Resources
Strategy and Strategic Planning
Creating Your Nonprofit’s Future: Why Strategic Planning May Be the Most Important Thing Nonprofit Executive Directors Can Do, Belinda Lyons-Newman
Good to Great and the Social Sectors, Jim Collins
The Strategic Plan is Dead, Stanford Social Innovation Review
What Is Strategy, Michael E. Porter
Emergent Strategy, Adrienne Maree Brown
Scaling Up Excellence, Robert I. Sutton and Huggy Rao
How to Create an Effective Non-Profit Mission Statement, Harvard Business Review
Where Strategic Philanthropy Went Wrong, Mark Kramer and Steve Phillips
Scenario Planning: Rapid Planning in a Time of Rapid Change, Belinda Lyons-Newman
Governance
Four Principles of Purpose-Driven Board Leadership, Anne Wallestad in Stanford Social Innovation Review
The Dynamic Board, McKinsey & Company
Ten Responsibilities of Nonprofit Boards, Richard T. Ingram
Board Development Insight Brief, Evelyn and Walter Haas Jr. Fund
The Inclusive Nonprofit Boardroom, Nonprofit Quarterly
Leading with Intent: BoardSource Index of Nonprofit Board Best Practices
State of Nonprofits 2024: What Funders Need to Know, Center for Effective Philanthropy
What Every Board Member Should Know, Adler & Colvin
Leadership
Discovering Your Authentic Leadership, Bill George, Peter Sims, Andrew N. McLean, and Diana Mayer.
Building Resilient Organizations: Toward Joy and Durable Power in a Time of Crisis, Maurice Mitchell
The Feedback Imperative: How to Give Everyday Feedback to Speed Up Your Team’s Success, Anna Carroll
How to Build a Blameless Work Culture, Vijay Pereira, Benjamin Laker, Jack Tillotson, and David Collings, Harvard Business Review. Inspired by this article, our team developed a continuous learning tool to track our own mistakes, lessons, and insights from our work, as well as action ideas for future improvement. Download a free template of our tool that you can use at your own organization.
Difficult Conversations: How to Discuss What Matters Most, Douglas Stone, Bruce Patton, and Sheila Heen
Diversity, Equity, Inclusion (DEI)
Racial Equity and Liberation Virtual Learning Series, Move to End Violence
The Groundwater Approach: Building a Practical Understanding of Structural Racism
Continuum on Becoming an Anti-Racist Multicultural Institution
Advancing Health Equity: A Guide to Language, Narrative, and Concepts
Disability Justice - An Audit Tool, by Northwest Health Foundation
Change Management
The Inconvenient Truth About Change Management, McKinsey & Company
Switch, Chip Heath and Dan Heath
Marketing and Branding
The Role of Brand in the Nonprofit Sector, Stanford Social Innovation Review
Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die, Chip Heath and Dan Heath
Annual Digital Fundraising and Marketing Benchmarks Study, M+R Benchmarks
Financial Management
Ten Nonprofit Funding Models, Stanford Social Innovation Review
Should Nonprofits Seek Profits? Harvard Business Review
The Nonprofit Starvation Cycle, Stanford Social Innovation Review.
Fund Development
Underdeveloped- A National Study of Challenges Facing Nonprofit Fundraising, CompassPoint and the Evelyn and Walter Haas Jr. Fund
15 Must-Know Fundraising and Social Media Stats, Nonprofit Tech for Good
Beyond Fundraising: What Does It Mean to Build a Culture of Philanthropy? Evelyn & Walter Haas Jr. Fund
Uncharitable, Dan Pallotta
Collaboration and Networks
Needle-Moving Community Collaboratives, Bridgespan Group
How to Start a California Nonprofit, California Association of Nonprofits
The Networked Nonprofit, Stanford Social Innovation Review
Community Asset Mapping, The Laundromat Project
Asset-Based Community Development (ABCD), Asset-Based Community Development Institute
Client-Centered Design
Listening to Those That Matter Most, the Beneficiaries, Stanford Social Innovation Review
Design Thinking for Social Innovation, Stanford Social Innovation Review
From Input to Ownership- How Nonprofits Can Engage with the People they Serve to Carry Out Their Missions, Bridgespan Group
From the Streets to the Boardroom: Homeless Residents Take Back Power in the Bay Area, The Mercury News
Evaluation
Logic Model Development Guide, W.K. Kellogg Foundation
Next Generation Evaluation: Embracing Complexity, Connectivity, and Change, Srik Gopalakrishnan, Hallie Preskill PhD, Shijie (SJ) Lu
Facilitation
Rituals for Work: 50 Ways to Create Engagement, Shared Purpose, and a Culture that Can Adapt to Change, Kursat Ozenc and Margaret Hagan
The Art of Gathering, Priya Parker
Let’s Stop Meeting Like This, Dick Axelrod and Emily Axelrod