[ To effectively contend with racist, authoritarian forces, our
work must be as powerful as possible. Maurice Mitchell unpacks
problems our organizations and movements face, identifies underlying
causes and core problems, proposes concrete solutions.]
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BUILDING RESILIENT ORGANIZATIONS: TOWARD JOY AND DURABLE POWER IN A
TIME OF CRISIS  
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Maurice Mitchell
November 29, 2022
Convergence
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_ To effectively contend with racist, authoritarian forces, our work
must be as powerful as possible. Maurice Mitchell unpacks problems our
organizations and movements face, identifies underlying causes and
core problems, proposes concrete solutions. _

Nonprofit Quarterly,

 

Executives in professional social justice institutions, grassroots
activists in local movements, and fiery young radicals on protest
lines are all advancing urgent concerns about the internal workings of
progressive spaces. The themes arising are surprisingly consistent.
Many claim that our spaces are “toxic” or “problematic,” often
sharing compelling and troubling personal anecdotes as evidence of
this. People in leadership are finding their roles untenable, claiming
it is “impossible” to execute campaigns or saying they are in
organizations that are “stuck.”

A growing group of new organizers and activists are becoming cynical
or dropping out altogether. Most read their experiences as
interpersonal conflict gone awry, the exceptional dynamics of a broken
environment or a movement that’s lost its way. A “bad
supervisor,” a “toxic workplace,” a “messy movement space,”
or a “problematic person with privilege” are just some of the
refrains echoed from all corners of our movements. Individuals are
pointing fingers at other individuals; battle lines are being drawn.
Identity and position are misused to create a doom loop that can lead
to unnecessary ruptures of our political vehicles and the shuttering
of vital movement spaces.

Movements on the Left are driven by the same political and social
contradictions we strive to overcome. We fight against racism,
classism, and sexism yet battle inequity and oppression inside our
movements. Although we struggle for freedom and democracy, we also
suffer from tendencies toward abuse and domination. We promote
leadership and courage by individuals, but media exposure, social
media fame, and access to resources compromise activists. We draw from
the courage of radical traditions but often lack the strategy or
conviction to challenge the status quo. The radical demands that we do
make are so regularly disregarded that it can feel as if we are
shouting into the wind. Many of us are working harder than ever but
feeling that we have less power and impact.

There are things we can and must do to shift movements for justice
toward a powerful posture of joy and victory. Such a metamorphosis is
not inevitable, but it is essential. This essay describes the problems
our movements face, identifies underlying causes, analyzes symptoms of
the core problems, and proposes some concrete solutions to reset our
course.

Roots of the Crisis

This moment is one of multiple, overlapping crises: a global pandemic,
rising authoritarianism, climate emergency, political violence,
unprecedented economic inequality, and general precarity all
exacerbate interpersonal tension points. Like the rest of society, our
movements exist within a general climate of anxiety, despair, and
anger without the necessary support to process such massive emotions,
individually or in community. Recognizing the challenging terrain on
which we struggle and grow can allow for more compassion for our
comrades as well as clarity about the urgent mandate at hand.

Our current movement is ideologically underdeveloped and uneven.
History can help us understand why. There has been a one-sided, often
government-initiated effort to defang movements for justice: the
brutal terrorism following Reconstruction, the Red Scare following the
Bolshevik revolution in 1917, the dismantling of Pan-African
nationalist movements in the 1920s, McCarthyism in the ’50s,
COINTELPRO in the ’60s, and the war on militant Black liberation
organizations well into the early ’80s. Leaders have been jailed,
killed, or co-opted; organizations have been invaded, dismantled, or
neutralized. We have inherited this traumatic and often bloody legacy.

As a result of this rupture, over the past 50 years, many of our
leaders have prioritized hard skills and pragmatism over developing
their ideological orientation or running transformative campaigns.
Other organizations have an ideological analysis but lack the skills
to develop an effective strategy and execute a campaign in a way that
builds large bases.

Current conditions also contribute to the organizational tensions
under which we operate. These include but are not limited to:

* A crisis of institutional legitimacy after 40 years of
neoliberalism
* A reckoning with institutional power and cultural privilege shaped
by social movements like the #MeToo Movement and the Movement for
Black Lives
* The structural and ideological limitations of 501(c)3 non-profits
in terms of their subservience to funding sources and resulting
incompatibility with power building
* The expansion of corporate and billionaire power, popularization
of ethnonationalist ideologies, and election of right-wing
governments, all of which create severe economic volatility for
working class and poor people
* The occupation of leadership roles by Black people, people of
color, immigrants, women, queer and gender non-conforming people, or
people who come from non-elite backgrounds without sufficient
institutional support
* The elevation of leaders to their positions based on exceptional
oratory and organizing ability rather than management skills
* The lack of management philosophy, theory of organizational
design, or model of collective labor in both non-profits and informal
spaces

Common Trends

Here are some common tendencies that flow from the larger conditions
we find ourselves in and the fallacies underlying those tendencies.

