In Support of Associate Directors

As transitions continue to happen in nonprofits, succession planning, internal promotions, supported leadership teams become top conversation points with boards looking at an Executive Director change.

Reading that sentence, we all know those conversations need to happen months, if not years, ahead of an Executive transition.  But no one wants to talk about difficult change and it is difficult to add an evaluation of professional development training and succession planning into an annual review.

But, the issue still remains.  As Exec. Directors retire, change jobs or leave the field, the staff remaining at the nonprofit is already running at full capacity.  Bringing a new Executive into the mix without evaluating who will be picking up additional pieces, what the strengths of the new leader are and what the leadership team as a whole needs to function effectively does not set up the new person for success.

We are seeing and recommending Associate Directors to many organizations looking ahead at a transition.  Particularly with long-tenured Executives who managed external relations and internal operations, the Associate Director gives the organization a chance to separate those roles and bring much needed attention to these areas.

An Associate Director with internal focus can conduct job analyses, IT assessments, pay transparency and compression, mission focus (v. mission creep).  Externally focused Associate Directors can participate in fundraising, marketing, developing grant libraries, evaluating Evaluations and more.

These are important tasks for any organization, but we make a mistake when we assume a single individual can accomplish all of this.