NonprofitEye

I attended a conference on non-profit policy. It was a conference, like a dozen others I’ve attended over the years. At the breakfast talk I was half asleep, but the keynote was so electrifying that I woke right up. After the talk, as I stood in line to talk to the keynote speaker, I said hello to Flo Green the Executive Director of the organization sponsoring the conference. We started talking about how ironic it is that nonprofits have come under attack for being too much “like a business”. We've all been working so hard for the past twenty years to have the work done by non-profits taken seriously. The approach being to emphasize that we were no different than any other business: professional, hard working, corporate, etc. And now we find the entire non-profit sector under attack, because if you can’t tell the difference between us and a business then maybe we don’t qualify for the much sought after IRS tax-exemption. How ironic to achieve SO much success that we could lose it...

Nonprofit Eye - Backstage Pass - New Feature A Letter from the Editor It's a new year and in lieu of resolutions, we have turned our "Eye" inward. The result? An examination of focus of the Nonprofit Eye. Looking out to the audience, two posts continue to grab a huge share of our readership (one on (of all the arcane topics: revenue recognition) and the other on Job Hunting). Readership takes a dive when I turn to self-exploration, technical topics, philosophical musings on nonprofit identity. I have to admit that even my own interest was waning as I've swum thru the waters of all things related to the Nonprofit World. So get ready for a new spin in 2008, and very soon...a new website and domain name. Such a move means a new start, appropriate for the beginning of a new year. And such a start demands a new theme. Time for audience participation here dear readers. Two themes call strongly to me and I'd love to hear your comments on them (both as to mark...

R eprint: originally titled "The Dearth of Nonprofit Thought" posted on NetSquared It's time to strike up a conversation backed by sound research, philosophy and experience. How is it we don't have our own "Wall Street Journal" by now? So much of the real estate space in nonprofit rags is devoted to a) our own salaries; b) how to raise money; or c) what nifty new accounting software we should buy. I launched the Nonprofit Eye to do my part - kickoff some discussion on real stuff, like revenue recognition , the meaning of charity , the hazards of promising too much, the oxymoron of performance outcomes , etc. etc. Join in, viva la revolution! Technorati Tags: Nonprofit Philosophy , Charity

Are nonprofits just sitting ducks? Is it easier to steal from a nonprofit? or is it a limit of imagination...our hearts are in the right place so much so that we can't conceive of someone setting out to take advantage... Still every month (even every week at times), another story of a nonprofit fraud. NOTE : these are not charities who have defrauded the public, but rather charities who have been the victims of fraud. SEPTEMBER 29, 2006 METHUEN, Mass. A Methuen woman faces two dozen felony charges for allegedly stealing from the Children's Glaucoma Foundation . ...45-year-old Karen Sicher stole more than half a million dollars from the Boston-based nonprofit organization.... SEPTEMBER 24, 2006 Elaine Bernard and Carol Dela Torre (launched) Genesis in 1987, eventually turning the Fresno group home and foster-care business into an $8 million annual enterprise caring for neglected, abused and abandoned children...Now the sisters...are accused of using the nonprofit's credit...