I.         Neoliberal Identity

DEFINITION

Using one’s identity or personal experience as a justification for a
political position. You may hear someone argue, “As a working-class,
first-generation American, Southern woman…I say we have to vote
no.” What’s implied is that one’s identity is a comprehensive
validator of one’s political strategy—that identity is evidence of
some intrinsic ideological or strategic legitimacy. Marginalized
identity is deployed as a conveyor of a strategic truth that must
simply be accepted. Likewise, historically privileged identities are
essentialized, flattened, and frequently—for better or worse—
dismissed.

FALLACIES

To be clear, personal identity and individual experience are
important. And while it is true that the “personal is political,”
the personal cannot trump strategy nor should it overwhelm the
collective interest. Identity is too broad a container to predict
one’s politics or the validity of a particular position. There
are over 40 million
[[link removed]] Black
folk in the US. Some have great politics, some do not. One’s racial
or gender identity, sex, or membership in any marginalized community
is, in and of itself, insufficient information to position someone in
leadership or mandate that their perspective be adopted.

People with marginal identities, as human beings, suffer all the
frailties, inconsistencies, and failings of any other human.
Genuflecting to individuals solely based on their socialized
identities or personal stories deprives them of the conditions that
sharpen arguments, develop skills, and win debates. We infantilize
members of historically marginalized or oppressed groups by seeking to
placate or pander instead of being in a right relationship, which
requires struggle, debate, disagreement, and hard work. This type of
false solidarity is a form of charity that weakens the individual and
the collective. Finding authentic alignment and solidarity among
diverse voices is serious labor. After all, “steel sharpens
steel.”

Neoliberal identity politics strips from identity politics a focus on
collective power or a political project and demand. What’s left is a
narrow tool used as a personal cudgel or, as Barbara Smith has said
[[link removed]],
“It’s like they’ve taken the identity and left the politics on
the floor.” It should be noted that we have already seen this tactic
used against us on the Left
[[link removed]] and the
Right
[[link removed]] in
the fight for racial and economic justice. Identity in this context
reaffirms the individualistic principles of neoliberalism instead of
challenging them.

II.         Maximalism

DEFINITION

Considering anything less than the most idealistic position as a
betrayal of core values and evidence of corruption, cowardice, lack of
commitment, or vision. Relatedly, a righteous refusal to engage with
people who do not already share our views and values.

Maximalist arguments may present themselves as debates around
principles, tactics, and language or as the performance of solidarity
with individuals, identity groups, and other movements. Maximalism
demands that allies embrace certain tactics or positions as a test of
alignment.

FALLACIES

Maximalism ignores the fact that the value of any tactic  — or the
appropriateness of any demand — must be evaluated within a larger
strategy grounded in a power analysis. Sometimes tactics and demands
help build power and sometimes they don’t. Taken alone, they are not
an adequate tool to test for alignment.

The simple reason is that there are not enough people who are already
100% aligned. Our organizations and movements need to _grow_. Holding
on to tactics and overly idealistic demands that keep us small but
pure ignores the basic strategic imperative of building power. We
should of course be skeptical of those who demand too little and tell
our movements to set their sights too low. But we should not mistake
putting forward anything less than our most ambitious aspirations for
an act of cowardice. In fact, it might reflect a sober assessment of
our own power or advance a longer term strategy.

Maximalist thinking is particularly pernicious when it is used to
justify not doing the basic work of organizing: talking to lots of
different kinds of people on the doors, in their homes, and in their
workplaces. We need to meet people where they are, build
relationships, and move them into action. The work of organizing and
base building also disciplines our tactics by grounding them in the
needs and demands of our people.

Our opponents are formidable and dangerous. We must assess the power
we actually have at all times and in every circumstance so that we
don’t either leave power on the table or overreach and come up
empty. Sometimes, our assessment will reveal the need for us to build
tactical and strategic coalitions that share broad — though not
identical — goals to fight our opponents. That requires us to
sharpen our skills at debate and internal democracy so that we are in
a position to lead a united front against rising authoritarianism.
When we organize and win material change with and for our people, we
expand our base and create more power. In this way, the demands we
make tomorrow can be more ambitious than the ones we make today.

