Jennifer E Goldman, Nonprofit Consultant

Somewhere in time it became standard practice for nonprofit organizations to plan a balanced budget for their upcoming fiscal year. I don’t know where that came from, but can we please send it back? Ask any small business owner and they will tell you that the bottom line matters. They’re looking to be profitable in their year. They want their budget to indicate sustainability and growth. They’re ok with expenses going up as long as income increases even more. I encourage nonprofit organizations to adopt this mindset as well. How will your nonprofit be able to serve your community next year if you aren’t making money? Your annual budget should be a reflection of your growth plans, your program development , and the increased impact you plan to make in your community. Here are a few examples of things I encourage you to STOP doing to your nonprofit budget: ·         Stop purposely making your income and expenses equal – for two basic reasons. If y...

There's a good chance that if the nonprofit you're part of is small in terms of employees, budget, and programming it was set up to have what's known as a 'working' board. And if you don't have any previous experience with small community nonprofit organizations, your only impression of what board membership means may have come from the silver screen. While you may have visions of being chauffeured to prestigious meetings where you state your opinions and cast votes on various matters of import the reality of board service looks very different and somewhat less glamorous, although (hopefully) highly more satisfying on a personal level. If your organization isn't staffed sufficiently to carry out its mission-related programs, AND raise funds, AND take care of all administrative requirements then it's up to the Board of Directors to roll up their sleeves and perform the work of the organization alongside the staff. It's imperative that board members un...

  No matter what type of nonprofit you’re with, what their mission is, or whether it has a governing or a working board, there are standards and expectations that come with the job of being a board member. Nonprofits are constantly on the lookout for amazing community members who might climb the not-so-corporate ladder and rise from being a general volunteer to serving on the Board of Directors. Unfortunately, sometimes people rise up only to “sit” on the Board of Directors. If you suspect you’re a “sitter”, I urge you to stand up and engage in a level of service that your nonprofit craves. Here’s a checklist of 10 ways to ensure you’re serving your organization: ü   Attend ALL board meetings. Sometimes life gets in the way, I get that, but most likely when you agreed to become a board member someone told you when board meetings would be; add them to your calendar in advance and please don’t make excuses regarding scheduling conflicts. ü   Feel the mission. Hopefull...

Being on a nonprofit board of directors is a serious commitment. Many community members, even if they’ve been a volunteer for your organization for year, aren’t aware of what will be expected of them when they join your board. I hear many nonprofit staff lamenting over the lack of engagement from some (or even all) of their board members. Lack of engagement can stem from any number of reasons, but one of the most common I have found is simply that people weren’t told what would be expected of them until after they started their first term, and then they either find they can’t uphold all of the expectations and would have turned down the opportunity to serve if they’d had more information ahead of time or they resent no having been told and now they have a bad taste in their mouths. I’ve come to realize there’s a fear among organizations that if they reveal everything they expect of a board member, people will turn them down. If this applies to you, I say let them! If you tell prospec...

  I hear from several of my nonprofit clients that board engagement is a challenge; getting board members to do more than just show up once a month for board meetings has proven more difficult than they expected. I like to work from the assumption that community members who agree to join a nonprofit board do so with the best of intentions of giving back, making a difference in their local community. And I do believe that’s true. What I’ve also come to believe, however, is that the average community member doesn’t really understand what being a board member for a small nonprofit organization entails. So, how do we get our board to be more engaged? The bigger question for me is: how can you get board members who are already engaged? People who understand your nonprofit, your mission, the expectations you place on board members and what ‘engagement’ looks like to your particular organization? I’ve talked in several of my presentations and seminars/webinars about what I call the ...

And start funding planning for your programs, your overhead, your growth. When I was the Executive Director of a small nonprofit, I can remember feeling like I spent all of my time either fundraising through special events or running the special events. We needed the event to add money to our bank account to keep us afloat until the next special event. Essentially, each event was paying for the overhead and event expenses. It was a vicious (and exhausting) cycle. I’ve been working on two basic things with my clients recently: Proving your value by showing the impact your organization has on its community Raising the funds you need to sustain and grow your nonprofit in a way that allows you to focus on your mission and your programs. By fundraising through events, nonprofits are rarely introducing people to their organization, their mission, their impact and importance. It’s the equivalent of a retail shop having a sale or hosting a pop-up. You may get a bunch of people excite...

I recently attended an event hosted by our local fine arts museum; it was a roving lecture on Pablo Picasso. We walked from room to room, hearing about his art (inspiring, innovative, and thought-provoking) and his personality (philandering, explosive, and troubled) as narrated by a curator. While not on the tour, guests were treated to mulled wine, charcuterie and holiday cheer in a large, open, rentable event space. As some friends and I sat at a table chatting, a man approached us – he was clearly excited about the event – and asked if we were having a good time and had we been on the tour yet. Immediately, I knew what role this man had in the organization. I asked questions about the event space, which had one brick side and looked like it may have once been the original entrance to the museum. He very happily told us all about the renovations that had been done to the museum years ago and their plans for further renovations as well as the expansion onto an adjacent property whic...

I often hear from nonprofit board members that they got involved in an organization to make a difference, but that once they joined, they feel useless – no one calls on them to truly be involved. If you read the Board Engagement ~ Conversation Checklist blog post then you know that one of my suggestions was to sit down and have a chat with each of your board members. Whether you’re the organization’s Executive Director or the Board President, it would be good for you to know what motivates each individual who’s engaged in your board. Even better if you can determine their passions and hobbies. And employ them. This post is meant to help you take those one-on-ones one step further. For many people, volunteering is high on their priority list. However, not everyone wants to give their time to a nonprofit doing the same things they do in their job/career/profession. So, while you might be thrilled to have a lawyer, accountant, marketing person, etc. on your board if directors, th...

