How Non-profit Organizations Manage People —— On Human Resource Management of Non-profit Organizations

In recent years, I have contacted many different non-profit organizations through various channels, including professional social work organizations, international organizations with volunteers as the backbone, private equity funds, provincial hub organizations and a large number of grassroots non-profit organizations. Everyone has different organizational forms and management styles. Because they are in it, they have no preconceived influence from other social experiences, and they also have a reserve of basic knowledge of management and psychology before, so I have some ideas and hope to write them briefly here. If there is any bias, please criticize and correct me.

Two extremes of non-profit organization management

The management of non-profit organizations is easy to fall into two extremes, one is the extreme of utilitarianism and the other is the extreme of idealism. The former's management ideas and methods are somewhat similar to those of enterprises or governments, emphasizing standardization, which is embodied in emphasizing performance (such as attendance and fund-raising objectives). ), job responsibilities, prohibition of orders, execution efficiency and other elements, while the management of the latter emphasizes humanization, individuality, democracy and equality, respect, autonomy, pluralism, innovation and other elements, and pursues a self-considered effectiveness. In fact, it is inappropriate to go to any extreme. On the one hand, because non-profit organizations and their employees do not pursue economic benefits or power status as their main goal, but social benefits as their main goal, a large number of idealists are full of them; On the other hand, and most importantly, it is determined by the complexity of human nature. How to strike a balance between the two and grasp the scale in detail operation requires leaders to have certain wisdom, which everyone in enterprises and social organizations must face. Therefore, in management, management is not only a technology, but also an art.

What kind of management style do you prefer to treat your employees? If you think people are selfish and lazy, you will try your best to make them not lazy. If you think people are subjective and tend to realize themselves, then you will reduce supervision and invest more encouragement and tolerance. There is a classic theoretical summary of this problem in management, which many people may have heard of, and that is the hypothesis theory of human nature.

This assumption of human nature is constantly changing with the development of society, and it has successively experienced such assumptions as "economic man" (X theory), "social man" (Y theory), "complex man" (beyond Y theory) and "cultural man" (Z theory). Theory X mainly represents the employer's understanding of employees in the early employment relationship in industrial society, thinking that everyone is trying to make money, and as long as he gives enough money, he will be happy and efficient; Later, with the expansion of labor scale and the accumulation of time, bosses found that this was not the case. The appearance of the conclusion of Hawthorne Experiment (Baidu, you will know) made everyone think that people not only care about personal material interests, but also pursue friendship, security and collective belonging between people, so building harmonious interpersonal relationships can improve production efficiency, that is to say, people are "social people." This time is already in the 1930s, which is a great transcendence. Later, Maslow's hierarchy of needs theory was put forward (this social worker and psychologist should be familiar with it), and the concept of "self-realization" was brought into management, which gave a more positive evaluation of human nature, so enterprises paid attention to providing employees with opportunities to challenge themselves and develop their potential. Later, some people put forward the Super Y theory and Z theory one after another, paying more attention to the complexity of human nature and the different expressions of "people in situations", emphasizing personalized management and the diversification of people's needs, and these needs change with the changes of age, role, situation, interpersonal relationship and cultural background.

It can be seen that there is absolutely no lack of standardization in management at the macro level, but it is also impossible to cut across the board. In micro-implementation, we should consider everyone's different situations and needs and encourage them in a targeted manner.

The Dilemma of Human Resource Management in Non-profit Organizations

As we all know, human resource management has six classic modules: human resource planning, recruitment and allocation, training and development, performance management, salary and welfare management and employee relationship management. Then, what is the situation corresponding to the daily work of non-profit organizations?

First of all, for most start-up institutions, human resource planning is empty talk, because the number of projects and the total amount of funds in the medium and long term are unpredictable, and the possibility of large fluctuations is relatively high. Therefore, the organizational strategy, organizational framework, post setting, talent echelon and rules and regulations involved in this plan are unrealistic. Only when you have a certain ability in income and talent can you mention this concept, because only in this way can you basically lock in the vision and mission of your organization through previous exploration and decide the projects you want to give up and the financing and social goals you want to pursue. Only when you have the project, the strength and more employees can you give everyone a clear job description and divide them into different departments. At this time, you can recruit more people as a talent pool, so that business development will not be affected by a person's departure. Therefore, I don't think it is necessary for non-profit organizations to make strategic planning, including human resources planning, otherwise they will set limits for themselves. What we have seen is that some established institutions have survived well and done well in all aspects, although their business is complex. Some institutions focus too much on a certain point or a certain line, but it is easy to break and disintegrate the capital chain because of changes in the external environment.

