Guide Star has released its June 2010 Survey "The Effects of the Economy on the Nonprofit Sector".The survey consisted of more than 7,000 respondents, composed of various nonprofit sector leaders such as CEOs, executive directors, vice presidents and presidents of non-profits. The survey measured the impact of the current economic environment and its effect on the nonprofit sector. The survey produce some interesting results:

* 40 percent of participants reported that contributions to their organizations dropped between January 1 and May 31, 2010, compared to the same period a year earlier.
* 63 percent reported a total increase in demand for their organization's services between January 1, 2010 and May 31, 2010, compared to the same period a year prior.
* 80 percent indicated that their organizations were in imminent danger of closing.
* Among organizations that use volunteers, 17 percent used one or more in what had formerly been paid positions.

To read and download the complete report click here:"The Effects of the Economy on the Nonprofit Sector"

Being a member of a not-for-profit organization’s board of directors allows members to be directly involved in the decision-making that ultimately decides the mission and direction of the organization However, with the transitory nature of many boards, with members often serving one or two terms, it can sometimes be difficult to set specific, consistent guidelines for Chief Executive Officer reviews.Changes among board leadership is often a given within a not-for-profit organization, so it is beneficial to establish a process for evaluating your CEO and determining appropriate rewards that can be consistently followed, even through transitional phases within the board. Increasing scrutiny regarding CEO compensation by legislators, donors, and the general public has also made it more important that the organization has an evaluation process that is documented and aligns with its mission and goals.There are many steps that can be taken to ensure that a board’s CEO evaluation process is sound and reduces any undue risks to the organization. Read More

Name: Nadanu : "Enables non-profits, educational institutions, campaigns and businesses to use a secure, next-generation fundraising platform to increase interaction, awareness and support. Our patent pending technology will create a simple, fun to use and accessible method of collecting donations and interacting with your donors."

Quick Pitch: Nadanu transforms the electronic giving into a simple, fun and accessible experience.

Genius Idea: Based on the ancient Sumero-Akkadian word for “giving”, Nadanu seeks to make the currently complex setup, management, deployment and usage of electronic giving and interaction with donors into a faster, better experience for users and charities alike. It helps organizations reach out to individuals who care in order to secure the funding they need.

For donors, the process is as simple as dropping virtual “coins” into a custom receptacle; the service eliminates the long, prohibitively complicated donation forms we’re used to seeing. Donors can also create reminders to give and set recurring micro-giving schedules for themselves. Read More

This is part one of a five part presentation from Stephen Melanson on Verbal Branding given at The Non-Profit Toolbox meet-up at the South Shore Science Center in Norwell MA. Here is the transcript of the clip:

I'm going to talk to you about Verbal Branding and Verbal Branding as you see are new literally unique in the world as far as I know branding applications. And the goal is as you see there. To simultaneously improve sales culture, what I refer to as Brand Density, and there is even more to it than that. But Ill talk about everything. I have about twenty minutes with you, I'm going to teach you everything I can in twenty minutes about Verbal Branding. I hope you find it interesting, and I think you'll find it interesting that you can apply some of these things starting tomorrow for your non-profits.

Now here's what I believe should keep you awake at night. Your brand being diminished every single day times every single person regardless of how many there are in your organization times every conversation they have. Now I don't make that up just to make a point I work with a lot of different kinds of companies and firms and organizations. This is the scenario that I see everywhere I go regardless of the situation. So it might now start keeping you awake, but this is what I see everywhere and this is to be avoided obviously for your brand. Now I do work in a specific area of branding. Branding is a huge topic as you know. There is what's called the identity elements, logos, tags lines, the name of your firm or organization, the colors and the imagery on your Web site, things like that. Those are all identity related, I don't do any of that work. I do what called positioning, and here is my very simple definition of what position should mean to you in my opinion. How are you different and because of that difference better than the competition whoever the competition is. This is what I use for a definition regardless who I'm working with and it works every time.
The gap in the branding marketplace is a spoken application. Believe it or not in the branding world, full service branding companies do all sorts of work for their clients, they never actually deal with what people say every day to people outside their organization. That's the work that I do. Again, Verbal Branding is a spoken application, literally a spoken robust application, for this thing that I call brand positioning and that's what its called in the marketplace.

