The NonProfit Times - June 1, 2008 - (Page 16)

OPINION Continued from page 14 evolving? Historically, it did not matter particularly. We could fly just fine below the radar.Today, there are some very compelling reasons: • Public funding for human services and programs that enhance quality of life, services provided in large measure by third-sector organizations, is eroding. Many domestic programs are so little valued that they are categorized as discretionary, even though they are essential to the functioning of many Americans. • Demographically-driven workforce and leadership deficits loom over the sector, not enough entry-level workers, BabyBoomers in management preparing to retire.The other two sectors face the same challenges, with the result that the nonprofit sector is competing for talent with the for-profit and public sectors as never before.The competition could be particularly acute for minority talent. • Volunteerism remains essential to the sector but research and experience suggest that the sector faces huge challenges. The rate of volunteering remains relatively flat. Many nonprofits lack the capacity and know-how to recruit and effectively engage volunteers, and we tend to be a sector of one-size-fits-all volunteerism when it is increasingly clear that different generations have differing expectations and needs. • The number of nonprofit organizations continues to grow while the rate of charita- ble giving is essentially unmoved (Note: the number of dollars might increase from year-to-year but the percentage of gross domestic product and household income contributed remains relatively flat). Combining this factor with looming reductions in public funding, there could be fewer dollars spread over more organizations, with the potential of more limited and diffuse impact. Some predict there will be organizational failures and consolidations in light of these factors but that remains to be seen. The Bottom Line: As a sector, we must compete and we must have the under- no simple answers, and yet, proceed to offer some. Let me just say, here are steps we might all consider on the road to reinventing and better positioning the sector: • Adopt more descriptive, precise common language. I know it is like herding cats to get everyone on the same page, but terms like nonprofit enterprise and civic sector could become better understood through common usage than the terms we now use for the sector and its organizations. Civic sector is more about what we contribute to than what we are not. And the surprising use of the term, Many nonprofits lack the capacity and know-how to recruit and effectively engage volunteers. standing, appreciation and support of the public not only to compete but also because we need their engagement and good will to do the work of community. We are ill served by allowing fuzzy notions of the sector to exist. We are ill served by not helping people in all demographic categories appreciate the sector as a world of enterprise as complex, challenging and gratifying as any other -- perhaps more important to the third sector than the other two since we depend on both paid and unpaid human resources. It is here that I should state, there are enterprise, is one way of communicating that this work is every bit complex and important as any other kind of enterprise. • As we adopt such language, stop using the word, charity, especially when it does not especially apply. I suspect many lay people assume that a charity collects resources and redistributes them to those in need. Well, many of our very finest “charities” do nothing of the kind.They provide research and education and engage in many other kinds of actions to achieve their goals. Let’s elevate the common denominator among the public. • Weave together the strands of effort in which many of us are engaged in our organizations to attract and develop talent. Human resources, volunteer development, training, diversity and inclusion are not separate streams.They are part of the greater whole of talent development in a competitive and diverse marketplace. • Strive collectively to re-frame and re-introduce the civic sector and civic enterprise as integral to peoples’ lives -- as citizens and potentially as a career focus, both for young people and for people seeking encore careers. Remember civics and social studies in school? Where they do not exist and/or fail to depict the civic sector effectively, let’s make them relevant through all the grades and let’s export this knowledge to settings that reach other populations, whether outof-school youth or future retirees or second careerists. • Grow the pool of talent for your field and for the sector. Strive diligently to meet the talent challenges of your organization but join in collective efforts, recognizing that: increasing the esteem in which the larger sector is held will benefit your organization as well; and that career paths are more often across organizations than within them. NPT Irv Katz is president of the National Human Services Assembly in Washington, D.C. His email is irv@nassembly.org 16 JUNE 1, 2008 THE NONPROFIT TIMES www.nptimes.com http://www.frdny.org http://www.frdny.org http://www.nptimes.com

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The NonProfit Times - June 1, 2008 First Kroc Center Set To Open It’s Layoffs And A Lawsuit At ARC In The Twin Cities Hospices Put On Life Support Contents Who...When...Where...How...What? Idol Charities Still Waiting For Funds Heck Of A Job Play On Words Make Endowments Pay Donor Management Software Who’s Next? Joining The Masses Online Email Evangelism Three Corners Business Briefs Fiduciaries And The 990 Calendar United Way Refocusing On Programs, Reducing Affiliates NPT Jobs Resource Directory

The NonProfit Times - June 1, 2008

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