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Staying on Course: What to Do If You Are in the Middle of a Multi-Year Transformation Plan
Good for you if you started a major transformation plan before the pandemic hit. While the pandemic forced many nonprofits to quickly pivot to change mode, your organization is in the relatively good position of having already embraced and started this process. Now the challenge is how to stay on course while recognizing that the world around you has changed.
What I Look For When Deciding to Donate: An Attorney’s Perspective
The unprecedented social, economic, and public health upheaval of the past few months has led many people across the country to make heart-felt charitable donations (to the extent they are financially able to do so). Many would-be donors are looking to support nonprofits working in cause areas that may be unfamiliar to them, such as organizations providing COVID-19 relief, scientific research organizations, and organizations that combat racism.
Another Crisis-Driven Pitfall: Vacation Accruals
As nonprofit organizations continue to adjust to each new twist and turn this crisis throws at them, sometimes basic steps such as updating vacation accruals can catch you by surprise.
Now Is a Good Time to Reassess Your Nonprofit’s Governance Practices
The current pandemic has ushered in a very tenuous period of hyper-change and disrupted planning for most nonprofits. This crisis has required organizations to be laser focused on survival, continuity, and operating with maximum efficiency. For many organizations, these challenges have shed light on old or outdated governance practices that may have been taken for granted in years past and most likely should have been changed years ago.
Picking Between Mission and Financial Health and Sustainability: Which Comes First?
In the short-run you must pivot to favor financial health over mission so you can make it to the long-run and deliver more on mission in the future. Ensuring your organization will be around a long time will be the single most important factor to sustaining and then increasing delivery on mission.
Options and Tactics for Managing Restricted Funds During a Crisis
When there is substantial accumulated restricted funding in place and held on the balance sheet, most nonprofit organizations find themselves at great risk of inadvertently using restricted funds for purposes other than those agreed to with the donor/funder.
Setting Up a COVID-19 Task Force is a Proactive Strategy
Through many conversations with clients and colleagues, and feedback from participants in my webinars and podcasts, I have found that nonprofit organizations are significantly benefiting from setting up a task force to help respond and react to the many issues and disruptions related to the COVID-19 crisis.
Prepare a Burn-Rate Analysis and Dashboard
During a time of crisis, knowing the ins and outs of your burn-rate is vital because there are so many decisions being made quickly. Having a good handle on your burn-rate enables you to pay more attention to the variable cost side of the equation knowing you have already considered your operational fixed costs through a burn-rate analysis.
Using Operating Reserves During a Crisis: When and How Much?
Many nonprofit organizations have worked very hard over numerous years to build up operating reserves to a level that allows them to be considered a financially healthy organization with enhanced sustainability prospects for weathering an unexpected economic downturn. However, now that we are in the midst of a full-blown economic crisis, organizations that have built-up substantial operating reserves are faced with a real quandary of answering two simple questions: When? and How Much?
Top 10 Legal Action Items for Nonprofits in Light of COVID-19
While the usual legal compliance issues affecting nonprofit organizations (tax compliance, corporate governance, privacy issues, charitable solicitation registration, etc.) have not gone away, the massive wave of new legislation passed in response to the pandemic has made adapting to these new circumstances the number one legal priority for all nonprofits.
Impact of Hyper Change on Financial Health and Continuity
During extraordinary times of hyper change, we are confronted with so many changing elements that making effective management decisions seems overwhelming and finding a starting point feels impossible.