Nonprofit Management Research Articles

Mission vs. Market: Theorizing the Tensions within Community Sport Trusts

With the withdrawal of the state from local sport provision in the UK, Community Sport Trusts (CSTs) have grown significantly. The growth of CSTs is a direct outcome of neoliberal and austerity policy contexts in the UK. Research on the commodification of services delivered by hybrid social organizations suggests tensions between mission and market (internal purpose versus external control). Yet little research to date has been conducted on CSTs, with even less research that takes a critical approach. We seek to begin to consider this research gap by theorizing the problem, by looking at the tensions in hybridity, social mission, enterprise objectives, and financial sustainability of CSTs. We approach this by theory building from an examination of multidisciplinary literature; community sport, non-profit management, social enterprise, and social accounting literature to arrive at a conceptual model. This model contributes to knowledge by identifying and drawing out the tensions at play. We call for further theoretical and empirical research on CSTs that problematizes the “social” and draws attention to the inherent tensions in these hybrid business models, which are both academically under-explored and crucial to the success of a policy context where CSTs play a significant and expanding role in community sport delivery.

Social Entrepreneurship and Nonprofit Management: Negotiating Institutional Complexity

Nonprofit organizations (NPOs) increasingly view social entrepreneurship as means to expand their mission scope while simultaneously diversifying revenue streams and strengthening financial foundations. However, the pursuit of social entrepreneurial ventures often incites a tug-of-war phenomenon between the deep-rooted social welfare logic of the parent nonprofit organization and a newly-evolving commercial logic at the subsidiary social enterprise. The present study seeks to understand how nonprofit organizations navigate such logic conflicts as they strive to become more entrepreneurial. Based upon case studies of two NPOs, we found divergence in organizational identity, legitimacy, and mission/vision between parent nonprofits and their subsidiary social enterprises as they struggled with a defining question: Are we a program or are we a business? Our research indicates that organizations reconcile such cognitive dissonance through four distinct processes: connecting, variegating, separating, and augmenting social welfare and commercial logic spheres. We thus contribute to the social entrepreneurship and nonprofit management literatures by illustrating ways in which non-commercial organizations may address issues of logic divergence when engaging in revenue-generating commercial activities.

Non-Profit Islamic Institutions and Quality Management Systems in Malaysia

This paper presents a narrative review of arguments made by researchers regarding the applicability of western and Japanese quality management systems by non-profit Islamic institutions. This review approach was employed after undertaking a literature search for selected articles based on the inclusion and exclusion criteria. The focus of narrative reviews in this study is to identify common themes across researches regarding non-profit Islamic institutions and quality management systems in Malaysia that can then be used to identify commonalities and critical differences among included documents. Following electronic searches of Scopus and Google Scholar sites, nine studies on quality management systems related to non-profit Islamic institutions were identified and subjected to a detailed narrative literature review. Findings reveal that the quality management systems discussed by researchers vary and there are researchers who rejected the idea of implementing western and Japanese quality management systems and instead implemented the Islamic Quality Management system, which was developed in Malaysia. This study intends to contribute to the quality of management and non-profit institution management literature with the proposition of adopting quality management systems by the management of non-profit Islamic institutions.

Director friendships with the CEO: are they always a threat to director integrity?

This paper examines the effects of friendships with the CEO on the decisions of directors of non-profit organisations. Participants in the experiment are active non-profit directors. Results indicate that non-profit directors with no corporate director experience manage earnings less for the benefit of a CEO when they are friends of the CEO, relative to when they do not have a friendship with the CEO. Further, disclosure of the friendship does not result in an increased willingness to manage earnings for the benefit of a CEO friend. The results with non-profit directors are entirely opposite to those previously documented for corporate directors (Rose, J., Rose, A., Norman, C., and Mazza, C, 2014. Will disclosure of friendship ties between directors and CEOs yield perverse effects? The Accounting Review, 89 (4), 1545–1563.). Further, we find that non-profit directors who also have corporate director experience are willing to manage earnings more for a CEO who is a friend, relative to a CEO who is not a friend, and disclosure of the friendship results in increased willingness to manage earnings for the CEO.