III.         Anti-Leadership Attitudes

DEFINITION

Holding skepticism of leadership as a rule. Questioning the authority,
legitimacy, and competence of those with positional, perceived, or
other forms of power. Therefore, all decisions made by leadership are
subject to broad-based skepticism and mistrust. Valuing expertise and
experience is challenged as potentially elitist. Professionalization
is cited as a problematic aspect of how leadership and power are meted
out. Anti-intellectualism is promoted as an egalitarian appreciation
of more informal forms of skill or knowledge. This is not to be
confused with a healthy skepticism of authority and leadership,
including within movement spaces.

FALLACIES

To be clear, abuse of authority, corruption, and the arbitrary
concentration of power are real problems that have gone unexamined in
years past. We should credit those people—many of them newer and
younger to the work—who are shining a light on systemic issues and
the deep harm they cause to individuals and the power we seek.
However, a reflexively anti-leadership orientation is an
overcorrection that doesn’t make room for the existence of
principled, responsive, accountable, and democratic leadership or for
the ability of anyone in a leadership position to build strong
movements, organizations, or workplaces.

Social change work requires experience, rigor, and study. It can take
years of development to grow into a skillful organizer, strategist,
communicator, campaign manager, or facilitator. Although talented
people can rapidly develop skills, many capacities only develop over
time. For example, judgment, relationship building, emotional
maturity, and landscape awareness (including the knowledge of what you
don’t know) deepen with experience.

“Professionalization” and experience are two different things that
should not be conflated. Most organizers historically and globally
have not been developed through professional pipelines. However, all
skilled organizers—professional or otherwise—have rigorously honed
those skills over time through study and practice.

Pretending formal leadership doesn’t exist can obscure hierarchies
and create centers of informal power. Formal leadership, when healthy,
provides clarity and transparency, which leads to greater
accountability. This in turn fosters more avenues for support to
develop new leadership.

Finally, there is a very real intellectual component to this work. The
idea that working people do not or cannot engage in intellectual work
is truly elitist and has not been my experience.

IV.         Anti-Institutional Sentiment

DEFINITION

Reflexively disdaining institutions and organizations as inherently
oppressive and antiquated, including the institution one may be
associated with. This point of view casts institutions themselves as
the problem, even those with a social change mission.

FALLACIES

We all have examples of bloated, aimless, top-heavy, or simply
irrelevant institutions that take space, hoard power, and demonstrate
little impact. Even institutions that begin as disruptors of the
status quo can slow-walk toward conservatism, disconnection,
bureaucracy, irrelevance, and inefficiency. In fact, given the system
of capitalism our institutions are navigating, if we are not mindful
of these realities, we risk falling into them.

Despite those common pitfalls, we need institutions for a powerful and
durable movement. Organizations and institutions are political
vehicles. They are also spaces where individuals develop skills,
connection, and ideological alignment. Institutions transmit
knowledge, hold strategy, and cultivate power. Atomized individuals
that loosely assemble cannot do this at the scale needed to take on
entrenched power.

Arguing for doing away with political vehicles without offering a
viable replacement demonstrates a lack of a power analysis. The most
organized forces can leverage crisis, so how can our movements win in
moments of crisis if we relinquish our organized vehicles? When our
opposition possesses disciplined and organized institutions at the
ready to fill power vacuums, what does it mean to unilaterally disarm?

Instead, movement institutions should have a self-aware practice of
mitigating the worst impulses of institutional drift while maximizing
the strengths of people-focused infrastructure.

V.         Cherry-Picking Arguments

DEFINITION

Using incoherent or decontextualized arguments and perspectives to add
perceived legitimacy to a position or oneself.

For example, using the term “intersectionality” to, let’s say,
defend edits to a press statement. Or employing the Audre Lorde quote,
“Caring for myself is not self-indulgence…,” to give gravitas to
a desire to stay home from an action or take off time that you’ve
earned and deserve as a worker. Or arming yourself with the concept
“small is all” from adrienne maree brown’s Emergent Strategy
[[link removed]] framework—outside
of its global fractal context—to resist taking responsibility for a
larger scale intervention or growing your community group into a mass
organization.

This tendency presents itself in language as well. Certain phases and
words carry cultural currency and cachet. We often find words like
“revolutionary” employed non-ironically in the service of
bourgeois individualistic demands. Decontextualized or uncritical use
of intellectual material, like the Tema Okun essay on white supremacy
culture
[[link removed]],
has at times served to challenge accountability around metrics and
timeliness or the use of written language. Yet metrics and
timeliness—and the ability to communicate in writing—are not in
and of themselves examples of white supremacy.

