Is This You?
Who can benefit from Not-for-Profit Accounting Help?
Although not-for-profit organizations come in all shapes and sizes, the accountants who work in them face many common challenges. Do any of these sound familiar?
- Your organization's funding sources and its programs vary from year to year. You wonder how to build an accounting system that’s flexible enough to handle all that change - or whether it’s even possible.
- You have been handed duties your accounting background didn’t prepare you for. Because other managers all have program responsibilities, you are expected to manage employee benefits, maintain personnel files, and renegotiate the lease. You are willing to take these on, but don’t know where you’ll find the time to learn to do them efficiently and well.
- You are responsible for maintaining effective internal controls. Staff all trust each other and believe that to be sufficient, while you know trust isn’t enough and would like to improve the controls that are in place –you’re just not sure where to start.
- You have to produce reports for five different sets of users – management, the board of directors, funders, the public and the IRS – and they each want something different. You’d love to know how you could produce them more efficiently.
- It’s up to you to determine whether new workers should be treated as contractors or employees. You need some good, solid guidance about staying legal while treating people fairly and staying within the budgets of your organization’s projects.
- Your organization has just received its first reimbursable grant from your county government. While everyone else is celebrating, you see another layer of detail to account for and a new set of grant requirements to conform to, and you can’t quite be as jubilant as they are. You need some guidance and would like to have a sympathetic ear.
- You are too often faced with an impossible choice – work overtime or complete your reports late, disappointing the people who rely on you.
No matter which of these sound like you, I can help you. Not-for-Profit Accounting Help’s materials are written especially for people in accounting departments with one to five employees. But they also contain information that’s useful to any size nonprofit.
I’ve worked with organizations with annual budgets ranging from $90,000 to $6 million
in the following fields:
- Low-income housing, both urban and rural
- Environmental organizations
- Student exchange and language education
- After-school programs, Head Start, and daycare
- Charitable uses of advanced communications technology
- Parent-Teacher Associations (PTAs)
- Social services
- Arts education
- …and a few for-profit companies besides
But will the materials work for you?
They will if you have these values:
- You want to be excellent. You are committed to doing the best job you know how, and to increasing your know-how so your performance improves.
- You want to be efficient. You are willing to change your old habits to try new methods, and you understand that efficient processes will help keep you excited about your work.
- You’re willing to use your whole brain. Accounting is a left-brain/right-brain activity: you need both halves of your brain - as well as your heart - to be an outstanding nonprofit accountant.
- You do your job to be of service. Your department is committed to serving the programs and management of your organization so that they can serve your community optimally.
You may be wondering how this all works. Click here to learn more.