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The New York State executive compensation and administration limit rules go into effect on January 1, 2013. These limits apply to those organizations that:
Generate $500,000 in State funds, from one of thirteen State funded agencies, or State authorized payments; and
Generate 30% of its funding from State or State authorized payments.
It should be noted that SED funds and payments from federal sources are not considered State funds or State authorized payments.
Executive Compensation:
If your organization is subject to the new regulations, executive compensation will be limited as follows unless a waiver is obtained:
If 100% of your agency’s income is from State funding, the maximum salary that can be paid to an executive is $199,000
If you have other than State funds, you can pay more than the $199,000, but the dollars must come from the “other than State funds” category. In such a case, an agency can pay up to the 75th percentile of an approved compensation study, without the need for a waiver.
The waiver must be obtained from one of the State agencies funding your organization and must be submitted 60 days prior to the reporting period. In determining whether or not to provide a waiver, the following factors will be considered:
The compensation should be comparable to that paid to similar executives at other providers;
The nature, size, and complexity of the covered provider’s operations and the services provided; and
The provider’s efforts, if any, to secure executives with the same level of experience and expertise, and skills for the positions of covered executives at lower levels of compensation.
If an executive provides both administrative and programmatic services, they should be properly allocated with the program part of the position not counted against the salary cap.
Administrative Costs:
Commencing January 1, 2013, at least 75% of all State funds must be spent in a program capacity. This will increase by 5% per year until it maxes out at 85% for 2015 and beyond.
Similar to executive compensation, a waiver can be submitted to decrease the program related costs, but you must show good cause and file the application concurrently with the timely submission of the provider’s cost report for the period for which the waiver is requested for, or if no cost report is filed, 60 days prior to the date of the contract, its renewal, or extension, whichever is sooner. In determining whether or not to grant a waiver, the following will be considered:
Are the administrative costs necessary or avoidable;
Evidence that failure to reimburse such costs will negatively affect the availability or quality of service delivered;
Have efforts been made to monitor and control administrative expenses and to limit requests for reimbursement for such costs?
The waiver is only valid for one year unless extended by the funder. It should be noted that waivers in both cases will be extremely difficult to obtain, and these rules are still being interpreted and finalized.
As of this writing, over 150 million business professionals use LinkedIn. Of that number, 3.6 million are working in the 128 thousand nonprofits that have company profile pages on LinkedIn. Nonprofit professionals list on average, 50 connections, well above the overall average. And there are over 87 thousand LinkedIn groups in the nonprofit sector.
Over 150 million business professionals use LinkedIn. To make the most of this social media powerhouse, you and your colleagues must put your best feet forward to define who you really are, not what you do. Then once established, you can further define your organization on LinkedIn’s company profile page.
Here are 10 tips to help you rethink your personal LinkedIn profile and, hopefully, spur you to gather new donors, volunteers, board members and staff from Linkedin – the premier social media platform offering professional-to-professional relationships. These tips can help you enhance your current profile to generate incremental interest in your cause.
- A LinkedIn profile is not a resume - Overall, your LinkedIn profile shows your experience, present efforts and future aspirations. A well designed profile should go further than just recount the past as most resumes do. Instead, describe your rich experiences and how they contribute to your current and future aspirations for yourself and your organization. Use short blocks of information with keywords and rich textual images--in easily digestible bites.
- Write a dynamic personal tagline - That 120-character line of text under your name is the first impression you make in your profile. It brands you all over LinkedIn. Make it intriguing. Make others want to know more about you, your passions and the cause you work for. Succinctly tell others who you really are and why they should choose you over the rest; do not merely list your title and organization name
- Put your polished elevator pitch to even better use - Your elevator speech, practiced and refined, is your self-description, the essence of who you are and the vehicle that pitches what you do. Hone it, and place it in your LinkedIn profile Summary section. Engage potential connections in the 15 seconds they will spend reading this; capture their attention so they click to learn more about your mission.
- Point out your skills, certifications, languages, volunteer work, publications, etc.- Display the unique professional abilities, personal skills, interests and values you bring to the proverbial table that round out your professional background and show you as a whole person. Cite an excerpt from one of your publications; express your skills, attributes and passion. Don’t forget to add the section called “Volunteer Experience and Causes.”
- Post a great photo - A clear picture of what you look like, showing a friendly, approachable nonprofit professional is one basic, yet often underutilized, tool that will reinforce your personal brand. Your photo should make it easy for someone to visualize you ahead of an initial meeting.
- Differentiate yourself from the crowd - Use the free LinkedIn applications to showcase your singular ideas and voice. With these, you can provide easy downloads of your multimedia marketing materials, which will add even more depth to your profile. These include SlideShare, Box.net and Portfolio Display to name just a few.
- Make your profile 100 percent complete (and that’s just the start!) - By completing your profile, you will look your very best and provide a well-rounded view of who you really are. Showing your industry, zip code, current position with description, two past positions, education, photo, at least 3 skills, and at least 50 connections helps search engine optimization on Google, too. Once you have achieved a 100% complete profile, keep working LinkedIn to make your profile even better!
- Obtain a personalized LinkedIn URL - Personalize your LinkedIn URL, instead of using the default. Use that URL on business cards, email signatures and all marketing materials so you can self-describe yourself in your own words and be found on LinkedIn. See instructions at https://help.linkedin.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/87/kw/personalized%20URL.
- Recommend and get recommended - Using LinkedIn, you can easily give worthy people recommendations they were not expecting (nice surprise) or ask someone to recommend you for a specific aspect of your work. The famous “Halpert 2 percent rule” applies: 98 percent people in your network like you; 2 percent so greatly admire you they are willing to recommend you.
