August 21, 2013

Risk Management Essentials: The Financial Risk Issue

We are pleased to announce the release of the summer edition of our newsletter, Risk Management Essentials. This issue addresses everyone’s favorite source of stress: finances! Dive into the newsletter to learn about financial sustainability risks, fraud detection, the pros and cons of fiscal outsourcing, and the trick to telling your story with a compelling financial dashboard.

Download a PDF of The Financial Issue.

View The Financial Issue online.

Read articles from The Financial Issue online:

• Financial Sustainability: The New Frontier
• IN is OUT and OUT is IN: Outsourcing the Finance or Accounting Function in a Nonprofit
• A Violation of Trust: Fraud Risk in Nonprofit Organizations
• Set the Story Straight with a Financial Dashboard

What I Learned Working at an Awesome Nonprofit

By Erin Gloeckner

I’m writing this on my final day at the Nonprofit Risk Management Center. Melanie told me I could write about whatever I want…so here goes.

Work is hard. Even when you love your job, work can be mentally draining, exhausting and frustrating. Many of my prior jobs were no exception. In high school I worked at a café where the hiring manager asked me to play strip poker—definitely a bad job! In college, I worked in an office where negative energy abounded and the promise of a happy hour drink was the only thing keeping everyone sane. When I started at the Center, I wondered what emotional side effects I would experience: pleasure, pain, stress, or satisfaction. As it turns out, the side effects were positive. Work is hard, but it’s fun when you have a great boss. The Center is an awesome nonprofit and I’ve picked up some management secrets from my boss, as well as my colleagues.

• Equality — Perhaps the main reason I love the Center is that structurally, we are a flat organization. Melanie is the Executive Director, but she treats everyone else like a colleague, not an inferior. Melanie’s respect for her staff prompts her to provide us with greater responsibility and intense challenges. I thrive in an environment where I complete new, exciting tasks each day. At the Center I was challenged to grow by taking on projects that—at any other organization—would have been reserved for a higher-level employee. Thankfully, our CEO views my age and lack of experience as potential rather than a limitation necessitating years of “paying dues” on the entry-level production line.
• Communication — The greatest cultural perk at the Center is openness and candor. Open communication promotes harmony among our staff and allows us to conquer challenges and disagreements in a healthy way. Not only are we encouraged to speak our minds confidently, but our CEO eagerly invites ideas different from her own. Melanie has a few good ideas herself, but I appreciate how she values my opinion and the thoughts of our colleagues.
• Flexibility — Many of us know the managers who are time sticklers. Arrive three minutes past 9:00 am and your job is on the line! The Center staff are lucky because the core workplace value of flexibility allows us to achieve a healthy work-life balance. Most managers are clock watchers because they believe that staff need a task master to hold them accountable. At the Center we’re judged by our work products and how we support and contribute to the team. We’re trusted to complete the work and enjoy many options when it comes to the work day, dress code and telecommuting. Melanie’s flexibility helped me relieve the daily stress which coincides with work, and her trust encouraged me to hold myself accountable to a higher work ethic.

Aside from expressing my gratitude to Melanie, I hope this RISK eNews inspires some supervisors, senior management and executives to evaluate the way they interact and communicate with their staff. As a staff person, I can say from experience that a caring boss empowers me to bring more positivity and productivity to the workplace. As a risk management consultant, I can say that many of our clients experience the ‘great divide’ between management and support staff. Build a bridge and watch your team revive itself. For more management tips, register for our upcoming September webinar, “All That’s Sacred: The Erosion of Employment at Will, the Regular Workday, and Other HR Icons.”

Memories from the Center

Everyone at the Center made my birthday great.

Melanie invited me to see Robert Plant. Coolest boss ever!

Melanie persuaded me to try sushi! I survived and am a convert.