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Building Bridges
Initiative Cluster Evaluation: March 2002 R.
Sam Larson, Ph.D
The Benefits of Nonprofit Management EducationIn
the student survey, we asked respondents why they were continuing their
education. Students told us
that the most important reasons for continuing their education were personal
development, skill acquisition, and new employment opportunities.
Students said they were pursuing their educational program to develop the
“skills and knowledge to do my job well,” for a “desire to learn theory
after years of practice,” out of a “general desire at mid-career to
‘re-engage’ academically,” “to put sound theoretical and research
backgrounds together with pragmatic skills,” and because they “need new
skills and ideas and enthusiasm.” As
a follow-up to this question, we asked alumni to indicate how their management
skills changed as a result of attending their nonprofit management program:
Alumni
gave many examples of how they use their new management skills.
Many of their responses refer to improved strategic planning and human
resource skills, but they include a full range of management activities – from
financial management to writing to fund raising to being a more effective board
member. A few of their responses
illustrate the type of management and client service improvements they associate
with their academic experience: The
management, human resources, and ethics courses have provided me with managerial
knowledge and leadership skills (e.g. knowing the language, rules, and ethics of
issues) to become an accountable leader. I
have used my skills to redefine my previous job and I received a promotion and
raise. Additionally, I have reached
more clients and helped them more effectively than before. I
have been able to advise our management team on legal issues surrounding board
activities and 501(c)3 tax exempt status that they were not aware of. I
am now on the Board of Directors of an NPO and have used fundraising and
budgeting information to educate other board members. In
the budget process for the upcoming fiscal year, I am now called upon to set
budget goals and fundraising goals because of my coursework. It
is not a “management” skill per se, but my greater understanding of the
goals of the nonprofit sector and the motivators behind philanthropy has given
me greater depth and strength of purpose to my “management” decisions. Alumni
frequently use their new management skills on-the-job.
Nearly half (46%) said they apply their new knowledge and skills on a
daily basis and 27 percent indicate they do so once or twice a week. Another
type of management skills is networking – connecting with other leaders in the
nonprofit world. Class cohorts can
become a network, particularly if the students or alumni remain in the same
geographic region. About half (47%)
of alumni survey respondents indicated that they saw their classmates as a new
cohort of nonprofit professionals that they could contact with management and
leadership questions. Alumni may
also see the university as part of their extended network with 43 percent saying
that were now better able to access university resources and personnel. With the development of new skills and a greater sense of efficacy, alumni may begin to consider, or re-consider, their career plans. Table 4 identifies the types of career changes alumni have experienced or anticipate as a result of attending a nonprofit management academic program.
Table 4: Alumni
Career Changes
When
asked to give an example of how their academic programs affected their career
plans nearly 80 percent of the alumni gave an example.
Most of their comments reflect new opportunities – they are moving-up
in their organizations, are aware of new careers and areas of work, and have
moved to new organizations or agencies. Several
of the over 100 comments exemplify the enthusiasm apparent in so many of the
responses: Attending
this program has launched my career. I
moved from executive assistant to researching charities – a more professional
job. The proposal writing class got me interested in grant writing…. It has opened up new opportunities for my career. The
director position of my organization may become available and I would be a
logical person to assume the role because of my education. The program
has helped me to establish contacts for potential job change opportunities in
the nonprofit sector. If
anything, my education has made career planning very unclear, which I
experience as a very positive opportunity to think and stretch “beyond the
box”. I
now expect to work in management rather than direct service in the nonprofit
sector. My program has provided me with the skills to be confident about
assuming a management position. The
program has opened new possibilities – perhaps in policy research. I
now have a clear idea of my career direction in the nonprofit sector and know my
next career steps. I
have considered returning to academia to more perfectly bridge the chasm between
theory and practice in philanthropic/non-profit studies. An
unintended consequence of an increase in management skills and efficacy may be
alumni dissatisfaction with their current work. Only 36 percent of alumni said that as a result of attending
their program they found their work more satisfying. Perhaps alumni would like more opportunities to apply their
skills. This possibility seems reasonable given that about one-quarter (27%) of
the alumni applied their new skills only monthly or less.