- Establish a LinkedIn company profile page for your agency - Have a look at these 5 blog postings I co-wrote to learn how to show your organization off to its fullest on LinkedIn: http://connect2collaborate.wordpress.com/why-linkedin-company-pages-matter-to-non-profits/
Bottom line, these 10 tips are just ideas unless you implement them. Continuously “work” LinkedIn as a power tool in your marketing toolbox. Social media, and LinkedIn in particular, are not spectator sports; they are actively changing the nonprofit sector, so you have to continuously contribute and participate to grow with LinkedIn.
Marc is a self-described “multi-preneur.”
Since leaving the corporate world in 2001, Marc W. Halpert has started diverse companies.
Two offer specialized, paperless electronic payment services to optimize the cash flow of, and increase the speed of payments, to:
retailers, small- and medium-sized businesses (Your Best Interest LLC)
professional and membership groups, and not-for-profit organizations (e-giving).
And his third company, connect2collaborate, spreads his LinkedIn and networking evangelism to train and coach others. Using the concepts presented in his coaching and speaking engagements, he offers professionals the opportunity to fully tell WHO they really are on their LinkedIn pages.
He has been recognized as a frequent speaker at national and regional conferences and local association meetings for small businesses and nonprofits to teach more about the importance of cash flow techniques and the best ways to use LinkedIn to improve business opportunities.
He has also authored numerous articles on innovations in cash flow technologies and social media techniques for self-branding, and he serves as a source for the press.
He is a frequent instructor at UJA-Federation of New York’s Connect To Care in White Plains, NY teaching displaced job seekers how to use LinkedIn to enhance their employment opportunities. He volunteers as a SCORE counselor at the award-winning Norwalk, CT chapter where he offers expertise in e-commerce and social media to start-ups, growing businesses, and nonprofits.
Contact Information:
Marc W. Halpert, Managing Partner
Phone: 203.373.0875
eFax 203.549.0406
Email: marchalpert@connect2collaborate.com
www.linkedin.com/in/marchalpert
www.connect2collaborate.com
Every day, more and more people of all ages and backgrounds are using online technology to connect to friends, families, and businesses. Many non-profits have been interested in embracing such technology but may not feel they have the expertise. If you think you can’t do it yourself, here are some tips to get you to conquer your fears and allow you to take advantage of many social media outlets to increase donations.
The first step is getting to know the technology. This may seem overwhelming but many of the social media sites such as Twitter, Facebook, and You Tube, have extensive online help instructions. Yes, you will need some patience and may make some mistakes at first, but focus on the fact that millions of people are using these sites on a daily basis, and more and more people are connecting. Facebook UK has an application (app) called JustGiving, and allows people to donate without going to another web page (that means they stay in Facebook and can continue whatever they were doing). And many other social media sites such as Causes integrate with Facebook making a seamless connection to the user.
As with any business operation, get to know your competition by finding out how other non-profit organizations are getting their message out. Sites such as www.BethKanter.org and www.Johnhaydon.com have a wealth of information for helping non-profits increase their networking through social media. Most search engines, such as Google, can help guide you to other sites that can provide more information or instruction.
Once you get past the technology hurdle, focus on your message that you want to get out. Consider the content of the material you had used before online technology, and make sure your message is clear – what do you want donations for and what is your overall mission. A clean and readable web page that makes it easy for a potential donor to know what you are about and how to donate will get you more results than a cluttered page of fancy graphics. Bottom line: keep it simple for your user to navigate and not get discouraged. For more tips on ways to use social media check out Tim Bete’s YouTube video “19 ways non-profits can use social media to connect with donors” at www.youtube.com/watch?v=I0qhxej2wdA.
Nonprofit organizations use technology in their work in a wide variety of ways, from raising money through text messages to mapping areas of need using Geographic Information System tools.
The variety of ways nonprofits can use technology, and the many choices there are about approaches and tools, can be more than small organizations with limited budgets can handle. Here are links to just a few resources that can help with this challenge, online and face-to-face.
Techsoup
http://www.techsoup.org/ is a website devoted to advice and information about technology developed with nonprofits in mind. TechSoup Stock is operated by TechSoup to provide a channel for donations of software and other technology supplies to nonprofits. Registration is required and there are often small processing fees. http://www.techsoup.org/stock/
Idealwear
“Provides candid reviews and articles about software of interest to nonprofits, centralized into a website. Through product comparisons, recommendations, case studies, and software news, Idealware allows nonprofits to make the software decisions that will help them be more effective.” http://www.idealware.org
Beth Kanter
Blogs about nonprofits’ use of social media and related questions. Scroll through the entries or sign up to receive new posts as they are written. http://beth.typepad.com/
NPower
A national network of local technical assistance providers focused on the needs of nonprofits. NPower centers offer workshops, reduced-fee consulting, online information and other services. http://www.npower.org/resources/tools/index.htm
CompuMentor
A nonprofit organization specializing in technology assistance for community-based organizations and schools. Its consulting practice offers technology planning, implementation, and support services. http://www.compumentor.org/
NTen
The Nonprofit Technology Enterprise Network is a membership organization concerned with nonprofits’ access to and use of technology. http://www.nten.org/
Vendors
There are many commercial vendors that provide specialized software and technology services to nonprofits. A good starting point for considering which service to buy and which vendor to select will be reviewing the information, advice and services offered by the organizations mentioned above.
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