Whether an organization is for-profit or nonprofit, strategic planning is only half the battle. Once the strategic decisions have been made, leaders and managers must find a way to reconcile their big-picture goals with environmental realities and the practical resources available. The Nonprofit Manager’s Guide to Effective Decision-Making provides nonprofit leaders with proven methods for smart, accountable, ground-level decision-making in their organizations. Snow and Phillips present a clear and structured way to manage the challenges of limited resources, competing demands, and the need for accountability while remaining true to the organization’s mission. The book provides both an overall method for making hard choices that minimizes risks while maintaining progress toward the group’s goals, and a practical framework for understanding and implementing the decision-making process. The authors supplement these guidelines with both qualitative and quantitative tools for implementing their recommended methodology, and brief illustrative case examples throughout that demonstrate how these methods can be applied to different types of nonprofit organizations. Among other applications, these tools can be used to choose between “unlike” projects competing for the same resources. For example, they could help an organization decide whether to use funds for new programming, upgrading its computer system, or specialized staff training. Managers who follow the model will better understand the opportunities, costs and risks asociated with introducing or expanding projects and programs. Based on research that grew out of the Wharton School’s Cultural Management Project–a program devoted to developing sustainable improvement in organizational infrastructure–The Nonprofit Manager’s Guide to Effective Decision-Making offers a proven model that helps nonprofit leaders and managers make complex decisions in a thoughtful and rigorous way.
Book Details:
- Author: Roberta M. Snow
- ISBN: 9780470185032
- Year Published: 2007
- Pages: 250
- BISAC: BUS074000, BUSINESS & ECONOMICS/Nonprofit Organizations & Charities
About the Book and Topic:
Whether an organization is for-profit or nonprofit, strategic planning is only half the battle. Once the strategic decisions have been made, leaders and managers must find a way to reconcile their big-picture goals with environmental realities and the practical resources available. The Nonprofit Manager’s Guide to Effective Decision-Making provides nonprofit leaders with proven methods for smart, accountable, ground-level decision-making in their organizations. Snow and Phillips present a clear and structured way to manage the challenges of limited resources, competing demands, and the need for accountability while remaining true to the organization’s mission. The book provides both an overall method for making hard choices that minimizes risks while maintaining progress toward the group’s goals, and a practical framework for understanding and implementing the decision-making process. The authors supplement these guidelines with both qualitative and quantitative tools for implementing their recommended methodology, and brief illustrative case examples throughout that demonstrate how these methods can be applied to different types of nonprofit organizations. Among other applications, these tools can be used to choose between “unlike” projects competing for the same resources. For example, they could help an organization decide whether to use funds for new programming, upgrading its computer system, or specialized staff training. Managers who follow the model will better understand the opportunities, costs and risks asociated with introducing or expanding projects and programs. Based on research that grew out of the Wharton School’s Cultural Management Project–a program devoted to developing sustainable improvement in organizational infrastructure–The Nonprofit Manager’s Guide to Effective Decision-Making offers a proven model that helps nonprofit leaders and managers make complex decisions in a thoughtful and rigorous way.
Nonprofit organizations have always operated on limited resources and have always been accountable to the communities they serve. However, in recent years an increasingly uncertain resource base, shifting demand and increasing public accountability have become pressing issues. Nonprofit managers experience the strain in daily operations, developing their programs and services, and communicating with their constituents. Nonprofit leaders, more than ever before, must carefully weigh the risks and rewards of their organizational decisions. They must evaluate what tradeoffs and compromises are appropriate. All the while they must keep in mind that they must best allocate their organizations limited or dwindling resources to advance its mission. And they must do so in a way that is consistent, fair, responsible and transparent to their constituents.
AUTHOR PLATFORM. The authors will use their extensive contacts in both academia and the nonprofit world to promote the book. They will both train widely using the book and will leverage their connections to Penn’s Wharton School, The United Way, the ALA and YMCA’s to reach readers. HOT TOPIC. In tough financial times, nonprofits are facing increasing pressure to be accountable with their resources. This book can be counted on to appeal to the large audiences who buy our strategic planning books, yet is unique in approach to decision-making in an environment of limited resources and elevated demands. PRACTICAL TOOLS. The book will include practical tools readers can use to apply the model to their own organizations. Interactive materials will be posted on-line for repeat use.
About the Author
Roberta Snow is currently the Director of the University of Pennsylvania’s Nonprofit Management and Leadership Programs. With a background in corporate planning and strategy, most of her research focuses on models developed in business and how they can be adopted appropriately in the nonprofit and public sectors. She has also worked as a consultant to a wide range of commercial, government and private nonprofit organizations. Prior to her current administrative position, she held an adjunct faculty appointment in Wharton’s Management Department where she taught the graduate course in nonprofit arts administration. She also holds an appointment as professor of management at West Chester University where she helped design degree and non-degree programs for management professionals. Paul Phillips is a former partner with KPMG Peat Marwick where he served both business and nonprofit clients. In subsequent CFO positions he has taken several companies through the due diligence process. He is a founding partner of Phillips Consulting, LLC, a firm that provides a range of management services to nonprofit and commercial clients, including assistance building the management and financial infrastructure needed to sustain organizational change.