I’ve been in communications for more than 25 years. Fortune 500, agencies, higher ed, executive leadership, crisis communications. I’ve built teams, led organizations through difficult moments, and genuinely thought I knew who I was as a leader. About a year ago I joined a nonprofit because I wanted my work to have more direct impact. I knew I’d have fewer resources. I knew I’d wear more hats. I actually welcomed that.
What I wasn’t prepared for was how emotionally hard it would be. The organization has experienced significant turnover. We’re trying to build processes while simultaneously delivering everything people have always expected. Every department is stretched thin, which means communications somehow becomes everyone’s bottleneck and everyone’s frustration.
Last month I received some difficult feedback. Some of it was fair. Some of it stung because it reflected problems that existed long before I arrived. Regardless, it’s made me question whether I’m actually the leader I thought I was.

I’m not looking for people to tell me I’m right. In fact, I assume there are things I need to improve. That’s part of leadership.

What I’m struggling with is figuring out where the line is between “this is what it feels like to lead through a turnaround” and “this role is never going to work.”
Has anyone else come into a nonprofit after a long corporate career and felt like all of your confidence disappeared?

Did you eventually find your footing, or did you realize the organization simply wasn’t set up for anyone to succeed? FWIW no senior comms person prior to me lasted more than two years, with one exception.

I’m having one of those moments where I’m wondering if I made the biggest career mistake of my life, and I’d appreciate hearing from people who’ve lived through something similar.

I posted a few weeks ago seeking advice about succession planning with a dysfunctional board. You all gave me the advice I needed to hear, albeit hard. I submitted my resignation to the board last week, staff, donors and stakeholders were informed today and a statement was sent out to the public this evening. It’s a bittersweet day. With that said, I’m stepping out of the nonprofit realm for a while to catch up on my to do list and reconnect with the people and places I’ve not had the time to prioritize. Best of luck to you all! Thanks for the good work you do and sound guidance you gave me.

This is definitely going to include some venting as I give info so I apologize. I’ll try to keep it as relevant and specific as possible.

I work at a small healthcare nonprofit. Under 25 staff, but in the process of a multi year expansion and capital campaign.

My role is “Communications and Outreach Coordinator” and my job functions include:
*Managing the entire grants calendar ( research, foundation outreach, applications, and reports)
*Managing summer and end of year appeals (writing and formatting, thank you templates, remit design, online form, organizing mailing, designing and mailing follow up reports)
*All social media content creation and management including photography and videography
*managing the website including a complete rebrand
*marketing materials including designing rack cards, handouts, building signage, etc.
*all community engagement including tabling, event planning and execution, and attending community meetings
*creation and management of student intern program
*staff welcome and appreciation including pictures and design for name badges and business cards, birthday celebrations, and special recognition days
*full org comms plan including press releases, ads, radio content, etc (which I create)
*various special projects such as creating and implementing patient experience survey, board recruitment, creating policy and procedure template and system, patient library, mobile health program, etc.
*also get calls from security system when something is wrong. I asked to be taken off and they refused

I make just over $60k a year.
I am burnt out.
At my end of year review I said something has to give, I need more money, more help, less work, or some mix of the three. I was told we have no money for any of this but this is the last year of bare bones staff and at the beginning of this year (2026) I’d receive a bonus structure plan and opportunities for professional development, I never did.

And don’t even get me started on the construction that affects my specific office the most.

In the month leading up to giving my notice:
We hired two providers at over $200k salaries. When I expressed frustration the operations director shared that my salary is tied to my role and I don’t bring in revenue (my fundraising apparently doesn’t count. Which is rich since neither does she and she makes double what I do) and that I wouldn’t have a job without a clinical team

Our clinical director said a point I made was “completely irrelevant” in front of the entire medical team. When I talked to my supervisor (ED) she said I’m highly attuned to being personally affronted (direct quote) and need thicker skin. Then said if I bring it up to him I need to be gentle because he’s sensitive.

A board member emailed me at 9pm on a Sunday accusing me of breaking HIPAA (I didn’t).

I gave 3 months notice to help with a transition. I was honest and said I didn’t feel appreciated and that I said at the end of last year I told them something had to give. In the same conversation she (ED) said I’m on the high end of the range for my title but also that she doesn’t think they will find someone who will be able to do everything I do.
She said she thought they were doing better at staff appreciation and I said it’s because I do it all and pointed out that I’m the only one who doesn’t get an appreciation day, and it was obvious she was just realizing that in that moment.

She said this is proof more work needs to be done on the culture. But told the board my reason for leaving is just that I’m moving. (I was originally going to commute).
They are hiring someone to take over comms and development. (Same pay, less work, better title) and splitting up my other duties among a couple current staff. I’m staying on part time as needed for a couple of months after my three months notice.

