St. Louis Nonprofit Leaders Offer Tips for Duplicating Their Mentorship Group Model

Three years ago, Bill Dahlkamp got promoted—and felt panicked.

“I walked out one day as program director and back in the next as executive director,” says Mr. Dahlkamp, who heads Support Dogs, a charity in St. Louis that provides assistance animals to people with disabilities. “And I suddenly realized, wow, I am now responsible for the well-being of this entire organization.”

Mr. Dahlkamp estimates that when he became executive director, he had only about half of the skills required to run the organization. He had a good grip on the charity’s day-to-day workings but lacked experience in areas such as fund-raising, budgeting, and human resources.

Fortunately for Mr. Dahlkamp, Jane Klieve had her eye on him, and on his potential.

The nonprofit leadership-development consultant invited him to participate in the Executive Director Roundtable, a group the St. Louis Nonprofit Services Center organizes for monthly meetings, It’s a peer-networking group for nonprofit chiefs and is known for reaching out to those a bit further down the leadership ladder.

“As a newer executive director, I was mentored, and it was incredibly helpful,” says Mr. Dahlkamp. “I had taken over at a transitional time for my organization and kind of got thrown into the fire. This roundtable was a safe space for me to say, ‘What do I need to know?’ and learn from, be guided by, people with significant leadership experience.”

Ms. Klieve says groups like the one in St. Louis not only benefit rookie charity leaders but also help nonprofit veterans pass on their knowledge.

“In terms of developing the next generation of nonprofit leaders, peer roundtable groups are one of the best things I’ve ever seen,” says Ms. Klieve. Best of all, she says, starting a peer network does not require money, just one person’s willingness to organize it.

The St. Louis Executive Director Roundtable began in 2004, and now three more groups meet across the state of Missouri. Membership is limited to a dozen participants per group, a number that ensures that everyone has an active voice, says Jerry Paul, interim head of the Nonprofit Services Center.

Participants in the St. Louis Executive Director Roundtable offer the following tips for starting—and sustaining—a similar group to help a community’s nonprofit veterans support aspiring leaders:

Make the call. Lori Behrens, head of SIDS Resources, a charity promoting safe sleep practices for infants, suggests that any new or aspiring leader simply connect.

“Reach out to your network to find half a dozen other peers and start a conversation,” she says. “It can be as easy as inviting everyone to have a coffee together.”

Most people will respond, says Ms. Klieve.

“People are very generous of spirit, and I’ve rarely had anyone I’ve asked to become a mentor decline,” she says. However, she cautions, the person who issues that first invitation will likely end up as the group’s de facto organizer, at least at first.

“There needs to be a connection point to initiate the meeting and confirm who’s coming,” she says. “Someone has to be in charge of this, but not forever: It might rotate periodically among members, or once a regular meeting is well established it might not even be necessary.”

Ask for commitment, but be flexible. Creating a sense of accountability to the group, while keeping things flexible, is key, says Mr. Paul, who spent 20 years as a hospital executive.

“There is no shortage of old buggers like me who are willing to share their experience, but you need to figure out ways they can be supportive and instructive without having to go to endless meetings,” says Mr. Paul.

He suggests that the first step is for the founding executives to agree to a regular gathering time—say, the last Wednesday of every month for a working lunch—and that members commit to attending three out of four sessions.

This consensus might be fairly easy to achieve, says Mr. Paul, because “a benefit to the mentors is that it’s really fun to hang out with each other. We don’t often make time to do this. And when it’s enjoyable, commitment remains high.”

Build it and they will come. “Once word gets out that this kind of opportunity exists, the next generation of leaders will pretty much come to you,” says Ms. Klieve.

However, she also likes to scout for potential talent among St. Louis nonprofits, as does Mr. Paul. Both point out that in mission-driven nonprofit careers, professional development often takes a back seat. Thus, sometimes promising young nonprofit professionals have to be alerted to their own potential and then invited to join the mentoring network.

Ms. Klieve spots candidates in her leadership-development work, where she is often called in to assist organizations in crisis.

“Calm and focus under pressure impresses me,” she says. “When I see someone acting professionally in a crisis, I start watching them to see if there is opportunity to foster leadership potential.”

Settle on a structure for meetings. Ms. Klieve is a firm believer in the roundtable approach, where all participants have an equal voice and are entitled to equal time to air their thoughts—no matter if they’re senior or very, very junior.

“It’s less formal, and this way the upcoming leaders won’t feel so shy about coming to ask for help and guidance,” she says. “It’s a very accessible approach that is easy to keep going without much planning burden.”

She suggests that the main part of the meeting take the form of a round-robin discussion of everyone’s current challenges, which can evolve into a group problem-solving exercise. That might be followed by a more formal presentation or topic discussion of the participants’ choosing.

Mr. Paul suggests that all those joining the roundtable—even the most experienced executives—should detail their skills and interests.

“When everyone is sitting at the table together, it’s helpful to be able to say, ‘Here are our areas of expertise, and we are here to answer questions or help you out,’” he says. “So rather than doing intensive one-on-one mentoring, you are making available this library of skills and experience that the nascent executives can call upon as needed, even outside the group.”

Don’t blab. For best results, abide by this rule: What happens at the roundtable stays at the roundtable.

“Confidentiality is essential,” says Ms. Klieve. “Often you’re talking about some rather tricky problems, and unless people know that what they say will go no further than the group, they won’t speak up.”

Ms. Behrens, of SIDS Resources, says that was her experience as a newer executive mentored by the St. Louis group.

“I found that I couldn’t always talk with my co-workers—once you’re the head of the organization, you have to be the one who has everything under control, or at least look like it,” she says. “For me it’s been crucial, having a safe space to explore issues and get perspective from people who have been there before.”

Remember: Mentorship works both ways. The nonprofit world has been changing rapidly in recent years, and as a result, says Mr. Dahlkamp, “I have noticed there are times the older [executives] are looking to the younger generation for resources. What used to work doesn’t always work anymore, and everyone is looking to learn new tricks for getting support, for getting attention. So when you meet people who are having experiences you’ve never had before, you want to learn from that—no matter where you are in your career.”

More from the 2012 Guide to Managing Nonprofits

What a New Executive Director Needs to Succeed

How to Negotiate for a Bigger Paycheck

Help for Young Professionals

Guide to Products and Services