FALLACIES

It’s easier to use language and cultural references that signify an
ideological inclination than to actually study and practice a
particular framework. However, such loose ideological signaling can
lead to incoherence. This practice can devolve legitimate frameworks,
concepts, and language into tools for individuals to virtue signal or
provide weight to an argument that does not stand on its own premises.
It should be noted that it is popular to borrow catchphrases and
quotes from Black feminists, theorists, thinkers, and collectives in
particular. This is especially pernicious when the arguments those
thinkers developed are hijacked and flattened by those seeking 
personal benefit or legitimacy.

The profligate and unexamined use of social media has amplified this
particular trend. These platforms—owned and controlled by
megacorporations—reward us for our ability to articulate or reshare
the sharpest, pithiest, pettiest, most polemic, or most engaging
“content.” There is no premium on nuance, accuracy, and context.
There is little room for low-ego information sharing or curious and
grounded political education. These platforms are ideal for, and give
immediate reward to, uninformed cherry-picking, self-aggrandizement,
competition, and conflict.

We are learning the damaging lesson that the performance of profundity
can supercharge our arguments and points of view while obscuring
scrutiny or accountability. In the worst cases, such practices weaken
our work. At the same time, the instinct to reach for a high-minded
theory when a simple request will do can overlook the power we have to
set personal boundaries. For example, “I need to take personal
time” is a complete and worthy statement. We are enough, and our
desires and boundaries matter on their own.

VI.         Glass Houses

DEFINITION

Insisting that change on an interpersonal or organizational level must
occur before it is sought or practiced on a larger scale.

FALLACIES

This point of view does not adequately consider the possibility that
internal contradictions are the byproduct of external forces or that
efforts to address internal and external challenges can run
concurrently rather than sequentially. Both/and thinking is key here.

A glass houses approach prioritizes perfection (usually of a small
group of people) over progress (on a societal level) by establishing
unattainable tests that can consume individuals and organizations in a
journey toward personal or organizational perfection at the detriment
of broad and urgent change. This fixation with small utopianism can be
both frustrating and unfulfilling. I would argue that “doing the
work” should be viewed as ongoing day-to-day practice. This requires
deep commitment to sharpening internal practices and culture as well
as to improving and evaluating on a continuum.

VII.         The Small War

DEFINITION

Elevating the power dynamics at play among actors internal to a
movement over the larger power dynamics in society. In nonprofits or
social justice organizations, this often takes the shape of focusing
on tensions playing out between junior staff and leadership. In social
movements, it may show up as conflicts between movement formations,
sectarian ideological groupings, or movement leaders.

In prioritizing the small war, one accepts the notion that all sites
of struggle are equal and that “making change wherever you are”
includes addressing the demands placed on you as a functionary of a
small nonprofit or a local activist in a community group. Refusal to
wage the small war may therefore be seen as shirking a vital
responsibility to maintain egalitarian power relations. Because
proximity becomes the most important factor in deciding where to take
action, this thinking often lacks a structural and systemic analysis
of oppression and can feed or be fed by disproportionality (or the
inability to identify the scale of the problem, further defined
below). Small war thinking draws false equivalencies and teaches
misassessments of power. The small war puts the “glass houses”
framework into action.

FALLACIES

The most accessible and manageable action is by no means the most
consequential. A key part of strategy is assessing the relative impact
of an intervention. The small war ignores that crucial step and can
therefore lead organizers to prioritize a relatively small internal
quarrel over, say, a corporate campaign or structural power fight.
Some may even halt a structural power play by a movement or
organization to pursue an internal power struggle.

These battles can implode and rupture institutions, leaving
constituencies with less institutional power to wage the broader
struggle.

Both/and is again a key concept here. We can address issues and
challenges close to us while prioritizing the larger fight. This means
making a commitment to broader objectives and the viability of the
political vehicle even as you critique and improve that vehicle.

To be clear, we must not ignore problems or conflict simply because
they are small, internal, or relatively parochial. In fact, I would
argue that fighting for larger change is the most compelling reason to
advance shifts to the internal workings of an organization. Small
problems become large when unattended or dismissed. However, we must
put them in proper context and stay focused on our north star. In
other words, engaging in small internal debates _for _the larger
fight.

The principled struggle
[[link removed]] framework,
beautifully articulated by N’Tanya Lee of Leftroots, is a more
productive approach to managing internal differences. Grounded in a
shared power analysis, north star, and commitment to a political
project, we can sweat the small stuff in ways that maintain focus on
the larger constituencies we’re accountable to.

