Recent Posts
Navigating the nonprofit world can be challenging. Blue Avocado offers expert guidance on a range of topics — from building strong boards to maximizing your fundraising impact. Explore our latest posts for practical tips, strategies, and solutions to common issues facing nonprofit organizations today.
Recent Nonprofit Articles
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Ask Rita: Emma’s Disability is Hurting Performance: Can We Fire Her?
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Five Tips for Better Board Packets
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A Board-Staff Agreement for Financial Accountability
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How Did This Happen? Part 2 of the Vanguard Foundation Story
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How to Hire a Great Accountant for Your Nonprofit
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Korean-American Nonprofit Implodes Diversity Myths
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Board Email: Reduce, Reflect, Rejoice!
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Just Awards: Follow-up to “The Nonprofit Justies”
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On Being Male in the Female-Majority Nonprofit Sector
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Ask Rita: Protecting Staff from Co-worker’s Violent Boyfriend
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What is an Advisory Board and Should We Have One?
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How Much to Pay the Executive Director?
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Decline and Fall of the Vanguard Foundation
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The Board Told Me I Had to Join Rotary
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Through the Valley of the Shadow of Failure
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Raise Money in 30 Days
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Foundations: Fleas or Elephants?
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Nonprofit Conflict of Interest: A 3-Dimensional View
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Married Co-Executive Directors of Nonprofits
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Updates on Some Sacred Cows
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Three Easy Ways for Foundations to Support Democracy
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Golden Rule of Board Resignations
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Ask Rita: Can Employees Smoke Medical Marijuana at Work?
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Bylaws Checklist
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Five Emergency “Musts” for Your Nonprofit
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Ten Things I Learned About Leadership from Women Executives of Color
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Ask Rita: Is being a surrogate mother a profession?
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Board Terms: 1 Year – 3 Years – 2 Years
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Volunteerism Public Policies Can Hurt Nonprofits
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Telecommuting and Flexible Work Arrangements: Do Them Right
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Working from Home: Sidebar on Legal Issues for Nonprofits
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Rockefeller Foundation and NY Times Win “Just Awards”
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Knitting Makes Me a Better Executive Director
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All-Volunteer Organization Resources
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Eight Strategic Mistakes with Memberships
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Attack of the Tax-Exemption Killers
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Nonprofit Business Model Statements
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Who is Responsible for the Board Doing a Good Job?
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True Stories of Grantseeking: A First-Person Nonprofit Story
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What to Do When You Really, Really Disagree with a Board Decision
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Census: Battleground for Money and Justice
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Angry Activist Gets Old & Wise: A First-Person Nonprofit Story
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Merging Nonprofit Voices into a Political Force
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Nonprofit Research that Gets to the Heart
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Ask Rita: Terminate Employee After One Year of Sick Leave?
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Nonprofit Jargon Watch
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Five Internal Controls for the Very Small Nonprofit
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Teach for America: Icon with Feet of Clay?
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Announcing the Just Awards
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Our Executive Director is Embezzling
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Nonprofit Self-Esteem Crisis
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Recruiting for Board Diversity: Part 3 in Diversity Series
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Three Nonprofit Sneezes in Health Care Reform
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Diversity & the Nonprofit Ecosystem: Part 2 in the 3-Part Diversity Series
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A Fresh Look at Diversity and Boards
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Ask Rita: When Swine Flu Hits the HR Department
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Amaze Your Friends with these Nonprofit Factoids
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Can Nonprofit Boards Vote By Email?
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From Artist to Executive Director: Not a Straight Line
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A Board Member “Contract”
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Six Ways to Know If It’s Time to Leave
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L3C: Pot of Gold or Space Invader?
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Ask Rita: Criminal Records Checks for Prospective Staff and Volunteers
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Turning the Tables on Pride
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Fundraiser Edie Boatman Shares Career-Switching Tips
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Attorney Recommends Review Instead of Audit
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An Agreed-Upon-Procedures (AUP) Success Story
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Seven Ways to Reduce Your Audit Costs
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Should Board Members Be Required to Give?
