Ecology is the study of the relationships of organisms to each other and to their environment.  And what is more about relationships than collaborative non-profits?  The fact that we all work in the natural resource field only makes the comparison of our non-profit ecosystem to the natural one more apt.  So, in the spirit of non-profit ecology*, here are 8 lessons the natural world can teach us about leadership.

1.  Hierarchy doesn’t equal leadership.  Just because you are the oldest wolf (or the E.D) in the pack, it doesn’t make you the automatic leader.  Respect your team and they will respect you.  Remember, leadership is something you can improve. 
2. Old wolves have seen more scat than you have – so pay attention when they try to tell you something.
3. Fly in a V – common goals and shared vision matter.  Birds flying in a V-formation can go further together than they can go alone.  They are a team, headed in the same direction and they leave and arrive together.  The birds support each other and so should your team.  As the guy in front tires, another takes his or her place.   
4. Every bird counts – value your team.  Every bird (or Board Member) should know they matter to the destination, because they do.
5. Succession is important.  No organization should be one charismatic leader away from failure.  Each bird in the V steps up when needed.  Every bird is prepared to contribute to the mission. 
6. Don’t get too far out front or the pack will turn on you.  Sometimes, change is slow… and you can only go as fast as the slowest member of your team.
7. Employ tenacious creativity (phrase from Leading at the Edge – Leadership lessons from the Extraordinary saga of Shakleton’s Antarctic Expedition).  What creature is more tenaciously creative than ants?  Those can find their way into anything and then COMMUNICATE that information CLEARLY to others.  Be industrious, be tenacious, and be creative.  Be an ant.
8. Feed your pack – both literally and figuratively.  Starving animals are a little unpredictable.  In a literal sense, provide food at meetings because there is something calming and bonding about sharing a bite to eat.  Figuratively, think about the ants and birds.  Ants form those industrious little trails searching for food.  Birds band together to migrate to where they will have better food and shelter.  Both species are seeking nourishment and, in a more general sense, survival.  Your team members are seeking nourishment too – that is why they volunteer.  It may be personal satisfaction, it may be sense of accomplishment, real change on the ground, or something entirely different – their reasons will differ.  But you, as a leader, can figure out what they are seeking (ask them!) and provide it.  Show the Board the impact of their actions.  Feed them, because if you don’t – they will find an organization that will.  Or they will eat you. 

* “Non-profit ecology” is a completely made-up term designed to provide a cool (or at least intellectual-sounding) framework for the ramblings of the author, Annie Schmidt, Director of the Chumstick Wildfire Stewardship Coalition.

Symbiosis literally means “together life.”  But there are lots of ways to live together.  In the spectrum of symbiotic relationships, some are win-win (mutualism) and some are win-lose (parasitism).  Here are a few fun symbiotic examples (from the win-win end of the scale):

1. Lichen.  Lichen is a composite of algae and fungi.  Fungi provide the conditions for life and the necessary growing environment (shelter, moisture) and alga photosynthesize, providing food for the fungi. 
2. The hermit crab and the sea anemone.  The hermit crab and the sea anemone live together to protect each other from predators and have access to nutrients.  The sea anemone perches on the outside of the hermit crabs shell, providing protection, while the hermit crab provides valuable nutrients to the anemone.   
3. The ostrich and the zebra.  Ostriches have poor hearing and zebras have poor eyesight.  So they hang out together to warn each other of approaching predators.  Symbiosis through communication keeps them both safe.

So what is more symbiotic than fiscal sponsorship?  One organization accepts and manages funds for another.  Generally, the sponsoring organization is compensated with a percentage of grant revenue (in our case, around 10%).  It sounds simple and is clearly a win-win, right?  Not so fast…

When a sponsoring organization accepts funds, they also accept legal and financial responsibilities for the sponsored program.  That part of the deal is often overlooked.  Fiscally sponsored organizations or programs connected to a fiscal sponsor for the sake of grant eligibility or 501 (c) (3) status, without quality interaction with their hosts, place everyone at risk.  Instead of a quality symbiotic relationship, the fiscal sponsor and sponsoree merely coexist.  It would be like the sea anemone and the hermit crab standing next to each other and unattached.  As long as nobody moves, everyone is safe.  As soon as there is action, you have a situation where someone is likely to get eaten!

At its best, symbiosis is mutualistic and provides benefits to both organisms (or, in the non-profit world, organizations). At its worst, well, symbiosis is parasitic.  A parasite feeds at the expense of the host until the host is harmed.  Think Giardia.  Or roundworm.  Or the movie “Alien .”  When parasitism is bad, it is really bad. 