In short, we should seek to steadfastly protect the viability of our
organizational vehicles and courageously confront internal challenges
in ways that allow us to wage the fights we need to wage.
 

VIII.         Unanchored Care

DEFINITION

Assuming one’s mental, physical, and spiritual health is the
responsibility of the organization or collective space. The onus is on
the organization to deal with the harm, burnout, or psychological
stress one may experience through the work. An organization or
movement should prioritize addressing individuals’ feelings and
healing any harm they encounter. Collective projects, campaigns, and
efforts can and should be interrupted in service of this priority.

Additionally, the scope of care a movement space, organization, or
group is responsible for is sprawling—potentially addressing all or
most personal triggers and traumas experienced in and outside the
work.

FALLACIES

Discerning what is yours to hold and what is the collective’s is an
essential life skill and fundamental to organizational work,
collaboration, and meaningful engagement of others. Organizations
generally do not have the specialized skills to provide emotional or
spiritual healing. Workplaces can provide a salary, benefits, paid
time off, and other resources to help individuals access the support
and care they require. Workplaces can also promote a culture of care
and encourage individuals to care for themselves. Workplaces and
colleagues cannot replace medical professionals, spiritual supports,
or other devoted spaces of care. 

This is also true for non-professional spaces. Your comrades can
provide support, foster a caring environment, or help you out when
you’re in distress. They cannot heal you or salve long-standing
traumas. It is natural for us to turn to those closest when we’re in
pain. It is an indictment of the larger systems in our society that
abundant mental health and healing resources are not available to most
of us. There are several groups now filling that void in a culturally
competent manner, such as Nqttcn.com [[link removed]], beam.org
[[link removed]], fireweedcollective.org
[[link removed]], generativesomatics.org
[[link removed]], and sinsinvalid.org
[[link removed]].

Emotional intelligence is a capacity an organization can and should
embody. But no organization can take on the emotional labor that is
squarely in the domain of the individual. This distinction is
critical. Additionally, discomfort is part of the human condition and
a prerequisite for learning. Violence and oppression are to be avoided
but not discomfort. The ability to discern the difference is a form of
emotional maturity we should encourage.
 

IX.         Disproportionality

DEFINITION

Being unable to interpret the scale of a problem. For example,
discomfort is not only unacceptable but “violent.” Any mistake
committed by the organization or an individual is an example of
failure or corruption.

FALLACIES

Disproportionality can be a byproduct of uneven training on concepts
like power and power analysis as well as a misunderstanding of
strategy. This tendency ultimately weakens meaning, dulls analysis,
and robs us of the ability to acknowledge and process instances of
violence and oppression. If everything is “violent,” nothing
really is. If every slight is “oppression,” nothing is.

X.         Activist Culture

DEFINITION

Acting on individual and personal impulses rather than the mandate
laid out by one’s role or organization. Desire to elevate one’s
individual brand or cultural cachet as a function of one’s work. A
desire to make an organization or movement visible in a manner that
either disregards or undermines process, protocol, or culture.

FALLACIES

Although it may be personally fulfilling and individually empowering
to do and say the things you desire when you desire, institution- and
organization-building requires the discipline to advance a collective
strategy. That often means sublimating your impulse or ego for the
greater good and leveraging your personal capacities for collective
goals. This flies in the face of activist culture.

At its very worst, activism absent the disciplining force of
accountability to the whole or a guiding ideology is a dangerous venue
for narcissism shrouded in “Left speak.” It can become the
performance of principle without the headache of accountability.

We all have a role to play if we are to transcend these tendencies.
Leaders of institutions -having more positional power- hold
responsibility for their own behavior, the stewardship of their
organizations, and a broader duty to facilitate movement-wide
progress. At the same time, we cannot hold out for saviors in these
roles. One leader or even a group of dynamic leaders cannot solve
something that is very much “in the water” everywhere. It would be
inconsistent for me to diagnose a problem as structural while pointing
to solutions that can be executed only by a handful of individuals. We
must adopt a more comprehensive understanding of leadership that
recognizes that leaders and leadership exist at all levels of our
organizations and movements. And importantly, the mass leadership of
the working class -while unrealized- is a form of leadership with the
potential to mitigate some of the tendencies outlined above, keeping
our focus outward and on the main struggle.

All of us — union stewards, field managers, text bank leaders,
cultural workers, political educators, neighborhood block captains,
members, donors — have opportunities to lead and choices to make
about our behavior. Concretely, that looks like each of us wrestling
with the ways we exhibit some of these destructive tendencies and
making corrections. It could also look like a large group of leaders,
across a number of organizations and sectors, joining forces to
advance a collective shift in our practices.

