Sponsors of this luncheon include:

BKD,LLP

Goodwill Industries of Kansas

Pure & Simple Health Education

Date: February 24, 2012

Time: 11 AM – 12:30 PM

Location: Envision, 610 N. Main in Wichita.

Luncheon Cost: Nonprofit Chamber of Service members can attend for $20, non-members can attend for $70.

Registration Form.

The Governor’s Proposed Tax Changes Will Impact Nonprofits

How will nonprofits address these issues?

Some of the proposed tax changes can and will impact every nonprofit in Kansas such as the exemption for charitable contributions and the community service contribution credit. Other topics for discussion include the impact on the families and individuals that nonprofit organizations assist. This discussion group is not an advocacy session, rather we hope to form working groups from this session that can be prepared to address issues as needed during the State Legislative calendar.

DATE: February 8, 2012
TIME: 3 PM – 5 PM
LOCATION: ARC of Sedgwick Count, 2919 W. 2nd Street in Wichita

Please RSVP by phone at 316.440.6744 or via e-mail to PerryLSchuckman@NonprofitChamberKS.org

Attendance for Nonprofit Chamber of Service Members is FREE

Non-Members will be charged $60 to attend.

Session One: Communications and Relationships as an Administrative Professional

May 10, 2012: 11:30 AM – 1 PM

Strong intrapersonal skills are an asset for any employee, but especially important for the administrative professional.  It is the administrative professional who is often at the forefront of business relationships.  Whether assisting a client, communicating with the director, or representing the organization in professional organizations, being an effective communicator and more importantly, an active listener, is essential to the job.  This session will give tips on how the successful administrative professional can build and maintain relationships with co-workers, management, clientele and others while representing the organization. Attendees will explore multiple office techniques including DISC Behavioral Profiles and regulations regarding whistler blower policies.

Session Two: Managing Electronic Communications

June 14, 2012: 11:30 AM – 1 PM

With the rapidly changing technological environment, administrative professionals often assist in media relations.  A social media strategy can complement other marketing activities.  While drafting a social media strategy, it is important to have a good grasp of your company, its business objectives, its major competitors, partners as well as other marketing channels being utilized.  This session will cover marketing and public relations campaigns, and how to develop and incorporate a social media strategy into the mix.  Not only will administrative professionals learn how to assist managers with social media during this session, they will also receive ideas on how to manage information overload and workplace expectations.

Session Three: Career Advancement for Administrative Professionals

July 12, 2012: 11:30 AM – 1 PM

Multiple resources are available to the administrative professional who directs efforts towards continued education.  Enhancing competencies such as knowledge, skill and behavior can benefit the administrative professional as well as the entire organization.  During this session, attendees will identify areas where they can seek training to see improvements, such as in time management and computer skills.  Soft skills, such as creativity, emotional intelligence, professionalism, dependability and cooperation will also be covered.

Session Four: Office Professionalism

August 9, 2012: 11:30 AM – 1 PM

The administrative professional that has a high degree of professionalism is often considered to be competent and valuable to the organization.  This is due to the credibility that the administrative professional receives when clientele, colleagues, and others can see that work, improved performance, and productivity are high priorities for the assistant.  This session will allow administrative professionals the opportunity to grow by identifying key aspects that affect professionalism, and how they can advance these professional skills.

Each session in this Administrative Professional Development Series is available to Nonprofit Chamber of Service members for $20 per single session or a member can attend the entire series for $70.

Non-members must pay a registration fee of $75 per session or $260 to attend the entire series.

Registration costs include lunch.

The host for this series is Spirit Aerosystems. 

Location:

Spirit Aerosystems, Inc.
4501 E. 47th Street South – East Entrance
Conference Room E216

Registration Form for the Administrative Professional Development Series.

This session will compare and contrast the many different types of development software available for nonprofit use.  We will discuss which software is recommended for different types of nonprofits.  We will also explore options that will help save nonprofits money such as collaboration with other nonprofits that face the same challenges and have similar needs.

DATE: FEBRUARY 13, 2012

TIME: 1 PM – 3 PM

LOCATION:

COMMUNITIES IN SCHOOLS, 412 S. MAIN, ROOM 200 SOUTH, WICHITA

REGISTRATION FEE:

NONPROFIT CHAMBER OF SERVICE MEMBERS ARE $15,

NON-MEMBERS ARE $60. 

*PRE-PAYMENT IS APPRECIATED.