Secondly, I think the recruitment and distribution of non-profit organizations are too arbitrary. Because of too many people, shortage of talents and low entry threshold, non-profit organizations often recruit at will. Middle and high-level employees are mainly introduced by acquaintances, and grassroots employees are mainly fresh college students and core volunteers. The relevant person in charge will join the company after judging that this person is available by his own intuition and existing experience. After joining the job, communication, project, administration, finance, fund-raising and other work are often easily confused, regardless of whether this person is good at it or not, regardless of this person's career planning. This directly leads to the mismatch between people and posts, the sharp increase of employees' work pressure and the increase of communication tension within the team, which indirectly leads to the increase of employee turnover rate. In addition to understanding employees' work experience and real life, I personally strongly recommend that organizations use professional career evaluation tools, such as Holland's career interest scale, professional personality test and personality test. Among the institutions I contacted, only two clearly pointed out that psychological testing is a necessary part of job interview, accounting for a very low proportion of all non-profit organizations. This also reflects from the side that our non-profit organizations lack talents and the level of specialization is not high. When selecting middle and senior managers, it is best to have a test of leadership style, because different leadership styles may have different effects on the organization's culture. For example, relational or democratic leadership style may not be suitable for organizations that emphasize performance very much. It is best not to use commanding or visionary people in positions that emphasize professional services, otherwise it will be too boastful and inhuman. MBTI professional personality test divides people into 16 types, some of which are very suitable for service, consultation and professional work, and are the best candidates for front-line service personnel of non-profit organizations (such as infj type and isfj type, etc.). ). At the same time, some types are obviously not suitable for this work. If he has to join, we may need more other considerations. Of course, it is best for the moderator of the test to be professionally trained, exclude the interference of other factors and make an objective judgment on the validity of the questionnaire. It is obviously impossible for job seekers to do a good psychological test.

It is worth noting that two new viewpoints have been proved by some scientific research institutions. First, introverts may not be able to play a leading role. Research shows that introverted leaders are more popular with subordinates than extroverted leaders, because they are strong in emotional ability, good at thinking and introspection, stable and cautious, and can maintain harmonious interpersonal relationships within the team. There are many such celebrities, including Bill Gates, abraham lincoln and Warren Buffett. Second, a few people are born leaders, most people can become leaders after training, and a few people cannot become leaders after training. This needs to be determined by the recruiter.

There is another kind of NGO practitioners who need to focus on, that is, the young literary type (perhaps the middle-aged literary type) driven by ideals. They are the backbone of voluntary service organizations, and sometimes they are active in some large and medium-sized public welfare organizations. They are full of energy, passion, distinct personality, with certain professional skills and strong social skills. Some of them are older, single, mainly focused on their careers and have no affection. Such people are suitable for short-term, fast-paced projects. They may have their own ideas or requirements about the working environment, working concept and working content, and their stability may be poor. When their expectations in these aspects conflict with the actual situation of the organization, the possibility of leaving the company will be great. Their incentives should be concrete, not material.

Third, performance management is a double-edged sword and should be used with caution. The focus of performance evaluation is to determine a comprehensive and accurate index system, and follow it up in a timely and effective manner. The extraction of indicators is based on the clarity of post occupation, and the quality of assessment is based on quantifiable and observable work content. However, a lot of work in non-profit organizations cannot be quantified, and the job responsibilities are not necessarily clear, so performance appraisal will become very difficult. Even in enterprises, there are countless examples of performance appraisal failure. At present, many large and medium-sized enterprises use commercial online performance appraisal system, which requires employees of the whole company to update their work progress in real time every day to improve work efficiency and make work progress and work effectiveness visible. This makes the grass-roots staff with heavy tasks complain. This kind of assessment takes up a lot of working time, but it does not bring direct value. I think the same is true of non-profit organizations. Performance management has become an extra burden to a certain extent, and it has become a chicken rib for both examiners and candidates.

Finally, in the management of employee relations, non-profit organizations can easily distinguish between public and private. The implementation of employee relationship management is to ease the tension of employment relationship in enterprises and break the stereotype of interest-driven. More humanistic care can improve organizational performance. Its elements include labor contract signing, dismissal and temporary dismissal, employee conflict handling, job enrichment, job rotation, promotion, management of internal communication, formulation and implementation of reward and punishment measures, and EAP and psychological quality development training (league building activities) popular among employees. Non-profit organizations consider these issues casually, and the particularity of the industry makes the relationship between people too intimate and lacks boundaries. This situation will pave the way for possible situations such as weak execution, conflict of values and malicious resignation in the follow-up work. Therefore, non-profit organizations should try their best to provide specific incentives for employees and determine the necessary human boundaries.

The most common problems in non-profit organizations

Here is a summary of some problems in the management of non-profit organizations, which can be analyzed in combination with the above contents.

1, low execution, shirking responsibility. The reasons for this situation may include: (1) The interpersonal boundary is unclear, which leads to the inability to lose face when assigning tasks; There are few employees and the work content is complicated, and everyone is not clear about their job responsibilities; Unclear tasks, lack of timely follow-up or guidance; The enthusiasm and initiative of relevant employees are not stimulated, and the incentive measures are missing or invalid; The employee does not belong to the personality type suitable for working in a non-profit organization or a specific post. If necessary, we can re-establish boundaries and rules and learn from some practices in enterprises to neutralize the loose wind.