From Problem to Solution

What can we learn from our errors and our attempts to correct these
errors in service of sustainable solutions? How can we shift from a
posture that simply analyzes the problems into one that is working to
solve them?

Rather than reacting to myriad symptoms, we must build resilient
organizations that can weather internal conflict and external crises.
Resilient organizations are structurally sound, ideologically
coherent, strategically grounded, and emotionally mature. The
dimensions of resilient organizations include:

* STRUCTURAL: The organizational form, roles, and mission. _What
kind of vehicle are we?_
* IDEOLOGICAL: The organizational vision for the world. _Where are
we going?_
* STRATEGIC: The organizational plan to advance toward this
vision. _How do we get there?_
* EMOTIONAL: The organization’s expectations of its people and
people’s expectations of the organization in matters of emotional,
physical, and spiritual care and well-being. _How do we behave on the
journey?_

Structural

* Managers should support and recognize unionization efforts inside
movement organizations as a reflection of our values. There is great
potential for internal staff unions to strengthen our workplaces,
including by inoculating against or mitigating the tendencies outlined
here. Organizing and contract negotiations can sharpen the skills
of—and connections among—non-managerial staff as well as deepen
management’s awareness of problems and the organization’s overall
health. Collective bargaining agreements can increase clarity, promote
equity, foster accountability, and provide a common language across an
organization. And, most importantly, healthy labor/management
relations can bridge gaps and serve as an ongoing resource for
managers and unit members to tend to collective goals. No process,
including unionization, can be a panacea to all our institutional
woes. When done with enthusiastic, upfront support from managers and a
bargaining unit committed to the organizational mission and vehicle,
unionization can mitigate glass house/small war/anti-leadership
tendencies rather than feed them.

* Leaders should be clearer and more transparent about where
hierarchies exist, why they exist, and where and how decision making
lives. This requires formal, clear, and understandable decision making
and leadership structures. This also means up-front validation of
those structures in relation to the organizational mission in contexts
like onboarding and recruitment. Additionally, people should
understand their place in these structures as well as opportunities
for their leadership development and advancement. 

Various tools exist to help clarify decision making, including DARCI
[[link removed]], MOCHA
[[link removed]],
and Interaction Institute’s decision making framework
[[link removed]].
No one tool is ideal for all contexts. However, having one is
critical.

* Organizations should promote a “pro-leadership” culture. Such a
culture does not elevate individual leaders or place them beyond
reproach. It does define and practice a form of leadership that moves
us away from neoliberal individualism toward collective power and
accountability. In the context of a grassroots or base-building
organization, this looks like rooting leadership in the working-class
base. In staffed organizations that are grassroots and
community-based, this means ensuring that non-staff leadership is
pronounced and real and staff leadership is accountable, clear, and
experienced. This also requires rigorous training, practice, and
intentional development of a culture that elevates the leadership of
working people.

* Hierarchy, commitment to leadership—including leadership
development—and other pro-leadership ideas cannot be assumed and are
not self-evident. They must complement and be justified by the
organization’s mission and theory of change.

* Efforts should be made to minimize bureaucratic structures. In
staffed organizations, managers should be trained to affirm how and
where staff can raise concerns, ask informed questions, experiment,
lead, and be creative. In such a culture, seniority is not fetishized
for seniority’s sake. Instead, there is a matter-of-fact recognition
that, with experience, one tends to grow in judgment and has a clearer
understanding of what one does not know. This must be supported by the
actual organizational culture of leadership development so more senior
leaders are tasked with training and supporting less experienced
people to execute, learn, and become leaders themselves.

* There should be regular evaluation of decisions and campaigns.
Leaders and decision makers should also be regularly evaluated—not
just by other leaders and decision makers but also by people who
report to them. Their strategies should also be regularly evaluated
based on the organizational theory of change.

* In staffed organizations, serious effort should be made to
diversify the organization across all dimensions of identity. This is
not for the sake of token representation but because true diversity
yields the most relevant and community-reflective structures. Take the
time to find quality fits for staff roles and ensure that diversity
takes place on all levels of the organization.

* If we value experience, emotional maturity, and diversity, we must
get serious about staff retention—developing the systems, practices,
and culture that create workplaces where people stay and thrive long
term.

 

Ideological

* Organizations should be trained and retrained in their own
ideological location and destination. Staff should be fluent in the
ideological underpinnings of the organization.