This session will be presented by Doug Jenkins, President of Professional Software.  Mr. Jenkins has expertise in mid-size business applications, including accounting, inventory/distribution, manufacturing, process managament software and development using Microsoft Access, VBA, SQL and Providex.  Professional Software is the proud winner of the 2010 Wichita Metro Chamber of Commerce Small Business of the Year and the recpient of the 2011 Sage Software Eagle Award at Sage Summit 2011 in Washington D.C for recognition as the number 1 reseller in North America for Customer Service. 

Mr. Jenkins specializes in software design, development and implementation.

This session is sponsored by Ribbit Business Solutions and .  Ribbit Business Solutions brings enterprise-level solutions to small, mid-size and large businesses. These solutions are not simply about Data, Voice, Video, and Web technology. They are about the service behind these technologies.

Registration form for Nonprofit Development Software and Database Management.

President Barack Obama has several times proposed limiting the charitable deduction for those earning more than $200,000 to their tax rate of 28 percent, rather than the current 35 percent.

Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), ranking member of the Senate Finance Committee, said that charities are still recovering from the market crash of 2008 and now isn’t the time to experiment with deduction caps for giving. “Tax reform options being discussed today are options that target charitable giving concocted by those who — hungry for more taxpayer dollars to finance reckless government spending — are now casting their sites on the already depleted resources of charities and churches,” he said. Hatch cited research indicating that the president’s proposal to cap the charitable deduction at 28 percent could lead to a drop in total charitable giving of $6 billion annually.

The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) examined 11 options for altering the income tax treatment of charitable giving, most of which included some form of adding a floor to the existing deduction; allowing all taxpayers to claim a deduction, with or without a floor; and replacing the deduction with a tax credit.

CBO analyzed two floors, one a fix dollar amount of $500 for individuals ($1,000 for couples filing jointly), and another as a percentage of income (2 percent of Adjusted Gross Income). Only contributions in excess of the floor would be deductible, or eligible for a tax credit. Adding a contribution floor to any of the approaches would reduce both the total federal tax subsidy and the total amount donated to charity, relative to the same option without a floor, according to Frank Sammartino, assistant director for tax analysis at CBO.

The 11 scenarios envisioned anywhere from a $2.7-billion bump in contributions to a $10-billion decline coupled with a tax subsidy ranging from a $7-billion gain to a $25-billion loss.

Most proposals that place limits on the charitable deduction would result in less charitable giving according CBO analyzes, Hatch said, or an increase in federal tax expenditures. Proposals that project an increase in donations yet reduce federal tax expenditures, he said, sound “too good to be true.”

“The changes being discussed are radical ones. This is not an area for experimentation by the federal government. It is certainly not the time to experiment with the charitable deduction by converting it to a tax credit,” Hatch said.

“Those at the bottom of the economic spectrum suffered most in the recession. They would bear the brunt of tax policy changes,” said Brian Gallagher, president and CEO of United Way Worldwide, based in Arlington, Va. Tax incentives often are a factor in how much donors give but not necessarily if they give, he said. He added that donors simply will withhold the difference they’re impacted by the tax rate. “Decoupling the tax rate from the deduction will be the beginning of the whittling away of the deduction,” Gallagher testified.

Eugene Steurle, the Richard B. Fischer chair and an Institute Fellow at the Urban Institute in Washington, D.C., said combining some of the options presented could be possible solutions. “Combining options creates new possibilities,” he said, such as extending a deduction to non-itemizers initially while enacting a floor on giving. “It could be designed to increase both revenue and charitable giving without adding to compliance costs” for the IRS.

Steurle also took aim at improved reporting on charitable contributions in the long run, including electronic filing by most charities, and limiting the deductibility for in-kind gifts because it can be ripe for abuse. “There’s a fairly extraordinary amount of deductions being taken,” he said, adding that charities sometimes receive a “very time amount” of the deductions taken thanks to intermediary organizations.

Of the proposals, an income-based floor on charitable deductions appears best to fit within current policy tenets, said Roger Colinvaux, associate professor at Columbus School of Law at The Catholic University of America. “A floor would improve the incentive aspect of the deduction by encouraging contributions at the margin. In other words, a floor would reduce the windfall that many taxpayers receive for charitable contributions they would have made with or without a tax benefit, and so could make the deduction more cost effective,” he said.

Colinvaux suggested linking the deduction to tax-exemption. “It’s hard to have this discussion when talking about deductibility and exemption at the same time reforming deduction is a heavy lift and a long-term project,” he said. If Congress wants to act quicker, it can raise the revenue without tax reform with one of the proposals on the table. An income-based floor on deductions would be the best fit within current policy, he said.