Despite all of this, I care deeply about the org and want it to thrive. I really believe in the work. I want to share constructive feedback in my exit interview but don’t know if it will just come off as emotional/not be taken seriously.
The ED just gave me a glowing reference for my new job. We are overall ending on good terms. Should I just let it go? Or should I go into detail about the things I see that I believe need to change before it affects more people?

I have been asked to be part of a new finance committee for a medium size nonprofit which has just hired a new finance director and accounting vendor. In doing my due diligence, I discovered that no one is assigned to monitory their receivables and their accruals for employee liabilities are all over the map. The employee liabilities should be easy to correct as their payroll processor should have all the data they need. Receivables have to be analyzed but I expect a write off a major percentage as uncollectible. Regardless, they need to identify someone as responsible for collections.

My usual approach would be to write up a report on my findings along with my recommendations and forward it to the committee, the finance director, and the ED. I am trying not to ruffle too many feathers on this one and I am hoping for some advice on how to handle this.

Hey y'all,

Up front: I'm somewhat of an external processor... Apologies if this is unclear and/or vague.

I'm in a new role at a nonprofit social enterprise. I'm a manager for a workforce training program that's oriented toward woodworking-adjacent trades and part of my job is reaching out and generating relationships & community programming: Building things like birdfeeders, rain barrel stands, flower boxes, etc etc. Schools, churches, cities / city events, are all fair game for us.

My question is... How?

I've never been in a position where I needed fundraise or "sell" something for a nonprofit. My experience has been all grant-funded workforce case management and county-level crisis response, the idea of this is entirely new to me. What do businesses want to hear? What have y'all found is the most effective for generating relationships in this space?

Hi all, we’re looking to buy some tickets for an event that we will then sell to support our fundraising.

From what I can tell, we should be able to track this as earned revenue and will have to provide individuals with acknowledgments noting any benefits. Not sure if I’m missing anything, or if there’s a compliance piece that needs to be looked into.

For context, I’m a Development staff, but liase with Finance frequently - trying to cover out butts!

I currently use debit card issued under my name and address even though it's tied to chase business account of the org. when I make online purchases using this debit card, I have to enter my own address.

I was recommended by charitycharge on this forum when I looked into applying credit card because most business credit card applications require someone personal details such as ssn, income etc. I would like to know whether charitycharge credit card address is still tied to a person address or is it possible to associate org mailing address to the card. If anyone have experience with this please share. Also would like to know what happens when staff leaves the org and the charitycharge credit is saved with an online vendor subscription

Hey all. I’m a bit stuck here and I’m not really sure what to do. For context: I’m 18, I am starting college in September, and this summer I’ve been doing an internship with a local nonprofit. I fell into the position after attending our senior dinner and discussing my future plans with the ED, when I told him I was interested in working in nonprofit. Later that night, I got an email offering me a paid internship, which I was thrilled about. We ironed out some details and I signed my offer letter two weeks later.

The offer letter was great — 20$ an hour with the promise of mentorship and the goal of providing me with firsthand experience in the nonprofit sector. For about the first week, that was true. I came with him to meetings, he taught me about finances and fundraising and I even got to sit in on an interview for our new development director position. But then, things slowed down. I never got any tasks, and he started having meetings that I couldn’t come to (totally understandable). Then, he went on vacation for a few weeks and I had pretty much nothing to do. I try to be helpful to everyone else who works here and I offer myself to them regularly but they all have it under control. For the past few weeks I’ve been doing nothing but answering the phone the once or twice it rings per week and occasionally sending an email or two. Otherwise, I do crossword puzzles and take care of personal projects during business hours. The only thing they have said they want me to do is paint the logo on the main entrance wall once a construction crew finishes with a few small renovations.

I feel utterly useless and like I’m doing nothing. The fact that I’m getting paid makes me feel uneasy since this is a nonprofit org I really care about and I don’t want to take their money for doing nothing. The ED just got back from vacation today and I was hoping he would give me something to do, but no such luck. What should I do? Should I reach out to the ED and ask for more tasks? Should I ask the one other person my age (we’ve gotten pretty close) for advice? Should I just keep doing what I’m doing and wait for them to give me something?

This is my first “real” job in a professional environment so I feel entirely uncomfortable navigating this on my own. I don’t want to seem unprofessional and I love this organization. Please advise!!

I have been interested and involved in development and fundraising since college via volunteering/student org. I have worked for 3 non profit orgs over 3 years mostly in housing and case management services and no matter how many times I volunteer or work on development projects, private grant writing, or take org development courses I’m not being given opportunities to grow or given a chance to officially be a part of development. For anyone who currently works in this area, what am i doing wrong and what can I do to force a pivot more effectively? I have gained experience in Raisers edge NXT and Salesforce as well as been a visible part of plenty of donor/stewardship events.

