Two situations have recently arisen in my life and both of them seem a little “off” to me. But when I try to translate my emotional response into a logical explanation, I’m coming up empty.
So, Dopers - would either of these situations annoy you, or make you say, “that’s not ethical!” in any way? If so, why?
This June I’m going to resign from the board of an organization I’ve been heavily involved in, in a variety of key roles, since 2018. (I’m currently board co-chair, but de facto chair as the other person doesn’t do much.)
To be a bit immodest, I’ve done wonders for the place, particularly in the financial and grant-writing areas. So while people understand that I am not obligated to continue working - especially as a volunteer - for forever, they are uneasy about maintaining the momentum I’ve created without my help. That’s why I gave 6 months notice, so that they have time to adjust.
What bothers me a bit is that two key people affiliated with the organization have been pressuring me to get my husband to replace me on the board. They hardly know him personally, but they know enough about him to realize he’d be an asset. (Plus, he’d come pre-packaged with an ongoing source of advice and information in the form of his spouse.)
I can’t put my finger on why, exactly, but I feel vaguely resentful about this. Kinda like, “figure it out on your own, guys - don’t try to find a back-door way to keep me involved.” Or something. He has zero interest in being on the board of this organization.
A different organization I’m volunteering with has precarious finances, but wants to go after Congressionally Directed Spending (CDS, formerly called “earmarks”). We’ve gotten quite the marketing pitch from an organization that wants to provide consultation in the process across a range of roles, but most notably (and usefully) lobbying in DC. How, you ask, would an impoverished organization pay for this? I’m told it is being proposed that the assistance be provided on a contingency basis: they help the organization through the process, and if the money is approved (probably $1 to $3 million), they get a cut.
I’ve never been a fan of grant-writing on a contingency basis, a process that is widely considered unethical unless an organization simply has no alternative. This seems to me like the Cadillac version of that. (Not that ethics are going to be a governmental concern during the Trump administration; seems to me far more likely that there just won’t be any CDS going to blue states like Hawaii.)
I don’t see it. Just say no. “he’s not interested, sorry.”
I get your second issue though. On the other hand, if it’s good for the organization, I don’t see an ethical problem. I’m skeptical about their chances, but it could be a win-win.
The problem is that depending on what the ‘cut’ is, the organization could be paying a significant amount of the grant to this professional grant-writing service instead of best using it for (presumably philanthropic) purposes. And the organization in question is probably better suited to actually appeal for the grant based upon their detail knowledge about what they would do with the money. Presumably they are considering this because they don’t have the in-house expertise to write a grant proposal or engage in lobbying, but frankly it sounds like they need to develop this in order to have consistent funding and farming it out is just going to make them more tethered to a potentially predatory ‘partner’. In general, professional lobbying agencies tend to regard basic ethics as guidelines to not be caught violating rather than rules for how decent people should make decisions.
The former case is clear cut: They do not want you to quit and are attempting to guilt you into continuing by all of them rolling over and playing uselessly dead. In effect they’re holding a gun to the organization’s head and saying “We will shoot it / ourselves unless you stay on to save us. Only you can save us Carol; only you!!1”
Screw that. I’d walk away that very day in response to that weak shit. And make sure 100% of the volunteers and management know exactly why.
IMO it’s just another tactic for beltway bandits to stick their suction nozzle into the federal trough. Eventually, a bit like SSDI appeal lawyers, they make themselves an indispensable part of the system, where the only way to get a grant is to pay 1/3rd of it as “protection” to a grant-expediting organization.
FWIW back when I was in IT we dealt mostly with state & local government procurement, but dabbled in Federal to no good effect. The fact we did not use a Federal procurement expediter company to shepherd our proposals through probably had a lot to do with our lack of success. Procurement is not granting, but the functional dynamics are similar.
Unrelated to the above …
My own take is substantially 100% of Federal grants for any topic will stop soon if they have not already. Anyone depending on any grant for anything is about to be unemployed.
Since my wife retired she’s been volunteering for a number of organizations, and was on the Board for one, as Treasurer. That was a two-year term. She planned to leave completely after that experience, but they had so much difficulty finding anyone willing to volunteer that she stayed on another year. (And nobody else could balance a checkbook. It was that bad.)
Her comments to me over the years is that local organizations are having extreme difficulties finding any volunteers, let alone skilled or talented ones willing to put in the time. They’re all aging out. Younger volunteers are impossible to find, at least with the lack of social media skills necessary to reach them where they will hear or see.
I agree with the others that you should take yourself out of the conversation. My wife was much happier not having to deal with the disorganization and sheer lack of future vision where she volunteered.