Now don’t misunderstand where this analogy is going; not all sponsored programs are parasites that will suck the blood out of a host.  And not all fiscal sponsors will leech so much time/money/energy from a sponsored program that the sponsoree is harmed.   My point is only that symbiosis (and fiscal sponsorship) can become parasitic.

This year, the Chumstick Wildfire Stewardship Coalition has been talking about sustainability, carrying capacity, evolution, and growth.  We have also been talking about fiscal sponsorship.  As a fiscally sponsored organization, partnership with our sponsor is critical.  Recent upheavals inside of our current sponsor as well as our growth have affected our relationship at a fundamental level.  It has forced us to examine our options: stay with our current sponsor, find a new sponsor, or become our own 501 (c) (3). 

As we examined our options for fiscal sponsorship, a few lessons emerged from the ecological world:   

1. Attach like the sea anemone.  Don’t just stand next to each other.  Attach (with a written agreement) and move together (by participating in each others’ financial and legal decision making process).  No one wants to get eaten.
2. Communicate like the ostrich and zebra.  Participate in the relationship.  Talk to each other often and pay attention to your shared environment.  Share your strengths and compensate for each others’ weaknesses.  Communication is in everyone’s best interest.
3. Grow together like lichen.  Think about our lichen: as the alga grows, the fungus grows to enclose it.  As programs grow, the fiscal sponsor should grow.  Grow together, so nobody is left without shelter or food.
4. Don’t be a parasite, part 1:  Be healthy and demand health.   When looking for a fiscal sponsor, or considering a potential program for sponsorship, make sure you are both healthy.  Parasites love weakness.  Is the sponsor sustainable?  How long have they been in business?  Have they ever hosted another program?  Do they have processes in place for communication and decision making?  Does the potential program make sense?  Is the potential program capable of completing its objectives without financial or program support from the sponsor?
5. Don’t be a parasite, part 2: Be picky.  Parasites are opportunists.  Don’t just take the first warm body filled with blood that comes along.  Look for a sponsor or program that is a good fit for you.
6. Keep examining your relationship. In the case of some mycorrhizae, which grow inside tree roots, they are occasionally completely absorbed.  The tree allows the mycorrhizae to exist for a time, while the mycorrhizae provide minerals to the tree and the tree provides carbohydrates to the mycorrhizae.  Sometimes though, the tree absorbs the minerals AND the mycorrhizae.   No more sponsored program, just the sponsoring organization.  Relationships that start out as mutually beneficial can change to parasitism… or worse. Don’t be afraid to communicate if you are starting to feel uncomfortable.
7. Sometimes it is time to move on.   Remember our friend the hermit crab?  Its relationship with the sea anemone is not the only symbiotic thing it has going.  Hermit crabs live in discarded shells from other organisms.   As the hermit crab grows, it occasionally needs to discard the old shell and find a bigger one.  Sometimes as non-profits grow, they need to move on from the shelter provided by a fiscal sponsor and pursue shelter as their own 501 (c) (3). 

So what is the Chumstick Wildfire Stewardship going to do?  We are still determining that!  However, regardless of our ultimate choice (old fiscal sponsor, new fiscal sponsor, own 501 (c) (3)), we are committed to avoiding the pitfalls of parasitism!

Author’s Note:  There are lots of great fiscal sponsorship resources available.  The NFF has posted some of them here.  To learn more about symbiosis and parasites, check out these links:

1. http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/symbiosis
2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Symbiosis
3. http://www.cals.ncsu.edu/course/ent591k/symbiosis.html
4. http://www.cbsnews.com/2300-204_162-10003942.html (10 Most Terrifying Parasites Ever)
5. http://www.cosmosmagazine.com/news/3929/the-best-examples-symbiosis-nature?page=0%2C0

Annie Schmidt is the Director of the Chumstick Wildfire Stewardship Coalition.  Non-profit ecology is a passion of hers, though she finds parasites extraordinarily creepy.

Sustainability is a hot topic in non-profit and resource management… and more or less the Holy Grail.   I talk about it, think about it, read about it, and even write plans that work to attain it.  During grant cycles I have been known to dream about it!  As the Director of the Chumstick Wildfire Stewardship Coalition, getting our non-profit to sustainability is integral to the successful advancement of our mission.   Sustainability means not just surviving but thriving until our work is done.  Sustainability means supporting ourselves with available resources.  Sustainability means living within our means.  Sustainability means shifting our cultural mindset:  fuel reduction is never “done” – it’s a fact of life in the fire-adapted West. 

In the natural world, discussions of sustainability go hand in hand with discussions of carrying capacity.  Carrying capacity is the population the environment can sustain with its available resources.  Helmut K. Anheiher, in Non-Profit Organizations: Theory, Management and Policy makes the link between carrying capacity and non-profit management.  He defines environmental carrying capacity as “the number of organizations that can be supported by the social, economic, and political conditions, given available resources.”   Friends in the non-profit world and I joke that the recent economic recession is really just non-profit population control.  Not necessarily funny when you have to live the reality, but it is a good illustration of how available resources can impact growth. 