TLDR: Y'ever feel misplaced?

A little over a year ago I got a gig at a family services & education nonprofit as COO, Moving from a Comms background. Shortly after I joined the comms guy quit, and my ED said the dread words: "you're good at comms, can you do it for a while?"

I made the amateur's mistake of wanting to be helpful, and agreed. I feel like that choice came back to haunt me, as the demands of both roles meant I missed some deadlines and couldn't do either role to its fullest. Then the building maintenance guy left and I got stuck with managing a 10hr a week contractor as well.

I know I'm not incompetent, just doing too much, which can often feel like being incompetent, but every time I mention it, my CEO says I need to ask for support. I feel like I am & not getting any concrete actions, just promises that we'll look at it in the next year.

Also, I feel like I'm really not cut out for the COO role, which seems to me to mainly consist of doing all the jobs the CEO was doing before he hired me, and only hearing when things go wrong.

That being said, I'm not even sure that I'm doing a COO role because of these comms and building maintenance aspects, so I'm pretty much spending most of my time being confused and demoralized.

My initial goal was to use the COO roll to get a little more experience working with boards and finances, and then look for an ed position in the arts, which is my background. Now I'm not even sure that I want to do that, but I've invested almost 10 years and non-profit work, and there are parts of it that I really love.

I very much enjoy working with passionate people who care more about doing good than turning a buck, and I enjoy and think I'm pretty good at the communication side of things, as well as building relationships, working with people across multiple fields and levels, and I'm a data nerd as well, so using KPIs & data to tell stories are strengths as well. I'm also big fan of analysing old systems and finding ways to improve.

I have flirted with the idea of freelancing or consulting, but I know that carries its own set of stressors. I'm wondering if anyone has had a similar experience, and if so, any advice on righting my own ship, either at this role or in a freelancer consultancy capacity, would be super helpful.

I am back on the job search (development roles) and have had some pretty good leads. At my current role, I have access to Candid and use it to look into organizations that I have applied for to get some insight on what their funding looks like and where it is coming from. Would it be weird or inappropriate for me to bring up information I've found during interviews? (IE: I noticed you've received funding from X foundation last year. I worked on a grant and reporting for blah blah) Or does this show that I am excited for the role? Thanks!

Hello! My small nonprofit ($1 mil annual budget) is strengthening the way we manage grants on QBO, while avoiding additional excess Excel spreadsheets.

We are exploring using "Projects" for individual grants, nesting under "Customer" -- which would be the donor / undation.

Does anyone have experience using Projects for time restricted project grants, specifically with project grant budgets? Can you get a clear Budget vs Actual report?

I chose to major in economics with the hopes of working in nonprofit or public sector, ideally international development. But I'm starting college this fall and beginning to second guess myself.

I don't know how to get from an economics degree to a nonprofit career because no one can advise me on it. Everyone I know who has an economics undergrad degree has ended up going into consulting, financial advising, or are on a pre-law track, and the people around me can't accept that this is not my goal as well. People tell me again and again to join business clubs at school, get internships with the big four consulting companies, do coursework in computer science to boost my resume. All of this is geared towards a corporate job of the type mentioned above, and I don't know if this will help me at all on the nonprofit side of things.

Now I'm beginning to wonder, is economics even the right major to do? It feels like it's going to lead me down the same path as everyone else, which is not the path I want. My college has a development economics minor that I really wanted to do but was discouraged from. Would it help to add that on? Should I stick with econ for undergrad, and do something else for masters? Any advice, however small, is appreciated :)

Hi everyone. I hope your week is off to a good start!

I’d like to try to get some energy and enthusiasm going for all of us in the nonprofit community, so I’ll pose a question to you.

What is one thing that you want to do this week to enhance or further your career in this field?

For me, it’s to register for the National Association of Charitable Gift Planners Conference in October.

I hope by sharing our goals we can support and learn from each other. Good luck out there.

Hi nonprofit folks, part of my job is running our blog. It's less of a traditional nonprofit blog and more of a journalistic-style storytelling avenue with members of our community. I put a ton of work into it, but the problem is: no one reads it. We include the stories in our weekly newsletter and have corresponding social posts, but that hasn't moved the needle much. Does anyone have advice on how I can get that number up?

Like the title says, I just started a new role at a highly visible and recognized local nonprofit as a development officer. I have a lot of experience at my prior org in the nonprofit world, but this is my first role where I will be serving as the relationship manager for a portfolio that includes five and six figure donors… as the title suggests: what are some helpful tips, do’s and don’ts, or just general things you wish someone had told you when you were first getting into major gift cultivation?

