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posted by Donnalee Sarda, LPC, Executive Director Defenders of Children |
The year is 2008. Overnight, banks and financial institutions are in crisis, the stock market plunges, interest rates and housing prices drop, corporate sales and profits dip, employment lines grow, funds everywhere dry up. Nonprofits, the fifth largest industry in Arizona, historically the recipient of a most generous donor base, now wear the burden of the downturn in the national economy.
The number of nonprofit agencies that succumbed to the recession is not the topic of this essay. Suffice to say, that most survived, some due to good luck, others to large contributions that came their way in the early months. As the funding pot boiled down, nonprofit managers tightened our belts. Responsibilities fell to the board of directors and executive directors to do something to save their organizations.
Executive directors, along with their bookkeepers, heard the clock ticking and felt the impact first. Staff! How do we meet our biggest expense, payroll, with the next fiscal quarter looming? Clients! How do we serve our needy client base: vulnerable individuals, “our” families and “our kids?” At that point in time, keeping ourselves employed wasn’t even a thought.
With no time to spare and with no colleagues with whom to collaborate (we were all too busy), executive directors had to act. Now, holed up our offices, we had to reach into our inner strengths. Each had to look to our individual motivations, and come up with self-satisfying answers for doing what we do: How devoted are we to the work we do? Is this a job or a vocation?
If one’s work as an executive director of a nonprofit organization is a vocation, a “calling,” the answers to the following questions are likely to be YES!:
Best of luck and hard work to all in 2013. I discovered both come easier when our efforts are our passion as well as our mission.
Donnalee Sarda is a state licensed counselor, having achieved her master's in counseling psychology from Arizona State University in 1996. Through a partial scholarship, she received a professional certificate in Nonprofit Management from the ASU Lodestar Center for Philanthropy & Nonprofit Innovation in May, 2010. She is executive director of Defenders of Children, a 50lc(3) organization working statewide as child advocates for abused and allegedly abused children and their families. For more information, visit www.defendersofchildren.org.
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Like this article? Get another! Read Clyde W. Kunz's "The Great Connection: Engaging donors in your mission." |
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Dark days for everybody in 2008/9. I sit on the Bo...
Dark days for everybody in 2008/9. I sit on the Board of an Environmental Not for Profit and the grant side is all but dead. We have been forced to adopt more of a fee-for-service model to augment the community and educational aspects of our mandate. Great article - nice to know that we are not alone in this.