Strong leadership is important for any social movement. Great leaders empower others, create alignment around a common purpose, and motivate individuals to achieve greater results. One of the most significant consequences of a lack of strong leadership is the absence of a clear vision and direction. Why is it so hard to retain strong leaders in the animal advocacy movement?
VERA FLOCKE: Strong leadership is important for any social movement. Great leaders empower everyone in their organization, create alignment around a common purpose, and streamline processes for greater results. Lack or loss of strong leadership is very costly, and can make or break an organization.
Faunalytics’ previous research has explored why animal advocates of all positions choose to leave their roles. The study’s results found that the most common contributing factor for leaving an animal advocacy organization was problems with leadership, which was cited by 39.7% of advocates. Meanwhile, research by Animal Advocacy Careers has consistently found that leadership roles are some of the hardest to fill.
We wanted to understand what these problems look like from a leader’s perspective. What makes it hard for leaders in the animal advocacy movement to do their jobs effectively, and why is it so hard to find and retain strong leaders? A better understanding of this issue may help us to strengthen our leadership, which is critical for increasing both leadership and general advocate retention.
To find an answer, we conducted an informal study researching why animal advocates in executive director roles choose to leave their positions, with an eye on developing proposals for increasing leadership retention in the animal advocacy movement.
The study had two parts: an online survey, which was followed by a few qualitative interviews. Sixteen former executive directors who had left their positions within the past five years participated in the survey, and six participated in subsequent interviews. All executive directors were from animal advocacy organizations.
The most cited factor contributing to the decision to leave an executive director (“ED”) role was burnout. 62.5% said that they were “burnt out or too tired to continue.” Burnout was followed by a perceived lack of making a difference (named by 43.8% of respondents) and lack of support from the board (37.5%). Other commonly cited contributing reasons (each at 31.3% of respondents) included interference of the job with other parts of one’s life, lack of fit in values or skills, harassment or discrimination from someone within the organization, low pay compared to other jobs, and a belief that one could have a bigger impact in a different role. SOURCE…
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