Be Volunteer-Run: this is our first principle. This nestles you into the "power of many", and with the Internet, this networked power of many creates a rich density of interconnections that self-organize into umpteen, unimaginable directions for growth. With all volunteers, the trust is very high and that improves efficiency radically; in addition, it gives rise to servant leadership where the chief coordinator isn't your boss, but more like a sibling who can mirror a deeper potential you wish to manifest in the world. That servant leadership radically alters the organizational DNA. Furthermore, being volunteer run dramatically reduces your overhead and allows you to deliver services for free; and because the barrier to entry is reduced, it attracts people and shifts the traditional supply-push model to a demand-pull one. Our "business plans" are always a step behind the future, right smack in the present; ie. our new projects aren't based on predictions about anticipated scenarios in the future. Instead, we look to the present and ask if the conditions are ripe for this new project or innovation. As a result, there is no such thing as a failed idea; implementation could fail but the timing is always spot on. And ultimately, giving your time is profound in and of itself; in a recent interview on giving time instead of money, I said: "If giving money is generosity, giving time is generosity on steroids." :)

Don't Fundraise: this is our second principle. "This is enough," is our attitude, no matter what we have. If it ever feels like this is *not* enough, the lack is in the heart of the organization and that is only fulfilled by one thing -- stepping up the selfless service. :) When our Smile Card sustainability experiments failed, we decided to step up it up -- Smile Cards went on sale. It made no sense (from the dominant paradigm context), but the next day, someone randomly sent in a donation that covered our costs. Just as a laundry machine is useful without knowing the details of centripetal force of the spin cycle, this principle of serving selflessly until you have enough also is quite useful. :) We can't theorize it or replicate it, but we can give anecdote after anecdote about how it has worked for us. To me, this is about the "power of monastic". Monks and nuns across all traditions have understood this and lived on these principles for centuries; the CharityFocus challenge is to create an organization that is "monastic". To work in this way, at a practical level, is to revere all life. My two word mantra is -- "assume value". Last week, I had a coffee with this woman trying to "bring more noble speech in the world"; two weeks later, she wrote a glowing article on her site. On the other hand, two days ago, someone egged our house, which is equally an offering too. No matter who it is, no matter what they are offering, assume value; everyone has gifts and they are constantly offering those gifts to the present moment. You just need to cultivate the eyes to see the value in it. At a subtle level, not fundraising allows us to deeply value all people, all events, and all life.

Think small: this is our third principle. No matter what the project, its smallest base case has to have meaning. DailyGood started with 4 friends as subscribers -- and even if it ended after one email, it was meaningful. Today, it reaches 70K people daily and that's fine too. PledgePage empowers people to do events to raise money for their favorite nonprofits; the site users have raised more than $3MM but even if it didn't scale, it has meaning for that one person running that one marathon in honor of their mother who has breast cancer. Thinking small, though, has subtler ramifications too. Over time, the base case starts shrinking from one-project to one-action; ie. you start valuing every step of the process. And when you become deeply process-oriented and hold the smallest action with the reverence it deserves, you outsource the outcome-management to the self-organizing principles of nature. You're not at all worried about how fast the project will be implemented, how you will sustain it or scale it, if someone will copy it or whatever. This is truly liberating, and naturally increases your capacity. A rich guy once asked Mother Teresa about her fundraising plan and she essentially said, "How should I know?" Sages have always understood this very clearly. :) Just as fundraising become a major overhead in traditional organizations, our attachment to outcomes is another attachment that even non-traditional efforts can face and our third principle helps us counter that by being deeply process oriented.

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No Cashing Out: when you serve freely, you attract people and gain influence. Most institutions, from corporate to spiritual, aim to "monetize" that attention. But how far can you go without cashing out? We don't know, but we want to push the bounds. :) While we are in position to have staff and increase efficiency in some specialized sense, we would never do that because it would disturb the entire ecosystem. Instead we ponder this kind of question -- what happens if you invest all of the "return on influence" back into itself?

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