Why Nonprofits Fail Their Own

Here's a surprising thing: the lifespan of a nonprofit employee is just 16 to 18 months.

That is, the great majority of nonprofit workers leave their positions every 16 to 18 months.

And it costs more than $125K to cover, transition and fill these roles, but they average compensation for the person is less than $50K annually.

So what's going so wrong (if it seems wrong to you)?

Lower compensation with higher expectations.

Lack of independence in their work flow and lack of recognition for good work.

Inflexible schedules and deadlines (because no one can change December 31st into February 16th just because it's the holidays - and a fiscal year is a fiscal year).

No upward mobility - since most smaller organizations are top-heavy and stagnant and Executive Directors and CEO's stay in their roles 3 to 5 times longer than in the for-profit sector.

Lack of career development opportunities. (So it's not just compensation and promotion in title and responsibilities - and why should a nonprofit equip their workforce only to see some other nonprofit benefit from the investment?!)

So, almost 80% of nonprofit workers will leave, change, shift their employment in the next 16 to 18 months, and it will cost your organization almost twice as much in costs to deal with it.

And you'll keep doing exit interviews and feign surprise and shock that someone will leave your mission-driven workplace for another mission-driven workplace.

​