7 Strategies to Kick Off the New Year and Set Your Nonprofit Up for Success
Practical steps to strengthen your mission, engage supporters, and achieve sustainable growth in the year ahead.
Your mission depends on your people. Retaining great staff isn’t just about reducing turnover—it’s about creating a workplace where talented, values-driven professionals want to stay, grow, and do their best work. When nonprofits invest in retention, they safeguard institutional knowledge, strengthen relationships with donors and partners, and ensure continuity for the communities they serve. This article offers practical, leadership-level strategies for nonprofit directors and board chairs to build a culture that keeps great people.
Why Retention Matters
Retention supports impact. Every time a key staff member leaves, programs pause, momentum slows, and connection to beneficiaries and stakeholders is disrupted. The true cost of turnover includes recruitment time, onboarding, lost productivity, and lost relationships.
Retention protects reputation. Donors and partners notice constant churn. A stable team signals organizational health, good stewardship, and leadership that plans ahead.
Retention builds capacity. Long-tenured staff take ownership, innovate, and mentor others. They improve systems, tighten operational discipline, and help the organization weather crises without losing its footing.
In short: retention isn’t a “nice to have”—it’s a strategic imperative for mission delivery.
Common Reasons Employees Leave (Beyond Salary)
While pay matters, most departures in mission-driven organizations stem from conditions leaders can influence directly:
Limited Advancement Pathways
Many nonprofits have flat structures. Staff don’t see how to grow, lead, or broaden their scope without changing organizations.Feeling Undervalued
Recognition often concentrates on volunteers, donors, and program outcomes—less often on the staff who make those outcomes possible. Over time, that erodes morale.Burnout and Workload Imbalance
Scarce resources can lead to heroic effort becoming the norm. When “always on” is rewarded, burnout follows.Lack of Ongoing Development
Training budgets get cut first. Without skill-building, people stagnate and feel their marketability—and their contribution—plateauing.Unhealthy or Inconsistent Culture
Culture is how decisions get made, how conflict is handled, and how people feel day-to-day. If trust is low, communication poor, or behaviors inconsistent with values, people opt out.
The good news: each of these is solvable with intentional leadership and practical structures.
Strategies to Keep Great People
1) Create Clear Career Pathways (Even in Flat Organizations)
What to do
Role architecture: Define levels within roles (Coordinator → Specialist → Manager → Director → Vice President) with competencies and behaviors. People can grow without changing titles every year.
Dual career tracks: Build leadership and expert tracks (e.g., People Manager vs. Program Strategist). Not everyone needs to manage to advance.
Scope-based growth: Offer stretch projects, cross-functional initiatives, or regional responsibilities that expand influence and skills.
Transparent promotion criteria: Publish the competencies and evidences required. Make internal candidacy the default for openings.
· Cross-Training: Pair staff for short-term rotations or shadowing to expand skills, provide backups for critical roles, and increase engagement.
Leadership signal: “We invest in growth here. You don’t have to leave to step up.”
2) Foster Appreciation and Recognition That Feels Real
What to do
Weekly gratitude habits: Managers close one meeting a week with shout-outs tied to values and outcomes.
Peer recognition: Introduce a simple, low-cost peer recognition mechanism (e.g., “mission moments”) that can be shared in newsletters or town halls.
Milestone markers: Celebrate work anniversaries and project completions with a short note from the ED or Board Chair, highlighting specific impact.
Private and public balance: Pair public appreciation with one-on-one notes that speak to the person’s strengths and growth.
Leadership signal: “We notice the work and the people behind it.”
3) Invest in Training and Development Without Breaking the Budget
What to do
Learning calendar: Curate quarterly learning themes (e.g., grantwriting, trauma-informed practice, inclusive facilitation) with free/low-cost webinars, articles, and internal teach-backs.
Mentorship and peer learning: Pair early-career staff with seasoned team members; rotate “brown bag” sessions where staff share expertise.
Cross-training: Create backups for key functions and expand skill breadth. It reduces single-point risk and keeps work interesting.
Tuition support and micro-credentials: Offer modest stipends for courses and certifications that align with strategic priorities.
Leadership signal: “We’re a learning organization. Growth is part of the job.”
4) Promote Work-Life Balance and Sustainable Work Practices
What to do
Workload audits: Quarterly, review workload distribution and prioritize ruthlessly. Drop or delay low-value tasks. Protect core missions.
Flexible scheduling: Offer flexibility around start/stop times, remote days where feasible, or compressed workweeks during slower periods.
Clear after-hours norms: Define what constitutes urgent vs. important. Rotate on-call responsibilities; avoid reactive culture creep.
Mental health and recovery: Normalize PTO use, encourage mental health days, and train managers to spot burnout early.
