🔒Pandemic complicates nonprofit recruiting for top posts

Finding nonprofit leaders is difficult enough during normal times, but when a major Hartford agency needed a new executive director this summer, Donna McCarty really had to improvise.

McCarty, senior vice president at recruiting and staffing firm J. Morrissey & Company, arranged to have the first floor of the company’s Broad Street office in Windsor set aside for use during the search. Employees stayed on the second and third floors while job candidates and board members filed in and out of the ground floor, with intensive cleaning in between visits.

“Given what we went through — strictly adhering to the CDC guidelines and the governor’s — we were able to successfully close the search,” McCarty said.

Harc, a major provider of services to the intellectually disabled statewide, named its new CEO, Kenneth Cabral, in October. McCarty’s firm was involved in the search from the start.

“We took all of those precautions throughout, and it worked out well,” McCarty said.

For nonprofits seeking new leaders this year, the pandemic has made a difficult job even harder. First and foremost, agencies have had to scramble to adapt to restrictions on services and programs, leaving little time for finding people for key posts.

Filling top nonprofit jobs has long been difficult as demands on leadership increase and salaries lag far behind the for-profit world. Except for executives at major hospitals and national charities, nonprofit leaders generally take home a fraction of their C-suite counterparts in the private sector.

A recent survey of nonprofit salaries in the region, conducted by Boston-based TSNE MissionWorks in 2017, found that nonprofit executive directors — the equivalent of a CEO — made an average of $134,834 in annual salary in southern New England and Westchester County, N.Y.

But candidates for leadership at a nonprofit often have a commitment to the agency’s mission that transcends the usual considerations of salary and benefits.

“I get to look at a candidate and ask, ‘do they have that passion?’ ” McCarty said. “That’s where it really has to start.”

Virtual beginnings

McCarty’s introduction to pandemic-era nonprofit recruiting started in March with an invitation from the Hartford Foundation for Public Giving (HFPG) to pitch her firm to Harc as part of the foundation’s Nonprofit Support Program. Under the program, the foundation pays for consulting services to help nonprofits find new leaders.

A 28-year veteran of J. Morrissey & Company who has been running the firm’s nonprofit practice since 2001, McCarty did her pitch presentation via videoconferencing, the first time she had used the technology for that purpose. She was notified that she got the job in late April, and promised to fill the Harc position by early fall.

First McCarty had to find candidates — many of whom were overwhelmed, working from home and difficult to reach. Then she had to arrange in-person meetings, a requirement in the final stages of the recruitment process.

“I met all of them personally, so that meant being outside,” McCarty said. “I did not bring them into the office. The good news is that we were talking about the right time of the year to do that.”

With a final slate of candidates chosen, McCarty and her staff had to coordinate with Harc’s board of directors on how to conduct interviews in a safe setting. In-person meetings were a necessity as many board members outside of the business world were less than comfortable with videoconferencing technology.

Filling important leadership roles also requires some personal contact, McCarty added.

“There’s nothing like being face-to-face with someone,” she said.

Cabral, a veteran of the state’s Department of Developmental Services and Department of Children and Families, was announced as Harc’s CEO on Oct. 9.

“We are very confident that Ken’s expertise in the industry will allow Harc to continue its tradition of providing dignity, quality, and inclusion for the individuals and families we serve,” said Harc Board Chairman Greg Calnen. “Ken’s comprehensive experience will bring him back to his roots as a private provider and lead Harc into the future.”

Larger challenges

Meher Shulman, associate director of the foundation’s Nonprofit Support Program, said nonprofits have been “amazingly adaptive, given limited resources, in terms of executive recruiting.”

“COVID has thrown a wrench into nonprofits’ work but they’re pretty resilient to begin with,” she added.

As part of its outreach to nonprofits, the foundation has budgeted grant funds to help with executive recruiting beyond its financial support of programs and operations. (Harc also received a $125,000 emergency grant from HFPG in the first weeks of the pandemic.)

Upheaval around the pandemic has led to some nonprofit leaders staying on longer than expected due to uncertainty in the economy, even as the widespread adoption of videoconferencing technology has opened up jobs to a wider pool of candidates, she added.

“All of us would probably say we would never have built our skills so quickly if it were not for the pandemic,” Shulman said with a laugh.

On the negative side, candidates are less willing to relocate for jobs, although those in cities like New York are looking farther afield.

“Connecticut has benefited by keeping its COVID rate low,” Shulman said. “This may be an attractive place to come.”

Recruitment for key posts in nonprofit fundraising and development continues to be challenging, Shulman said. The pandemic has disrupted many traditional fundraising strategies and development staff are under more pressure than ever to find alternate funding streams.

Nonprofit fundraisers tend to burn out quickly in the best of times, Shulman said. Agencies can hold onto the talent they have and find new sources of funding by expanding the responsibility for fundraising to include the executive director, staff and board members, she advised.

“Fundraising really works best when it’s a team sport,” Shulman said.

This story was done with support from the Hartford Foundation for Public Giving.