Grantmaking in this area is primarily by invitation only. However, we do encourage organizations — philanthropic, nonprofit, and otherwise —working on nonprofit leadership development to contact us about shared interests or potential collaboration.

The vitality and well-being of our Bay Area community depend fundamentally on effective nonprofit leadership. Passionate, skilled leaders are the moving force behind the many nonprofits the Fund supports, from small, emerging grassroots groups to large, well-established institutions. In pursuing all of our goals for social change, we rely on leaders who are driven by strong values, articulate a clear vision of the future, adapt to change, and forge collaborative bonds across boundaries of ethnicity, class, and community. For all of these reasons, we have decided to bring a special focus to supporting these nonprofit leaders.

Like the field of nonprofit leadership development itself, the Haas, Jr. Fund’s work in this area is formative. We begin with the belief that one of the best ways to advance our mission is to cultivate strong nonprofit leadership and governance: not only executive directors and their senior staff, but also governing boards, with their crucial roles. We also believe that improvements in leadership ripple through an organization, touching all aspects of its performance.

We look forward to working with our grantees and other partners to continue learning about how best to strengthen nonprofit leadership.

Challenges and Opportunities

Our exploration and research to date have shown us that nonprofit leaders today work within a shifting and complex environment—one that demands increasingly sophisticated skills. Among the challenges such leaders face are shrinking resources, a complicated web of government agencies, and dramatic changes in communities’ ethnic makeup. Meanwhile, many well-established founders and executive directors will retire in the coming years, creating an even more urgent need for capable new leaders rooted in their own communities.

The for-profit sector devotes considerable time and resources to cultivating a pipeline of leaders; yet too few opportunities exist for nonprofit leaders to develop the talent and skills required to advance organizational and community goals. Scarce resources and an emphasis on the collective good tend to discourage nonprofit leaders from devoting time to their own development. At the same time, nonprofit leadership development programs tend to focus primarily on short-term training geared toward individuals rather than on organizational leadership.

By contrast, the Haas, Jr. Fund aims to strengthen organizational leadership, helping deepen each organization’s capacity to achieve social change by building a strong team of board and senior staff leaders. We take the long view, seeking to invest in the training and resources necessary to boost an organization’s success over time. Furthermore, we plan to provide tailored approaches to developing leadership, honoring the complexity of leaders’ roles in nonprofits and the differences among their organizations and fields. In short, we seek to take full advantage of the opportunity that nonprofit leadership development presents for advancing our goals for social change.

Early Priorities

Grantmaking in this area is primarily by invitation only. However, we do encourage organizations — philanthropic, nonprofit, and otherwise —working on nonprofit leadership development to contact us about shared interests or potential collaboration.

Strengthening Organizational Leadership (through Flexible Leadership Awards)
The Fund is interested in helping to strengthen the leadership of grantee organizations that play essential roles in advancing the goals in each of our program areas. We are particularly interested in strategies that address senior team and board leadership and offer opportunities for long-term leadership development that is driven by an organization’s mission and tailored to its needs.

The Flexible Leadership Awards program is currently available by invitation only. The program is designed to enable organizations to tailor leadership development plans to their particular challenges and opportunities. We seek to help selected grantees assess their needs for leadership development and gain access to the resources to address those needs—for example, executive coaching and training and intensive leadership institutes. We will also support organizational interventions such as board development, succession planning, senior team development and fundraising support.

Building Bay Area Programs and Resources
The Fund recognizes that strengthening nonprofit leadership in a local community is not a one-time or short-term effort. It requires supporting leaders with a continuum of opportunities over the course of their careers, as their organizations weather transitions, plan for successions, respond to new opportunities, and engage in a long-term process of enhancing board and senior staff leadership. Such support calls for a varied array of programs and resources.

Ultimately, we seek to deepen the Bay Area community’s capacity to strengthen its nonprofit leaders, thereby strengthening the health and vitality of our local nonprofit sector. To begin, we seek to support improvement and expansion of existing programs and resources for developing organizational leadership, with a focus on serving the Fund’s grantees.

We are also interested in strengthening mechanisms for cultivating new leaders of organizations in communities of color and emerging communities. At the same time, we are exploring ways to help boards and senior staff be effective partners in setting an organization’s direction and moving it forward.

Building the Field of Nonprofit Leadership Development
We are interested in helping this nascent field grow and become capable of providing the knowledge and technical assistance necessary to strengthen leadership and governance in the nonprofit sector. Toward this end, we are working with selected local and national partners.

Examples of Our Grantmaking

CompassPoint Nonprofit Services CompassPoint Nonprofit Services, the area’s largest management support organization for nonprofits, is expanding its leadership services, including executive transition services, coaching and peer support, as well as launching a training program for fundraising staff of color.

---

Horizons Foundation Horizons Foundation, a community foundation, is expanding its Strategic Partners Program of coaching and technical assistance that build the leadership skills of executive directors from leading gay community organizations.

---

Coleman Advocates for Youth The Flexible Leadership Award is supporting Coleman Advocates for Youth to both invest in its legacy and its future as an important voice for low-income youth and families. Coleman is engaging in a collaborative strategic-planning effort to build on its 30 years of policy wins to form an even stronger citywide, multi-ethnic constituency for children and youth, and FLA grant funds are also supporting coaching and training for the new executive director, saff leaders and board.

---

Girls Incorporated Girls Incorporated of Alameda County is using its Flexible Leadership Award to prepare for a critical transition of its longtime executive director. It is clarifying its strategic priorities and vision, particularly in light of new federal and state initiatives that support after-school programs. The grant funds have also bolstered board and staff capacity to expand Girls, Inc.'s funding base and provided leadership coaching for the staff and board.

---

Gay-Straight Alliance Network With support from the Flexible Leadership Award program, the Gay-Straight Alliance Network is strengthening its capacity to fight homophobia in schools while also managing the transition from small start-up to an organization of considerable size and reach. GSA Network is also further developing its youth leadership model and developing a plan to take its work to a national level.

---

Grantmakers for Effective Organizations Grantmakers for Effective Organizations, a foundation affinity group, promotes organizational effectiveness by identifying and promoting grantmaking practices that invest in the development of nonprofit leaders and improve grantee performance.