Nonprofit Board Crisis

Nonprofit Pinball Museum: Why Nonprofit?

The New York Times today tells the story of the Pacific Pinball Museum.  According to the story, the museum was started because the founder (and collector) was less than excited about the "other" pinball museums.

Pinball machines, you may recall, most frequented bars and arcades.  Now, they merit museum status.  Why?

Nonprofit Poopy

The New York Times thinks it is being helpful looking for and telling the stories of the nonprofits that have lost their tax exempt status due to failure to heed the many, many, many, many notices sent by the IRS.

Yes, these are puppy-dog sad stories.  Well, the story on July 15 was about a group that fills doggy bag dispensers at Fort Greene park.

Anyway, do citizens really want a bunch of organizations that can't meet the minimum requirements for existence right? (I know, they didn't get a personal notice and apparently no one in their organization ever reads the paper although they read it enough to call the NY Times.) I say "NO"!

Nonprofit Governance: What I Believe

Just doing some thinking about effective nonprofit governance and wanted to share.

I believe that the most effective board is one that is mission and results focused: first! 

I believe that an effective board defines and fulfills its roles and responsibilities to best match the needs of the organization being sure to understand and embrace its fiduciary duties of care, loyalty and obedience. 

I believe that a board has only one employee who is the executive and is most effective when it understands and practices the difference between governing and managing/operating/volunteering. 

I also believe that when board members are fully informed and fully understand the results of the organization's work, both statistically and in narrative (e.g. stories), they make better policy, planning and evaluation decisions. 

Finally, I believe that by-laws should support board roles and structure; fewer standing committees help ensure effectiveness and efficiency and maintain engagement and interest; and, size does not matter as much as commitment by all.

 

Nonprofit Celebrity Leadership Not Enough

Nonprofits should be reminded that a nonprofit, even a mega-church with "celebrity" leaders, does not, eventually, do well without a board to govern. 

At least this is my take-away by the Chapter 11 Bankruptcy filing announcement of the mega-church Church at South Las Vegas.   I believe that particularly large nonprofits live long and prosper best when a dynamic board and strong management are at the helm and backed by a strong donor base.  I believe that success is not so possible when the nonprofit's survival is dependent on the celebrity status of its founders/leaders.  And, there is good evidence that these beliefs are sound, particularly in the religious arenas where celebrity leaders often tend eventually to treat their enterprise as just that, THEIR enterprise.  Mostly because there is little or no accountability to a higher power: i.e. a governing body.

Meanwhile, according to the Wall Street Journal,

“one of the fastest-growing churches in the Las Vegas Valley, with 3,500 members attending services weekly, the church couldn’t afford both its expansion efforts and the payments on a $9 million real-estate loan from First Bank it took out to buy some of its campus facilities.

The church, which said its income almost exclusively comes from donations, estimated its assets were worth between $1 million and $10 million. That includes $963,400 in cash.

Hm.  Not my idea of good governance and management.

Nonprofits Part of Lobbying Game

Did you know that lobbyists make big gifts to nonprofits as a way to "show their love" to the representatives they are hoping to influence?  That's the story according to the Washington Post. 

The question boards should be asking: how can I get some?  Of course this question should be asked after making sure they are supporting the same side.  Or.....is this a criteria at all?  You know, that tainted money thing.....

Nonprofits With Bucks Starting To Share

One of my pet peeves is how even among nonprofits there are the "haves" and "have-nots".  Most irritating to me is that traditionally, distribution of the wealth has not surfaced as a core value of the "haves".   In the higher education world, the "haves" are recognizable and include the Harvards and Yales etc. 

But maybe a window is opening, if just a crack.  A Washington Post article reports that (some) colleges are replacing loans with no-pay grants for its neediest students.  Of course it helps that some municipalities have come forward with programs to ensure that all their students that graduate will be supported to go to College and maybe that softens the demand on cash this change might require but, bottom line, this is certainly the right thing to be doing.

Hooray for the college boards that have seen this path as the best path toward leaving no child behind.

Nonprofit Sluggish out of the Pit

In 2009 I noted the perhaps sad demise of the All-American Soap Box Derby organization.  Possibly due to some corporate mis-steps, probably the economy and also what I call the "bowling alone syndrome" or in this case the "driving alone syndrome" (check-it out here).  Regardless of cause, the Derby organization was going off-track for good.

But, according to the AP, the City of Akron, wise folks that they were, saw an opportunity driving out of the city if it didn't put itself in gear.  So the City guaranteed the Derby's $508,000 in loans.  Then the actor Corbin Benson made a movie about a soap box derby racer (perhaps giving some of the profits to the Derby?) Now life is looking promising, at least down the road.

Whew! And what could have moved the Derby board to take on 1/2 a million dollars in loans?  Hopefully, lessons to be learned.

Nonprofit Social Enterprise Is Ray Of Hope

I can't say much about its financial model (or economic potential) but New Orleans' Cafe Reconcile is certainly making the effort to change the lives of its youth by providing a training facility that also feeds the local community and hopefully generates some revenue to offset dependency on grants.

This is one of those win:win:win (providing training, a product and institutional revenue) prospects that sometimes can actually work for the long haul.  This is also one of those enterprises that needs a lot of good, solid management to ensure solvency because solvency is what makes the rest of the effort work.  While I am sure the Exec is more than competent, let's hope that the board is equally competent and supportive.

Here's the complete story from the Christian Science Monitor.

Nonprofit Accountability

Here's a rather thougthful albeit lengthy analysis of nonprofit accountability linking in part to how nonprofits can be better at being more fully accountable if they diligently acquire and employ technology tools.

Makes sense.

Nonprofits to get new board member prospects

The Office of Government Ethics has advanced a proposal that "aims to change a regulation that prohibits federal employees from serving in their official capacity on the board of a nonprofit without a waiver from their agency".

According to the New York Times,

These (proposed) changes will benefit federal agencies that employ scientists by removing a serious impediment to the full participation by those scientists in their scientific and professional societies -- an activity that is integral to the life of a scientist," they wrote in the letter, which was signed by groups such as the Ornithological Council, the American Chemical Society and the Society for Conservation Biology.

"The removal of this deterrent to federal service will make it easier for agencies to attract the best and the brightest scientists to their scientific staffs."

Well, I guess it's possible in the scientific community that scientists might not want to be federal employees because they can't serve on a nonprofit board although that wouldn't have been my first thought.  This aside, the opportunity for nonprofits to be able to expand the pool from which folks might serve on their boards is good news.  Plus, federal employees are part of the combined federal campaign and that raises a larger potential for fundraising.

Of course, the issues being addressed by the feds are not uncommon concerns possibly to any employer that is active in the nonprofits in the community.  Equally important though is that nonprofits need to be clear, as is true for all board candidates, that the prospective federal employee is first passionate about the mission and next, brings something of value that contributes to the work of the board.  Conflict of interest issues are always possible no matter the employer.  Having a good fit and getting all a person has to offer, that's really the key question.