The Values Of Nonprofit Organizations For Benefit Organizations

Organizational is comprised of core values, beliefs and basic assumptions within organizational life which helps guide and coordinate member behavior. Edgar Schein, a preeminent scholar of organizational culture research, argues that people can come to know organizational culture based on three levels of awareness known as: artifacts, values and beliefs, and basic underlying assumptions.

Organizational culture is the summation of the underlying organizational values manifesting as collective assumptions, attitudes, beliefs, expectations and norms.  Grounded in the customs and

The nonprofit sector in America is a reflection some of the foundational values that brought our nation into existence. Fundamentals, such as the idea that people can govern themselves and the belief that people should have the opportunity to make a difference by joining a like-minded group, have made America and its nonprofit sector what it is today. The American "civil society" is one that has been produced through generations of experiments with government policy, nonprofit organizations, private partnerships, and individuals who have asserted ideas and values. The future of the nonprofit sector will continue to be experimental in many ways. However, the increase of professional studies in nonprofit management and the greater

Guidance for financial statements for nonprofit organizations is provided by FASB Statement of Financial Accounting Standard 117 (FASB117). The goal of FASB117 was to “enhance the relevance, understandability, and comparability of financial statements” and “requires that those financial statements provide certain basic information that focuses on the entity as a whole and meets the common needs of external users of those statements” (FASB, 1993). FASB117 is considered important because it mandates functional reporting of expenses by nonprofit organizations. FASB117 requires a nonprofit organization to prepare 3 financial statements: a Statement of Financial Position, a Statements of Activities, and a Statement of Cash Flows. In the Statement of Financial Position, the nonprofit must categorize net assets as unrestricted, temporarily restricted

1. Connors, T. D. (2001). The Nonprofit Handbook. New York: John Wiley & Sons, Inc. [US].

Nonprofits can be described as organizations that are held exclusively separate from the government, whether it be a local governing body or the federal government. Nonprofits are also known as the middle men and

Until spending time in the nonprofit program at Johnson, I never considered the many different tasks associated with starting a nonprofit. Additionally, through growing up at a long-established nonprofit, I took for granted the work involved in establishing it as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit. The IRS website provides explanation for the many these required tasks needed to file for tax-exemption status. Filing the articles of incorporation and establishing bylaws remain crucial for an organization to receive recognition as a legal entity. However, establishing a nonprofit involves a great deal more than simply attaining tax-exemption status. Tschirhart and Bielefeld highlight many of these aspects, such as developing the mission and vision statements of the organization (Tschirhart and Bielefeld 49). As the reading from last week discussed, evaluating and acquiring resources for an organization should stem from the mission of an organization. Even more so, in order for that to take place, the organization needs established with a mission that will keep it rooted in its cause and a vision

Nonprofit organizations broadly described operate to achieve missions that serve the common good. Graduate study in the field of nonprofit management focuses on the development of leadership skills for nonprofit managers and provides education in areas such as general operations, human resources, strategies, and fund development (Nachmias, 2008). Students of nonprofit management also develop proficiency in other matters such as nonprofit legal issues, organizational development, donor relations, financial management and fund-raising, volunteer, and human resource management, and pro-gram evaluation, to name a few competencies (Nachmias, 2008).Many nonprofit management programs have a theoretical component, and most programs rely on experiential learning as a vital element of a graduate student’s education. Future studies of community impact should include analysis components from the fields of nonprofit management education, service learning, capacity building, and nonprofit evaluation, and take into consideration specific factors that may affect study outcomes.

For this reason, nonprofits were chosen as the mode of production and management of new affordable units because they had a wholesome image with the American public (Bratt, 1998). This image, coupled with a track record for having the health, welfare, and safety of the public in mind made nonprofits very attractive to legislators and popular with the public.

Non-profit organizations include, but are not limited to: Fraternal beneficiary societies, orders or Associations, cemetery corporations and corporations organized or trusts created for religious, charitable, scientific or educational purposes or for the prevention of cruelty to children or animals, home owner associations, business leagues or organizations not organized for profit but operated exclusively for the promotion of social welfare, as well as clubs organized and operated exclusively for pleasure, recreation and other non-profit purposes. The net profit of these organizations cannot benefit any private stockholder or member. An unwarranted salary, however, may cause a corporation or organization to lose its nonprofit status.

The legal research guide provides (1) an overview of the topic of American Nonprofit Law; 2) guidance to the researcher major and secondary sources on Nonprofit Law including statutes, cases, articles, books, government documents, and Internet sites; and 3) annotations to determine the usefulness of the resources for particular issues. This guide is not intended to be comprehensive. Nonprofit Law has been subject to a voluminous amount of scholarly and practical treatment. Also, issues in Nonprofit Law are related or discussed in many other legal areas – including taxation, wills and trusts, and general corporation law.

Nonprofits especially appeal to individuals who are passionately committed to a cause, enjoy pursing public issues and love their work. Attempting to classify all the organizations that make up the nonprofit sector is difficult. Some of these organizations are somewhat esoteric by nature, especially single-issue organizations like those dedicated to sickle cell anemia or the prevention of cruelty to laboratory test animals. Other nonprofit groups are much broader in scope, like the United Way.

Nonprofit organizations have several functions, and not each one is alike. Essential to all non-profit organizations are four functions: planning, budgeting, funding and management.

A not for profit organization is a corporation or an association that conducts business for the benefit of the general public without shareholders and without a profit motive (Legal, 2013).” There are immense community benefits as a not-for-profit generally accepts everyone regardless of ability to pay. Nonprofit organizations are granted tax-exempt status which helps them to provide services to the public and are expected to be effective managers of their finances as well as being efficient (Financial Management, 2010). In doing so, they can gain exemptions from federal and state incomes taxes and have the ability to solicit tax-deductible contributions (Financial Management, 2010). Organization must follow legal financial

Thus, the true culture of the organization cannot be understood by solely looking at the artifacts. To understand more, it is necessary to look at the next level. Espoused beliefs and values are goals, values, aspirations and ideologies shared by everyone in an organization. Normally, these values are laid down by the leaders or founders of the organization (Schein, 2010, p.25). However, espoused beliefs and values can sometimes be mutually contradictory (Schein, 2010, p.27). Thus, the organization’s culture is only understood just on the surface level. Basic underlying assumptions, which are unconscious and taken-for-granted beliefs and values provides for a deeper understanding of an organization’s culture. Schein concluded that the essence of a culture lies in the pattern of basic underlying assumptions (Schein, 2010, p.32). If the basic underlying assumptions are not deciphered, it will be hard to understand the artifacts and espoused beliefs and values correctly.