• A clear mission that evokes passion from staff, supporters, and participants
• Talented, dedicated staff
• A balanced philosophy to the program/overhead formula
• Investment in staff development
• Transparent and approachable leadership styles
• Strategic decision-making

And for my dream job:

• Meaningful projects
• Autonomy over my schedule and priorities
• Appropriate compensation
• Opportunity for advancement
• Opportunity to learn from my manager or organizational leader

Every nonprofit organization and every nonprofit professional should have everything on the list! No excuses.

A clear mission that evokes passion from staff, supporters, and participants

When you see the Ben & Jerry’s logo, you immediately know what the company does and what the company’s culture is. The same should be true for nonprofits. I walked by a purple awning with nothing but 4 capital letters on it, and I knew it was a nonprofit. A business couldn’t afford to be so ambiguous about its mission and services, and neither should nonprofits!

It’s just good business sense. A strong mission and brand help motivate staff and supporters, helps focus the work to the most important, most vital services. It can help focus a meeting, focus a budget, or focus a fundraising event. And it costs nothing to be clear and specific!

Talented, dedicated staff

Have you ever worked with someone who didn’t like their job? Not fun, right? In addition to being unpleasant, it’s inefficient. Someone who doesn’t like their job isn’t doing their best work, isn’t being efficient, isn’t bringing new ideas to the meeting, isn’t building relationships with those around them.

Nonprofits have the advantage of recruiting staff who believe in the mission, from the moment they walk in the door. That means nonprofits can also afford to find the best qualified and most talented staff from the available pool. I’ve always enjoyed the talent of my nonprofit peers. It inspires me to work harder to match their level of quality.

A balanced philosophy to the program/overhead formula

Do you know how much of the budget Ben & Jerry’s spends on administrative costs? No? But you still buy their product right? Because it’s a superior product!

Nonprofits, on the other hand, spend a lot of effort trying to keep down “administrative” costs to spend more on “program”. I argue this is a plan for disaster. Many of us argue this is a plan for disaster. Artificially suppressing administrative costs makes for a slow, cumbersome organization that is not built to withstand stressful times, and will fail to take advantages of opportunities. It means the nurse or teacher has to spend 45 minutes fixing the copier, instead of healing or teaching. It means the accountant is overburdened and makes significant errors. It means the senior staff is putting out fires rather than building relationships and finding more support for the organization’s programs.

Perhaps I should go to business school. My gut tells me that by investing slightly more in administrative support, productivity of program staff at a nonprofit would be vastly improved. In other words, this would not cost the organization money in the long run.

Investment in staff development

Offering staff opportunities for professional development makes for a happy staff, as well as a happy organization. It’s a wonderful way to retain staff, build internal leadership, and improve the performance of the entire nonprofit organization.

Every city in the United States has a network of universities, associations, institutes, etc. that offer a spectrum of professional development opportunities for nonprofit professionals. Many of these are subsidized or completely underwritten for nonprofit staff! I know at YNPN Chicago our events can run as low as $5 or 10!

Transparent and approachable leadership styles

I think I was about 22 when I realized that just because someone was older than me, it didn’t mean they were a grown up. Have you ever run into that situation? Met someone who was in their 50s but behaved like a capricious teenager?

The pool of people interested in working for a nonprofit organization is wide, diverse, and deep with talent. We can save ourselves money by investing in approachable, transparent leaders to motivate our staff. I know some managers promote a problem staff person rather than confront them, but that practice will definitely hurt the organization and be very expensive in the long run in terms of staff turnover and missed opportunities.

Strategic decision-making

It only took 3 months of my nonprofit career before I saw someone lose their job because the project lost funding. I can’t understand how grant-chasing is healthy for long-term program development. Nor can I understand how grant-chasing is an efficient way to build an organization.

It goes back to a clear mission. What are our values as an organization? What do we want to accomplish? How do we want to accomplish it. And after all those questions are answered, where are we going to find the funds to accomplish our goals?

Meaningful projects

I love understanding how my project fits into the larger objectives of my organization, and how I am contributing to moving our mission forward. Even when I stuffed thousands of envelopes in a day, it helped me understand I was part of a larger fundraising project, and know what kind of work the funds were supporting. Everything we do at nonprofits has meaning, it’s up to us as manager and leaders to make sure everyone feels valued.

Autonomy over my schedule and priorities

With a pool of talented, well developed staff, we can trust them to schedule their time and set their priorities. Of course, everyone needs a manager and strategic objectives. Let’s banish the ineffective micro-manager!

Appropriate compensation

Compensation is lower on my list than many would expect. Nonprofit staff value personal fulfillment and professional opportunity. However, they also want to make a fair, living wage. I know many nonprofits rely heavily on interns, Americorps VISTAs, recent college graduates for inexpensive staff. All organizations still need a component of senior staff with talent, organizational knowledge, and leadership skills.

Have you ever tried to scrambled for hours putting together a budget for a foundation proposal… only to have the senior finance person stop by and give you a few tips and background information that saves you HOURS of time? Nonprofit organizations need to make sure compensation is at an appropriate level to keep those senior staff and improve the efficiency of our work.

Opportunity for advancement

Advancement doesn’t just mean more compensation, although that’s nice. It means opportunity for leadership, opportunity for project management, opportunity for more responsibility. With a well managed, well developed staff, nonprofits can be very creative about how they make room for advancement to keep staff challenged, and high performing.

I made up my own title several times at one of my organizations, helping to bring the organization into new areas of online technology. It was beneficial to me, and (more important) beneficial to my organization.

Opportunity to learn from my manager or organizational leader

In my almost 4 years at YNPN Chicago, the word mentorship has come up hundreds of times. Hundreds. HUNDREDS. Whenever we do a survey, a focus group, a networking event, the word comes up. mentorship. Mentorship. MENTORSHIP. Everyone wants it, so how do we find it?

I look to my peers and managers to be my network of mentors. It benefits all of us to share resources, provide advice and support. I especially enjoy watching my manager or leader in action, and learning how they handle difficult situations. It inspires me to watch great leaders at work.

When we held focus groups in early 2009 for YNPN Chicago, I learned a lot that I will apply to the focus groups I will run for 2010. For example:

• Divide groups up according to affiliation with the organization! I know this seems like so obvious, but it’s an important planning step that I missed in my first attempt.
• Gather questions from various departments. Maximize your investment of time and energy by getting the most benefit for your organization. Pay special attention to new cross-department initiatives.
• Have a few major goals in mind. If you’re like most nonprofits, fundraising will be one of those goals.
• Keep the conversation between an hour and an hour and a half.
• Thank your focus group participants with a small token. Even a $10 Starbucks gift card will do. We’re nonprofits, but we really value the feedback of our supporters.

I’ve heard from many of my peers that they’ve stayed on track with 2008 numbers, fewer donors, but higher average gift amounts.

I’ve enjoyed the challenge of making  the case for a donor to support my organization. It has helped me focus on our case for support. What brings a donor to our organization? What about our work most appeals to them?

Year end fundraising is also an enjoyable challenge in planning and segmentation. What times and days are best for sending an online email appeal? Who are the people on our email list and what is their affiliation to our organization?