VillageReach: innovating for improved health care at the “last mile”

Learning outcomes The learning outcomes are to understand the definition of public value and the strategic drivers behind public value creation, understand the nature of social innovation in the public sector, identify the critical opportunities and challenges involved in sustaining innovation in the public sector and identify the role that non-profit organizations can play in supporting and sustaining social innovation. Case overview/synopsis This case puts participants in the shoes of a global health innovator’s leadership team as the organization approaches a funding crisis. The organization, VillageReach, is on a quest to expand across the public health system of Mozambique and experiences a funding dilemma. The case reveals the challenges of working with governments to achieve large-scale, systemic change. It explores the conundrum of using international donor funding to embed new practices in government service delivery. Ultimately, it asks participants to choose between the pursuit of new, small-scale innovative projects and the large-scale rollout of a national programme. Complexity academic level This teaching case is written for courses focused on social entrepreneurship, social innovation and social change. It can also be used in courses focused on non-profit management and public sector innovation. Specifically, the teaching case is suitable for two audiences: social enterprise and non-profit managers focused on strategy, development and operations (the case focuses on an enterprise that relies primarily on donor funding) and health-care managers and administrators. Generally, the case is suitable for undergraduates in their final year of study as well as graduate-level business and public administration courses, including MBA, MPH, MPA, EMBA and Executive Education courses. Supplementary materials Teaching Notes are available for educators only. Subject code CSS 3: Entrepreneurship.

Drivers for Non-Profits’ Success: Volunteer Engagement and Financial Sustainability Practices through the Resource Dependence Theory

The strategies that non-profit organizations choose for volunteer engagement and financial sustainability are of the utmost importance for successful work. The main purpose of this study was to investigate feasible strategies for volunteer engagement and financial sustainability. Interviews were conducted to obtain data on the experience of volunteer managers in dealing with volunteers and financial matters together. Qualitative data analysis methods were used to code and analyze the data. Significant themes emerged from the data gathered through interviews that highlighted the strategies for volunteer engagement and financial sustainability chosen by the managers of non-profit organizations. From the manager’s perspective, the following strategies were considered important for engaging volunteers at non-profit organizations (NPOs): ‘building the skill sets of volunteers’, ‘fulfilling ulterior motives’, and ‘administering a culture of administrative support’. Moreover, ‘local fundraising preference’, ‘transparency’, and ‘building trust’ were regarded as successful strategies for maintaining financial sustainability. The findings of this study showed that, to function smoothly, non-profit organizations need to follow certain strategies to be cautious about volunteers as well as finance. The findings provide fruitful implications for practitioners and policy makers, and these are discussed in the paper. Furthermore, the limitations addressed in the study suggest a future direction for research in terms of study design and more focus on study informants.

Understanding and Deterring Misreporting in Nonprofits: The Joint Effects of Pay Level and Penalty Type

ABSTRACT We experimentally examine how nonprofit pay levels affect nonprofit managers' misreporting and how different types of penalties deter such behavior. Absent any penalties for misreporting, we find similar levels of, but different mechanisms for, misreporting by managers who select into lower- versus higher-paying nonprofits. Specifically, lower-paying nonprofits attract mission-focused managers who misreport to advance their nonprofit's mission and justify doing so by their personal sacrifice of wealth, whereas higher-paying nonprofits attract a majority of self-focused managers who justify misreporting by focusing on their personal outcomes. Because managers who select into their nonprofit at different pay levels have different motivation and justification for misreporting, we predict and find that penalizing the nonprofit is more effective in deterring misreporting in lower-paying nonprofits, while penalizing the manager is more effective in higher-paying nonprofits. Our study contributes to theory on the behavioral drivers of nonprofit misreporting and informs practice of ways to deter it. JEL Classifications: D91; J31; L31; M40.

Why do participants in voluntary organizations leave? Exploring the relationship between value congruence and length of stay

AbstractRecognizing the importance of values and the specific characteristics of participants and situations in voluntary organizations, we examine how value congruence—the fit or compatibility of values between participants and the organization, or among participants—interacts with personal and situational factors to predict participants' length of stay in their organizations. Introducing the case of a voluntary organization that offers shared housing, we measure value congruence through textual similarity in the self‐introduction documents of 49 participants and the organization's mission statement. This approach differs from the self‐reported measures based on participants' perceptions or recalled interactions used in previous studies. In line with expectation‐disconfirmation theory, participants with the strongest beliefs in organizational values had shorter lengths of stay. The amount of intraorganizational communication also moderated the relationship between value congruence and length of stay. This study provides theoretical and methodological implications for nonprofit management by considering personal and situational factors and evaluating value congruence by textual similarity.

