How to Interview and Screen Nonprofit Volunteers
If you’re placing volunteers in sensitive jobs with your nonprofit, such as working with children or providing peer counseling, screen your applicants carefully. Screening, including a fingerprint check [more…]
How to Provide the Right Amount of Nonprofit Volunteer Training
The degree and extent of training volunteers at your nonprofit depends on the type of job you’re asking them to do. Volunteers who answer telephones, for example, may need more training than those volunteers [more…]
How to Evaluate the Benefits of Insuring Nonprofit Volunteers
Typically, nonprofit organizations carry liability and property insurance. Almost all states require that workers’ compensation insurance be in place to cover on-the-job injuries to employees [more…]
How to Improve Nonprofit Volunteer Performance
If you work with lots of volunteers in your nonprofit, especially volunteers who perform complex and sensitive jobs, you may discover one or more volunteers who don’t have the skills or personalities to [more…]
How to Develop Nonprofit Personnel Policies
Personnel policies and procedures outline how a nonprofit organization relates to its employees. They’re essential for both supervisors and employees because they provide guidelines about what’s expected [more…]
How to Set up a Nonprofit Payroll System
When a nonprofit organization begins employing workers, it first must establish a payroll system. The organization needs to decide how often to distribute paychecks, for example. You can disburse paychecks [more…]
How to Write a Job Description for a Nonprofit
One of the first things you should do when looking to hire a paid employee for your nonprofit is to write a job description for the position you want to fill. Going through this exercise helps you clarify [more…]
How to Determine Necessary Qualifications for a Nonprofit Job Description
Some nonprofit jobs require various levels of formal education and special training. If you’re hiring someone to provide counseling services, for example, that employee probably needs to meet certain education [more…]
How to Establish Nonprofit Salary Levels
Deciding on a fair salary for your paid employees isn’t easy. Compensation levels in nonprofits range from hardly anything to six-figure salaries at large-budget organizations. [more…]
How to Review Candidate Résumés for Nonprofit Jobs
Résumés and cover letters give you the first opportunity to evaluate candidates for a nonprofit position. Respond quickly with a postcard or an e-mail to tell applicants that their materials have arrived [more…]
How to Raise Funds for Your Nonprofit through Direct Mail
If you think you want to try large-scale direct mail fundraising at your nonprofit organization, consider hiring a direct mail consultant or firm to handle your campaign. Direct mail fundraising can be [more…]
How to Design a Nonprofit Event to Fit the Budget
Special events for nonprofits can be produced on bare-bones budgets, for princely prices, or for any amount in between. As with most kinds of investments, event planners expect a higher return in exchange [more…]
How to Create a Budget for a Nonprofit Fundraiser
The bottom line is very simple: Your nonprofit’s total earnings from a special event must exceed your total cost — by a lot, you hope. But how do you get a handle on revenue and expenses? [more…]
How to Solicit In-Kind Gifts for Your Nonprofit Fundraiser
When you think about what your event will cost your nonprofit and how you can pay for it, think about the business contacts that your board, staff, and outside supporters have. Often, a business’s contribution [more…]
How to Prepare for Your Nonprofit Fundraiser
Although nonprofit events vary greatly in size and complexity, and although you can adequately pull off successful events in two or three weeks, it would be better to work against a six-month schedule. [more…]
How to Find a News Angle to Promote Your Nonprofit Fundraiser
Think about all the angles you can exploit for publicity for your nonprofit’s fundraiser. Try to look at it from the point of view of every section of a newspaper or newscast. Modify your basic press release [more…]
How to Use the Foundation Center to Find Nonprofit Grants
Over the past 60 years, information about funding sources for nonprofits has become increasingly available to the public. One milestone in this movement was the creation of the [more…]
How to Search the Foundation Center’s Grant Information for Your Nonprofit
Foundation research for nonprofit grant funding opportunities generally has two phases: Developing a broad list of prospects, and then refining that list until you find the likeliest sources. Here are [more…]
How to Determine the Best Grant Prospects for Your Nonprofit
It’s time to take your broad list of prospects for grants to your nonprofit and find out more about each of those prospects. See what you can discover from the following sources: [more…]
How to Pursue Federal Government Grants for Your Nonprofit
To pursue government funds for your nonprofit organization, you should look at Grants.gov. Grants.gov only covers federal grant programs. If you’re seeking personal financial assistance, follow the links [more…]
How to Get Started on a Grant Proposal for Your Nonprofit
Generally, a grant writer for a nonprofit organization develops a proposal by talking with staff members, volunteers, or the board about a project idea. The writer builds the members’ enthusiasm and refines [more…]
How to Write a Nonprofit Grant Cover Letter and Summary
Technically, the cover letter isn’t part of the proposal narrative for the grant application for your nonprofit. It’s attached to the top of the proposal where it serves as an introduction to the document’s [more…]
How to Introduce Your Nonprofit Agency in a Grant Proposal
Some nonprofit grant proposals contain introductions.Others contain background information sections. Choose which to use by following the preferences of your funding source or, if no preference is given [more…]
How to Describe the Need in Your Nonprofit’s Grant Application
A grant writer begins to shape the argument behind the nonprofit’s proposal plan in the problem statement or a statement of need. Generally a writer prepares a problem statement when proposing a new relationship [more…]
How to Set Nonprofit Goals, Objectives, and Outcomes in Your Grant Application
After the grant writer has described a problem in ways that interest the reader’s concerns, the next step is to introduce what the nonprofit can achieve if it takes on the proposed project. [more…]
