Some people may read the title of this post and think, "Nonprofit social responsibility...hmmm...aren't most nonprofit (charitable organizations) engaged in pro-social behaviors anyway...isn't that an oxymoron?"
But, I would tend to disagree.
A couple of years ago, I became interested in the area of environmental performance and social responsibility...however, not only among corporations, but in the nonprofit sector as well.
By now, I'm sure that almost everyone is familiar with the terms, "corporate responsibility," "corporate social responsibility," "corporate citizenship," etc., but not too many people are familiar with a similar concept--one that I like to call, "nonprofit social responsibility."
But, what exactly is the social responsibility of the nonprofit sector?
Well, in the corporate realm, we (we being citizens, consumers, stockholders, stakeholders, and yes, even nonprofit "watch-dog" organizations) tend to hold businesses to a certain level of environmental, social, and financial accountability standards and metrics (e.g. the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) and "triple-bottom line" sustainability). And, we will even judge companies based upon their measures of corporate responsibility. Simply think Wal-Mart versus Target...which do you prefer? Why?
Yet the nonprofit sector as a whole remains largely focused on bottom line sustainability -- or, as some would argue, "double-bottom line" sustainability: financial performance and mission-related focus -- and we don't seem to care too much beyond this.
But, should we care?
Should we care if a nonprofit organization fails to engage in environmentally sustainable practices? If it's not an environmental organization, who cares if they recycle? Who cares if they are energy inefficient? At least they have paper and are able to pay the utility bill, right? Should we care if employees in the nonprofit sector are underpaid and earn a salary below a livable wage? I mean, who cares if whether or not nonprofit employees have health care benefits? At least they're making something, right?
Wrong!
I would argue that nonprofit social responsibility should be a major priority in the nonprofit sector. As the sector continues to grow, many nonprofit organizations are beginning to adopt management and organizational principles similar to those of for-profit companies. Although this emulation of the for-profit sector can, in many ways, be beneficial to the operational success and management of nonprofit institutions, it is apparent that not all aspects of these principles have been adopted in whole by the nonprofit community.
However…
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