Sample Personnel Policies For Nonprofits

It should include disclosure of relationships and interested party transactions. A collaborative national project calling on board members to advance their nonprofits’ missions through greater advocacy. Advocacy is essential to advance and achieve nonprofits’ missions. Keep reading to learn four best practices to consider when drafting or updating your handbook. Keela is a comprehensive platform that gives you powerful, intelligent tools to manage your donors, mobilize your volunteers, market your nonprofit, and raise more money. This guide is complete with market rates, job description templates, and growth tools for Canadian, American and Australian Nonprofits.

• After all, they are the boots on the ground, driving your mission forward and ensuring your donors’ contributions make the intended impact.
• Up-to-date, legally sound personnel policies are so significant that many insurance companies, funders and potential board members look to a nonprofit’s personnel policies as a bellwether of security ë or risk.
• Moreover, several federal laws and many state laws require that workplaces distribute or post certain written policies.
• Whether you’re writing a handbook for the first time or want to verify the content of your existing handbook, the free non profit employee handbook template provided below will prove useful.

Define key concepts and terminologies used in the policy to ensure understanding across your organization and to whom the policy applies. As great as it is to steward and engage your donors, you need to take good care of your staff and volunteers too. After all, they are the boots on the ground, driving your mission forward and ensuring your donors’ contributions make the intended impact.

States Recognizing Implied Contract Based On Verbal Promises

Employment with Nonprofit is at-will, which means that either you or Nonprofit may terminate employment at any time, for any reason, with or without notice. The policies and practices described in this employee manual are provided to you for guidance only, but don’t constitute a contract of employment. Neither this handbook nor any other documents circulated to employees, nor any verbal representations constitute contracts. No supervisor or employee except the executive director has the authority to enter into an employment agreement, express or implied, with any employee concerning the employment relationship. These policies supersede any previous policies that may have been distributed previously. Your signature on the acknowledgement is a certification that you have received a copy of these policies as updated.

Other common types of lawsuits are in regard to allegations of discrimination and harassment. It is far better for organizations first to ensure that these types of improper types of behaviors do not occur, than to have to defend themselves in courts of law. The best way to ensure occurrence of proper behaviors is to enact comprehensive guidelines regarding how employees and volunteers are treated in the workplace.

Even the most eloquent, clear, and useful handbook is worthless if it’s outdated or no longer addresses current employee and employer issues. While there’s no set-in-stone timetable for updates, we recommend checking in every six months to make sure all elements of your handbook are still relevant. Especially in light of the COVID-19 pandemic, employers should be evaluating their handbooks and addressing remote work policies, furloughs, and emergency planning. Employees should re-sign the employee handbook each time it is updated.

Nonprofits should strive toward creating a workplace that welcomes and supports employees who reflect the diversity of their community. Nonprofits should conduct background checks on employees, particularly if their positions involve working with children or vulnerable adults, performing financial duties or serving in other sensitive areas. Become a part of one of the largest statewide associations of nonprofits in the nation to advance your mission.

Nonprofit organizations should define their compensation philosophy, balancing internal equity with market-based and livable compensation for all employees. The information in any resource collected in this virtual library should not be construed as legal advice or legal opinion on specific facts and should not be considered representative of the views of its authors, its sponsors, and/or ACC. These resources are not intended as a definitive statement on the subject addressed. Rather, they are intended to serve as a tool providing practical advice and references for the busy in-house practitioner and other readers. To round out your knowledge of this Library topic, you may want to review some related topics, available from the link below.

Reviews

Specific sequences of activities resulting from the guidelines are often called procedures. Revising or drafting policies is generally authorized by the chief staff executive or board of directors that designates a staff person or special task force to lead the project. Some nonprofits have standing personnel or human resource committees charged with responsibility for the project.

More so, since most of the work done in the nonprofit sector involves building long-term donor relationships, it is essential to have a system in place that encourages your staff to remain committed to your organization’s mission. You should have in place a standardized form and consistent processes for conducting individual performance reviews of all employees. Employment policies are vital to the well-being of your favorite nonprofit. Such policies set workplace expectations, define work guidelines, reduce and eliminate confusion and misunderstanding, and provide steps necessary for any disciplinary action. Formalizing workplace rules makes certain that everyone—from independent contractors to management to staff to board members—are informed and on the same page.

