engage     collaborate     exchange    transform   

NELI Curriculum

The Executive Leadership Certificate is designed to meet the needs of nonprofit and public sector leaders working in human service agencies. The integrated NELI curriculum challenges both seasoned and new leaders to advance their skills and put the information learned into immediate practice. The NELI curriculum features three major components that ensure personal and professional growth.

• Individual 360 degree leadership assessment, executive coaching, and intersession assignments.
• Advanced seminars combining theoretical, experiential, and practical lessons.
• Peer learning communities to support and advance one’s learning and experiences.

Curriculum Overview

Change is constant and complex in both the nonprofit and public sectors. Leaders in these areas must be efficient, effective and entrepreneurial while being accountable to the populations they serve, the public, funders and individuals that donate time and money.  The Nonprofit Executive Leadership Institute (NELI) offers an interactive learning environment designed to deeply engage participants in discussions of their unique leadership challenges.  The Executive Leadership Certificate program offers opportunities to learn new theories and techniques to meet those challenges.  The NELI curriculum unfolds over time allowing Fellows to integrate and test out new techniques and discuss the results with their peers.  NELI Fellows transform themselves and their organizations.   

The NELI Program

The NELI curriculum uses a rich mix of teaching methods, with special attention to creating an interactive environment that promotes dialogue among Fellows and between Fellows and NELI faculty. The seminars are reinforced by assignments, intersession projects and networking among NELI Fellows. This content is provided against the backdrop of the self and peer-assessment data that enables Fellows to deepen their appreciation of their personal strengths and challenges and to integrate these insights with the knowledge and practical techniques gleaned from the seminars. Ultimately, the hallmark of the NELI Program is its focus on multi-level learning through integration of individual assessment, practical knowledge, challenging case studies, assignments to apply new insights, intersession communication among Fellows and NELI Program coaches, and peer learning strategies that promote shared understanding of all materials and the creation of longstanding collegial relationships.

The quarterly intensive sessions are scheduled throughout one year focusing on different aspects of leadership and management. Each session features experienced faculty and individual and collaborative work that supports the curriculum.  In addition, the fact that the NELI program unfolds over time allows leaders to develop and hone skills and competencies.

Upon successful completion of the NELI program, graduates receive a Certificate in Executive Leadership from the Bryn Mawr College Graduate School of Social Work and Social Research (GSSWSR), and join a vibrant and growing alumni community dedicated to professional development and networking.

NELI KEYNOTE ADDRESS

 Each year a nationally recognized speaker addresses the NELI Fellows and their mentors as well as NELI alumni and members of the College community. Past keynote speakers are:

• 2008: Ruth McCambridge, Editor in Chief, Nonprofit Quarterly
• 2007: Robert L.E. Egger, President and CEO, DC Central Kitchens and Co-Convener, The Nonprofit Congress
• 2006: Paul Light, PhD, Professor of Public Service at New York University’s Wagner School and founding principal investigator of the Organizational Performance Initiative
• 2005: Tom Gilmore, Vice President, Center for Applied Research (CFAR), and founder ISPSO (International Society for the Psychoanalytic Study of Organizations).

NELI SEMINARS

Session I

Campaign Model for Change. The latest management theories accept the fact that organizations and the workforce are increasingly complex, chaotic and always in the process of change. Fellows use the focused approach of the “campaign”—including politics and advertising-- to create organizational change. They learn where to look to find the energy and momentum within their agencies to achieve their goals. Additionally, NELI Fellows learn how to apply these theories to their action projects --projects they bring to NELI and work on during the program.

Leadership and Management Differences. There is no one way to lead. NELI Fellows are introduced to theoretical and practical differences between leadership and management and how they can be applied strategically in their organizations.  Relevant topics such as Emotional Intelligence and different leadership styles will be discussed.