As the Chumstick Wildfire Stewardship Coalition continues its ongoing conversations about strategic planning and our future growth, carrying capacity has come up, but not in the way you might think.  When it comes to collaborative efforts, any discussion of sustainability must include a discussion of the carrying capacity of our partners. Building trust, working together in pursuit of mutual goals, seeking common ground… all of these things take time and effort.   The Chumstick has been successful in part because our partners continue to invest time in our mission and our relationship.  How many similar efforts can they reasonably be expected to participate in?  What scale is most effective for collaborative groups?  Our small scale and tremendous landowner participation have been major assets, but are efforts like ours replicable on the same District or Forest?  In short, is there a collaborative carrying capacity and will our future plans exceed it?

Those are questions we can’t answer right now.  But, with a little luck… and the successful return of our very first survey… we will be close to answers soon!  The Chumstick Wildfire Stewardship Coalition has developed a short questionnaire designed to shed light on the carrying capacity of our partners, as well as their perceptions regarding collaborative effectiveness.  In order to plan our future, we have to take our environment, including the capacity of that environment, into account.  Gathering data from our partners is a good step.  Understanding what our environment can support will help us as we move toward a sustainable future.  Sustainability may be the Holy Grail, but it doesn’t have to be a blind quest. 

Annie Schmidt is the Director of extremely charismatic Chumstick Wildfire Stewardship Coalition. 

Originally published on Conservation Connect, the blog of the National Forest Foundation!

*****

As I was presenting a joint fundraising opportunity to our local Rotary club the parallels between endangered species and non-profit organizations suddenly became clear.

A Rotarian asked me how I thought a group like the Chumstick Wildfire Stewardship Coalition (CWSC) would fare raising funds side by side with our local community cupboard.  Then he asked about how we could compete alongside an organization providing medical treatment in third-world countries.  Without missing a beat, I replied that while we weren’t a charismatic mega-charity, we had a niche of our own. 

And then I went home and started to think.

There isn’t a non-profit Executive Director or Board around that will tell you times are easy.  Foundation funding is tight and getting tighter as a result of the economy and, to certain extent, we are all in competition for the same limited resources.  Many non-profits are struggling just to survive.  You might call them threatened.  Perhaps even endangered. 

The CWSC is a collaborative focused on forest health and fire resiliency; our before and after pictures show healthy forests instead of smiling kids.   In the comparison the Rotary chair was making, we are Spalding’s Catchfly, the community cupboard is a Grizzly Bear, and the medical charity is a Bald Eagle.   I am guessing you have all heard of the Grizzly Bear and Bald Eagle.  Unless you are a western botanist, you probably thought Spalding’s Catchfly had wings! 

In the race to survive, species that are big, fluffy and adorable have a set of competitive advantages.  The have name recognition, they are further up the food chain, and they appeal to society in a way the Spalding’s Catchfly doesn’t.  But does that make the Spalding’s Catchfly less valuable or less important?  The answer, I believe, is an unequivocal “NO!”   Just like the Spalding’s Catchfly, my organization plays a role in its ecosystem. The Chumstick Wildfire Stewardship Coalition has a niche.  Knowing that niche, as well as the other “species” that surround it, is incredibly important to ensuring our survival.  Knowing the competition doesn’t hurt either; it is always good to know who looks at you and thinks “food.”

Every federally listed species has a recovery plan.  The US Fish and Wildlife Service defines “recovery” as “the process by which the decline of an endangered or threatened species is arrested or reversed and threats neutralized so that its survival in the wild can be ensured.”  Non-profits need recovery plans too.  We need to analyze our threats and develop strategies to ensure our survival.  The Chumstick Wildfire Stewardship Coalition recently took the first step in this process and completed a Financial Plan which identifies our current financial challenges and opportunities.   Have we ensured our survival?  Not yet, but we are starting to think about what survival means and how to get there.

Non-profits in this economy must know their niche and develop a recovery plan, but they must also adapt.  When resources dwindle, species that survive find a way to make do by changing.   It occurs to me that change is as difficult in the wild as it is for non-profits!  So, my question to the other Spalding’s Catchflies out there is: “how has your organization adapted to survive?”  Just as we learn from the natural world, we should learn from each other.

Annie Schmidt is the Director of the (extremely charismatic micro-charity) Chumstick Wildfire Stewardship Coalition.

Spalding’s Catchfly (Silene Spaldingii) is a federally threatened perennial herb native to the western states.  It does not have wings.