Elder Dallin Oaks of The Church of Jersey Christ of Latter-day Saints, focused his testimony on the good work that volunteers provide and what that mean for charities’ efforts.

The role of volunteers, whose efforts are not measured on financial reports, is very important, said Oaks, pointing to the response in rebuilding the Gulf Coast after Katrina and other hurricanes. “If you cut into the deduction, the activities of charitable organizations and the roles of volunteers…is going to be decreased,” he said. Whatever functions government presumes to provide in lieu of the charitable sector is going to call forth a great deal less from volunteers than what charitable organizations would call forth, Oaks said.

“The beauty of our system is that it’s simple,” said Gallagher, adding every proposal floated the past few years makes the system more complex. “It’s so efficient because volunteers follow the money,” he said, leveraging charitable contributions.

In a survey of donors, United Way found that almost a quarter of them said that any change to the tax rate would have a major impact on giving, Gallgher said. “The timing is bad, not just on financial terms, but at a time when local communities will have to find new solutions to difficult social problems,” he said. United Way is directly counseling governments in the United Kingdom, France and China about what they can put into their tax code to provide private initiative in communities.

How much charitable giving might be affected by a deduction cap is anyone’s guess, but some have estimated that giving could drop anywhere from $1.7 billion to $3.1 billion. (Americans last year gave almost $300 billion to charities).

Sen. Jon Thune (R-S.D.), a member of the committee, said he did not support reducing the deduction to raise revenues, outside of an overall tax reform effort.

Source: The Nonprofit Times October 19, 2011

http://www.thenonprofittimes.com/article/detail/charitable-deduction-the-focus-of-u-s-senate-hearing-4156

Article by Mark Hrywna

Marci Alboher is a vice president at Civic Ventures, a non-profit think tank leading the call for encore careers, which they describe as jobs “combining personal fulfillment, social impact, and continued income, enabling people to put their passion to work for the greater good.” An expert on career transitions and workplace trends, she is author of One Person/Multiple Careers. She also coined the term “slasher career” to refer to people who can’t answer the question “What do you do?” with a single word or phrase. 

Alboher offers the following suggestions, insights, and resources to help you shift to a non-profit career:

Become a “slasher.” (e.g. sales rep/literacy mentor). This could play out in two ways. Slashing can help you transition from your current field into a non-profit job. If that’s your target, Alboher suggests you hold onto your day job while you dip into the nonprofit world on the side (using the suggestions below). By taking the slash approach, you’ll be able to continue earning a living and simultaneously build skills and relationships to help you transition to the non-profit sector. Keep in mind, you may earn less in a new non-profit job, so your financial plan may include saving some money while you are planning your career change.

On the other hand, you may wish to create a permanent “slash” career, where you have one foot each planted in both the for-profit and non-profit worlds. Either way, follow the advice below and carefully carve out time for each of the sides of your “slash.”

Volunteer in organizations where you have a strong interest and you can create real impact. Don’t just set aside a few days a year to work with Habitat for Humanity, for example. Incorporate high-level volunteer work and make a real effort to be involved in substantive projects that expose you to the field and introduce you to people doing the kind of work you want to do for a living.

Consult. Take on a consulting project for a nonprofit as a way to showcase your skills. If you choose to work for free, make sure you’re building relationships, knowledge, or something else to help you as you try to find a paying job. Non-profits appreciate and seek employees who are passionate about their missions, so it makes sense to identify issues and organizations you may want to work with for the long term.

Meet people. Leverage your social networks to help. Consider using Branchout (a Facebook application) or SimplyHired.com’s application to help you learn where your Facebook friends work. Add your volunteer interests and work experience to LinkedIn via the “add sections” tab when you update your profile. Search on LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, and Google+ for groups and people either working for or actively involved in non-profits that interest you.

Get involved in your target sector. Go to conferences or panel discussions. Look for Twitter “chats” about your interest area. Reach out on Facebook and LinkedIn to your friends. Update your Facebook status to let people know when and where you are volunteering. Share information and news about your favorite non-profit organizations and causes via your social media platforms. Subscribe to LinkedIn’s newsfeed on nonprofit news. If you’re a good writer, consider authoring a blog highlighting those interests.

Show up. Once you identify organizations that interest you, go to their events and attend to conferences where you might be able to meet people who work in those organizations.

Dig in. Keep up-to-date on what’s happening in your field.