But I sympathize with the desperation your organization is feeling. Local organizations only do good if there are a few truly talented and dedicated leaders at the top. They soon run themselves into the ground if they have no base to support them.
If your husband really has the time and talent to contribute, he should ask himself if he has the willingness. If not, he should under no circumstances put his body into the breach.
On #2, I see the opportunity that the consultants are trying to exploit. Winning grants has become a specialized art. I once had to put together a 100 page grant in five working days; it almost killed me. Yet that was 40 years ago and it’s exponentially more difficult now. Hiring a professional for a professional job is normally the intelligent move. Yet I’m always leery of consultants, especially those who contact you. Interviewing multiple firms is always better.
I hate seeing both sides of a conundrum; life’s much easier when one route is obvious. You understand the issues, though, so I have confidence that any decision you make will be a good one.
Thanks for the wisdom in all of the comments. You’re all articulating the issues very nicely.
Regarding this - yes, he is totally planning on saying “no,” because he wants to volunteer with organizations that interest him, not throw himself into topics he’s not especially engaged in. I’ve kept him in the loop, passing on the verbal and email pleas I’ve received, with the accompanying message: “totally up to you. If you think you’d want to replace me on the board, great. But don’t do it for me, because I see zero reason why you should have to.”
And I’ve directly told people/responded to emails with “It’s up to CairoSpouse, and I’ll share your request with him. But I believe he is currently engaged in/planning on [insert his actual pastimes and obligations here].”
That’s their principle motivation for the time being. I understand the resentment on your part, and their fear that they can’t do it without you. Take the fear as a compliment and forget about the rest. Your main problem now is trying all the ways you can fill the new time available to you.
It’s simply unethical. That’s why I’m sure it’s a growth industry and will probably work better than the organization writing its own grants. After all, the constitution says “to Hades with ethics when there’s a profit to be made”, doesn’t it? I’m sure it’s in there somewhere.
Why waste everyone’s time? They will continue to ask because there hasn’t been a clear answer. Your husband doesn’t want to do it. Just say no and get it over with.
Good question but no - everyone I work with there is great, but by definition, they already have a role as a staff or board member.
I think I’ve been pretty clear that the doesn’t want to do it. But, “what should I do” isn’t really my question (though of course I recognize that posting will lead to getting advice, and I’m happy to hear it). My concern is not “how should I handle this” as I don’t mind telling them he’s not interested, but “this annoys me but I can’t put my finger on the reason, would it annoy you and if it would, why?”
With regard to this, I’m not very familiar with it in the grant writing context, but you probably know that it is widely practiced in law in civil litigation. That is, a law firm representing a plaintiff will often take the case on a contingency basis and only get paid if the plaintiff wins (often taking 1/3 of the recovery). At least in the law arena, the propriety of this practice is somewhat controversial. Some people see this as beneficial, allowing otherwise impecunious plaintiffs a chance to at least bring a lawsuit they could otherwise never pay for and recover something. Others see it as contributing to our litigious society, with ambulance chasing lawyers and hungry law firms hunting for lawsuits and only then looking for a convenient plaintiff to represent.
Heh, I sure do. We (the organization in question #1) used an attorney on a contingency basis to get back the money that had essentially been stolen from us (long story, I posted about it as it was happening).
If they’ve asked more than once, or twice at the most, and didn’t get the hint then it would annoy me. If I had directly declined and they still persisted then I would go beyond mild annoyance.
Too late for @CairoCarol, but some wise advice I got when I first stepped into a management role: always know who your replacement is. And then make sure they understand at least informally exactly what you do and how you do it. This advice applies to many roles that require a lot of on-the-job experience.
That is indeed good advice. Hard to follow on a small island where human resource capacity is severely limited, but still a good idea whenever possible. That’s how I managed to get away from the Executive Director position - someone came along who could replace me, and I made sure that they eventually did.
But there’s another angle which we’ve discussed in many threads about folks approaching retirement or folks in a bad job situations about to be squeezed out by a downsize or driven out by a hostile situation. To wit:
You are not responsible for the continued success of an organization you’re leaving. It is. If the org can’t be successful without you, then a) that’s their problem, and b) you’re probably overestimating your own importance, and doing so to your own detriment no matter how good it feels.
In the OP’s case 1 this is simply lazy or incapable volunteers laying a guilt trip on her. The OP is right to feel that this is “off”, and IMO would be more right to be visibly annoyed / actively hostile about this sleazy underhanded attempt to manipulate her (& hubby) via guilt.