How Sustainable Is Your Nonprofit?

Is your nonprofit organization on the road to sustainability? In fact, the better question may be: How does the average nonprofit prepare its organization to become more sustainable? That’s what Bloomerang set to find out in its "Nonprofit Organizational Health & Sustainability Benchmark," which surveyed 600 U.S. nonprofits.

The survey reported that 77 percent of organizations defined their top three organizational priorities and 66 percent defined their top three organizational challenges for the calendar and fiscal year. Surprisingly, only 46 percent of organizations utilized a strategic plan, 35 percent utilized a marketing plan, 16 percent utilized a succession plan and 28 percent utilized a communications plan last quarter. On the plus side, 62 percent of organizations did utilize a fundraising plan last quarter.

When asked, “Did your organization measure program impact last quarter?” 59 percent of organizations said “yes” and 41 percent said “no.” Of those organizations that answered “yes,” 47 percent said that the
degree of impact increased and 49 percent said that the impact was reported externally.

When it came to giving internally, 59 percent said that their board members donated in the past year and 39 percent said three-fourths of their staff gave at “personally meaningful levels in personally meaningful ways for the past year’s annual gift.” Twenty-eight percent of organizations were not sure the number of months of operating cash on hand (not including restricted funds). Overall, 24 percent of organizations were not sure how many total hours were volunteered last year, while 43 percent reported over 101 hours, 19 percent reported 51 hours to 100 hours, 10 percent reported 11 hours to 50 hours and 4 percent reported 0 hours to 10 hours.

Visit goo.gl/FVCkbI to read the full report.