It’s March 22, World Water Day. The Nature Conservancy is celebrating by bringing water conservation awareness to all and wants to share these great tips:

On World Water Day, do your part to protect freshwater for future generations with these water (and money!) saving tips.

• Consider cutting a little water usage from your morning routine. Does anyone really need to shower for more than 5-10 minutes? Keeping a timer in your bathroom will remind you to wrap up and get out. And please turn off the faucet while brushing your teeth!
   
• Celebrate World Water Day by cooking a meal from scratch — the manufacturing of frozen foods requires more water than it takes to make a home-cooked meal.
   
• If a home renovation is in the cards, splurge on low-flow and water-efficient appliances — they’ll save you money in the long-run.
   
• Check for — and hastily repair — leaky pipes and faucets. The tiniest leak has far greater impact than you’d think. Many cities lose 40 to 60 percent (or more!) of their water supply due to leaky pipes.
   
• Turn off the lights when you leave the room. Each year in the U.S. alone billions of gallons of water are used in the process of creating electricity.

http://www.nature.org/initiatives/freshwater/features/art30977.html?src=sp1

The Non Profit Companion has partnered with Ed2go.com, a online training resource for directors, board members, volunteers and staff members. Expand your skills now and grow your organization!

Get your staff and volunteers up to speed when it comes to using specific computer programs, bookkeeping, writing, and web design. Ed2go.com also offers special classes directed towards non profit organizations; including grant writing, project management, non profit management and non profit marketing.

Click on the banner below to get started!

Compensatory time, usually referred to as “comp time” is sometimes common practice for non profit organizations.

Most employees are familiar with the term “comp time,” which refers to the practice of allowing an employee to take extra time off from work after a long week, instead of being paid overtime wages. What you may not know, however, that in most situations, the practice is illegal, if you are working for a private, non-governmental employer, and you are a “non-exempt” employee otherwise eligible for overtime pay.

Most non profits who work with government agencies allow their staff to take advantage of comp time. However for most states in the US, it is against labor laws to not pay the overtime wages. Government agencies are allowed to take advantage of the benefits, but not privately owned businesses or organizations.

In the state of California, compensatory time is not allowed under state labor laws. IWC, (Industrial Welfare Commission) provides Wage Orders which are updated every few years. These orders will verify any wage and hour law for the applicable type of employee that works for your organization. http://www.dir.ca.gov/iwc/wageorderindustries.htm

NOTE: It is always advised to check with your local state labor law regulations and always consult with legal aid before implementing any new policies and to ensure your organization is following laws correctly.

Published February 27, 2010 in the New York Times, it was reported that states such as Hawaii were moving to tax non profits in an effort to raise much needed taxes for states, counties and cities. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/28/us/28charity.html?scp=3&sq=non%20profit&st=cse

Governments are implying that tax revenues are diminished and that for some states, a 1% tax should be imposed on tax exempt organizations. Non profits which occupy buildings within city limits are not paying any taxes which they  would have benefited from when a regular business occupied the premises previously.

Most non profits that I work with could not take this hit, even if it was 1% of less. As the article states, most tax exempt organizations are being hit hardest lately with the poor economy, downturn in fundraising take in and increase of permitting costs, etc. Imposing a tax on non profits would without a doubt increase the amount of doors closing to those places already barely holding on. Also, the amount of money asked for in grant funding would be only increased to accomodate for the extra fees, making funding more competitive than ever and would allow agencies and foundations to fund less projects and causes.

It is realized that governments too are having a tough time right now. In California, all state employees are being furloughed on Friday’s until June 2010 at the earliest. However, asking non profits to foot the bill for lost tax revenue is not the answer to the problem. The economy will bounce back, and a lot sooner without imposing unneccesary taxes and fees on small businesses and non profits.

Please write your local state officials to ensure this doesn’t happen to you! Running a non profit is more difficult than ever right now, this will impose serious obstacles that most cannot endure.

In today’s world of technology and fast paced enviroments you wouldn’t think it would necessarily be important for a non-profit to be visible or worry about marketing. Wrong!

The more you market your organization the more people understand your cause and will in turn care. This really counts when your bank account is empty and you feel the need to fundraise, or when your roof is leaking and you need a volunteer to come and patch it up. Having a following also makes it easier to get landowner permission slips signed, have a large attendance at a meeting or recruit new board members.

