To be honest, I usually zone out when people start talking. It’s not on purpose, but for some reason if my subconscious senses a lecture coming on, it comes out to play and my conscious-conscious goes in to take a nap.

Looking back on our last Fellows Learning Session, that’s what I would have assumed would happen when Doug Kridler, the President and CEO of The Columbus Foundation, came to as a guest speaker. I was super surprised then when he got up to leave after having talked for nearly an hour and I realized I had listened the whole time.

I promise I’m not just looking for brownie points because he basically signs my paycheck; I’m serious when I say I really picked up some useful bits of knowledge from Mr. Kridler:

1. Slow down and people will listen to you! The way he spoke was conducive to me listening. His slow, calm speech contrasted strongly with my usual tongue-tied stammers at work.
2. Be skeptical, but not cynical. This resonated with me because there has been more than one ball drop or mis-communication this summer between my office and our community partners. I suppose if everyone is skeptical about something going smoothly, everyone would be checking and double checking and minimizing hitches.
3. A successful nonprofit is the one that is run like a business. Perhaps it’s common to think that NPO’s are or should be above private sector tactics for growth. Mr. Kridler talked about erasing the stigma around NPO’s using funds to promote themselves. He explained how promoting and growing an NPO is promoting the cause.
4. A good employee. I asked Mr. Kridler what makes an employee successful. People aren’t born as CEO’s. How do they get there, or anywhere they want to go? He described a successful employee as one who is rooted in the description of her/his job and who enjoys getting all of the details right, but who uses creativity to think beyond how things are to what things can be.

I found these four eclectic pieces of advice to be exceptionally relevant to my current life, and I plan to take them with me on all of my future endeavors.