* Some re/unlearning and philosophical clarity is necessary.
Postmodern philosophies have broad value in helping us perceive and
challenge grand narratives and socially constructed hierarchies.
However, some postmodernist relativism can collide directly with the
entire enterprise of power building, which rests on materialist
principles. We seek to understand, deconstruct, and interpret the
world only to serve the goal of changing it, not simply to further the
production of knowledge. That is arguably the role of the academy and
organic intellectuals, not social change agents. Marx says on this
point, “…philosophers have only interpreted the world in various
ways. The point, however, is to change it.” We should take this to
heart.

* Continuing political education should be a cultural norm for all.
Ideological education should be offered and promoted movement-wide so
that there is a common movement vocabulary.

Strategic

* Leaders should ensure that the organizational strategy is clear and
understood across the board. Invest in training all stakeholders on
how the strategy was developed, what hypotheses are operating
underneath the strategy, and how to measure the strategy’s
effectiveness.

* Strategy and theory of change should be the ultimate arbiter of
which tactics to employ and demands to make as well as how to assess
inevitable compromises in a situation where we have limited power.
Develop a practical expression of the organization’s strategy and
theory of change and work with it regularly in planning and
decision-making sessions.

* The organization and its senior leaders should invest serious time
in presenting the full and complex strategic landscape to more junior,
less experienced, and newer people. There are, of course, times when
details are so sensitive that they cannot be shared widely. We should
push to make those cases exceptions and, even in these instances,
provide a rationale for the secure nature of the information. We
should tend toward strategic transparency. This is an opportunity to
build strategic trust and sophistication across an organization.

* Organizations should note where they are in their life cycle, and
efforts should be made to evaluate this from time to time. This will
validate a commitment to affirm, strengthen, and grow the political
project. Also, if the organization has satisfied its objectives or is
rendered unable to satisfy them, it can set the stage for a careful
and responsible wind down.

Emotional

* See as a center of your work the establishment and re-establishment
of connection, meaning, and belonging.

* Make the celebration of the individual and collective contributions
of your people a rigorous practice. Help your teams cultivate a
practice of finding the lessons, the steps of success, the moments of
laughter and camaraderie, the times that are special. Build a culture
of celebration.

* The organization should always endeavor to have the best possible
impact on the emotional well-being of its people. Toward that end, the
organization should be clear and consistent about its responsibilities
in relation to the emotional, mental, and general well-being of the
people in its orbit. This requires the organization to generate clear
boundaries.

* While it’s not possible or advisable for an organization to
protect its people from discomfort, unnecessary discomfort should be
avoided where possible through clarity around roles, accessible
avenues of redress for grievances, and encouraging and providing
support for skills like effectively engaging in conflict with others.

* Experience matters. In a staffed and non-staffed organization,
invest in and take the time to recruit more experienced and
emotionally mature people. Non-staffed movement orgs should seek out
members with longer memories and the emotional elasticity to resolve
conflict, engage differences to bring a collective together, and
elevate the importance of protecting the political vehicle.

* Less experienced leaders or staff should have clarity as to where
they are expected to collaborate, contribute, follow, learn, or lead.

* Less experienced leaders or staff should be developed emotionally,
strategically, and ideologically. Spend the resources to coach,
support, onboard, and train them. They are a special responsibility.

* Don’t recruit too many less experienced people at once. Less
experienced people need more time, mentorship, and training to excel.
Effectively providing such support requires much more time and labor
than we typically allow.

* Hire slowly, always. Unintentional scale is an enemy to solid
culture. A healthy organizational culture should be prioritized over
sheer scale. Take time in establishing and reestablishing culture as
you hire.

* In staffed organizations, emotional maturity should be evaluated
before hiring, elevated as a key value during onboarding, and
reinforced through regular performance evaluations. In non-staffed
spaces, emotional maturity must be considered when giving people roles
and elevating people in leadership and responsibility.

* There is a training gap for managers and staff in identifying and
dealing with trauma—we must confront this and build up both internal
and movement-wide resources to support our folks working to change a
traumatizing world.

* Resist artifacts from professional culture that either denigrate
joy, celebration, pleasure, and expression or put them in a box. Free
them from those boxes and allow them to flow throughout your
organization. This means organizing with all five senses. Food, visual
art, music, movement, and culture should be expressed in all corners
of the organization to humanize our practice and develop more
emotionally dynamic spaces. Normalize the idea that rigor,
seriousness, and excellent work should coexist with fun and joy.

A Vision of Joy, Power, and Victory

In this paper, I have laid out a diagnosis of our current predicament
and sketched out some ways forward. Building the movement of our
dreams can at times feel like a utopian fantasy. Our myriad problems
and conflicts can make that project feel like an impossible puzzle to
piece together. This framework and my recommendations are designed so
that our freedom dream can begin to translate into a practical and
urgent charge of our day.

