Don’t be a leader. Be a builder.

I had a meeting with my business mentor, Behram Atashband, last week. In the meeting, he talked with me and my business partner about hiring more people into our business. And he said, don’t be a leader. Be a builder.

Coincidentally, Umair Haque recently wrote on 3 tips he’d give mid to late twenties people at the Harvard Business Review.

His three tips were:
Cultivate (your better self). (The self that has with a moral compass, an ethical core, a cosmopolitan sensibility, and a long view born of historicism.)

Forgive (and fail). (When you fail, and fail big — forgive. Forgive the people around you. Forgive yourself. Examine the past, but don’t let it imprison you. Gently remember that mistakes aren’t the end of the world, but the beginning of wisdom.)

Create (something dangerous). (Pursue your passion unrelentingly, with a vengeance, to the max and then beyond. Create something: don’t just be an “employee,” a “manager,” or any other kind of mere mechanic of the present.

Be a builder, a creator, an architect of the future.

It doesn’t matter whether it’s a sonata, a book, a startup, a financial instrument, or a new genre of hairstyles — bring into being something not just fundamentally new, but irrepressibly dangerous to the tired, plodding powers that be.)

We who work at or for nonprofits are uniquely poised to realize all of these.

• When we ask big questions, and think about how we can make the world better, we cultivate our better selves.

• When we build our communities to empower themselves, to sign petitions, to get out in a protest, to ask the important questions of lawmakers and elected officials, we can change the shape of our communities and start to change the shape of the world.

• When we forgive and fail (as we so often must, in the search for grants, or for community support) we learn that there’s always another proposal around the corner, always another appeal letter, always another way to help people care about our nonprofits, our charities, our causes.

My favorite one, perhaps predictably, is “Create (something dangerous).”

This blog and my book are like unexploded bombs until people read them. Then BOOM! Your life changes. Expanded by new information. Unable to shrink back to what it once was. People have literally told me that my book changed their life.

• Because I had corrupt bosses, I made this blog to expose and stamp out corruption.
• Because I was attacked for my fashion at work, I made this blog to expose the pervasiveness of gender bias.
• Because I saw people focusing too much on overhead, I made this blog to call attention to the misconceptions about nonprofits.
• Because I wanted a roadmap for “making it” in the nonprofit world, I started blogging about it, started a nonprofit job club, and started teaching and consulting with people who wanted to move up in their careers, or become consultants.
• Because I had abusive bosses, I made this blog to help people empower themselves at work, recover from a toxic workplace and had a chapter focusing on this in my book as well.

This is all dangerous information. Because this helps you understand that your life doesn’t have to be this way. But not only that. It’s a reminder that your life can be better.

But this is what I wanted to build.

I had the privilege of meeting one of my blog readers, Lisa, this past week, and even though we didn’t get to spend as much time together as I would have liked, she made me feel just a bit more happy, a bit more powerful knowing that there are people reading who want to take action, who want to build better systems.

Make something dangerous.

If I can do it, you can do it.

I wrote a book, built a blog with 21,000 monthly readers, made some apps, built another blog, and another wrote another book, started to get known for art classes, started public speaking, started teaching, and fighting against systemic oppression of women and of nonprofit workers through my work. That was what was important to me. To speak my truth. To teach others how to be better fundraisers.

To ask people to dream of a different world.

But what is important to you?

Whatever it is, be a builder. How can you build a better nonprofit? How can you make your life into something you’ll be proud to tell people about?

What have you longed to make that is lying dormant in you, waiting to be released?

Is it a nonprofit? Is it a book? Is it a national movement? Is it a series of systems to help build your volunteer army to run your fundraising office?

Build it.

Tell me in the comments, what will you build?