The Prostitute in the Living Room

If a pimp walks into a nonprofit tax clinic and asks for advice about his prostitutes and 13 underaged & undocumented El Salvadorean girls, what should you say?

A) Sure we can help you set up a tax-sheltering brothel! (Said with more enthusaism than a Walmart greeter.)
B) That would be illegal, unethical, and immoral! (Said with self-righteous outrage.)
C) Would you happen to be actors? (Said with suspicion.)

I wish this whole ACORN scandal was a joke, even a not-so-funny one. But instead it's a not-at-all-funny ring of hellfire for the nonprofit that even Johnny Cash and June Carter Cash couldn't make sound good. Leftists can make an okay argument for why prostitution should be legalized. But pimping underaged girls?

ACORN, you've made good progress digging your own grave and now you have lots of helpers and decidedly fewer defenders to dig you out. Nonprofits will be under more supervision and observation now, having to prostitute ourselves more to show we're not poisoning trees or murdering babies. Just give it a year, and I bet my own brothel that this shit will have led to even more nonprofit restrictions -- and at some point belt-tightening becomes asphyxiation.

Catch Phrase

Every time a corporate-leaning non-profit type uses the phrase "leveraging technology" I want to shoot myself so I'll feel something besides boredom. When I ask what the phrase actually means, I'm invariably told something even more boring that everyone's already doing: internet databases or something else completely unsexy. 

I'd rather imagine leveraging technology as slinging a computer over a cliff. Or at least through a window. 

If this is kind of corporate-speak that experts want us to use as we "professionalize" the sector, they should be prepared for an involuntary  cannonball. Don't forget to tuck the knees! Hey, we have to test the technology one way or another.

With this kinda help...

With everything going so crappily  for, well, everyone, it's time to give another look to ... volunteers?

Apparently so. The New York Times ran this article recently. Here's a quick summary: with so many upper-management sorts out of work (and out of sorts), why not get them helping out with nonprofits, those organizations sometimes known for their lack of organization. Out-of-work execs get to feel productive, and nonprofits get free management expertise. Everyone wins! What could go wrong? 

Of course, anyone who's ever worked with volunteers is chuckling nervously right now, counting the ways volunteers make their work lives more difficult. My favorite is how there's inevitably that one sketchy guy volunteer -- one who shows too much chest hair, or makes too much eye contact, or won't make your gaze at all. He's probably not a perp like he's typecast on Law and Order, but he's just awkward enough for you not to want him around. At all.

But my main problem is that the New York Times made an ass out of you and me by assuming nonprofit managers want the sort of bona fide expertise the laid off for-profit world can offer. Sure it can be hard to find people who consistently want to spend the night in a homeless shelter with people who are often mentally ill, not to mention stinky. But I'm not convinced it's ever been hard to find for-profit execs excited to yap their pie holes at you about what could be done better. 

Rather, I think we non-profit folks sometimes just don't want to hear. We don't believe for-profit management offers any usable lessons for us. After all, we have heart and aren't evil and OF COURSE Mr. Corporate Sold-His-Soul won't ever understand our idiosyncratic filing system, much less our crappy accounting. We take pride in our lack of professionalism because somehow it shows we're homespun and care about the work more than the job.

Silly NY Times for thinking you could change us. Joke's on you! Right?