The most frequent question posed on the ASU Lodestar Center's "Ask the Nonprofit Specialists" service is about how to start a nonprofit organization. Recent research by Civic Ventures suggests that there is strong interest and intention among "boomers" (individuals in their 40s, 50s, and 60s) to create jobs for themselves and others as entrepreneurs, making a positive social impact.

More than 12 million aspiring entrepreneurs want to be "encore entrepreneurs," by starting a nonprofit or socially oriented business. There is also a growing trend of new nonprofits run by college students. According to Crain's New York Business, "The flood of 'postmillennials' creating their own nonprofits stems from two trends, experts say: a generational desire to do something meaningful and the quest for individualism."

"In a sea of bad economic news, it's heartening that millions of people with experience want to take matters in their own hands and launch their own ventures to meet social needs in their communities," said Marc Freedman, founder and CEO of Civic Ventures.

Mark Rosenman, in a blog post titled, "Calling All Boomers: Don't Start More Nonprofits," disagrees with the idea of…

Welcome to Research Friday! As part of a continuing weekly series, each Friday we invite a nonprofit expert to highlight a research report or study and discuss how it can inform and improve day-to-day nonprofit practice. We welcome your comments and feedback.

You serve on a nonprofit board of directors. Or, you are a member of management for a nonprofit organization. You are expected to understand the organization's finances. And your role (board or staff) determines how you contribute to the overall security of the nonprofit with which you are affiliated.

When those who are responsible for an organization's overall fiscal management responded to a study by The Moody Foundation, it was found that nonprofits need to "fortify their financial skills to better forecast future needs, navigate economic instability, and manage risk."1 This study, Financial Literacy and Knowledge in the Nonprofit Sector (PDF), "engaged a random sample of primarily human service nonprofits, as well as health, civic, environmental, arts, and education nonprofits."2 Again, the study surveyed nonprofit financial managers such as CEOs and CFOs.

The…

When starting out with social media as a nonprofit, it can be a tricky and confusing process. It’s not like the for-profit sector where you have a goal to gain customers through deals and offering products/services. It’s about your cause.

You now have supporters, donors, partners, and those directly affiliated with your organization to think about and cater to. Besides a website, the musts of nonprofit social media include a Facebook page and Twitter account. They provide an easy way for others to show their affiliation and support while being able to directly engage with the nonprofit. Your cause and organizational updates are able to become clearer and more regular through your messaging. I personally began employment at my first nonprofit, ICAN, a year ago, and this is how I’ve been able to make my social media mark on the brand.

The Facebook and Twitter pages had already been set up, but they were scarcely used. I re-evaluated the mission and audience of the organization and found a healthy mix.  As I began to post on a daily basis, I started including real-time photos and posts about events, donation thank you’s, and basic organization updates. Eventually, I began adding in “behind the scenes” posts about staff to make our brand include more than just the faces of those we serve, but also those who were providing service. Within a year, both the Facebook and Twitter followers more than doubled, and engagement increased almost…

Welcome to Research Friday! As part of a continuing weekly series, each Friday we invite a nonprofit expert to highlight a research report or study and discuss how it can inform and improve day-to-day nonprofit practice.

In our professional and personal lives, we are all asked to take a dozen or more surveys every year. At work, I receive email surveys on everything from how we use social media to how we like the services of our vendors. At home, I get opinion questionnaires from organizations ranging from political parties to movie ticket vendors.

Being the recipient of so many surveys, I pick and choose which I respond to. No doubt you do as well. As the Nonprofit Finance Fund (NFF) embarks on its fourth annual nonprofit State of the Sector Survey, I hope you will choose to spend a few minutes of your valuable and busy work time responding to ours. Here’s why.

Nonprofits are our social safety net, particularly now, during the hard times our country continues to experience. They help and enrich people and communities, some of whom face dire health, housing, or food access circumstances. Yet many of the nonprofits that Arizonians rely on for a just and vibrant society are themselves in dire circumstances. Revenue is down, particularly from government funders, while service demand is up (77% saw a rise in service demand last year, on top of increases in service demand from previous years).

As we’ve seen with the…

In these hard economic times, nonprofits are famously struggling—fighting for funding and fighting for resources. Now, more than ever, it is important for nonprofits to play smart while building capacity. At the heart of this notion is leveraging volunteers.

In her blog post, “Don't Be Afraid To Ask,” Stephanie La Loggia says, "recruiting volunteers is one of the most important jobs in most nonprofit organizations.” And that’s true - the recruitment process is crucial but it’s also imperative to engage and retain those who can be, or who already are, key volunteers.

Ostensibly, volunteers are a source for one-time, episodic projects; free labor to tackle those tasks our organizations simply don’t have the time (or resources) to do. However, I've learned from both serving on boards and being a volunteer myself, that volunteers can easily become invaluable assets to an organization. Key volunteers are the most dedicated and skilled of your organization’s volunteers who can essentially take on the duties of staff when resources are limited.

Engaging and retaining these key volunteers is paramount to the success of most organizations. Through proper volunteer cultivation and management, the process can be both painless and productive.

Volunteers love to feel needed. When volunteers feel like their personal contributions…