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Nonprofits go to class

Their mission statements earn raves, but sometimes, their business models don't. A new program at the University of Tampa will give nonprofit leaders a crash course in business.

By CHRISTINA REXRODE
Published January 28, 2007

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Norrine Russell was a college professor with no plans to leave academia.

So two years ago, when she became executive director of the Ophelia Project - Tampa Bay, she had a Ph.D. in psychology but not a single business class on her resume.

A pro at Freud, but not fixed assets, she thinks it's time for more formal training.

"To take Ophelia to the next level," said Russell, 38.

She hopes to enroll in the inaugural class of the Nonprofit Management and Innovation certificate program, a new initiative starting this spring at the University of Tampa. And the program's founders hope to reach executives just like her.

The idea for the program was sparked a couple of years ago, when leaders of local nonprofits started to worry about the impending retirement of many of their executives.

They also worried about the business acumen of their up-and-coming leaders, many of them former social workers or education majors.

"Generally, what you find with nonprofits," said Bill Rhey, UT's dean of graduate studies, "is terrific heart and terrific ambition to serve the community, but there's often very little business training."

Their brainchild, the Nonprofit Management and Innovation program, is meant as a crash course in strategic thinking, marketing, management and other skills you don't pick up when you're busy finding adoptive parents for children without homes, or delivering meals to the elderly.

"Everyone who is involved in nonprofits knows that they (the organizations) need to improve their business skills," said Sheff Crowder, president of the Conn Memorial Foundation and chairman of the program's founding task force.

UT faculty and nonprofit professionals will co-teach the courses, which will be spread over a year and a half in four seminars of one week each.

The first course starts in March. When it ends, students will have a month to develop a three-year plan for their agency.

Though the program is aimed at professionals, students at UT's business school can apply for the program and earn 12 credit hours for completing it.

The University of South Florida also offers a certificate program in nonprofit management, though it's housed in the public administration program, not the business school. The program can be completed in a year, mostly through evening and weekend classes.

For Russell, the UT program's schedule was a major selling point.

"I really would not even consider something that is an evening or weekend course," she said. Her evenings and weekends are already consumed by work-related events.

Same goes for Ralph Smith, the busy executive director of Tampa's Computer Mentors Group.

When Smith founded Computer Mentors in the late '90s, he knew all about computers, having spent years as a systems analyst at Citibank. And he knew all about mentoring, as he had a longtime passion for helping underprivileged youth.

But writing a job description and recruiting volunteers were uncharted territory for Smith, who studied economics when he attended college in the 1970s.

In 2000, he took some evening classes with the Nonprofit Leadership Center of Tampa Bay, a resource center for nonprofits that is helping the UT program get off the ground. (Until recently, the center was known as the Management Assistance Program of Tampa Bay.)

He has since nursed his agency into an eight-employee operation with an annual budget of $300,000, but he thinks that more extensive business training could help him reach more kids.

"You can have a vision," said Smith, 54, "but if you don't know, businesswise, how to move that vision forward, nothing's going to happen."

Christina Rexrode can be reached at crexrode@sptimes.com or (727) 893-8318.

To apply for the Tampa Bay program

Applications for the Nonprofit Management and Innovation certificate program are due Feb. 16. The first weeklong session will be in March. To download an application, visit grad.ut.edu and click on the link to the program.

Applicants must have a bachelor's degree, the academic equivalent or relevant work experience.

The total cost per student is about $7,000. Scholarships are available.

For more information, visit the Web site, call (813) 258-7409 or e-mail utgrad.ut.edu.

Other favored nonprofit programs

The founders of the program at UT say they were impressed by similar programs at these schools:

- Rollins College in Winter Park

- Grand Valley State University in Michigan

- La Salle University in Philadelphia

- Robert Morris University in Pittsburgh

 

. fast facts

Nonprofit numbers

2,000: Approximate number of nonprofits in Tampa Bay area with operating budgets of at least $25,000.

1,400 to 1,800: Number of new senior managers those nonprofits may need to recruit from 2007 to 2011.

55: Percent of nonprofit leaders older than 50.

61 to 78: Percent of nonprofit executives who plan to leave their jobs within five years.

Sources: The Nonprofit Management and Innovation program; the Annie E. Casey Foundation; CompassPoint Nonprofit Services; the Meyer Foundation

. fast facts

2,000: Approximate number of nonprofits in the Tampa Bay area with operating budgets of at least $25,000.

1,400 to 1,800: Number of new senior managers that those nonprofits may need to recruit between 2007 and 2011, based on national data.

55: Percent of nonprofit leaders over the age of 50.

61 to 78: Percent of nonprofit executives who plan to leave their jobs within five years.

Source: The Nonprofit Management and Innovation program, the Annie E. Casey Foundation, CompassPoint Nonprofit Services and the Meyer Foundation

 

[Last modified January 29, 2007, 05:35:51]

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