A Spotlight on SynerVision Leadership Foundation's Online Community for Community Builders
About Today's Episode:
Today's episode is a little different. Rather than interview a nonprofit expert, founder and president of SynerVision Leadership Foundation, and host of The Nonprofit Exchange, Hugh Ballou shares some details about the online community for community builders. He discusses the details about all the resources and added value that nonprofit leaders get by joining this community.
 
Read the Transcript Hugh Ballou: Welcome to The Nonprofit Exchange. This is Hugh Ballou, founder and president of SynerVision Leadership Foundation. People don’t really know the word “SynerVision” because I made it up. I’m a musician. I’m a conductor. Conductors create community. We call this “ensemble,” whether it’s instrumental or vocal, it’s a choir or orchestra. It becomes an ensemble because we function together at a higher level. In our boards and our staff and our committees in the nonprofit world, which includes churches and synagogues, we create this higher functioning. It’s the synergy we create with a common vision. The synergy we create with a common vision is defined by SynerVision. As leaders, we are catalysts, we’re visionaries, we lead, we influence people, and we make things happen.
For 32 years, I’ve been working with nonprofit leaders all over the place, on at least four continents and multiple countries. A lot of work in America. A lot of work with cause-based charities. People wanting to impact other people’s lives. I spent 40 years serving an organized church from 120-12,000-member churches. I’ve seen it from different perspectives and different sized organizations. I have worked exterior to multiple types of nonprofit organizations. Membership organizations, cause-based charities, and many others. We have a million and a half 501(c)3s in this country. What I do know, statistics show that half of the new nonprofits that are formed every year will close, some with money in the bank. They will close because they are not able to fulfill their mission.
There are many reasons for this. More often than not, it’s one person with a cause, with a passion, with a fire; however, that person is unable to let that fire spread and build a sustainable legacy under that vision. We want to make sure that we’ve fully thought out the process, built a strategy, and built a team; therefore, we can be fundable and sustainable. You can create your legacy that can continue. SynerVision is the legacy I am creating that will continue the work after I’m gone.
I want to share about the work of SynerVision. It’s for nonprofit leaders and clergy. Those of you making a difference leading an organization, one you founded, one you didn’t found, it doesn’t matter. You’re the person in charge of implementing the vision. You’re the person influencing others to make things happen. You’re the person that builds and maintains relationships so that you can lead, you can fund, and you have a communication system based on, yes, relationships.
SynerVision is designed to provide high-quality resources for you working in the trenches, things that are going to help you get unblocked. Maybe you’re not blocked, but you’re not really hitting your stride. Maybe you have some money and have a staff, but if you got more funding, more staff, more focus, you can impact more people’s lives. It’s not about the money. The money is necessary to provide for people who do the work.
It’s sort of like building a car. Once we build the car, we have to get the gas to make the car go. Therefore, money is an important commodity that we must have a replenishable supply because we do run out of gas. We have to refuel. In order to make that happen, there are lots of moving parts.
My job is to equip, empower, and train nonprofit leaders to build boards, to build strategies, to build systems, to create funding, and to impact people’s lives more fully. To fully achieve the mission of the or