Charity CEO’s Tales of Woe

Overwhelming duties, low pay cause leaders to leave the top spot

The vast majority of nonprofit executive directors are so fed up with their fund-raising responsibilities and other

challenges that they plan to quit, according to a new survey of nearly 2,000 nonprofit leaders in eight cities.

Three-quarters of the executive directors surveyed said they do not expect to be in their current jobs five years from now, and 9 percent are already making a transition, said a report on the study, which was conducted jointly by the Eugene and Agnes E. Meyer Foundation and CompassPoint Nonprofit Services, a nonprofit-management consulting group in San Francisco.

The top reasons for the groundswell of discontent: frustrations with boards of directors and donors, a lack of administrative and management support, and compensation levels that fail to match the demands of stressful leadership jobs.

Among the key findings of the survey:

• Despite the anticipated turnover, fewer than a third of the executives have begun to discuss succession planning with their boards of directors. While the exodus will affect charities throughout the nonprofit world, small organizations — those that have 10 or fewer paid staff members — are more likely to see an executive director leave in the next five years than better established, and better financed, charities.

• Frustration with boards of directors is often cited as a major cause of “executive burnout.” While 65 percent of the executives said that they feel personally supported by their boards of directors, fewer than one in three believe that their board challenges them to be more effective. And 73 percent want board members to be more active in fund raising.

• Nonprofit boards of directors frequently drive executive transition. One out of three executive directors said that they came into their present jobs after their predecessor was fired or forced out.

• Most executives say that by choosing to run a charity they have made a significant financial sacrifice. One-third of the chief executives said that they were unhappy with their compensation. Of executives who plan to leave within a year, twice as many said they were dissatisfied with their pay as the number of executives who chose to stay longer.

Jan Masaoka, executive director of CompassPoint, says that the study found that little has changed since the organization conducted a similar study five years ago and found that large numbers of executive directors were passionate about the missions of their organizations but hated the workload they faced (The Chronicle, November 1, 2001).

While the frustration is worrisome, she says she is not so sure a mass exodus from the CEO office is about to happen.

“Just because someone says that they are going to leave doesn’t mean they actually will,” she says, noting that researchers found that 32 percent of executives say they have previously decided to leave their jobs and then changed their minds.

New Findings

Several important new findings emerged from the data, says Ms. Masaoka.

Researchers were surprised by the number of instances they encountered of charity leaders who had been forced out or fired by their boards — 34 percent of the survey participants said that their predecessor had been fired or otherwise forced out.

“You can interpret that as boards of directors simply firing too many people, but it’s also an example of boards stepping up,” she says.

Another surprise: the outright hostility that many executive directors appear to feel toward foundations and other grant makers.

Only 33 percent of the charity leaders said that their key donors have a good understanding of what the chief executive’s job entails.

While the 2001 study showed that concern over finances was a major source of stress for charity leaders, the new survey found that nonprofit leaders increasingly view the foundation grant-seeking process itself as a cause of their problems.

“They’re telling us that foundations behave in ways that burn executive directors out,” says Ms. Masaoka.

Ms. Masaoka says the study also helped knock down perceptions that younger nonprofit leaders are far more restless than older ones.

“There’s a sense that the new generation of leaders is completely different from the one that came before it, but there may not be the differences between the generations that we think,” she says.

“Executive directors who are in their 50s now probably never thought that they would end up staying as long as they have. They once said things that are very similar to what young leaders are telling us today.”

Influence of Grant Makers

The influence that grant makers exert over their charities was a major annoyance for most of the executive directors.

They said they could feel the impact of grant makers on the development of their programs as well as in decisions about personnel, and that too many philanthropies were fickle.

“Foundations are always changing their priorities,” says Horace Small, founder and executive director of the Union of Minority Neighborhoods, a Boston charity that trains residents of the city’s poorest neighborhoods to be community advocates. “They’re always looking for new and innovative stuff.”

In Mr. Small’s case, the influence of foundations — particularly local ones — has been felt mostly by their neglect. He notes that since he started the charity in 2002, it has received only $40,000 in foundation support.

“We’re not getting rewarded for the work that we do,” he says.

“Every time we approach local foundations, we get a reject letter. And until we get local support, we’ll never get anywhere with the national foundations,” says Mr. Small, who says he believes local foundations are turned off by his group’s mission, which often involves challenging the status quo.

Whatever the reason behind the charity’s failure to attract donors, it is having a powerful effect.

Mr. Small is contemplating leaving the organization, worn down by the daily struggle to keep the doors open and the bills paid. “My most important job is making sure that my staff gets paid,” says Mr. Small, who has spent the last 30 years working for nonprofit organizations.

“We need to hire at least two more staff members, but I can’t ask people to come and work for us if we don’t have the money to pay them,” he says.

The frustration executive directors felt with foundations is exacerbated by their intense dislike for all types of fund raising, plus the unwillingness of many board members to seek donations.

When asked to rank the least favorite aspects of their jobs, 47 percent of executive directors said fund raising and finance were the topics they most disliked. Forty-nine percent said fund raising was the skill they most needed to strengthen to become more effective, and 73 percent said they wanted their boards to become more engaged in the process of seeking donations.

Six months ago, Debra Roepke, executive director of Computer Community OutReach and Education, an Alexandria, Va., charity that teaches basic computer skills to people who are jobless or seeking better careers, was getting ready to leave the charity she founded in 1997.

“I went through a period where I would come in and think to myself, ‘I don’t know how much longer I can do this,’” says Ms. Roepke, one of the participants in the CompassPoint study.