So here's what's at issue and everyone will be all relate to this. What conversation do you want or need to have when you speak to somebody? How many conversations do you think you've had in your entire business or nonprofit life? Most people say, oh five hundred, ten thousand, things like that. Right? Actually there's only, two you're either the same or you're different, there's no middle ground. And you should know that when you're in the field and you're talking to people there's only two options, you're either the same or you're different from your competition. That's what goes on in the mind of the consumer. Does that make sense?

OK, now to something I call conversational dynamics, but before I go into that in a little bit of detail, I want you to know this. This is why my best tips and I hope you remember it forever. When you tell someone your name, when you tell them what category your business or your firm is in, your non-profit, here's what I have to say. No one cares. Ok? No one cares, isn't that awful? No one cares but it's true. Nonprofit about X Y or Z, CPA firm, attorney, branding consultant, guess what I don't even care that I'm a branding consultant. So I never tell anybody that because I know that they shouldn't care because I don't even care. I care what my positioning in the marketplace is. It's totally different and what I'll tell you and I see everywhere I go is that people sell quote, unquote sell or try to raise money based on category. Listen to what people say in maybe even listen to yourself and you'll realize that what happens is they'll tell you what category of business they're in and then they'll go about talking about the positive attributes of the category alone and they have not positioned themselves for differentiation in their competitive space. Start listening for that and you'll hear it everywhere, ninety nine percent of the time. That's to be avoided.

See the complete transcript at:

http://thenon-profittoolbox.com/2010/...

Would it surprise you to learn that a LOT of the folks I’m working with today (and I suspect the same is true of other career coaches) are expressing strong interest in the possibility of making a career switch from the for-profit to the non-profit sector?

Predictably, when things get tough in corporate world, a healthy contingent of private sector workers usually seek to “escape” to what they perceive to be the less fickle, political, and hard-charging world of not-for-profits. Additionally, given the huge cohort of older workers currently in transition, it’s also likely that this trend reflects a shift in priorities among many professionals of the Baby Boom generation — and the desire of such individuals to find work they feel is more meaningful and will allow them to leave more of a legacy, versus just taking yet another “rat race” position to meet material needs. Read More

he erosion of the traditional business model for news has led many to go down the non-profit path. The result is a slew of new non-profit news websites. The Bay Citizen, which launchedat the end of May, is the newest and joins the likes of ProPublica, MinnPost, and the Texas Tribune, to name just a few. But as the closing of the non-profit Chi-Town Daily News last year indicates, running a non-profit isn’t easy.
Perhaps no one understands this as well as Jim Barnett. After almost two decades as a newspaper reporter, Barnett threw his efforts into launching his own non-profit news service in 2005. Managing a non-profit proved to be a major challenge and Barnett realized he’d need some new skills in order to be successful in this space. These days, he’s pursuing a masters in non-profit management at George Washington University, working as an in-house adviser to AARP’s publications group and doing some editing for the Washington Post News Service at night. He’s also been expanding on his academic work on his blog, The Nonprofit Road, and more recently on Harvard’s Nieman Journalism Lab blog. Read More

