Does your nonprofit organization have a Human Resources Department? Or, does it have even just one dedicated HR professional?

If you work in the nonprofit sector, it may not come as a surprise to you that the majority of small nonprofits do not have one staff member who focuses on HR. Small organizations with just a handful of employees tend to focus staffing responsibilities on one or two managers — including on the ED.

According to the 2011 Nonprofit Employment Trends Survey from Nonprofit HR Solutions:

Eighty-four percent of nonprofit respondents agreed that the HR function is critical to their organization’s ability to fulfill its mission, yet few prioritize the HR function within their organizations. The majority of respondent organizations (52 percent) do not have a dedicated HR professional.

This table shows how human resources is handled by organizations of various sizes:

In addition, 67% of people who responded to the survey from small organizations said the Executive Director oversees their hiring processes. This is rather high. Imagine adding hiring, staff training and human resource issues to the already overloaded responsibilities of the Executive Director. These added demands could take away time the ED could be spending on leadership. On the extreme end, it can contribute to job burnout.

Several years ago, I went to a professional development seminar, and the leader said something that has stuck with me ever since. He said that with regard to your talents and abilities, it is better to strengthen a strength than try to improve a weakness. If staff training, hiring and other HR issues are not your strong suit, find someone for whom it is. In doing so, you can focus on those areas at which you are great. Imagine what you could accomplish by transferring the time spent on HR into efforts at which you excel!

While a small nonprofit may not have the HR demand to hire a full-time staff person, consider some alternatives. The nonprofit could hire a part-time HR professional. Nonprofit HR Solutions suggests “Small organizations lacking a dedicated Human Resources position could consider outsourcing the HR function to an outside agency as a possible solution. Currently only three percent of respondents from small organizations outsource the HR function to a third-party vendor.”

How does your organization handle the HR function? How can you better serve the needs of hiring and employees by finding creative HR solutions?

Sandra Sims is a contributing blogger to ExecSearches.com. ExecSearches.com is a job board for nonprofit job seekers interested in fundraising, management and executive nonprofit jobs.

(image source)

#

Last updated on September 18th, 2012 at 05:21 pm