Courses Focused on Nonprofit Management
When looking for a local organization that offers the highest quality in non-profit management training, the first among a worthy slate would be the Duke University Nonprofit Management Program, a unit in Duke’s Learning Innovation and Lifetime Education department. The Nonprofit Management Program offers a structured and rigorous grounding in the establishment, operation, and development of successful nonprofits.
Training will be offered in 6-hr virtual courses or via 4- to 5-hr. MindEdge Online Courses
Duke Nonprofit Management Program:
CORE Classes & Key Electives (Virtual Classes – Online Zoom, 9 AM – 4 PM (ET) – 6 hrs., includes lunch break)
- Nonprofit – Board Development/Governance – Sep 27, 2024
- Nonprofit – Financial Management – Oct 25, 2024
- Nonprofit – Fundraising – Oct 29, 2024
- Nonprofit – Human Resource Development – Nov 8, 2024
- Grant Writing – Nov 13, 2024
- Nonprofit – Planning and Evaluation – Nov 14, 2024
- Sustainable Strategic Planning – Dec 10, 2024
- Principles of Marketing for Nonprofit Organizations (4 hours)
- Introduction to Nonprofit Management (5 hours)
Course Descriptions:
Virtual Course Offerings (6-hrs.)
Nonprofit – Board Development/Governance
In order to be successful, nonprofit organizations require strong leadership from their Board of Directors. The Board’s responsibility is to oversee the effectiveness of management policies and decisions, including the execution of its strategies. Learn the key roles and responsibilities of the board and the essential areas of Board oversight. Discuss strategies to increase board members’ commitment to the mission and purpose of your organization, and how boards must be active and engaged to fulfill their legal and governance duties.
Nonprofit – Financial Management
This course provides an understanding of financial management for nonprofits and focuses on topics integral to nonprofit fiscal management. Learn finance terms as they relate to the effective operation of a nonprofit organization. Discuss how to track income and expenses to specific programs to fulfill expectations of funders, donors and the IRS. The role of the board, staff and committees are covered. Become familiar with the standards of excellence for nonprofit organizations and gain an understanding of financial statements, budgeting, and surviving an audit. Participants will gain an understanding of the broader financial realm of nonprofit organizations – where they work or volunteer.
Nonprofit – Fundraising
Fundraising is about more than money; it is about relationship-building and strategizing. This course addresses the most effective and successful methods of raising money. Discover ideas and activities to help you strengthen your fundraising program. Learn current trends and best practices in annual giving, retaining and upgrading current donors, prospecting new donors, engaging volunteers, and managing the fundraising process. You will be guided from “the ask” to “the acknowledgement” and will gain specific ideas to enhance your fundraising results.
Human Resource Development
The ability to help people experience success at work creates benefits for employees, volunteers, leadership teams, organizations, and those whom your organization serves. This class addresses skills that can be used at an individual level and to better help staff with obstacles that may affect their job performance and satisfaction. Learn how to strategically respond to issues related to employee communication, motivation, delegation, and coaching; how to actively listen to and give constructive feedback to employees, volunteers, and clients; how to use team members’ individual differences to help them stay fully motivated at work; how to apply an effective step-by-step process for successful and mutually beneficial delegation with shared, defined expectations; and how to prepare for and conduct a solutions-focused coaching session that fully involves your team member to create a strategy for performance improvement.
Nonprofit – Planning and Evaluation
In this course, we will discuss the who, why, when and how of program evaluation. What does it take to incorporate an effective and comprehensive program evaluation? Why does program evaluation have an impact on services and sustainability? This course is designed to be very basic. Those in attendance will learn ways in which program evaluation impacts potential funding and organizational sustainability. Participants will walk away with a basic sample of program evaluation in which they can build on and use within their organization.
Grant Writing
If you are a beginning grant writer, this course will provide you with the essential tools needed to write a successful grant proposal from start to finish. For those more experienced, this workshop will sharpen your skills and keep you up-to-date through discussions of current grant writing trends. Learn about the grantsmanship process – from foundation research and cultivation to the development and writing of a winning proposal. You will learn about the typical questions funders ask when considering a proposal and the criteria used. Class participants will have an opportunity to review and critique a proposal. Tips for ensuring grant compliance and improving your chances of future grant success will be discussed.
Sustainable Strategic Planning
Participants will examine the parts of a strategic plan including the vision and mission statement, values and goals that will guide the organization into the future. Students will also learn important tools to analyze their respective nonprofit organizations to help them make decisions for setting a course for the organization’s future. Analysis tools include the SWOT Analysis, BCG Matrix, the Sustainability Matrix and the Strategy Canvas. There will be an opportunity for students to apply the tools through group work to evaluate an organization and understand the process of constructing a Sustainable Strategic Plan.
MindEdge Online Courses (4-5 hrs.) – To demo online courses, visit: http://dukenp.mindedgeonline.com/acl.php?A5D01A31.
(Online Courses must be completed within six months of registration.)
Principles of Marketing for Nonprofit Organizations
After completing this course, you should be able to: define what marketing is within the non-profit environment; explain the service-intensive nature of non-profit program activities; explain how the marketing mix is expanded for service products (the 3Ps of Services Marketing); describe the importance of customer satisfaction and how expectations play a role in satisfaction with service products; discuss the role of ethics in non-profit marketing; describe the importance of and explain the process of non-profit marketing plan; describe how target markets can be identified for donors; and explain how new service products are developed by non-profits.
Introduction to Nonprofit Management
This course covers management best practices for leading a nonprofit organization. You will gain an understanding of the nonprofit sector and the issues that leaders face in this exciting and growing field. You will also be exposed to the major areas of responsibility for nonprofit leaders, including strategy, managing employees, fundraising, grant writing, board governance, and marketing and social media.
After completing this course, you’ll be able to:
- Discuss the purpose and structure of the nonprofit sector
- Describe the governance of nonprofits, including the types of boards and the relationship between boards and executive directors
- Explain how nonprofits establish their vision and strategic direction
- Describe the nonprofit leadership role and what it entails
- Discuss servant leadership
- Outline key ethical issues faced by nonprofits
- Discuss how nonprofits managers handle staff and volunteers
- Outline the key financial issues facing nonprofits
- Describe the key legal issues facing nonprofits
- Discuss the importance of marketing and communication for a nonprofit
- Explain the basics of nonprofit fundraising
- Outline the grant writing process
- Discuss the growing importance of social media for nonprofits
- Define and explain social entrepreneurship and social innovation
- Outline methods for assessing nonprofit performance
- Discuss trends impacting nonprofits now and in the future
This grant is provided by “Durham Culture & Arts – Invest to Restart” a program of the Durham Arts Council supported by the City of Durham American Rescue Plan funds. Durham Arts Council will distribute funds through December 2025, to help support individual artists and arts and culture-focused nonprofit organizations and businesses as they rebuild, recover, and grow.