Networks and Social Capital. Our relationships or networks represent our richest resource. In this session, NELI Fellows learn to take advantage of the networking opportunities in their lives, and to develop these connections into matrices to further professional goals. By exploring theories about networking and social capital, along with relevant case studies, Fellows will learn about the benefits of networking and discuss how they can immediately apply these lessons to their experiences as NELI Fellows.

Enhancing Financial Capabilities. This seminar takes Fellows beyond a passive understanding to prepare them to work confidently and strategically with auditors, boards, staff, donors, in grasping the financial realities, recognizing the ratios that count, and installing controls that are the state of the art.

SESSION II — Leadership and Management, Organizational Structure and Dynamics

Organization Structure and Dynamics: Tops, Middles and Bottoms. Organizational structure can impede or propel the performance of agencies. How does a leader assess the organization in which s/he exists? This experiential seminar will place NELI Fellows in different roles that will challenge their knowledge about hierarchy, introduce new paradigms, theories and techniques that honor diversity and inclusion and lay out a new way to look at organizations and their potential for change.

Conflict Resolution and Managing the Difficult to Manage. Conflicts within the organization, with the board, funders and others in the external world are a constant. Leaders learn how to manage conflict effectively and be agile in their responses. In addition, Fellows experiment with how to turn conflict to an advantage when possible, and when necessary, how to mediate successfully.

Leading and Developing Staff. A highly functioning staff is critical to an organization’s success.  Fellows explore ways to recruit great talent, inspire high performance through coaching and recognition, and approach supervision and management as opportunities to help others succeed.  Some attention will be given to the challenges of managing people.  Ideas from Resonant Leadership will form the basis of a discussion of what makes a great leader.  

SESSION III —The Interplay of Internal and External Relations

Strategic Thinking for Leaders. While it is fairly common for nonprofit organizations to engage in strategic planning, it is less common for their leaders to look more deeply into the assumptions and premises for the services they provide and for how those services are provided.  Using cases from NELI participants and published articles, this seminar offers a framework and skills to support this approach to thinking about organizations.    The goal is to align each organization’s practices with the needs programs are intended to meet.

Organizational Cultural Competency. It is essential for nonprofit and public sector leaders to work effectively with peers, board members, employees, clients and volunteers of different races, ethnicities, genders and sexual orientations. Examinations of effective leadership strategies that foster good working relationships and manage identity-based conflicts are covered and application to each Fellow’s organization is analyzed.

Measuring Organization Effectiveness and Performance. It has become increasingly important in the nonprofit sector for leaders to step back and evaluate organizational performance.  Fellows assess their own organization’s internal processes for diagnosing performance issues and identify high risk and problem prone areas.  During this session, Fellows develop a plan to improve operational processes to measure organizational effectiveness to address the increasing demands for accountability and performance expectations.

Advanced Advocacy.
Nonprofit and public sector leaders must garner support for their organizations and their missions from a variety of constituents including clients, donors, political leaders, allies and competitors.  Fellows learn how to tailor each approach to increase their effectiveness while staying grounded in their organization’s values.

SESSION IV — Governance and Board Issues; Circling Back and Moving Forward

Legal Nuances for Leadership. A glance at the newspaper reveals a much more threatening legal terrain for the non-profit and public sector leaders to tread. Avoiding legal problems must be the first goal for any executive, but addressing them both within and beyond individual constituencies will be broached in this section, as the NELI Fellows learn where the quicksand lies and how to skirt it.

Board Governance and Best Practices.  In an increasingly competitive environment with heightened expectations for accountability by funders in particular and the public in general, nonprofit organizations must have a highly engaged Board of Directors to effectively and responsibly carry out their governance function. By examining the responsibilities of boards within the context of today’s challenging environment, special attention will be placed on the role of the leader in developing a vital and productive board of directors.

The Next Stage of Development: Accomplishments and Post-Institute Planning

In this session we discuss the accomplishments, discoveries and work remaining to be completed.  Each Fellow delivers a speech that reports on the activities of his or her Action Project.  Personal Development plans are reviewed and strategies are developed for staying connected within the NELI Alumni network.