Tweets from Service Employees International Union Local 500‘s Nonprofit Summit today in Washington DC.
Read more: “Why would progressive nonprofit organizations need a union?”
Here’s some reasons, from the 2013 US Nonprofit Employment Trends Survey:
- The nonprofit sector is an often overlooked and important economic driver with its 10.7 million employees making up just over 10% of the US’s private workforce.
- 69% of nonprofits surveyed reported not having a formal succession plan for senior leadership, putting put organizational sustainability at risk.
- 90% do not have a formal strategy for retaining staff despite many indicating that staff retention is an organizational challenge. Inability to pay competitively, promote staff, and excessive workloads were cited as the greatest retention challenges. A lack of sufficient professional development at mid- and entry-level staff levels will also likely contribute to retention challenges.
- While the majority of nonprofits surveyed indicated that diversity and inclusion are important to their organization, many still face challenges, such as retaining staff under the age of 30, having their staff reflect the composition of the communities they serve, and balancing ethnic and cultural diversity.
- When positions are eliminated, 74% of respondents indicated that they distribute responsibilities among their current staff, contributing to burnout.
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Is the fact that the US NGO Consortium, InterAction, is planning an “anonymous issue” evidence that whistleblower protection is a big issue for NGO workers? http://us1.campaign-archive1.com/?u=eab138ae3e106a9e54e046c64&id=7d8f77f719&e=73a382feaf
I am the president of the local at my international development NGO, and I wanted to say that unionization has been very helpful for us. It has dealt with discrepancies in pay as well as instituting a salary grid, and our strong relationship with management has allowed us to collaborate and bring in a working from home policy that gives more flexibility to our members.
My experience in over 20 years working for non-profits is that, while we are always looking out for the best with our clients, our own practices in terms of how we treat our employees often leaves a lot to be desired. Unions help to protect employees from such bad practices!
For those in DC: Interested in unions for nonprofits? Come to a @SEIULocal500 nonprofit happy hour Tues Oct, 29th from 6:30-8pm at Billy Goat Tavern, 500 New Jersey Ave NW.