Source: Business Insider October 5, 2011

 http://www.businessinsider.com/7-steps-to-help-you-land-a-non-profit-job-2011-10

Article by Miriam Salpeter

Seventy percent of workers in two surveys said their jobs were either disappointing or only somewhat fulfilling. That might be a reason 25 percent of workers said they were considering looking for a job outside the nonprofit world.

The surveys gathered data from about 3,500 nonprofit workers in the New York and Washington metropolitan areas and were conducted by the staffing firm Professionals for NonProfits.

Among the other findings:

• Four out of 10 workers in both cities said that the factors they ranked as most essential are not on display at their nonprofits:—“respect, trust, and support by management” as well as a sense that their organization has “a compelling mission.”
• About half of all workers said they felt recognition and reward for their hard work and outstanding performance were essential. And yet 60 percent of workers in Washington and 65 percent in New York said hard work was not valued at their organization.
• The pay cuts that many nonprofit workers have taken during the economic downturn may be exacting a cost in employee satisfaction: About half of workers in both surveys said a salary reduction would be a reason to leave and a more important motivation for departure than a change in work expectations or job description.

Gayle Brandel, president of Professionals for NonProfits, said employers should be concerned about the financial challenge posed by worker unhappiness.

“The cost of employee disengagement and poor performance is very high, as is the cost of turnover,” she says. “Given the increased competition for talent in the sector and the limited resources of nonprofits, these costs hit the bottom line and so the price an organization pays for disengaged staff can be staggering.”

Non-Essential Perks

The survey pointed to some deep dysfunction at many nonprofits. For instance, just under half of workers said they felt it was essential that office politics not get in the way of their work. Yet three out of four employees said internal politics hampered their abilities to function in their jobs.

In other cases, the survey suggested that no matter how much employees may appreciate some of the perks of nonprofit life, they do not rate them as essential as issues like pay and trust.

For example, only 12 percent of workers cited child care or parental leave as essential, while 17 percent of workers said they valued flexible work schedules.

Even so, many employers offer those perks; 30 percent offer leaves and 49 percent offer flexible schedules.

“I was most surprised by the fact that many of the usual benefits that are offered to nonprofit employees are not considered essential by employees,” says Ms. Brandel.

Even though the survey showed some disturbing issues for nonprofits managers, the majority of employees were optimistic about the future: Nearly 60 percent think that the next five years will be challenging but “will get much better” for the nonprofit world. But a similar share believe that “bold leadership for dramatic change is needed.”

Source: The Chronicle of Philanthropy October 24, 2011

http://philanthropy.com/article/Nonprofit-Workers-Say-Their/129519/

Article By Peter Bolton

His book, Tension City, gives readers a closer look into the moments during these debates that helped to determine the outcomes of elections.

Lehrer has received numerous awards including the William Allen White Foundation Award for Journalistic Merit, National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences Silver Circle (1999), and an Emmy Award.

The reception being put on by KPTS will take place at Drury Plaza Hotel Broadview, 400 W. Douglas Avenue in Wichita on December 6.  The reception will begin at 4 PM with a brief program from 5:00 PM until 5:30 PM.  Tickets are $50 each and only a limited number of tickets are being made available.  You can purchase tickets online at www.KPTS.org or call KPTS at 316.838.3090 ext. 219.  Tickets will be on sale until December 2.

Left to Right: Perry Schuckman, Executive Director, NPCOS; Michele Gors, President / CEO, KPTS Channel 8, and Jim Lehrer at the 2010 event.

Executive Transition and Succession Planning Series

Sustaining the Impact of Your Nonprofit

The number of “baby boomers” holding executive positions has created a nation-wide increase in current or near future leadership transitions at nonprofits and government agencies.  At the same time, agencies have responded to tight budgets by reducing investment in talent development among younger managers.  These trends have serious implications for the sustainability and future growth of service organizations.  This series will help you prepare for both emergency and planned leadership transitions.     

Executive Transition and Succession Planning:  What’s at Stake?

January 23, 2012

1 pm – 3 pm

A recent Succession Issues survey of over 160 Kansas nonprofits, conducted by The Wichita State University Center for Community Support and Research (CCSR), will be shared and discussed. In addition, a panel of local board leaders who have managed a range of executive transitions will comment on lessons learned.  An overview of executive transition and succession planning strategies will also be offered. 

