Vu Le doesn’t shy away from tough topics. He seeks them out.
In his irreverent Nonprofit AF blog, Le tackles the racism that leaders of color face, low pay and sometimes nonexistent retirement benefits for charity workers, and the power imbalance between grant makers and the groups they support, to name just a few.
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And the thing is, he’s funny. When he takes on the question of overhead, a decidedly wonky and unfunny topic, he asks readers to imagine firefighters racing to a raging wildfire. But every half mile or so, someone stops them to make sure tax money is being spent only on the water and not the hose, firetruck, salaries, or fire suits.
Humor is important, but Le thinks the blog is popular because he says what many nonprofit leaders are too afraid to say.
“We have a lot of fear in the sector,” he says. “Fear of funders, fear of losing donors, fear of our organizational reputation being affected by what we say. It really prevents us from saying the things that we want to say out loud.”
Shared Power
Upending the accepted way of doing things is equally important in his day job, leading the Rainier Valley Corps, a nonprofit in Seattle that works to strengthen organizations that are led by and serve people of color.
The group has taken steps to share power throughout the organization. In 2016, it reinforced that approach by hiring a managing director, Ananda Valenzuela, who leads the group’s day-to-day operations, while Le, serving as executive director, is in charge of its interactions with the outside world, especially fundraising.
The era of the heroic leader standing alone at the top of a hierarchy is dying, Le says. “I think it’s a good thing because that’s not how the world should work,” he says. “That power should not be concentrated in one person.”
What’s more, Le and Valenzuela don’t make all the big decisions. The manager in the organization closest to the situation makes the call and can’t be overruled as long as the manager checked in with the staff members who will be most affected by the decision and the people at the organization who can offer the best advice to help decide what to do.
“As the external executive director, I have a few things that I can make decisions on, mainly large grants, and should we apply for them,” he explains. “I can’t make decisions on HR, our operations, our finance system, none of that stuff.”
Giving managers that kind of autonomy helps leaders throughout the organization grow, and Rainier Valley Corps is stronger as a result, Le says.
Strong enough that Le feels like he can step down. His last day on the job is December 13. With two small kids and more than a dozen years as an executive director — in his current job and previously at the Vietnamese Friendship Association — he says it’s time.
“I feel very privileged and grateful to be able to be an executive director the last 13 years,” he says. “The reality is it’s also very, very stressful, constantly thinking about funders and constantly thinking about cashflow and whether you can pay all these brilliant leaders who are on your team. It weighs on you.”
Le thinks he would have left two or three years ago if it weren’t for the power-sharing measures the organization had put in place.
His immediate plan is to watch Netflix for the next couple months and be a stay-at-home dad. After that, he’s not sure, although he has some preliminary ideas. He wants to write a book. He’s also worried about nonprofit leaders of color burning out and thinks about becoming an executive coach.
“Funders are not paying any attention to this,” he says. “The trickle seems to be gradual, but it is a very strong trickle of leaders of color leaving the field.”
And he has one other idea: writing a nonprofit sketch comedy for Netflix. If you know someone at the company, Le says, put in a good word for him.
Nicole Wallace has been reporting on nonprofits for the Chronicle for more than 20 years. Her areas of expertise include data, technology, fundraising, and innovation. She recently wrote about leaders of color and how they feel about being underestimated and breaking barriers. Email Nicole or follow her on Twitter.