today announced the addition of a new portfolio of software, services and consulting grants to respond directly to the needs of local non-profit organizations to improve their effectiveness.
These new IBM Trailblazer Grants open up IBM's innovation technology and the deep expertise of its employees and make them available to the local non-profit sector. Through consulting and technology tools in areas such as social networking, project management, strategic planning, leadership and collaboration, IBM's Trailblazer Grants will help local non-profit groups to reach farther into their communities, connect with populations in need, and more efficiently and effectively manage their organizations.
These new localized software, services and consulting grants leverage IBM's expertise in the communities it engages, and mirror the type of assistance it provides to its clients. In a pilot phase, these grants have been distributed to 30 non-profit organizations and schools in the United States with 150 more groups around the world set to receive grants in 2010. These new grants enable local, non-profit organizations to receive for free some of the same services and tools that for-profit businesses routinely are able to obtain, allowing them to operate more efficiently in the current economic environment and position for future community stability and growth.
"In a tough economy, non-profit organizations have the dual challenge of shrinking budgets and increasing requests for help from people in need, particularly in the case of local groups that are part of the social safety net," said Stanley S. Litow, vice president of IBM Corporate Citizenship & Corporate Affairs. "IBM has a long history of commitment and engagement with communities as a local, good corporate citizen. These grants respond to the very real challenge of helping community agencies improve their productivity and effectiveness."
These IBM Trailblazer Grants help recipient non-profit organizations to build up their IT infrastructure and their leadership, management and technology skills. The solutions were developed with non-profit partners, and designed to help them enhance their ability to meet the needs of their communities. By leveraging IBM's strength in these areas, the new grants align closely with the needs of small-to-mid-sized non-profit and educational organizations. Some of the early recipients of these grants have offered perspective on the relevance and impact these offerings can have:
"The extent to which IBM has helped us to think more strategically through the Strategic Assessment grant is the extent to which we will be better able to improve public education and to help students, teachers, families, community members, and teachers in the Philadelphia community, so that all of our students have access to college and careers." - Carol Fixman, Executive Director, Philadelphia Education Fund
"We're using the social media tools we gained from this grant in order to both reinforce key financial aid information delivered during our in-school advising sessions and reach out to new students in need of guidance about how to afford college. We learned from IBM how to employ tools like Facebook and Twitter to create a network that will connect us with these students and help them form a community with each other as well – this will keep them engaged from their freshman year of high school all the way through to successful completion of college." – Kevin Mitchell, Development Director, ACCESS, Boston
"This grant helped us build skills at Safe Horizon for better management of some of our most complex projects in serving victims of violence in the New York City area. Our mission is to provide support and prevent violence for victims of crime and abuse, their families and their communities. With improved management, we'll be better able to coordinate and execute on projects across our organization, from facilities management to legal contract reviews to operations." – Ariel Zwang, Chief Executive Officer, Safe Horizon, New York
"At Greenlights, we are working to connect the Central Texas community and enable local non-profit groups to manage their business and governance issues. In tough economic times like these, small groups that have the passion to do good work may not always have the business tools and skills they need to stay afloat. With the knowledge and tools we've received through our project management consultancy grant, we're helping our local community nonprofits to do more with less, serve the increasing numbers of local populations in need, and thrive in a tough economy." – Ann Starr, Director of Education, Greenlights for Nonprofit Success, Austin
The IBM Trailblazer Grant offerings include a range of services, software and technology including project management, social media, leadership and collaboration and strategic assessment. As well as data back up, resiliency and hacker vulnerability services, along with donation of key software tools such as LotusLive and Lotus Foundations.

Source-PRNewswire

With the fight over state teachers salaries and benefits getting bloodier, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie is putting his budget cutting focus on non-profit social agencies doing business with the state.

Most specifically, the amount the state is willing to pay for CEO salaries and employee benefits.

According to a Department of Human Service draft memo obtained by the New Jersey Star Ledger, the state would limit the salaries of top earning executives 10 to $141,000 for any non-profit social service agency with a budget of over $20 million beginning July 1. Read More

The analysis of data is critical to making an informed decision about your event's online direct marketing strategy, yet many people are intimidated by the sheer volume of data tied to fundraising programs. For event marketers and fundraisers, data is often seen as an especially big mystery. They collect a lot of data, but are either not sure what to do with it or are analyzing the wrong pieces.

One of the most important pieces of information you can extract from data analysis is a better understanding of the type of event you are running. Is it an attendance event that brings out the masses? Or is it a fundraising event that brings in the dollars? If it is the former, then you will want to identify ways in which you can transform the culture of your event from one of participation to one of fundraising. Once you understand and evaluate various key metrics and corresponding benchmarks, you can use your analysis as a blueprint to think strategically about how to use online direct marketing to improve your event's future fundraising results. Read More

Legislation signed into law by U.S. President Barack Obama last month overhauls the $2.5 trillion U.S. healthcare industry and extends coverage to 32 million uninsured Americans.The wave of newly insured will benefit not-for-profit hospitals in the short-term, along with other reforms such as reimbursement protections this year and a 10 percent Medicare bonus payment for primary care physicians and general surgeons in 2011, Moody's said.
Longer-term, not-for-profit hospitals will benefit from meaningful decreases in bad debt and charity care due to reforms, such as a mandate requiring individuals to obtain healthcare and the establishment of state insurance exchanges, said Moody's. Read More