Executive Issues

Ted Hart, CEO of P2P Fundraising, GreenNonprofits.org and TedHart.com, spoke with Certified Fundraising Executive Christopher M. Cannon, author of "An Executive's Guide to Fundraising Operations," in May.

The Meyer Foundation and CompassPoint Nonprofit Services released The Board Paradox, completing a series of three briefs based on a national study of more than 3,000 nonprofit executive directors. The briefs report survey results and findings not included in the Daring to Lead 2011 main report, which was released in late June. The three briefs in the series are:

• Leading Through a Recession
• Inside the Executive Director Job
• The Board Paradox

Following are reasons (beyond money) why people leave one nonprofit for another or leave the nonprofit space altogether for work in the for-profit sector. Evaluating your organization by these measures may help you make small changes that can increase tenures of valuable team members.

Many philanthropists are handing out human resources advice along with the money they give to nonprofit groups, a strategy that underscores concerns by donors and even some organizations’ leaders about the management of nonprofits. “Pretty early on, I realized that when I asked these organizations about management, the response I usually got was, ‘That’s business and we’re not a business,’ ” Peter Lewis, chairman of Progressive Insurance, said. “I told them baseball teams have managers, too, but that seemed to have little impact on their opinion.”

Successful fundraisers know how to manage their priorities and protect their time so they can focus on the things that need to get done.

Sometimes even the best donors give money to bad organizations, Jacob Harold, a program officer at the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, told a meeting Monday of nonprofit officials held at New York University’s Robert F. Wagner Graduate School of Public Service. In some cases, Harold says, these donors focus on the wrong type of information when making decisions about their giving, often looking only at organizations’ overhead and not at whether they are effective in fulfilling their missions.

An innovative capcity-building grant from Sutter Medical Center, Sacramento helps small nonprofits learn to become self-sustaining organizations built for the long haul.

Darian Rodriguez Heyman, managing partner at the CODE Green Agency and former executive director of the Craigslist Foundation, talks about his book, "Nonprofit Management 101."

The cover story in the May issue of FundRaising Success, "Strength Training for Fundraisers," featured 12 tips from global fundraising consultant Ken Burnett to help nonprofits flex their fundraising muscles and build (or rebuild) an effective development department from the ground up. As promised in the issue, here are the final steps — 14 and 15.

The cover story in the May issue of FundRaising Success, "Strength Training for Fundraisers," featured 12 tips from global fundraising consultant Ken Burnett. As promised in the issue, here are the three remaining tips in Ken's list.