By Gayle Gifford
Nonprofit funding: paid staff associated with meeting goals
A key challenge of most nonprofit organizations in raising funding is that they simply don’t have enough staff working on fundraising
Thank you for your service
Each of us has many options to serve. For example, we might to choose to serve by: Serving meals each week at the community meal site. Wading in the muck to pull old tires out of the river. Bearing silent witness in a vigil line. Helping a neighbor in need.
Caring for a family member. Stepping into danger to prevent a greater harm. Giving blood.
And even serving on an organizational board.
Nonprofit boards – stop stressing the elevator pitch
It seems everyone is stressed out about elevator pitches. Why?
It think it is because most board members are worried about flubbing the introduction to their organization. And because everyone keeps telling them they need an elevator speech.
So here are three bits of advice you might find helpful:
Nonprofit evalution – counting what matters
But multiple speakers stressed the need for our sector to take back both qualitative evaluation as a legitimate form of measurement and to champion the other critical impacts we have in community, such as improving the social fabric, personal fulfillment and quality of life.
Nonprofit governance research – food for thought
I am eager to see the end of the belief that there is one set of “best practices” when it comes to boards and governance. Let’s finally agree that governance is extremely complex as researchers are recognizing “the importance of context to our understanding of governance and the work of boards.”
Strategic Planning Practices in High Performing Nonprofits
The bottom line: “93% of successful organizations report that strategic planning has ‘some to critical impact’ on overall success, whereas only 48% of low success organizations report such impact.” Association for Strategic Planning
Strategic planning – 8 questions to consider
At the center of strategic planning is the commitment to community outcomes or mission-based objectives. These objectives are backed up by a clear-headed understanding of the dynamics of the world you exist in, a thoughtful and evidence-based strategy for executing programs (or an experiment that you’ll learn from) and a plan for building the operational capacity and strategic partnerships that are your best shot at reaching those objectives.
Is your nonprofit contributing to the income gap?
Anyway, while we can be proud of the work of the nonprofit sector providing direct supports and advocating for policy change to correct income imbalances, we also must acknowledge our own sector’s contribution to the income gap.
How many of our own workers are we paying poverty wages?
How many of our own workers lack health care coverage?
How many of our own workers will lack pensions when they retire?
Six rules for working in groups
Do you have a set of ground rules you use when facilitating a group? Mine are fairly simple. Here’s the list. Share space Share responsibility Honor time Savor humans and humor “Everyone has a piece of the truth” Phones on vibrate