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Volunteer Management: How to Get it Right
How essential are volunteers to achieving your nonprofit’s mission? In our recent study, we learned that the lack of understanding about the essential nature of volunteers and the staff who lead them (called Volunteer Engagement Professionals–VEPs) un …
Data Visualization: User-Centered Design
Our partner organization, Your Part-Time Controller, offers helpful advice on how U/X and user-centered design methods can better communicate visual stories in a way that advances the mission of your organization. How to use data visualizations …
How To Be a Community-Powered Nonprofit
Accusations of fake news are all over the news. So when donors want old-fashioned, honest information, they are turning to nonprofit news organizations they trust. We asked consultant Kevin Davis, who works with many of these nonprofit journalis …
The Financial Outlook for Nonprofits
Last issue, we included a survey and invited you to share what 2017 was going to look like for your organization’s financial outlook. Almost 500 of you shared your answers — thank you!! — and we’re happy now to share back with all of you what we …
Following a Founder or Long-Timer Requires a Hard Head
When Blue Avocado asked for potential interviewees who had followed a founder or a long-time executive, we didn’t expect 58 people to respond. We interviewed 18 executive directors who followed founders, and another 10 who followed long-time execs. Las …
Adding It All Up: Nonprofit CFO Study
This survey of 906 nonprofit finance professionals reveals some surprises about these crucial-but-often-overlooked staff, looking at questions ranging from educational backgrounds, workload, board and CEO understanding of finance, and CEO compensation: …
Nonprofit Job Sites Reviewed and Rated
Where are the best sites to post jobs? Where are the best sites to look for nonprofit jobs? This article reviews and rates 31 sites for several specific criteria, and includes a Table of Contents and the Tom Battin Awards for Best Nonprofit Job Sites. …
All-Volunteer Organization Resources
All-Volunteer Organizations (AVO) are some of the most invisible — and most powerful — nonprofit organizations around. Supporting them is a priority for us at Blue Avocado; here is a list of the articles of particular relevance to AVOs: Boards of All …
Amaze Your Friends with these Nonprofit Factoids
When we believe something to be true but don’t have the data to support that idea, what happens when we do find the hard evidence? Two things: either we find out we were wrong after all or . . . we were right and now we have the facts to put into a gra …
The Secret to a High Impact Annual Report
We nonprofits often put a great deal of time and effort into our annual reports, especially compared with how briefly most recipients will look at them. “The annual report is a comic book,” a nonprofit executive once told me. “Th …