I've been feeling really unsure if my work is actually hitting the mark for my boss and the board lately. It's gotten to the point where I'm just completely burned out. I'm starting to wonder if this is just a normal part of the job. Sometimes it feels like you're just trying to keep everyone happy. Anyone else ever feel this way?

Hello, I am currently finishing up my masters in peace and security conflict studies. I went into my masters right after undergrad, and I only have about a year and a half worth of internship experience. The job market right now is impossible, so I find myself applying to unpaid internships. I have applied to some on for the IRC and was wondering if it is a good organization? Would this help me move up the career ladder? Is it worth working for free to get experience to apply to other jobs? Is it common to get a job at the IRC after my internship? Is the IRC a good organization to work for? Please let me knwo if you have any insight! Thank you :)

I applied for a reading partners position with americorps and I received an offer after three months of silence and it wasn’t the position I applied for (I was alright with doing either role I just confused by it). Should I proceed with caution or could there have been a larger reason for the delay?

Posting from throwaway account and will try to stick to facts without much fluff. as you may tell, I’m a little overwhelmed…

I am an operations executive at a smallish nonprofit. I‘ve been here for a couple years and report directly to our executive director, who hired me shortly after she started. We inherited a bit of a financial mess that has only gotten messier. We do not have a CFO or Director of Finance, only a 3rd party accounting firm. It’s gotten to the point where we are facing huge cash flow issues but our ED has no plan to solve it. Vendors are not being paid, I’m asked to negotiate payment plans in the dark without any inkling on what we can actually afford to pay and how often. The ED’s current strategy is “let’s see if we can afford to pay you next week” but there’s no communication, forecasting, or recovery plan because no one on our staff (including our ED) has any financial expertise. we don’t even have an operating cash flow that is being managed. I know we need a CFO to get us out of this crisis, but my ED is convinced that we can’t afford one.

For the first time in 2 decades, we are dipping into our endowment to cover our deficit with the hope that staff can figure out a sustainable business model. But we are in no better shape this fiscal year and the calls from unpaid vendors are starting earlier this year. And they call me. I need to do something about this. Do I tell our finance chair on our board? how do I ask for help without throwing my boss under the bus? I love my job and hate the thought of leaving, but I feel tasked to deal with the consequences of our lack of financial leadership and the stress is literally making me sick. Do I try to salvage this or do I jump ship? Any advice appreciated.

Small nonprofit with ED doing all fundraising (board brings in under 5K for $1.3m budget). Very solid reserve of over $1.5m, a few long-term contracts that are reliable, but growth has been so slow without better fundraising capacity, along with some other challenges (that have to do with a niche focus…).

What should we ask candidates outside of the usual list? What are things to look for from someone who may be green but has great instincts?

Also: we are realistic about who wants to work at a tiny shop but we have had very few viable applications so it has been hard to assess if we need more outreach (LinkedIn and idealist) or if we are doing something wrong. Job is remote mostly, with a few in-person days (events, eg), $110-135K, full health bens.

Advice on any of these fronts welcome!

First time post! I am working for a teeny, tiny non-profit where I am the only staff, and I am part time. (There are a couple independent contractors.) The board would like to bring me on full time but they are mostly professional artists and professors - not fundraisers. And I would really like to be full time. I love working here!

One of them has been successfully writing grants, and we do have an active member base. But otherwise, we don’t have a fundraising strategy.

What first steps would you take in my situation to help diversify their fundraising? Open to hearing about classes, website, books, actionable steps I could take or the board could take, consultants you’ve worked with, etc.

My initial thought is to try to move members into donors or major donors…

Edited to add: we have ~300 paying members and ~1,500 newsletter subscribers.

Thanks!!!

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To everyone working in nonprofits, universities, and research organizations:

A single referral for a position can completely change someone's future. It isn't just about filling a position—it's about opening a door that may have been closed for years.

Many talented, hardworking people are overlooked simply because they don't have professional experience, even though they have the passion, education, and willingness to learn. Sometimes all they need is one person who believes in them.

If you're in a position to hire, mentor, or refer someone, please consider taking a chance on an entry-level candidate. The impact goes far beyond a resume. You could be helping someone build a career, support their family, stay in a country legally, or simply regain hope after months of rejection.#Years from now, the projects you'll complete may be forgotten, but the person whose life you transformed by believing in them will never forget your kindness.

If you're in a position to mentor, refer, or hire someone, remember: you're not just filling a role—you may be writing the first chapter of someone else's success story.

The smallest opportunity can become the biggest turning point in someone's life.

To everyone who has ever given a newcomer a chance—thank you.[ Your decision may have changed a life in ways you'll never fully know.]