You’re a nonprofit leader. People are in awe of what you can accomplish; how much you can get done in a day. But are you a manager? Do you ever feel like you’re so mired down in the day-to-day minutiae that you just don’t have time to see the big picture? No time to implement new processes or ideas? Being an Executive Director is a BIG job especially when you’re leading a little organization, one with little to no staff, save for you. And that’s when it’s especially important to operate like a manager; like the CEO that you are. In my experience as a former (“recovering”) Executive Director, our board met once a month and it somehow always turned into an idea mill. By the end of those meetings, board members had scads of new, fabulous ideas. For ME to plan and implement. My to-do list got longer every time they met. Not to mention all the suggestions and ideas I fielded from donors and well-meaning community members. So what’s an ED to do with a to-do list a mile long (and growing) and...

When was the last time you got an appeal letter at home that included a self-addressed, stamped envelope...so you ran for your checkbook? I can’t remember either. It may have been enough to get you bonus donors back in our mothers’ day, but today the extra money spent on double the envelopes and double the postage is just an added expense to an already low-netting fundraiser. On average, fundraising appeal letters see a return of around 5%. That’s not a lot. To put it into perspective, here’s a little math I did for you. You’re welcome ;)      100 = number of letters you sent out          5 = the number of donations you receive If your ask in the letter was $100, then you may (or may not) have grossed $500 for that fundraiser. Total. And here’s likely what you spent on this “fundraiser”: 5-10 hours of your time creating, composing, collating, and mailing out – if you make $30/hour that’s $150 - $300 of your time $126 on posta...

If you’re struggling to find support for your nonprofit organization, you may want to begin tracking certain data to help you build a more compelling narrative. The more you understand what your organization has accomplished, in specific quantitative measures, the more your stakeholders and prospective supporters will be able to grasp the magnitude of the importance your nonprofit has in the community. Nonprofits that aren’t able to show their value, in both quantitative (numbers) and qualitative (narrative) ways often find support lacking in the following ways: Board member disengagement and/or dysfunction Not enough volunteers signing up Volunteers who step forward but don’t commit or follow through Donations waning in number and/or amount Grant applications rejected Partnerships dissolved or waning in commitment The more data you can collect during your fiscal year, the easier you’ll find it to tell your organization’s story. The method of data collection isn’t important – it can be...

Many nonprofit leaders feel as if their board isn’t engaged  *, or not as engaged as they’d like. On the flip side, many board members feel useless, like they want to do more, they just don’t know what to do and no one’s asking them. So, how can we get our directors to go from sitting on a board, to serving the board? It’s really quite simple. Talk to them! I invite you – either the head staff member or the board chair – to meet with board members one-on-one and find out how each member would like to be involved and at what level. The results may surprise you. Some board members will jump at the chance and some may not, but I believe they will all feel good about having had the conversation and the opportunity to be heard. Here's a list of questions or conversation starters you might want to use in these conversations: What first attracted you to our organization? What’s the biggest challenge you feel our organization is facing? And what suggestions do you have for resolving it? Wh...

Board retreats are a fantastic way to create meaningful engagement between staff and board, board member to board member and to solidify the commitment your board has to your nonprofit organization. Unfortunately, sometimes after a retreat, board members go back to status quo and that’s not ideal. Typically, a board retreat is put together with the hopes that board members will be re-energized, re-connected and renewed in their zeal to help lift an organization to a higher level of success. Here's a list of things I’ve found to be helpful in creating a retreat that will have a positive, lasting impact on your organization and the people you count on for its success: Decide what challenges you want to work through at the retreat and what outcomes/goals/deliverables you’ll be working toward. Make it a full-day or 2-day retreat. Eight solid hours if it’s only one day, six hours each day for 2-days. The best times of year for 2-day retreats to get the highest level of attendance (appr...

  Many nonprofits struggle with fundraising . I see several of them addressing funding concerns by adding events to their already busy calendars. And I get it. An overwhelming majority of people aren’t comfortable with asking for money. It may seem easier to raise funds through ticket sales, silent auctions or cash bars. But in reality it takes a lot more time (not to mention energy) – from your staff and your volunteers. I’d like to help organizations be more comfortable with asking for money. It ties into my 2023 theme of value proposition . It’s easier to ask for money when you believe in yourself and you believe in what you’re asking money for. See and feel the value of yourself and what you bring to the table as well as your organization, your programs, your projects and the level of service that you bring to your community. The first step, in my mind, is to realize (visualize) your own strengths and assets. We all have different personalities, different attitudes, different ...

I don't actually mean you. I meant me. I did it wrong. Not ALL of it, but certainly some of it. And maybe you are, too... Despite the fact that that line ( You're doing it wrong! ) came from the movie Mr. Mom , pointing out that the daddy was doing school drop-off/pick-up incorrectly, I’ve come to realize that being the mommy doesn’t give you any better instincts. Forget parenting, just being a human can be difficult to comprehend some days. You can see why I’ve been in therapy more than once in my lifetime. Turns out my first hurdle was mommy vs. daddy in a bout of marriage counseling. What I learned is that I’m one of those people who does it all. Sometimes because I have to, when there’s no one else willing to share the load. And sometimes because in my head, it’s just easier and faster to do it myself instead of explaining it to someone else. Or because I shouldn’t have to ask, so I don’t. Or because I know I’ll do it the way I want it done – and isn’t that really better an...