Editor's Notes

Nonprofit Management and LeadershipVolume 31, Issue 1 p. 7-9 EDITOR'S NOTES Editor's Notes First published: 02 September 2020 https://doi.org/10.1002/nml.21443Read the full textAboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Share a linkShare onEmailFacebookTwitterLinked InRedditWechat No abstract is available for this article. Volume31, Issue1Fall 2020Pages 7-9 RelatedInformation

Assessing Undergraduate Nonprofit Management Curriculum: A Mixed Methods Case Study of a Strategically Selected University Program

Given the growth of nonprofit management education (NME), there is a need to assess the fulfillment of undergraduate NME programs in comparison to NACC Curricular Guidelines and, further, to compare curriculum to views of former graduates and current nonprofit leaders. This study meets that objective through a multimethod case study of the undergraduate NME program at Arizona State University. Results indicate that former students highly valued leadership skills including ethics and values; leadership and management; finance and fundraising; managing staff and volunteers; and assessment, evaluation, and decision making. Similarly, nonprofit managers reported that areas specific to their roles in management were most important, including human resources management, financial management, assessment and evaluation for decision making, and management theory. A comparison to course syllabi reveals potential gaps in curriculum. Results also lead to practical recommendations including expansion of NACC Undergraduate Curricular Guidelines, increased use of case studies, and integrated curriculum. Subscribe to JNEL

Incorporating Diversity Into Undergraduate Nonprofit Management Education: Can Reading Diverse Narratives Increase Students’ Perspective-Taking Capacity?

Although the use of narratives has been shown to increase students’ ability to empathize, which can be an indicator of their perspective-taking ability, no studies have focused on the use of narratives specifically within the context of nonprofit management education. In this study, we tested a pedagogical technique designed to increase students’ perspective-taking capacity. Specifically, we incorporated reading assignments of personal narratives by a diverse body of nonprofit leaders into two undergraduate nonprofit management courses: one an in-person course at a large public land-grant university in the Southeastern United States ( n = 85) and the other an online course at a large public university in the Northeastern United States ( n = 20). We conducted pre- and postinstruction assessments to explore whether the use of these narratives enhanced students’ empathy and perspective-taking abilities. Our findings indicate that narratives are effective in improving perspective-taking skills and can be effective in both online courses and in-person courses. These findings should be of interest to nonprofit management educators. Subscribe to JNEL

ENHANCING EFFICIENCY AT NONPROFITS WITH ANALYSIS AND DISCLOSURE

The U.S. nonprofit sector spends $2.54 trillion each year. If the sector were a country, it would have the eighth largest economy in the world, ahead of Brazil, Italy, Canada, and Russia. The government provides nonprofits with billions in tax subsidies, but instead of evaluating the quality of their work, it leaves this responsibility to nonprofit managers, boards, and donors. The best nonprofits are laboratories of innovation, but unfortunately some are stagnant backwaters, which waste money on out-of-date missions and inefficient programs. To promote more innovation and less stagnation, this Article makes two contributions to the literature. First, this Article breaks new ground in identifying sources of inefficiency at nonprofits. The literature focuses on incentives, arguing that managers and board members are less motivated to run a nonprofit efficiently because they cannot keep its profits. In response, this Article emphasizes that the problem is not just motivation, but also information. Measuring success is harder at nonprofits. Instead of tracking profitability, they use metrics that are less reliable and harder to measure. These measurement challenges complicate the efforts even of dedicated and competent managers to operate efficiently. While this information problem is familiar, another has been largely overlooked in the literature: When success is hard to measure, incompetence and self-interested practices are less visible, and thus are harder to stop. For example, if managers regularly overpay vendors, the consequence at a for-profit firm (lower profits) is easier to observe than at a nonprofit (less effective service for beneficiaries). Second, this Article recommends a response to this underappreciated source of inefficiency: better analysis and disclosure as a strategy for organizational change. In principle, nonprofits are supposed to maximize social return, but how can they operationalize this abstract principle? To help them do so, this Article recommends three questions that nonprofits should answer every year: first, how important are the challenges the nonprofit is trying to address?; second, how effective are the nonprofit’s responses to these challenges?; and third, is the nonprofit the right organization to respond to these challenges? These questions press nonprofit managers and boards to be more explicit about priorities, monitor progress, improve and expand high-value programs, and fix or shut down ineffective ones. This Article also recommends that nonprofits should disclose this analysis to the public, even though current law does not require them to do so. This disclosure would empower donors and rating agencies to be more effective monitors. It also would help donors make better informed philanthropic choices and would enable charities to borrow innovative ideas from each other more easily.

