UnderDeveloped: A National Study of Challenges Facing Nonprofit Fundraising

Posted by on February 11, 2013

Study confirms fundraising challenges facing nonprofits

Many nonprofit organizations are hobbled by entrenched fundraising challenges that include high turnover and instability in key development positions, a dearth of qualified candidates to fill those positions, and a lack of organizational development capacity, a joint study by CompassPoint and the Evelyn and Walter Haas, Jr. Fund has found.

Based on a survey of more than 2700 nonprofit executive directors and development directors, UnderDeveloped: A National Study of Challenges Facing Nonprofit Fundraising found that nonprofits tend to rely solely on their development director to raise funds; that fully half of the development directors surveyed said they expect to leave their current job within two years; and that 40 percent of development directors surveyed said they were not committed to a career in development.

At nonprofits where the development director position was vacant, positions stayed open six months on average, while 16 percent of nonprofits reported that the post had been vacant for more than two years.

The study also found that nonprofits faced an inadequate talent pool when hiring a development director, with 53 percent of executive directors reporting that their most recent search attracted an insufficient number of qualified candidates. In addition, nearly one in three executives are lukewarm about, or dissatisfied with, the performance of their current development director, although leaders of organizations with large operating budgets  tended to be more satisfied, with 41 percent saying they were “very satisfied,” than leaders of organizations with smaller budgets (27 percent).

To view the full study, go here.

http://issuelab.org/resource/underdeveloped_a_national_study_of_challenges_facing_nonprofit_fundraising