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.
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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
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Ask Rita: Wading through the New Family and Medical Leave Act Regulations
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Finance Fear Factor Ratios
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Too Many Nonprofits? Yes – At Least Too Many AIDS Organizations
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Health Insurance: A Bit of Good COBRA News
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Too Many Nonprofits? Yes! Clueless in Seattle
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Volunteer Time Financial Statement Illustrations
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Tracking Volunteer Time to Boost Your Bottom Line: A Complete Accounting Guide
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A Devil’s Advocate on the Board?
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Loans From Nonprofit Board Members
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Ask Rita: Downsizing from Employees to Independent Contractors?
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The Car Donation Controversy and the Right Way to Donate Your Car
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Succession Planning for Nonprofits of All Sizes
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The 411 on Starting a Car Donation Program
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Advice for Servicemembers and Veterans Looking at Nonprofit Jobs
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New Thinking and Talking About Volunteers
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A Board Leads an Organization Out of the Ashes
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From Air Force Captain to Nonprofit Fundraiser
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Nonprofit Layoffs and Furloughs: Do Them Right
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When You Lose Your Health Insurance Coverage
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Layoff Stories from Blue Avocado Readers
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Laid Off From a Nonprofit: Me!
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The Nonprofit Board’s Role in HR
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Sample Layoff Letter
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Will Obamaniacs Change Nonprofits?
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George W. Bush’s Legacy: A Dramatic Increase in Volunteer Spirit
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Ten Nonprofits that Shaped the Life of Martin Luther King Jr.
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New Growth from Old Wood: Heroes & Nonprofits (and Sarbanes-Oxley)
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Model Document Retention Policy for Nonprofits
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Sarbanes-Oxley and Nonprofits: Bogeyman in the Boardroom?
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A 360-Degree Look at the Organization: Seeing Ourselves as Others See Us
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Speed Up the Board Recruitment Process!
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Too Many Nonprofits? No — There Aren’t Enough Good Nonprofits
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Six Things Every Board Member Should Know About the New 990
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An Insight About Catholic Schools’ Business Model
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Nonprofit Executive Director Assessment
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The Secret to a High Impact Annual Report
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Governance Committees: More and More Common
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What Information Should Board Members Get?
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Succeeding With (or Maybe in Spite of) Evidence-Based Practices
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An Alcohol Problem Holds the Bookkeeping Hostage
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Nonprofit Email Sign-Offs
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Nonprofit Embezzlement: More Common and More Preventable Than You Think
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A Drug and Alcohol Free Workplace Policy for Nonprofits
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Fun at Work
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A Steep Road Ahead for Immigration Volunteers?
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The Board Builds Its Sense of Self: Body-Building for Nonprofit Boards
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Ask Rita: What Happens When the Office Coffee Comes With Politics?
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Three Steps to Effective Board Oversight of Insurance
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A Board Member’s Guide to Nonprofit Insurance
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If You Don’t Have Time to Save: Nonprofit Retirement Part 3
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What Nonprofits are Saying About the Bailout: A Fast Roundup
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Closing Down the Right Way
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Nonprofit Retirement Part 2: How and Where to Save
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Thinking the Unthinkable: Maybe We Should Shut Down
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Community Nonprofits: Katrina’s Unsung Heroes Still on the Job
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How to Take a Public Policy Stand, with Sample Criteria
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Nonprofit Retirement: Calculating retirement Needs & Exploring Choices
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Ask Rita: Zero Cell Phone Use While Driving Policy
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A Family and Medical Leave Act Checklist
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Ask Rita: Can an Employee Come and Go Using Family or Medical Leave?
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Is It Time for an Audit?
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Gas Rates, Volunteers, and Justice
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Should the Board Hold Executive Sessions?
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More Than the Olympics: Sports, Nonprofits & Community
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Boards of All-Volunteer Organizations
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Three-Step Immigration (IRCA) Compliance for Employers
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Obama: the Nonprofit Sector’s Favorite Son?
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Overtime Pay for Nonprofit Preschool Teacher?
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The Best Way to Raise Money? Choose a Revenue Strategy
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What Should Nonprofit Boards Know About Insurance Brokers?
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In Search of Unicorns: Finding & Hiring Outside Grantwriters Part 2
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Unicorns Found: Meet Two Grantwriters
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Word on the Street from the Council on Foundations Conference
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The Unrecognized Value of Community Nonprofits, Hiring Grantwriters, Extended Warranties, MTV
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In Search of Unicorns: Finding & Hiring Grantwriters, Part 1
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Nonprofit Budgets Have to Balance: False!
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Don’t Drive, Chew Gum and Use the Phone at the Same Time
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Meaningful Acts of Appreciation for Nonprofit Boards and Staff
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Nonprofits and the Media
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Pay Off My Student Loan or Pay Into a 401K?
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Why is it called Blue Avocado?
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Abolish Board Committees?
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Reasons to Have (& Not to Have) an Attorney on a Nonprofit Board
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Can We Require An Employee To Take Her Meds?
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Promises, Promises: Rural Advocates vs. Big Philanthropy
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Five Ways to Let Government Money Run You Over
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Good Management vs. Good Leadership
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What Do I Say to a Donor or Funder?
Copyright attorney Kate Spelman shares how your nonprofit can protect its original material and ensure you’re not improperly using someone else’s material.
The research librarians at IssueLab compare love and nonprofit research, finding and highlighting unusual research reports.
Can an employer terminate an employee who exceeds the maximum medical leave?
For your future use and reference, Blue Avocado shares some common jargon often found across the nonprofit sector.
Segregation of duties, checks & balances, can be difficult to implement in small organizations. Here are five important, do-able controls.
Rick Cohen delves into the less-heard concerns and questions about Teach for America, and its effect on the education sector.
The Just Awards will show the most irrational, irresponsible, and irrelevant organizational behaviors that hinder social service and change.
It’s the call no board member wants or expects to get: The organization’s executive director is being investigated for embezzlement.
Jonathan Spack dives into fallacies that the nonprofit sector has internalized, which can contribute both to poor management and self-esteem.
Part 3 in Blue Avocado’s series on diversity offers specific, practical tips for recruiting people “unlike ourselves” for nonprofit boards.
Rick Cohen explores three large and distinct ways that the nonprofit sector is involved with the health care reform debates.
Explore how diversity is applied the nonprofit sector as a whole — speaking to foundations, consultants, capacity builders, and observers.
This article — the first of three in a series — provides a fresh and practical focus on nonprofit board diversity.
Nonprofits have a long history of innovation and heroism in health care and in disasters; be sure to manage the flu and its implications well.
Rick Cohen mined metric tons of data to bring some newly published, meaningful facts about the nonprofit sector that we should be aware of.
Attorney Gene Takagi and Emily Nicole Chan discuss whether nonprofit boards can vote by both mail and email.
Steven Young Lee shares how his past experiences provided the right mix of skills to launch him on the path of nonprofit work.
One way to be sure that each person on the board is clear on his or her responsibilities is to adopt a board member contract.
Tim Wolfred, a leader in the field of nonprofit executive transitions, on how to weigh both the organization’s needs, and your own heart.
For-profit companies seek foundation grants and government tax exemptions that presents risks and challenges to the nonprofit sector.
Ask Rita explores how nonprofits should do criminal record checks on prospective employees, volunteers, and board members.
Pamela Davis explains how everything we’ve been taught about this economy needs to change, with the false equivalency of price and value.
Edie Boatman shares advice about making a career change from a for-profit position to a nonprofit position.
A nonprofit considered moving away from having an annual audit to having a review, and the board wanted a legal opinion before making a decision.