Leadership signal: “We deliver results sustainably. Rest is not a reward; it’s a requirement.”
5) Build a Healthy, Inclusive Culture Anchored in Trust
What to do
Values in action: Translate values into observable behaviors (e.g., “Respect” = we check understanding before debating; “Equity” = we share decision rationales).
Decision transparency: Publish how decisions are made and who is involved. Close the loop with “Here’s what we heard, here’s what we decided, here’s why.”
Psychological safety: Train managers to invite dissent, ask “What might we be missing?,” and thank people for candor—even when it’s uncomfortable.
Inclusive practices: Audit policies and norms for equity impacts (leave, scheduling, professional development access) and fix gaps quickly.
Leadership signal: “We live our values—especially when it’s hard.”
Action Steps for Directors and Board Chairs
Retention rises when boards and executive leadership take aligned, visible action:
Governance-Level Actions
Set retention goals: Include staff engagement and retention metrics in the strategic plan (e.g., increase 2-year retention by X%, improve engagement score by Y points).
Budget for people strategies: Fund development, recognition, wellness, and manager training as non-negotiables—small dollars, big impact.
Monitor culture health: Review quarterly dashboards with turnover by function, exit interview themes, engagement survey trends, and workload indicators.
Executive-Level Actions
Model the norms: Protect boundaries, give credit, and be transparent about tradeoffs. Your behavior defines what “acceptable” looks like.
Grow great managers: Invest in manager capability—feedback, coaching, prioritization, and equitable practices. People stay for managers more than missions.
Communicate often: Regular, predictable updates reduce rumor and anxiety. “No update yet” is better than silence.
Board–Staff Interface
Clarify lanes: Keep the board at the governance level; avoid micromanaging staff. Respect roles to prevent confusion and stress.
Listen without bypassing: When board members hear staff concerns, route them through the ED respectfully and collaboratively.
Celebrate staff publicly: Invite staff to present work to the board; recognize contributions in board communications.
Measuring What Matters: Simple Retention Dashboard
Track a handful of indicators consistently:
Voluntary turnover rate (overall and by department)
Time-in-role distribution (how many are growing vs. stuck)
Internal fill rate for new roles
Engagement survey scores on recognition, development, workload, and trust
PTO utilization and after-hours email volume (proxy for burnout)
Exit interview themes (categorize and trend)
Promotion and training participation metrics (by demographic to ensure equity)
Review quarterly, discuss openly, and tie improvements to specific actions.
Practical Tools You Can Use This Quarter
1) Career Conversation Template (30 minutes)
Opening: “What’s exciting you in your work right now?”
Exploration: “Which skills do you want to grow in the next 6–12 months?”
Pathways: “What projects or responsibilities could help you get there?”
Support: “What training, mentorship, or feedback would be most helpful?”
Commitments: “Let’s agree on 2–3 concrete steps and a check-in date.”
2) Recognition Rhythm
Weekly: 2–3 values-linked shout-outs in team meetings.
Monthly: Short note from the ED to a staff member highlighting specific impact.
Quarterly: Share “mission moments” in a town hall with peer nominations.
3) Workload Reset
Identify the top 5 priorities.
List recurring tasks that don’t directly support those priorities—drop, delegate, or delay.
Define response SLAs (e.g., donor inquiries within 48 hours; internal requests within 5 business days).
Schedule “focus time” blocks for deep work.
4) Manager Essentials Micro-Series (4 sessions, 60 minutes each)
Session 1: Giving and receiving feedback.
Session 2: Coaching for growth and career pathways.
Session 3: Prioritization and workload management.
Session 4: Building psychological safety and inclusive practices.
Common Pitfalls—and How to Avoid Them
Announcing culture change without changing systems: Align policies (PTO, performance, promotions) to the new norms, or employees will see it as lip service.
Overloading high performers: If their reward for excellence is more work without support, you’re training them to leave. Add resources, adjust scope, or rotate responsibilities.
One-size-fits-all development: Tailor development to the person’s strengths, aspirations, and role. Choice increases engagement.
Skipping exit interviews or ignoring the themes: Exit data is gold. Synthesize quarterly, share insights, and act visibly.
Conclusion: Make Retention a Strategic Choice
Keeping great people is not the result of luck or high salaries—it’s the outcome of daily leadership choices and clear structures that make growth, recognition, learning, and wellbeing part of the job. When boards and executive leaders treat retention as strategy, they build organizations where staff thrive, cultures align with values, and missions move forward with steady, compounding momentum.
Start today with one action:
Schedule a career conversation with each direct report.
Send three specific thank-you notes this week.
Audit one team’s workload and remove two non-essential tasks.
Publish a short note explaining a recent decision and the rationale behind it.
Small, consistent steps—owned by leadership and supported by systems—create the kind of nonprofit where great people choose to stay.