CAPACITY

Building a strong team is essential for the success of any nonprofit organization. At a minimum, your core team should include a dedicated Board of Directors to provide governance and strategic oversight; an Executive Director to lead day-to-day operations; one or several Programme Managers to implement the activities; and a Financial Manager to manage budgets and ensure fiscal responsibility. 

Finding the right team members is crucial to building a successful organization. Start by leveraging your existing network. Showcase all the benefits your workplace offers. Broaden your search channels to reach diverse candidates and offer clear opportunities for growth to engage and retain your staff. Together, these strategies will help you build a strong, committed team.

People tend to underestimate the real cost of defending human rights. Once you have defined what needs to be done to implement your mission (= your activities), take your time to work on a budget, and define how you will finance your work. 

Accessing human rights funding is highly competitive, and most organizations and movements turn to the same but few traditional human rights funders. However, to ensure a minimum of financial freedom, it is vital to count on a diverse range of income types, such as individual donors at varying levels, foundations, and government or other institutional contributors. At Phoenix Initiative, we regularly publish open calls for proposals on social media (in English) and on our website (accessible in many language thanks to machine translation) to alleviate the financial bottleneck. We also share experiences and lessons learned of how others have succeeded in their fundraising endeavors. 

A number of financial practices are vital to ensure that you can safely pursue your work to defend human rights. The below is the ideal practice to thrive for:

o Yearly financial controls, (and if necessary audits) are conducted and reports are made available upon request. 

o Financial statements are prepared quarterly, following a consistent format. 

o Solid fiscal management processes are in place. 

o Good practices include careful cash monitoring, regular budgets monitored with monthly cash flow statements and a board finance committee.

o Efforts are in place to establish and maintain a reserve fund, ideally equal to 3 to 6 months of operating expenses. 

However, having such elements in place depend highly on the individual situation and organizational complexity of those who defend human dignity. In our resource section, we propose ways and solutions how to ensure sound financial management practices that shall fit your context, and not solely the above ideal practice.