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Board of Directors

Featured Posts

How Board Members Can Stop Nonprofit Leader Burnout

How Board Members Can Stop Nonprofit Leader Burnout

September 9, 2019 By Nell Edgington

This summer, after much convincing, one of my clients (who was close to burnout) reluctantly took a long weekend off. She said it felt amazing. But she also felt guilty. It is insane that three very short days away felt somehow wrong to this beleaguered nonprofit leader. But, her plight, nonprofit leader burnout, is so […]

The Right Questions to Ask A Potential Board Member

The Right Questions to Ask A Potential Board Member

August 24, 2017 By Nell Edgington

Recently, fundraising maven Kay Sprinkel Grace wrote a post on the GuideStar blog outlining four questions to ask potential board members when interviewing them for board positions. While I heartily agree with her that nonprofit leaders should institute and follow a rigorous due diligence process in recruiting new board members (rather than just shoving anyone […]

3 Questions to Get Your Nonprofit Board Engaged

3 Questions to Get Your Nonprofit Board Engaged

April 17, 2014 By Nell Edgington

I know how hard nonprofit leaders struggle to get their board of directors active, engaged, involved, motivated, moving forward with their nonprofit organization. So today I want to give you three questions that can get your board engaged and invested in the work of your organization. Before I start, though, I want to say that […]

plane taking off

5 Traits of a Nonprofit Ready to Take Off

March 5, 2019 By Nell Edgington 2 Comments

In consulting with a nonprofit my role is to guide the organization to the next level. Perhaps they want to dramatically grow their impact or influence, or they want to develop a truly sustainable financial model, or they want to become a national player. Whatever their aim, my role is to help them figure out […]

Why Nonprofit Leaders Should Play Big

May 31, 2018 By Nell Edgington 4 Comments

One of the many books I read on my social media hiatus last Fall, was Tara Mohr’s Playing Big: Practical Wisdom for Women Who Want to Speak Up, Create and Lead. Her argument is that there are countless women out there who could be contributing so much more to society but are holding themselves back […]

When A Funder Takes Your Nonprofit Off Course

January 29, 2018 By Nell Edgington 4 Comments

It’s fairly common knowledge that in the nonprofit sector the relationship between funders and nonprofit leaders is often fraught. A power imbalance between those with the purse strings and those without can sometimes lead to poor decisions about a nonprofit’s future direction. The other day I was advising a nonprofit leader — let’s call him […]

3 Questions To Regularly Ask Your Development Director

July 27, 2017 By Nell Edgington Leave a Comment

Beyond the mistakes nonprofit leaders often make in staffing their fundraising function, the relationship itself between a nonprofit executive director and the development director (or whatever you call the staff person in charge of bringing money in the door) can often be fraught. In an ideal world, the executive director and development director have a symbiotic […]

3 Mistakes Nonprofits Make in Fundraising Staff

May 23, 2017 By Nell Edgington Leave a Comment

Before a nonprofit can achieve financial sustainability, the nonprofit leader has to figure out how to staff their money raising function effectively. When I conduct a Financial Model Assessment for a client, one of the sections of my final report is always focused on the nonprofit’s staffing structure and how that contributes to or detracts from the nonprofit’s […]

Understanding The Full Costs of Nonprofits: An Interview with Michael Etzel

May 16, 2017 By Nell Edgington Leave a Comment

In this month’s Social Velocity interview, I’m talking with Michael Etzel. Michael is a partner in The Bridgespan Group, a global nonprofit organization that consults to nonprofits and philanthropists, provides leadership development support, and develops and shares insights — all with the goal of scaling social impact. Since joining Bridgespan in 2006, Michael has focused on effectiveness […]

Do Your Programs Contribute to Mission AND Money?

April 25, 2017 By Nell Edgington Leave a Comment

There is a tool that I think is incredibly helpful to nonprofit leaders trying to figure out where to focus their resources and how to plan for the future. Indeed it is typically one of the first activities in the strategic planning process I use with my clients. The Program Matrix helps a nonprofit board […]

How Effective Is Your Nonprofit Leader?

April 13, 2017 By Nell Edgington Leave a Comment

In an ideal world, one of the things a nonprofit board of directors does is annually evaluate the performance of the executive director. But let’s be honest, how often does that actually happen? I once had an executive director so desperate for feedback about her job performance from a board who refused to evaluate her that she hired me to […]

Goodbye to a Mentor and a Friend

March 30, 2017 By Nell Edgington Leave a Comment

I have a heavy heart today. I found out yesterday that my first boss, long-time mentor, and most influential teacher of all things nonprofit management died over the weekend. Mary Jubitz was the CEO of SMART (Start Making a Reader Today), a statewide early literacy nonprofit in Portland, Oregon. I met Mary when, as a […]

Nonprofit Leaders Have More Power Than They Think

February 16, 2017 By Nell Edgington 2 Comments

A few weeks ago I wrote a post on a controversial topic, “How to Remove a Troublesome Board Member.” As I wrote in the post, Of the many taboos in the nonprofit sector, the taboo against asking bad board members to resign is one of the most destructive. Instead of encouraging ineffective or meddling board […]

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Reinventing Social Change Book

Download Chapter 1 of “Reinventing Social Change”

and keep up on webinars, training and events when you sign up for the Social Velocity e-list

Embracing Abundant Social Change by Nell Edgington

Social Change Leaders, Take a Leap of Faith With Me

April 16, 2021

Pink Flowers

You Don’t Have to Be Stuck in Scarcity

April 8, 2021

Free Training

Join Me for a Free Training — Your Roadmap to Abundance

March 31, 2021

Your Social Change Work Can Be So Much Easier

Your Social Change Work Can Be So Much Easier

March 25, 2021

Woman holding colorful umbrella

You Have The Power to Change Philanthropy

March 19, 2021

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