Nonprofit Environmental Dynamics

Welcome to the bronze badge lessons on environmental context!

While “environmental context' sounds a bit technical, it’s actually a broad term that simply means understanding where our organization fits into the bigger picture. This bigger picture might include our local community, the landscape of our particular mission’s relevance to current affairs, and even our place in time. For that final reason, environmental context has a lot of connection with the concept of sustainability, and how our nonprofit will last over time.

In our bronze badge lessons on environmental context, we will spend time considering what this topic is and why it matters. We’ll take some time looking at the individual skills you can develop to improve and enhance your own abilities to connect more meaningfully with the idea of environmental context. And we’ll wrap up our bronze badge learning with a look at how this topic is a critical lever in our strategic planning processes.

In your work on this badge, you’ll begin to see the importance of environmental scanning as a natural process of your work, regardless of the position you hold.

Let’s start our learning!

*Note that a transcript of all audio is available for download on the lessons to come, as well as an audio-only version of the lessons. You can always turn on closed-captions on the video player settings above.

In this lesson, we'll jump in on an overview of what environmental context is and look at the organization's capacity for environmental context.

Be sure to download the transcript to begin building your reference library, and also feel free to use the audio-only download below for on-the-go learning.

Now that you have some basics about environmental context, let's take a look at why environmental context matters.

Remember, you can download the transcript for this video below, and can also turn closed captions on and off for your convenience.

In this lesson, we'll look at the six primary skills to draw upon to understand your nonprofit’s unique environmental context. Remember: skills can be learned, practiced, and developed over time, so if you feel that you have a little (or a lot of!) room for improvement, know that you're on the right track!

Be sure to download the transcript to begin building your reference library, and also feel free to use the audio-only download below for on-the-go learning.

In this lesson, we'll bring together our learning on what effective environmental context looks like, and how can we measure it.

Be sure to download the transcript to add to your reference library, and also feel free to use the audio-only download below for on-the-go learning.

To improve our effectiveness in any capacity area of our nonprofit, it’s helpful to measure or assess how we’re doing in that particular capacity.

One way to measure our environmental context abilities is to use the three-part planning framework we discussed in our last lesson as a measurement tool.

Remember, you can download the audio and transcript for this video below, and can also turn closed captions on and off for your convenience.

Welcome to our silver series of lessons on environmental context! In this series of courses, we’ll explore how to put your knowledge of environmental context to work. We’ll look at how to activate your own abilities to deepen your personal skills in this area, and then look at leadership practices that will help you and your nonprofit.

We’ll then explore how your nonprofit can embrace some new practices to support its work in environmental context, and look at goals that will help you and the organization improve in understanding the world in which your nonprofit operates.

Throughout our work on this capacity area, we’ll reference selected portions of the “Community Tool Box” created by Kansas University’s Center for Community Health and Development. You’ll find links to this tremendous resource in our badge resources!

Let’s get started!

*Remember that a transcript of all audio is available for download below on the lessons below, and you can always turn on closed-captions on the video settings above.

Let’s start with how to activate our environmental context abilities and go beyond the focused skill-building we talked about in our bronze lessons. We’ll look at more deeply exploring your motives for improvement, managing innovation, and understanding others.

Be sure to download the transcript to review your learning.

Now that we have a little bit of foundation in your environmental context efforts, let's think about how we can apply this to your organization.

Remember, you can download the transcript for this video below, and can also turn closed captions on and off for your convenience.

In this lesson, we'll look at how to put environmental context strategies into practice with a look at how to build and enhance it in your nonprofit.

Be sure to download the transcript to review your learning.

In our consideration of how to build up your own capacity in developing and supporting effective environmental context at your nonprofit, we’re going to consider the principles behind goal-setting.

Be sure to download the transcript to review your learning.

Setting goals to improve your nonprofit’s overall environmental context efforts looks and feels different than setting goals as an individual.

Remember, you can download the transcript for this video below, and can also turn closed captions on and off for your convenience.

Welcome to the gold series of lessons on nonprofit environmental context! In this series, we wrap up our learning with an emphasis on how you can take your own abilities to the next level in understanding the environment within which your nonprofit operates.

We’ll start with a consideration of how motivation works in relation to the challenges of collecting, analyzing, and experimenting with environmental data. We’ll then review all that we’ve learned across the entirety of our work on this topic. You’ll wrap up your learning with the development of a personal learning plan, shaping your own goals into an actionable plan that can stretch three to six months into the future.

Let's get started!

*Note that a transcript of all audio is available for download on the lessons to come, as well as an audio-only version of the lessons. You can always turn on closed-captions on the video player settings above.

In this lesson, we'll look at how motivation can be supported in building environmental context efforts in your organization.

Be sure to download the transcript to not only review your learning but also to see the research references used in this lesson.

In this lesson, we're going to discuss how we can inspire others to get personally motivated about nonprofit environmental context efforts, especially those who may be resistant.

Remember, you can download the transcript for this video below, and can also turn closed captions on and off for your convenience.

In this final teaching lesson on environmental context, we're bringing together all our learning into a capstone video on how we can grow from everything we've covered thus far!

Be sure to download the transcript to not only review your learning but also to see the research references used in this lesson.