Choosing Leaders for Nonprofit Organizations

A good nonprofit leader begins early to offer staff development opportunities. Good idea. However, the reality is that many nonprofits have small staffs, so in order to advance one often has to switch jobs. What a huge loss of institutional memory occurs when this happens!

The greatest challenge to nonprofit organizations occurs when the leader needs to be replaced. All too often, an internal candidate is not ready to take the helm, precisely for the reason just described. An even greater challenge occurs if the board does not itself possess enough institutional knowledge to conduct an effective search process.