This year, we should challenge ourselves to address an elephant in the nonprofit sector: our long-standing and pervasive under-investment in our own workforce. Most nonprofit professionals work in environments where the stakes are high and there are limited resources. We work with some of the most vulnerable people, animals and environments. But because demand for services are growing and resources are diminishing, the first thing we slash from our annual budgets are investments in professional development.
In 2018, let’s collectively resolve to do better at investing in the people who make the magic happen in our sector!
If you’re not sure where to start or how to make the compelling case to funders that this kind of investment is critical to help us continue to provide high quality services for our constituents, Fund the People can help. They’ve created numerous toolkits to help change attitudes and behaviors of nonprofits, funders and intermediaries around investing in the talent pipeline.
Check out these Case-Making Toolkits:
Top Reasons to Invest in Nonprofit Talent
Provides succinct language and anecdotes that can be used to introduce the concept of talent-investing to foundation staff and board trustees and to communicate the compelling reasons for investing in nonprofit talent.
Nonprofit Myths & Realities
Provides alternative views about some of the harmful assumptions that continue to inform nonprofit leaders’ attitudes and behaviors toward the nonprofit workforce.
The Investment Deficit By the Numbers
Infographic offers data on the deficit of investment of the nonprofit workforce.
How-To Guides:
Talent-Investment Menu
Outlines the different investment partners, key roles, spheres of investment levels, and where along the talent-investment continuum funders can focus their talent-investments.
Talent-Investing Across All Grant Types
Explores how talent-investments can be baked into all types of grants including program/project, general operating support, and capacity building. A grant in talent-investment can stand on its own as a fourth major type of grant.
Who Drives Change in Talent-Investing?
Addresses two overlapping questions – 1) Who or what is the “subject” or “target” of the intervention? and 2) Who gets to drive the problem analysis, objectives, content, and format of the intervention? These are key questions funders should ask when considering how to structure their investments in grantee talent.
Discussion Guides:
Talking Talent for Nonprofits
Helps nonprofit leaders conduct internal discussions about why and how to invest in staff development, and how to mobilize your funders as allies in these investments.
Talking Talent Between Funders & Nonprofits
Supports funders and nonprofits to explore the mutual benefit of investing in the nonprofit’s staff development.