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Book Review: Breakthrough Thinking for Nonprofit Organizations: Creative Strategies for Extraordinary Results

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Breakthrough Thinking for Nonprofit Organizations: Creative Strategies for Extraordinary Results, by Bernard Ross & Clare Segal; Jossey-Bass/John Wiley & Sons, 2002; hardcover, 255 pages; ISBN #0-7879-5569-8

This book is based on a simple but challenging idea: "Good performance" is no longer good enough for nonprofits. In a world of increasing demands that must be met, nonprofits must set and achieve breakthrough goals. Bernard Ross and Clare Segal show nonprofit managers and board members how to transform their thinking and improve their performance to meet the needs of the people and causes they serve.

Breakthrough Thinking for Nonprofit Organizations offers a veritable "ideas toolbox" for managers who want to achieve significant and inventive change in their organizations, whether in fundraising, service delivery, or overall performance. With practical advice, exercises drawn from their successful workshops, and examples of best practices from companies such as 3M, Hallmark, and Microsoft -- as well as from the most innovative organizations in the nonprofit world -- Ross and Segal show nonprofits of every size how to tap into creativity and transform that creativity into innovation. Exploring why and how some organizations achieve extraordinary results, the authors offer the practical advice and tools that readers need to emulate those results in their own organizations.

Because methods and approaches differ depending on individuals and organizations, the book is organized so that readers can pick and choose the specific tools or techniques that work best for their own situations. The wide range of case studies includes both best practices and worst disasters, so that readers might avoid the mistakes of others and apply the principles of others' successes. The authors show how to set breakthrough goals, overcome creativity-killing mindsets, turn creativity into innovation and sustain a high-performance culture.

About the authors

Bernard Ross is a director of The Management Centre, the United Kingdom's largest nonprofit consultancy and training organization. He has worked for nonprofit management for 20 years and has tested his methods with organizations such as Greenpeace, Save the Children, the Red Cross, and others.

Clare Segal is a director of The Management Centre. She works exclusively with organizations in Europe and the United States on marketing, coaching, and communication skills.

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