Transcending the Organization
FROM THE ARCHIVE: The secret to ensuring that this critical relationship works isn’t about clear role definition; it’s all about trust, according to recent research.
This convoluted case of organizational malfeasance is a cautionary tale for boards that have abdicated their oversight role.
A former board member absconds with artwork donated to the organization’s auction. What’s an ethical board to do? Impoverished volunteers avail themselves of donations while sorting them. How to handle?
AN NPQ CLASSIC:
Nonprofits offer precisely the connections and meaning for which people yearn. Schambra exhorts nonprofits to cultivate these characteristics and not lose themselves to mimicking government or business.
Welcome to the Winter 2007 issue of the Nonprofit Quarterly, “Transcending the Organization.” In this edition you will find articles proposing that sustainable nonprofit organizations as we now understand them are not the goal of our work, nor are they always even the most effective vehicles for achieving our missions. Sometimes, in fact, organizations—and our assumptions about their centrality and structural requirements—distract us from the work we must do to keep our democracy and our communities healthy and vibrant. This may be particularly true in the last ten to fifteen years when so much of the conversation we have with our funders focuses on organizational rather than transformational capacities. Of course these two characteristics should be linked—but sometimes they do not seem to be. Sometimes, not following a strategic plan frees us to recognize what’s in front of us.
What is excessive compensation of a nonprofit leader? The IRS is paying closer attention, so should you.
The most substantive decisions on your organization’s governance is likely happening far from the board room. How should your governance systems respond?
Centro Presente, a leading organization in the immigrant justice movement, energized its mission and constituency when it moved from a top-down board to a governance structure that engaged a broad array of stakeholders.
The strange new mutants of philanthropy.
Two overeducated brothers fight it out on one of the most frustrating conversations among nonprofits and their funders.
