Hi everyone, sorry this post is a day late (my laptop updated at the most inconvenient time last night and took hours). Before we get to this week’s topic, quick announcement. BEER, which stands for Beverage to Enhance Equity in Relationships, took a break last year, but is now back on this year. It is a time for foundation staff and trustees and nonprofit staff and board members to get together in their cities and just hang out and see one another as human beings. It usually happens around the Summer Solstice, so this year it’ll be around June 17th or 18th. Of course, grabbing some fries or ice cream together preferably outdoor or virtually is by no means a substitute for meaningful change in philanthropy, but it’s a start.

The pandemic has challenged the dominant ways of thinking about place, space, and time in our personal and professional spheres as well as across the communities nonprofits serve.
At the 2021 Washington State Nonprofit Conference we are excited to explore concepts of place, space, and time – inviting in different perspectives, uplifting innovative and adaptive stories from the field, and pushing our collective thinking and creativity.

Once upon a time, you would ask a person what they did for a living and they would likely tell you they were in sales. Or marketing. Or accounting. Or technology. Or one of several other common, easily-identifiable career categories.
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These days?  Well, thanks to the increased “consumerization” of the labor market and the resulting hyper-specialization of most job functions, it is hard to find people who fit these generalized career boxes any longer.  And if they do — or more importantly if YOU do — it might be time to rethink your career brand and update how you are marketing yourself, professionally.  As author Penelope Trunk remarked all the way back in 2007,  “being a generalist means being good at nothing and headed for long-term unemployment.  Generalist is the label for a career that will die.”