I believe our people deserve mass movements that exude joy, build
power, and secure critical victories for the masses of working people.
Such movements would be irresistible. People associated with these
change projects would themselves exhibit liberatory values, including
the practice of radical compassion and humility. They would work from
a grounded understanding of power. Leaders would invite
accountability, act with rigor, and speak with clarity. Problems and
contradictions would be met with curiosity instead of judgment and
finger pointing. Harm would be addressed with seriousness and an eye
toward reparation, remediation, and healing. And we would build power
with relish and let our successes and failures breed innovation.

We are closer than we think to such a reality. We must go through a
humbling but necessary period of change to achieve it. We must learn
how to synthesize lessons from the past and observations in the
present. That means sitting in an awkward both/and place. We must call
out fallacies that weaken us, even when it’s hard and we face
criticism for it. And we must meet our problems with grounded
solutions that are drawn from a sober assessment of the larger time,
place, and conditions we find ourselves in. None of this, of course,
will be easy. In fact, much of it will cause great discomfort.
However, on the other side of the uncomfortable journey is an
abundant, playful, and powerful home for our freedom dreams. Will we
choose it?

_Convergence is pleased to be co-publishing this article
with Nonprofit Quarterly 
[[link removed]]and The Forge
[[link removed]]. We’re sharing it across our
platforms as a small step towards the collaboration the movement needs
to build in these challenging times._

_[MAURICE MITCHELL
[[link removed]] is a
nationally-recognized social movement strategist and organizer for
racial, social, and economic justice. Raised by Caribbean
working-class parents in NY, Maurice began organizing as a teenager.
After graduating from Howard University, he went on to work as an
organizer for the Long Island Progressive Coalition, downstate
organizing director for Citizen Action of NY, and Director of the NY
State Civic Engagement Table. After Mike Brown was killed by police in
Missouri, Maurice relocated to Ferguson to support work on the ground.
Seeing the need for an anchor organization to provide strategic
support and guidance to Movement for Black Lives activists, Maurice
co-founded and managed Blackbird. In 2015, he helped organize the
Movement for Black Lives convention in Cleveland. In 2018, Maurice
took the helm of Working Families Party as National Director where he
is applying his passion and experience to make the WFP the political
home for a multi-racial working class movement.]_

"Our people deserve mass movements that exude joy, build power, and
secure critical victories for the masses of working people."

_Download a discussion guide for this article here
[[link removed]]._

SOME ADDITIONAL READING & EXERCISES 

from Nonprofit Quarterly
[[link removed]]

* Yotam Marom, “Moving Toward Conflict for the Sake of Good
Strategy
[[link removed]].” _Medium_.
Jan 13, 2020.
* Bryan Mercer a
[[link removed]]nd Hannah
Sassaman [[link removed]],
“Embracing Conflict Didn’t Tear Our Organization Apart, It
Transformed Us.” _Convergence_. 2022. Part 1
[[link removed]] and Part
2
[[link removed]].
* Daniel Martinez HoSang
[[link removed]] _, _LeeAnn
Hall [[link removed]]_, _and Libero
Della Piana [[link removed]],
“To Tackle Racial Justice, Organizing Must Change
[[link removed]],” _The
Forge_. January 4, 2022.
* Joshua Kahn Russell
[[link removed]] and Michael
Strom [[link removed]], “Healthy
Group Accountability: Learning How to Learn
[[link removed]],” _Convergence_.
August 6, 2021.
* Jen Disla, “Organization for Black Struggle on Conflict: Know
Your Friends From Your Enemies
[[link removed]],” _Convergence,_
* “Combat Liberalism with Olufemi Taiwo, Mindy Isser and Zachary
Hershman
[[link removed]],”
The Dig podcast with Daniel Denvir. April 16, 2021.
* adrienne marie brown, “Disrupting the Pattern: A Call for Love
and Solidarity
[[link removed]],”
and _We Will Not Cancel Us: And Other Dreams of Transformative
Justice_ [[link removed]].
* Auburn Seminary, “Nurturing Relationships, Navigating Conflic
[[link removed]]t”
– a 4 to 6 hour workshop (can be broken up over a few sessions)

* the Left
[[link removed]]
* organizing
[[link removed]]
* Left strategy
[[link removed]]
* Organizing Practice
[[link removed]]
* left organizations
[[link removed]]
* Working Families Party
[[link removed]]
* WFP
[[link removed]]
* Movement Strategy
[[link removed]]

*
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*
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*
*
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INTERPRET THE WORLD AND CHANGE IT

 

 

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