2. Rigid dogma and lack of innovation. The reasons for this situation may include: the person in charge is too old and the way of thinking is solidified; The person in charge has poor learning ability, slow acceptance of new things and limited vision; Limited staff level and lack of innovation ability; The management structure is institutionalized and enterprise-oriented, lacking flexible, equal and caring organizational culture; The leadership style is imperative, and the communication channels from bottom to top are not smooth.

3. The organization has long been influenced by the founder's backward concept, low working ability and insufficient management ability, and it cannot be broken through. This is a very common problem and the most fatal one. In fact, the bottleneck of the development of many non-profit organizations lies in the leaders, but they often don't know it, and the people around them don't directly point it out because of their feelings. The founder spent money to register the organization, and he did everything from relationship maintenance, project implementation and financial management along the way, and paid a lot of effort, which can be completely understood as his own organization. On the other hand, after becoming a full-time public welfare person, the economic income in this area has become an important means of making a living, which is also a big reason. But from a rational point of view, when the person in charge of an institution realizes that his personal ability has begun to limit the growth of the institution, he should submit his resignation to the board of directors, and hand over the institution to someone with more ability to take care of it, so that the institution can be reborn. From a legal point of view, the registered capital and fixed assets of public institutions do not belong to the personal property of the person in charge (legal person) from the moment they exist, which is somewhat similar to the meaning of "donation". Even after the institution is cancelled, the remaining assets "should be transferred to charitable organizations with the same or similar purposes in accordance with the provisions of the articles of association of charitable organizations".

4. High turnover rate. The reasons for the high turnover rate generally include: low salary, insufficient room for promotion or progress, incompatibility with organizational philosophy, poor team atmosphere, questioning the financial transparency or motivation of the organization. Even when some public welfare partners leave their jobs, they have a strong verbal attack with the person in charge of the institution, destroying the information of the institution and spreading the secrets of the institution to the outside world. Nine times out of ten, this worst situation is due to the fact that the agency's practices have not met the ideal expectations of retirees, and it seriously doubts the effectiveness and financial transparency of the agency's projects. This is a unique situation of non-profit organizations, which is completely different from enterprises. Most employees leave their jobs because of salary deduction or unfair business competition. Some people like the sentence of Ma Yun, "There are only two real reasons for employees to resign: 1, money is not given in place; 2, heart, injustice ",regardless of whether Ma Yun has said this sentence, first of all, I don't agree. Because this is to simplify complex problems, money and heart are not either one or the other, but complement each other. The reasons for employees' resignation must be treated in detail. As we said above, people are "complex people" and "cultural people", not just "economic people". There is a well-understood theory about the needs of employees, that is, employees are divided into four types from the two dimensions of "internal needs" and "external needs". According to different types, take corresponding incentive measures. As shown in the figure below:

In addition, in the motivation theory, there is a famous "motivation factor-health factor theory" for reference, and interested friends can enter the Baidu Encyclopedia entry "Two-factor motivation theory" to study it carefully.

5, emphasize the ideal, ignore the actual effect. The organizations that have this problem are mainly voluntary service organizations. Their leaders often organize a large number of volunteers with a loving heart without professional training in project design and project management, and devote great enthusiasm to doing things vigorously, only to find that this kind of funding is unsustainable or has not changed the substantive problems in the end. How many rural people's livelihood industries failed to help the poor, how many electric classrooms donated by non-profit organizations were left idle, how many left-behind children didn't care after receiving stationery and clothes, and how many elderly people in nursing homes were washed their feet to watch cultural performances again and again? I think people in the industry in particular are very clear. Although many people and organizations advocate improving working methods in recent years, problems still occur from time to time. My suggestion to such an institution is that the person in charge should strengthen learning, master the ideas and tools to dig deep into the needs of the clients, analyze the causes of the problems, formulate intervention strategies, and at the same time identify the recruitment of volunteers and develop the potential of professional volunteers. Voluntary organizations do not have to be transformed into social work organizations, and voluntary service can be very professional. It's just a matter of attitude or ability.

Finally, in terms of the best number of teams in non-profit organizations, I highly admire the "7 2 rule", which I believe is as magical as the "golden section". This law was first discovered in the study of cognitive psychology, and later it was also studied in management. I often listen to the public welfare predecessors around me saying that the number of truly efficient NGOs should be controlled within five, and if there are many people, it will not be an NGO. Considering the division of functions, if there is a person in charge, a financial officer, an administrator and two project personnel, these five staff members can form a team. As for social work organizations with dozens or hundreds of employees, it is another matter after the government has fully liberalized the purchase of services. Social work organizations with large population emphasize standardization as the top priority, while NGOs with small population emphasize humanization as the top priority.