May 8, 2023

The life of a nonprofit CEO: Lessons from Nayak

‘Nayak: The Real Hero’ prepared you to become chief minister of the state, but can it also teach you what to do if you were made CEO of a nonprofit?

2 min read

1

When a board member who heads a private equity firm questions why you’re not expanding your network and leveraging it to raise funds:

2

When the website developer explains what they can do to improve your site and increase your readership, but then laughs when you tell them your budget: 

3

When a member from the fundraising team tries to reject a grant from a BigTech company due to ethical concerns:

4

When HR says that many employees mentioned burnout in the annual review and so the company should consider four-day work weeks and mandate daily nap breaks: 

5

When the consultant’s laptop dies while they are making a presentation on why you must build a second line of leadership, so you ask them to ‘just talk you through it’:

6

When your globetrotting board member is unable to get you a speaking slot at TED, despite promising to do so for three years:

7

When you’ve been going back and forth with a funder for a year and they still can’t confirm if they can renew your grant: 

8

Your 21-year-old employee when you schedule a meeting for 9 am:

9

You, when they say 9 am is the time they make their matcha latte and get ready to take on the day:

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ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Sneha Philip-Image
Sneha Philip

Sneha leads content development and curation at IDR. Prior to IDR, she worked at Dasra and EdelGive Foundation, across research and diligence verticals, on issues such as health, sanitation, gender, and strategic philanthropy. Sneha also worked at AIESEC—the world’s largest youth-run nonprofit organisation, and was a founding member of a language training company in Budapest, Hungary. She has an MA in Development Studies from the Institute of Development Studies, University of Sussex and a BA in Economics from St Xavier’s College, Mumbai.

Cincy Jose-Image
Cincy Jose

Cincy Jose heads editorial operations at IDR. She is involved in people, partnerships, and process management, and the projects she has led include setting up IDR Hindi, the multilanguage feature on IDR English, and IDR Answers–the first AI-powered search and analysis engine built to answer questions about social impact in India. Prior to entering the development sector, Cincy spent seven years in the publishing industry holding key editorial positions at Juggernaut Books and DK Books India. She has a master’s and bachelor’s in English literature from Miranda House and Jesus and Mary College, Delhi University.

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