My varied career has revolved around a commitment to meaningful, results-oriented communication, from a stint as a daily newspaper reporter to more than a dozen years editing special-interest magazines to some 16 years acquiring nonfiction for Atlantic Monthly Press, W. W. Norton & Co., and Chelsea Green Publishing, and, finally, the last 8+ years directing communications and marketing at the Vermont-based national nonprofit Orton Family Foundation.
Both my professional experience and years of volunteer service to my communities qualify me to bring new ways of thinking, perceiving, and doing to mission-driven organizations. Having helped bring the Orton Family Foundation’s groundbreaking Community Heart & SoulTM community-development method to towns from Maine to Colorado, the chance to use similar approaches within mission-driven enterprises thrills me.
The keys to Heart & Soul’s success are: a belief in the value of all voices being heard; a commitment to listening carefully and the trust it engenders; and a promise to use plainspoken language—no jargon, no acronyms, just direct English (or other language). Those seemingly simple elements open doors of understanding, possibility and achievement beyond expectations. They also dispel long-held assumptions that stifle creativity. This is not theory, it is practice proven across a dozen towns from 900 to 25,000 in population. I welcome the opportunity to collaborate with your creative, committed, diverse staff to bring about new ways of listening, talking, seeing, doing, and achieving.
John Barstow Associates 