Nonprofit Organizations as Multi-Sided Platforms

The theory of multi-sided platforms (MSPs), originally known as two-sided markets, has been influential in helping digital platforms like Google and Facebook monetize their popular free services. However, this theory can apply to any firm that serves multiple sets of customers who are inter-related in a particular way, namely at least one type of customer prefers that there be greater numbers of the other type. Thus, in its most abstract form, MSP theory can be applied to nonprofit organizations, a setting of growing interest among management scholars. Moreover, this theory can offer nonprofit managers guidance on certain questions that for-profit managers typically do not face, such as whether to charge money for nonprofit services. We therefore focus on how MSP theory can provide practical guidance on nonprofit pricing, highlighting three findings. First, donors and recipients of nonprofit services can be regarded as two sides of an MSP. Second, the price of the nonprofit’s services will be discounted because of donor-side demand. Third, nonprofit services might be discounted to zero, resulting in free services. This paper thus extends the domain of MSPs by applying it to nonprofits, and also contributes to the growing literature on nonprofit management and strategy.

Are Governments Better than Donors at Rewarding Nonprofit Performance?

Nonprofits engaged in social production can receive funding from both donors and governments. Much of the nonprofit performance theory is based in economic organization literature and suggests that donors are unlikely to base donation decisions on nonprofit production, But governments may prioritize performance in nonprofit funding decisions. Using rare internal production reports from the nonprofit housing sector and dynamic panel data analysis, this study compares the effects of performance on donor and government funding. We find that a 1% increase in production increases donations by only 0.09%, but increases government funding by 0.32%. Governments are less sensitive than donors to problematic financial ratios and also seem to be better at observing and rewarding nonprofit performance than donors. Governments are also much more responsive to donations than donors are to government funding. Findings indicate that donors face more costs in observing performance than nonprofits do in sharing it, and that future scholarship in both public and nonprofit management should consider that government might have a unique advantage as nonprofit principals.

How Valuable is Experience? Examining the Impact of Founder Experience on Nonprofit Start-Up Success

Nonprofit entrepreneurs face a number of liabilities that are particularly significant during the emergent phase of a new nonprofit. Using a human capital perspective, this study examines the influence previous experience plays as it relates to nonprofit organizational start-up success. The study draws on a sample of 118 nascent nonprofit entrepreneurs. The results from a logistic regression analysis show no significant impact with regard to education or prior nonprofit management experience. The results, however, show that prior start-up experience significantly enhances the likelihood of start-up success.

Government funding and fundraising: an online experiment of nonprofit leader preferences and personality

PurposeMany empirical studies have focused on whether public funding leverages (crowds in) or discourages (crowds out) private giving behavior, finding mixed results. Recent studies suggest the need to examine how nonprofits adjust their fundraising efforts after experiencing cuts or increases in government funding, which can then influence donor behavior.Design/methodology/approachIn this study, the authors conduct an online survey experiment with nonprofit managers to test how nonprofits respond to changes in government funding.FindingsThe authors find some evidence that nonprofit organizations would change their fundraising expenses when facing cuts in government funding, yet the authors also find that the change could be either to increase or decrease fundraising spending. Since decisions are made by executive directors, the study also considered how executive personality type as maximizers or satisficers may interact with institutional and environmental constraints in decision-making. When funding goals are met, executives tend to behave as “satisficers” and are unlikely to make significant changes, even when their individual personality is more consistent with being a “maximizer.”Research limitations/implicationsThe authors find these results to be the reflection of the current environment in which many nonprofits operate, characterized by pressures to keep operating costs low. The results of the experiment have implications for both funding agencies and nonprofits that strive to enhance the capacity of nonprofit services.Originality/valueThis study is the first attempt to untangle the multilayered relationships between government funding, fundraising, leader preferences and personalities, and donations using an experimental approach with current nonprofit leaders.

Governing for Whom? Representative Governance and Segregation in North Carolina’s Charter Schools

Market-based reforms have altered accountability structures in the public sector, raising questions about whether markets effectively hold organizations accountable to the public. Research on market models in education has revealed that these reforms can sometimes have perverse results, such as segregation, that contradict the public interests typically linked to public education. This study offers an empirical examination of one policy-relevant mechanism for understanding public accountability in market-based reforms that employ nonprofit service providers. Using Guo and Musso’s (2007) theory of representative governance in nonprofit management, we examine how representation and participation in the governance of nonprofit charter schools contribute to public accountability. We find that few charter schools in our sample employ mechanisms to increase organizational capacity to represent the public at large. Moreover, we find that lower descriptive representation is linked to substantive outcomes that contradict the public interests articulated in public law.