It is possible that alumni who do not find their work more satisfying may
feel less challenged – their new skills may be underutilized.
It is also possible that the majority of alumni respondents were
satisfied with their jobs prior to enrolling in the program and that additional
education did not increase or decrease an already high level of satisfaction. How have the
management capacities of alumni improved as a result of their educational
program? This
paper represents the second phase of a two-phase project.
The project started with a survey completed by students enrolled in
nonprofit management programs affiliated with the Building Bridges Initiative.
The purpose of that survey was to help us identify why students choose to
continue their education, why and how they chose nonprofit programs, and how
satisfied they are with various dimensions of their academic programs.
This paper reports on the findings from the second part of this project.
It followed a subset of students twelve-to-eighteen months
later to assess their opinions of programs but this time as alumni. This
paper also focuses on skills alumni have gained and how their professional lives
have changed as a result of their education. The
relative importance of course topics remained somewhat constant from the student
survey to the alumni survey. Some
courses may be more important when one is an alum – such as fundraising and
development, governance, and human resources.
Courses rating low in the student survey in importance for managing
and leading a nonprofit – advocacy, information systems, economic and market
issues, quantitative analysis, and international issues – were rated even
lower in the alumni survey. Taken
together, these findings suggest that alumni want (and need) to develop skills
closely aligned with the pragmatic, day-to-day management and leading of an
organization. When
alumni were looking for an academic program, they were looking for a program from a reputable
institution that focused on nonprofits and connected university knowledge with
practice knowledge. Alumni are
satisfied with their decisions, and nearly all would make the same decision
again. However, the active
connections between the university program and the field of practice –
connections such as collaborative opportunities for nonprofit leaders and
students, networking opportunities for students and alumni, links between the
program and nonprofit organizations, and connections between research and
practice – are areas in need of more attention.
Admittedly, these are difficult connections to make and maintain. It may
take several more years before programs can engage in this type of outreach. Perhaps
the most important finding in this study is the ample evidence that alumni have
garnered new skills and are thinking and acting differently because of these
skills. Alumni are better able to
contribute to their organizations, are more confident in their management
abilities, and are better able to apply theory to practice.
Alumni tended to talk about new or improved skills in strategic planning,
human resources, and several financial domains (fundraising, budgeting, proposal
writing). And alumni use these
skills frequently – nearly half apply them on a daily basis and about
one-quarter do so once or twice a week. Finally,
alumni are thinking anew about their career options and most like what they see. It is quite likely that programs such as those supported by
the BBI are an important means to curtail the movement of talented individuals
out of the nonprofit sector. That
is, these programs may be a retention intervention – helping the nonprofit
sector to develop and keep bright and motivated leaders. References
Larson,
R. S. & Long, R.F. (1998).
Nonprofit management academic centers: Moving from the periphery.
Paper presented at the Association for Research on Nonprofit
Organizations and Voluntary Action, Seattle, Washington. Larson,
R. S. & Long, R. F. (2000).
Academic centers: Moving beyond the periphery.
Journal of Public Service and Outreach 5(2), 39-47. Mirabella,
R. & Wish, N. (2000).
Nonprofit management education: Summary of research on graduate degree
programs. Paper presented at
the International Association for Third Sector Research, Dublin, Ireland.
National
Association of Schools of Public Affairs and Administration. (2000). Task
group report on guidelines for graduate professional education in nonprofit
organizations, management and leadership. [On-line].
Available: http://www.naspaa.org/guidelines/guide_npft.htm
O'Neill,
M. and Young, D.R. (Eds.).
(1988). Educating
managers of nonprofit organizations. New York, NY: Praeger. O’Neill,
M. & Fletcher, K. (Eds.).
(1998). Nonprofit
management education: U.S. and world perspectives.
Westport, CT: Praeger. Wish,
N. & Mirabella, R. (1998a).
Nonprofit management education: Current offerings and practices in
university-based programs. In M. O’Neill and K. Fletcher (Eds.), Nonprofit
management education: U.S. and world perspectives, (pp. 13-22).
Westport, CT: Praeger. Wish,
N. & Mirabella, R. (1998b).
Curricular variations in nonprofit management graduate programs.
Nonprofit management and leadership
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