Simple and free ways to market your organization include running a blog, starting a Facebook page or using Twitter. Make sure to keep active with your posts or people will stop following. Post things about upcoming projects, new partnerships, volunteers you want to recognize or news effecting your cause.

A newsletter is also a great way to attract attention and will keep supporters up-to-date. Printing and postage can be costly, so think about keeping it green by only emailing it out to your supporters or posting it on your website. Something as simple as one or two pages can really catch new eyes. Make sure it is colorful and skip the clip art! Instead, use photographs from Microsoft Office’s free database. In fact, Microsoft has some wonderful free newsletter templates to take advantage of.  http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/clipart/default.aspx?ofcresset=1

Fundraising can be challenging for most non profits. It takes a great deal of planning, setup, volunteer hours and sometimes money. When all is said and done, sometimes the return is not much greater than the money and hours spent on it.

I stumbled accross Goodsearch.com, a Yahoo powered search engine which gives money to non profits when you search and surf the internet, a year ago. It was designed by some well known internet tycoons who realized the need for fundraising opportunities through the internet.

A new easy way to raise money for your favorite cause. Just start using Yahoo! powered GoodSearch.com as your search engine and they’ll donate about a penny to your favorite cause every time you do a search!

In addition, do all of your shopping through their online shopping mall, GoodShop.com, where you can shop at more than 900 top online retailers and a percentage of your purchases will go to the charity or school of your choice. You pay the same price as you normally would, but a donation goes to your cause! New stores are being added weekly and include major corporations such as Office Depot, Ebay, Amazon and even travel site Expedia.

Here’s the web site — http://www.goodsearch.com. You can also read about GoodSearch in the NY Times, Oprah Magazine, CNN, ABC News and the Wall Street Journal.

This is truly an easy, no brainer fundraiser. Join today and sit among 88,000+ non profits already on board with this wonderful fundraising opportunity.

When running a non profit, it sometimes takes great effort to reel in volunteers. You work hard, posting flyers, partnering with other groups and non profits and sometimes the result is a new volunteer. So what happens when the volunteer you get is making mistakes, causing you more work than helping, or perhaps the individual is embarrassing or unprofessional when answering the phone or interacting with the public.

Before accepting a volunteer, I feel it is always best to interview them. Treat them as if you were to hire a new staff member. Ask them what their comfort area is, are they computer savvy, do they like to be on the phone or are they comfortable speaking with the public. By completing this quick task it should give you a good clue as to what type of jobs you can assign this person to, if you want them to help at all.

My motto has been to never turn down an employee, if they do not work out in one area, move them to filing, drafting letters or janitorial work. If it’s a sunny day have them outside planting flowers, sweeping the sidewalk or anything else to spruce up your office. Think about tasks that your staff or other volunteers never have time to do. Everybody has their niche and if a volunteer is comfortable with their task, they are more apt to enjoy themselves and continue volunteering.

If you’ve tried all of the above and the person still isn’t working out try speaking to them and saying, thank you for all of your hard work. Then polietly tell them that you will call them in the future if any other volunteering opportunities come up. Never burn bridges! It will always come back to bite you in the end.

Times are tough no matter what type of non profit you run. Even if you have a decent amount of funding coming through the doors, it is typically marked to go towards specific projects with minimal overhead built into the budget.

I get many questions from different non profits asking me if it is common business to give paid holidays. On this President’s Day, I felt I would officially answer the question. The answer is yes. However, instead of trying to compete with government agencies and giving many paid holidays, I would recommend trying to choose perhaps the six  major holidays; New Years, Memorial Day, 4th of July, Labor Day, Thanksgiving and Christmas. This allows your organization to not only boost morale and thank your staff by giving them a paid day off, but it allows you to market a priceless benefit package to help attract talent to your paid positions. This also eases the cost of paying employees on a day when they aren’t working in the office, therefore stretching your organizational budget.

One month after the earthquake hit, Good Morning America Announced that almost a half billion dollars was donated from Americans to the top 23 charities in the United States. Currently 69% or 325 million dollars of the money has yet to be spent.

Video: GMA; Haiti, One Month Later