Bringing Beneficiaries More Centrally into Nonprofit Education and Research

This paper makes the case for bringing beneficiaries more centrally into nonprofit research and education. First, the paper provides a historical overview of how scholars in three fields came to recognize beneficiaries as central organizational actors. Tracing these early observations, and the related concepts of coproduction, value cocreation and comembership, this paper considers why these ideas have not been more central to nonprofit education and research. Second, the offers three likely explanations based on a review of early discussions in the field of nonprofit management education. Third, the paper turns to current research about nonprofits and their beneficiaries published in three major nonprofit journals between 1998-2018 (Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly, Nonprofit Management & Leadership and Voluntas) to show that although most researchers are not using these concepts directly, their detailed empirical findings provide evidence of the relevance of these ideas for nonprofits. The final section suggests next steps for bringing beneficiaries into nonprofit research and education.

ENHANCING EFFICIENCY AT NONPROFITS WITH ANALYSIS AND DISCLOSURE

The U.S. nonprofit sector spends $2.54 trillion each year. If the sector were a country, it would have the eighth largest economy in the world, ahead of Brazil, Italy, Canada, and Russia. The government provides nonprofits with billions in tax subsidies, but instead of evaluating the quality of their work, it leaves this responsibility to nonprofit managers, boards, and donors. The best nonprofits are laboratories of innovation, but unfortunately some are stagnant backwaters, which waste money on out-of-date missions and inefficient programs. To promote more innovation and less stagnation, this Article makes two contributions to the literature. First, this Article breaks new ground in identifying sources of inefficiency at nonprofits. The literature focuses on incentives, arguing that managers and board members are less motivated to run a nonprofit efficiently because they cannot keep its profits. In response, this Article emphasizes that the problem is not just motivation, but also information. Measuring success is harder at nonprofits. Instead of tracking profitability, they use metrics that are less reliable and harder to measure. These measurement challenges complicate the efforts even of dedicated and competent managers to operate efficiently. While this information problem is familiar, another has been largely overlooked in the literature: When success is hard to measure, incompetence and self-interested practices are less visible, and thus are harder to stop. For example, if managers regularly overpay vendors, the consequence at a for-profit firm (lower profits) is easier to observe than at a nonprofit (less effective service for beneficiaries). Second, this Article recommends a response to this underappreciated source of inefficiency: better analysis and disclosure as a strategy for organizational change. In principle, nonprofits are supposed to maximize social return, but how can they operationalize this abstract principle? To help them do so, this Article recommends three questions that nonprofits should answer every year: first, how important are the challenges the nonprofit is trying to address?; second, how effective are the nonprofit’s responses to these challenges?; and third, is the nonprofit the right organization to respond to these challenges? These questions press nonprofit managers and boards to be more explicit about priorities, monitor progress, improve and expand high-value programs, and fix or shut down ineffective ones. This Article also recommends that nonprofits should disclose this analysis to the public, even though current law does not require them to do so. This disclosure would empower donors and rating agencies to be more effective monitors. It also would help donors make better informed philanthropic choices and would enable charities to borrow innovative ideas from each other more easily.

Mapping the Research Landscape of Strategic Human Resource Management in Nonprofit Organizations: A Systematic Review and Avenues for Future Research

A decade after key theoretical developments in strategic human resource management (SHRM) in nonprofit organizations (NPOs), we still lack a comprehensive understanding of the disparate strands of empirical evidence. Furthermore, this growing field requires integration and synthesis of new themes and conceptual developments. Therefore, we conducted a systematic review of SHRM studies in NPOs published between 2008 and 2017. Our review of 74 articles synthesizes a fragmented body of research and maps out the relationships into a more integrated whole. By mapping the research landscape, we provide insights into the tensions NPOs face between external pressures and values, highlighting the underexplored role of managerial discretion in shaping NPOs’ differing responses. Our review expands the resource orientation to include a social capital dimension and identifies new empirical manifestations of human resource management (HRM) types. We offer avenues for research on content, process, outcomes of SHRM, and discuss how the interplay across key themes can inform the development of the field.