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Non-profit brain drain?
Non-profits across the country, disproportionately run by
baby boomers, face a mass exodus of top leadership in the coming decade --
a generational shift that could pose a crisis to an industry that already
struggles to compete with compensation in the business world. In the Bay Area, the problem is further compounded by the
high cost of living, which could make attracting the next generation of
leaders even more difficult. ``A major sea change in leadership is ahead for the
non-profit sector,'' said Tom Adams, founder of TransitionGuides, a
Maryland consultant to charities who wrote a report on the looming
management upheaval for the Annie E. Casey Foundation in Baltimore. A 2001 survey of nearly 1,100 non-profit executive directors
by San Francisco-based CompassPoint Nonprofit Services reported that 61
percent were older than 50. Adams found similar results in a smaller
study. Many non-profits emerged during the 1960s and 1970s, spurred by
President Johnson's leadership in anti-poverty funding. Many of those
organizations are still being run by the people who started them. ``There is a whole generation of organizations led by people
in their late 50s and early 60s,'' Adams said. Most non-profit leaders won't retire hastily, though. The
missions of their agencies are their passion. Furthermore, because
non-profits often lack good retirement packages, these leaders won't be
racing to the door, Adams said. Eventually, though, they will leave, joining millions of
other boomers easing into retirement. With the departure of boomers from
the work world, the labor force will be smaller and non-profits will have
to compete even harder to attract new employees. ``The competition for talented workers will be
extraordinary,'' Adams said. ``Unless the sector has a strategy to attract
workers, it is going to lose them to other sectors.'' To that end, conferences and workshops are being held to
address the issue, and some foundations are providing support to
non-profits to assist them in management transitions. Indeed, a movement
is growing to encourage executives to plan their departure years in
advance. Finding able non-profit executives is not easy, even in a
down economy. ``There is a huge shortage of people who have the skills to
lead non-profits,'' said Margaret Donohoe, a Silicon Valley consultant who
helps with leadership transitions. Not
a good fit Those with experience in corporations usually don't make a
good fit in the non-profit world, where an executive is expected to be a
``jack of all trades,'' she said. ``The bench strength of your
second-in-command isn't always that strong. I've seen a lot of people move
in from the for-profit sector and crash and burn.'' Unlike corporations, which have the resources to groom
successors to the chief executive for years, non-profits often don't have
such a luxury. Without such a plan, though, an agency led by a very strong
leader can experience a sudden crisis -- and even go out of business --
when that person leaves, said Tim Wolfred, director of executive
leadership services at CompassPoint. This generational transfer of power is starting to happen at
some non-profits, including Chinatown Community Development Center in San
Francisco, the Unity Council in Oakland, the Mid-Peninsula Housing
Corporation in Redwood City and San Jose's Mexican American Community
Services Agency. Esther Medina, 66, executive director of MACSA, gave her
agency two years' notice that she would retire at the end of 2003. She has
overseen MACSA as it grew from two employees to a staff of 120 over the
past 20 years. She knows filling her position won't be easy. MACSA's board
has yet to select a new executive director. ``I don't think executive directors have the luxury of doing
one job,'' Medina said. ``You have to raise the money, provide the service
and everything else.'' Sometimes those next in line to an executive director don't
want the job, Donohoe said. ``They take a look and say, `I don't want this
job. It's too big. I want a life.' A lot of people are looking for
balance.'' Indeed, in some cases, one executive handles the jobs of
three employees -- chief financial officer, chief fundraiser and chief
programs manager. ``It's unrealistic to expect someone to come in and be the
80-hour-a-week person'' the former executive was, Wolfred said. That management structure will have to change, non-profit
transition consultants say, if organizations hope to compete for workers
in the future. Young people are interested in non-profit careers, said
Barbara Zahner, 57, former executive director of Sacred Heart Community
Service in San Jose. But younger generations are better at ``setting boundaries''
and separating personal and professional lives, said Zahner, the interim
executive director of Child Advocates. She also teaches at San Jose State
and Santa Clara universities. Magda Escobar, 33, executive director of Plugged In, an East
Palo Alto community technology center, believes members of her generation
are more than willing to work as hard as boomers for non-profits. Pay
an obstacle The only obstacle to that is compensation, she said.
Non-profit executives might have been able to afford to buy a home in the
1970s. But the cost of a house in the Bay Area is out of reach for those
just starting out in the field. Higher pay must be a major component in recruiting the next generation of leaders, she said. If it isn't, ``there could be a vacuum,'' Escobar said. ``We are mobile. We'll go where things work.'' Copyright
© 2002 Global Action on Aging |