Executive Transition and Succession Planning: Case Study and Application Session               

February 2, 2012

6 pm – 7:15 pm

Succession planning consultants from CCSR will present a case study of a nonprofit facing the transition of their founder executive director.   Instructors will probe both the technical and adaptive components of managing such a transition while facilitating a discussion designed to help participants apply succession and transition issues to their own nonprofits.

Emergency Succession Back-up Planning and Policy Development

February 24, 2012

1 pm – 3 pm

Participants will develop or update their emergency succession back-up plan and policies.   A template developed by TransitionGuides will be used to walk participants through the decision-making steps necessary to prepare your board and organization for a sudden and unexpected executive transition.

Plan, Pivot, Thrive:  Stages and Strategies for a Planned Executive Transition

March 6, 2012

6 pm – 7:15 pm

We know that a successful executive transition requires advanced planning.  But even with excellent planning, nonprofits often fail to identify, predict and respond to challenges that take place during transitions and in the first days of a new executive’s tenure.   This session will offer strategies to navigate the entire transition.               

This series is brought to you by the Nonprofit Chamber of Service. 

Registration Form for Transition and Succession Planning Series 2012

A great deal of the “big data” out there is user-generated content available on the open web — news stories, blogs, social networks, etc. But a great deal of it isn’t. Instead, it’s what’s called “massive passive data” or “data exhaust.” It’s the personal data corporations collect about what products their customers buy and about how they use digital services. Corporations today are mining this data to gain a real-time understanding of their customers, identify new markets, and make investment decisions. This is the data that powers business, which the World Economic Forum has described as a new asset class.

Mobile phones — and mobile services — are exploding across the developing world, and that means people in these countries are generating plenty of data. The potential to analyze this data exhaust also has exciting implications for the way we do international relief and development work. In today’s fast-moving, hyper-connected, and volatile world, data and real-time analytics can drive greater public sector agility in protecting vulnerable populations from shocks, in order to keep global development on track.

Consider: MIT researchers have found evidence that changes in mobile phone calling patterns can be used to detect flu outbreaks; A Telefónica Research team has demonstrated that calling patterns can be used to identify the socioeconomic level of a population, which in turn may be used to infer its access to housing, education, healthcare, and basic services such as water and electricity; and researchers from Sweden’s Karolinska Institute and Columbia University have used data from Digicel, Haiti’s largest cell phone provider, to determine the movement of displaced populations after the earthquake, aiding the distribution of resources.

At Global Pulse, an innovation initiative of the UN Secretary-General, we believe that analysis of patterns within big data could revolutionize the way we respond to events such as global economic shocks, disease outbreaks, and natural disasters. Our team of data scientists, open source hackers, and international development experts functions the way an R&D lab does: asking questions, formulating and testing hypotheses, building prototypes and collaborating with partners within and outside the United Nations to develop methods for harnessing real-time data to gain a real-time understanding of human well being.

We’re in discussions with corporations about how their digital services could be used as human sensor networks to detect the early warning signs that communities are losing jobs, getting sick, not getting enough food, or struggling to make ends meet. Now we need to find a way for the private sector to share, safely and anonymously, some of what it knows about its customers to help give the public sector a badly needed edge in protecting citizens. It’s the concept that has been called “data philanthropy.”

The companies that engage with us, however, don’t regard this work as an act of charity. They recognize that population well being is key to the growth and continuity of business. For example, what if you were a company that invested in a promising emerging market that is now being threatened by a food crisis that could leave your customers unable to afford your products and services? And what if it turned out that expert analysis of patterns in your own data could have revealed all along that people were in trouble, while there was still time to act?

Data philanthropy could make a real difference, and it makes good business sense as well. To get there, we need to work together to develop a viable approach that contributes both to public good and business continuity, while also protecting both individual privacy and corporate competitiveness. Global Pulse will be talking about big data for the public good at the O’Reilly Strata Summit in New York (being held today and tomorrow). The time has come for companies to recognize the importance of using their data to help the United Nations understand what is happening to the world’s citizens — their customers.

By Robert Kirkpatrick

Robert Kirkpatrick is the Director of Global Pulse, an innovation initiative in the Executive Office of the UN Secretary-General.

Source: Forbes, September 20, 2011

http://www.linkedin.com/news?actionBar=&articleID=802659684&ids=0SdPkMdPAQcjwIe38UdPoVdj4Ub3cVdPcTdzAMe2MQe3oVdjoOc3wIcjcUej0Nd34U&aag=true&freq=weekly&trk=eml-tod-b-ttle-100&ut=2brotkTg-TB4Y1