Moreover, several federal laws and many state laws require that workplaces distribute or post certain written policies. Up-to-date, legally sound personnel policies are so significant that many insurance companies, funders and potential board members look to a nonprofit’s personnel policies as a bellwether of security ë or risk. Many accreditation standards require that personnel policies be reviewed regularly. To ensure that the nonprofit’s policies are current, schedule a policy review on a regular basis. Employers often use handbooks and manuals to inform employees of their employment policies and to enforce their at-will policies. Although no express employment contract exists, courts have held that handbooks and manuals can be implied contracts if the language creates an impression that employees can only be dismissed for cause. The employee must be aware of the handbook provisions at the time of the discharge to rely on them in a lawsuit.

Principles And Practices

While your employee handbook serves as legal clarification of your policies and procedures, it should primarily be an educational and inspiring document. It’s fine to include disclaimers to clarify the handbook’s purpose, but in general the language you use should be less formal—not legalese—and speak to the culture and vibe of your company.

Independent contractors differ from employees in that IC’ers control their financial and work-related relationships and pay their own self-employment, Social Security, and Medicare taxes. Employment agreements need to be individualized to suit each employment relationship. All employees and volunteers sign a document that indicates that they have reviewed the policies and will act in accordance with them. © Copyright Carter McNamara, MBA, PhD, Authenticity Consulting, LLC. Note that matters of employee law and regulations apply the same to for-profit and nonprofit organizations. When employees are terminated, nonprofits should provide adequate notice and information about benefit continuation, unemployment compensation, references and job placement assistance when possible. Nonprofits must comply with all federal, state and local employment laws when hiring, employing and dismissing personnel.

Board Involvement With Hr And Personnel Policies

“Constituents”describes people with a stake in the success of the organization and may include members, neighbors, clients, volunteers, and contributors. Nonprofit boards should budget for the professional development of their staff.

When you hire an independent contractor, you should have a written and signed contract that clearly outlines the scope of work, price, and payment, severability, deliverables, and clearly identifies the person as an independent contractor. Also, you can minimize and avoid legal liability by placing the right provisions in an independent contractor agreement. An employment agreement sets the conditions, terms, and obligations between you as the employer and an employee. It’s considered a binding contract that should be administered in writing and signed by both the employee and an acting officer. Any violation of terms of the policies is immediately addressed with reprimand or termination of the employee or volunteer, depending on the nature of the violation.

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This document should not be used “as is” but should be modified after careful consideration of your specific organization’s employment policies and procedures. We recommend that this handbook not be converted into a final employee handbook without attorney review and approval. This is a scary prospect, because in order to have a successful company, you must have a “home base,” so to speak, for where your policies and procedures live, so everyone in the organization can know where to find them. A handbook documents your organizational policies and procedures and any other need-to-know information for your employees. Handbooks help manage your employees’ expectations and keep your business compliant with the ever-growing list of employment rules and regulations. If you already have some of the above-listed employment policies in place, when were they last updated?

Consider the following list to get an impression of some of the major policies in an organization. The policies developed by an one organization depend on the nature and needs of the organization. Nonprofit personnel should receive ongoing performance-related feedback and a formal performance evaluation at least annually.

That’s why I want to make it clear, upfront, that I will work with each individual Iowa nonprofit organization to come to an agreement for a fee that fair, but also accessible and not a strain on the nonprofit. So, in short, the cost of drafting essential employment policies or other employment documents, like an employee handbook, is entirely flexible to fit each situation.

Best Practices For Creating A Nonprofit Human Resources Policy

Think about the many ways your organization has changed and grown since they were written, including new employees you hired and existing employees whose roles evolved. Changes to state and federal laws may have rendered some elements of your employment policies incomplete or out of compliance. It may be time to renew your commitment to a productive and happy workplace by revising employment policies.

Consequently, when a nonprofit changes its policies and distributes a new employee handbook it’s important to ensure that every employee receives the new version of the policy manual. Even employees who are out of work on leave should receive a new manual, by mail using a method that provides proof of delivery. Any procedures that describe disciplinary steps should always be clearly described as guidelines, to be used at the nonprofit’s discretion. The disclaimer should also address the fact that the nonprofit has the right to make changes to its personnel policies and that the new policy manual supersedes any prior manuals. One of the fastest growing types of lawsuits brought by employees against their organizations is wrongful termination of employment.

Get the latest human resources, payroll, and benefits news, tips, and insights for small businesses. When employees depart, nonprofit organizations should conduct exit interviews to learn from the employee’s employment experience. Nonprofit organizations should create a culture of transparency and open communication where internal information is shared as appropriate. This also includes being open to input from personnel regarding the organization’s activities and results on a continual basis. To the extent of their ability, nonprofits should provide employees with adequate benefits, including health insurance, and the opportunity to financially contribute to retirement plans. As a precautionary measure, any supervisory employee involved in hiring should be trained not to make promises about future job tenure.