Ms. Roepke says she was frustrated with the charity’s board of directors, particularly its inattention to fund raising, and she decided to tell them how she felt. Now, she says, “the board is in the process of making itself over and as part of that we said, no kidding, up front, you’re responsible for fund raising. Here’s your timetable, here are your targets.”

Board members were asked to raise or give $2,000 a year, and since January, notes Ms. Roepke, most of the 11 board members have contributed or raised more than they were required to do.

Ms. Roepke says that the challenge of helping to transform her board has re-engaged her, putting off any thoughts of leaving, at least for now. “If I leave it won’t be for at least two years,” she says.

Lack of Fund Raisers

Aside from the lack of board help, another reason so many chief executives are stressed out by fund raising is that 60 percent of their organizations do not have a senior staff member whose main responsibility is seeking donations. Even among organizations with more than 30 staff members, one-third do not have a senior fund raiser.

When Adam Woodworth (also a survey participant) last month accepted the position of executive director at the Children’s Museum in Oak Lawn, a suburban Chicago institution, the board of directors made no secret of the fact that fund raising would be a major part of his job.

While the board had recently secured a $200,000 grant to help pay for programs and the salaries of Mr. Woodworth and two other employees, in the future it would be up to Mr. Woodworth to raise the money for his own salary, which he says is between $70,000 and $80,000 a year.

As he settles into his new job, the first-time executive director has plenty of fund-raising experience to draw upon; Mr. Woodworth formerly served as the vice president of annual giving and major gifts for the American Heart Association. But it’s another position that he thinks will prove most helpful to his task as chief fund raiser for the small museum: his work in sales and advertising at a Chicago radio station.

“We worked on straight commission,” he recalls. “You didn’t get paid unless you sold ads.”

Approaches to the Job

While the survey found real frustrations, it also uncovered numerous ways in which executive directors are trying to cope.

One tool that is becoming increasingly popular: executive coaching.

In the 2001 study, hiring a coach wasn’t something that interested many executive directors. However, in the new study, a quarter of executive directors said that they had used executive coaches at some point in their careers; 8 percent said they had a coach now.

Kristen Mickey, head of the Foundation for Autistic Childhood Education and Support in Redwood City, Calif., assumed the helm of the 10-year-old charity after several jobs in fund raising and a lengthy career in the biotechnology industry. So when she attended a training session for new executive directors that offered five half-hour sessions of executive coaching, Ms. Mickey leapt at the opportunity for some outside counsel.

“It’s so helpful to have someone to talk to,” says Ms. Mickey, who talks to her coach on the telephone every week for 30 minutes, an arrangement that her charity pays for. “A coach is totally neutral. They want to make you a better manager. My coach has helped me identify my strengths as a manager and expand on them. She’s been a tremendous help.”

So far the relationship has lasted for a year and a half, and Ms. Mickey has no plans to end it, or to leave her position. “I have a lot more to do here. I feel like it will become evident when I’m no longer adding value or when the organization needs something that I can’t offer.”

Suggestions for Coping

The report makes several recommendations to executive directors about other ways to cope. Among the suggestions: Executives should ask for help if they need it — and for more money if they feel that they deserve it. Perceptions of isolation and resentment over low compensation are both major causes of burnout, say researchers.

Executives should also continually ask themselves: Am I still the right person for this job? Periodically examining their fit with the position may help charity leaders avoid forced resignations, and make succession planning easier when they decide it is time for change, the report says.

Layli Miller-Muro, a survey participant and founder of the Tahirih Justice Center, a charity in Falls Church, Va., says she is always thinking about how long she should remain as leader. In 1997, she left a large corporate law firm to start the center, which provides legal services to immigrants and refugees who have fled to the United States to seek protection from human-rights abuses.

Ms. Miller-Muro says that at professional-development meetings, she often hears comments that make her think twice about how long she can stay in her role.

“I was at a training session for executive directors and someone made a really mean joke about ‘founderitis,’ or founders who stay too long. I remember sitting sheepishly in the back of the room and wondering, ‘Am I one of those?’”

Whether she’s “one of those” or not, Ms. Miller-Muro says that the pressure not to stay too long has taken a toll and she plans to leave within five years. “It’s been a very conscious part of my thinking,” she says. “I don’t want to keep the organization back.”

Getting Help From Trustees

Beyond examining their own leadership strengths and weaknesses, the report urges executive directors to put more effort into developing effective relationships with their trustees.

While building a strong board may take time, they note, it is likely to pay off in the long haul.

But board members too have a responsibility for ensuring that executive directors are getting the support they need, the report says. Board chairmen and chairwomen should take personal responsibility for making sure that the trustees are working effectively and that they understand their fund-raising responsibilities and carry them out.

Trustees should also try to diversify the racial and ethnic composition of their boards, the report says, as a diverse board makes it more likely that future executives will be recruited from a wider pool.

The report also urges grant makers to recognize the role they play in helping to retain charity leaders. Top on the list: listen to what executive directors say they need in order for them and their charities to be effective.

“Anything grant makers can do to simplify processes, provide additional stability, and increase funds available for management and general operations will help give executive directors additional breathing room,” the report’s authors conclude. (For more about what grant makers can do, see Foundations Are Burning Out Charity CEO’s.)

A free electronic copy of “Daring to Lead 2006: A National Study of Nonprofit Executive Leadership” that is available for downloading is scheduled to be posted online on March 9 at http://www.compasspoint.org/daringtolead2006. Print copies cost $15 each and can be ordered online or by calling CompassPoint at (415) 541-9000.