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What to Do with Board Members Who Don’t Do Anything
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Faith-Based Nonprofit Funds: Presto Change-o
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Switching Careers at the Worst Possible Time
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Ask Rita: Model Dress Code for Nonprofits
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Focus on the Destination, Not the Route (Budget)!
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Ten Quick Ways to Invigorate Board Meetings
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Ask Rita: Tattoos and Piercings… and a Model Dress Code
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Alcoholics Anonymous vs. Best Practices
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Social Innovation Fund: Where Is the Money Going?
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Top Ten Questions from Job Seekers… Answered!
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Critical Path for the Board
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A Nonprofit Dashboard and Signal Light for Boards
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Six of Our Board Members Are in Prison
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New 990 Software Release on July 20: Is It Enough?
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Alligators in the Boardroom and Urban Legends About Nonprofits
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Ask Rita: I Have a Bad Boss! Help!
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Boards Should Only Have Three Committees!
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What Are the Board’s Responsibilities for Volunteers?
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The Volunteer Who Couldn’t
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Survival Strategies for the Arts
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A Bigger Budget and Smaller Butt in Just 12 Weeks!
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Fundraising Confessions of a Former Camp Fire Girl
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Life on Planet 501c: Contest Winners
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What’s the Point of a Nonprofit Board, Anyway?
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A 7-Point Checklist for Responding to a Request for Family or Medical Leave
Everybody has an opinion about nonprofit executives’ salaries, but almost nobody has any real data outside their own experiences.
Board meeting time is precious time, and the fulcrum of board-staff opportunity or disappointment. Let’s be smarter about how we use it.
An overlooked but crucial element in strategic planning is the attitude or stance that the executive director takes to the process.
Kim Klein declares the that she is a Christian, calling for all who are religious to stand against the war on women and people of color.
A sample job description you may consider using or modifying to fit your nonprofit’s open board support positions.
The single most common question asked of experts on nonprofit boards: What’s the right number of people to have on the board?
Evaluators explain a type of program evaluation — and how to make it work for your nonprofit.
Increasingly, nonprofits are finding scrip to be a comparatively easy way to raise funds. How does scrip fundraising work, anyway?
Think more broadly (and effectively) about how board members can support the key aspects of your nonprofit revenue strategy.
Doug Plank of MobileCause explains the benefits of using text messaging to reach people for nonprofit outreach.
Spend a few minutes ahead of time thinking about what to ask prospective board members to get a better idea if it’s a good match.
Rick Cohen provides thoughts about the fall of the Vanguard Foundation and the impact on the nonprofit sector.
The true life story of an environmental organization’s audit, how they survived, and their tips for the rest of us.
A tongue-in-cheek version of the familiar Salary Calculator model to comment trenchantly on the indiscriminate — and not so indiscriminate — differences in how nonprofit staff get paid.
A process and an evaluation instrument for executive director evaluation surveys. Includes survey in Word format for easy modification.
An update on Vanguard CEO Hari Dillon and major donors involved with businessman Mouli Cohen and a series of get-rich-quick schemes.
Rather than supporting nonprofits, foundations and consultants are increasingly telling nonprofits what they should be doing.
Can nonprofit employees get fired for posting negative comments about their employer on their private social media accounts?
Board evaluations of ED performance are radically different from any other type of performance review and must be approached differently.
“When you start with the needs of the community, and you’re opening to listening, you realize that doing one or two things isn’t enough.”
“Nonprofit staff don’t vote.” The Silicon Valley Council of Nonprofits tested this. Here’s what they found.
We in nonprofits are good at taking on myths and sacred cows. But perhaps the least examined of these myths is the one about going to scale.
Sick of people telling you a hundred things your nonprofit should be doing with social media? Kaitlyn Trigger provides some dos and don’ts.
Should social workers be classified as exempt or nonexempt employees when it comes to overtime considerations?