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Two places are very thorough in their coverage of the
most frequently asked questions about leading a nonprofit or voluntary
association. They cover current information on issues related to leadership,
management, organizational development, legal, finding and using resources,
and the development of nonprofits and voluntary association. Start with
the Internet
Nonprofit Center. We suggest you start here to see if your question
is answered.
BoardSource,
(formerly, The National Center for Nonprofit Boards), FAQ site deals with
board structure, board governance, board development, board responsibilities,
board meetings, financial issues, fundraising, and legal liability issues.
Q: What nonprofit-related resources
and opportunities are available through the federal government?
See the Nonprofit
Gateway home page.
Q: What are the current average
salaries of nonprofit staff in South Carolina?
The Bureau
of Labor Statistics provides tables on wages by occupation for
the state. Both hourly rates and salaried levels are included. However,
in general nonprofit leaders are earning below what they are able to
command in private business settings. We suggest that you pay your
leaders a decent wage irrespective of what other organizations in the
area pay. You are apt to keep your employees longer and productivity
normally is higher. In addition you are apt to recruit more qualified
personnel.
Q: What is the size and budget
of nonprofit organizations that are similar to ours?
GuideStar is
one of the better resources to consult. They post all 990 IRS forms
of nonprofits that register with them. This site is also very good
to get current information about how to use your financial statements
as a public relations and marketing tool to show you are accountable.
Q: Everyone
is into accountability discussions right now. What do they mean?
How can our organization be seen as accountable?
One of the better sites on financial and legal accountability
is Nonprofit Cyberspace.
One of the better sites that will help you understand
program accountability is the Harvard
Family Research Project. Their online publications on program accountability
are very good.
Q: We are starting a new nonprofit
organization. Can you tell me what we need to know to get going? Do
you have any guides to follow?
Most fob the essentials are available online. The Internet
Nonprofit Center covers all essentials in developing and managing
a nonprofit organization. In our opinion it provides useful information
on all phases of startup and the changing issues of daily operation.
Another widely used resource is How to Form a Nonprofit
Corporation in All 50 States published by Nolo
Law for All Center. They also have a very good FAQ section on starting
a nonprofit. You can purchase this online through Amazon.com. Another
very useful resource is the Nonprofit Kit by Stan Hutton and Frances
Phillip. Consider acquiring Fiscal Sponsorship: Six Ways to Do it Right
from the Study
Center Press.
Using existing organizations as a base for testing the
waters before starting a new organization is considered the better way
to go in starting a new nonprofit. Fiscal Sponsorship will help you explore
wisely the possibility. All of these resources can be purchased through
amazon.com.
BoardSource,
(formerly, The National Center for Nonprofit Boards), has a checklist
that can be used to guide discussion and planning.
The Free
Management Library also has a list of very important questions
that need to be answered realistically. Most recommend that a business
plan be created because it will cause leaders to consider all the
requirements of managing an organization. See Don
Griesmann's article (in PDF format) on starting a nonprofit.
His article tells you what needs to be in a business plan.
Q: What is a 990? If we are a
nonprofit do we have to have one?
Form 990 is an Internal Revenue Service information
return that must be filed every year by many nonprofits. Nearly all the
information in the form is available to the public. Nonprofits are encouraged
to post their Form 990 on their web site as evidence of accountability. GuideStar publishes
most of the filed 990's. The Independent
Sector, the National
Center for Charitable Statistics and the Association
of Fundraising Professionals are working together on a project to
improve the quality of reporting and of the form. The Form 990 may become
a major document consulted by funding organizations to check out who
you are. If you earn less than $25,000 you aren't required to file this
form, but we strongly urge you to do so since it does demonstrate you
are willing to be held accountable to the public for the use of the funds
people give you.
Q: I have heard that many nonprofits
in South Carolina are not compliant. What does that mean and how do
I make sure our organization is compliant with state and federal rules
of the road for nonprofits?
The SC
Department of Revenue has a complete set of helps online for you
to consult. All update notices are there. Your board's finances committee
should consult this site frequently to make sure the organization is
compliant with changes in federal and state law as they occur. A review
of the annual reporting requirements for nonprofit organizations is
also online. Other useful publications and resources are identified.
In addition they also offer workshops throughout the state for your
financial officers to attend.
Q: We have to start evaluating
services. We don't know how to do evaluations or what is involved.
Can you suggest resources we can consult? They need to be user friendly.
Funders recently are more serious about looking for
evidence of success, outcomes and impacts of programs. In order to show
evidence of effectiveness, nonprofits and voluntary associations must
build evaluation efforts into daily operations. If you are new to evaluation,
we suggest you consult the tools for program and comprehensive community
initiative evaluation that are available for the Community Toolbox. Their
site will also point you to additional resources that are available.
The User-friendly Handbook for Mixed Method Evaluations and Empowerment
Evaluations page are for people with intermediate understanding of evaluation.
The American Evaluation Association is a primary forum for those who
wish to learn on the job and from the nation's best. The Community Toolbox
will direct you to self-help software that is available online. You can
also access an interesting virtual learning forum on empowerment evaluation
through them. In addition to the Community Toolbox, The Program Evaluation
Kit is a highly used evaluation package. What started out to be just
one self-guided booklet to design and conduct an evaluation has now become
a series of tools. The topics covered include how to design an evaluation
that meets your needs; how to analyze data; how to assess program implementation;
how to communicate evaluation findings; how to design an evaluation;
how to focus an evaluation; how to measure attitudes; how to measure
performance and use tests; how to use qualitative methods. It is one
of the most used kits currently available. It can be purchased from Sage
Publications. The title is Program Evaluation Kit by Joan Herman.
A new publication is available from the Independent
Sector entitled Outcome Measurement in Nonprofit Organizations.
Q: I am the president of a nonprofit
board. I want our board to become familiar with the key resources and
associations that help nonprofits lead and manage effectively. Who
should we pay attention to?
The Independent
Sector is a leading coalition of nonprofits, foundations, and corporations. BoardSource,
(formerly, The National Center for Nonprofit Boards) and The
Foundation Center would be on our short list.
Q: We need grants in order to
do our work, to meet capital development and technology development
needs. Where do we go to find what's available?
Developing a sound financial base for your organization
should be a priority concern of the Director and board members. The financial
base of the organization needs to be diverse in order to weather the
ups and downs of gifts and grants. When you do your business plan you
will have to think about all the different ways you plan to access financial
resources so that you are sustainable. Getting grants is just one of
several paths to financial stability.
The following sites are some of the better ones:
Catalog
for Federal and Domestic Assistance
Chronicle
of Philanthropy
Foundation
Center
The Grantsmanship
Center
Grantsnet
GuideStar
Hoover's Online
National Association
of Fundraising Professionals
Philanthropy
News Network
Q: I need to learn how to write
a proposal. What goes in a proposal? How do I go about approaching
foundations and granting agencies?
There are many sites that have online how-to booklets
on grant writing. The one we recommend the most is produced by the Grantsmanship
Center. It is entitled Program
Planning and Proposal Writing. It is very inexpensive. In addition,
they offer highly recognized grant writing workshops. We suggest you
consider attending one, if you have to write grants on a regular basis.
Q: Where can I go to get an understanding
of the various IRS forms our organization needs to file and why?
The National
Center for Charitable Statistics provides an easy to understand
overview of what forms to file and also provides the forms online.
Also consult the SC
Department of Revenue's online resources.
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