• Where is your organization's leadership stretched?

    About two minutes, and you'll leave with a name for what's been wearing your team down. No email needed to see your result. – Matt

  • {pick}

  • Where is your organization's leadership stretched?

    About two minutes, and you'll leave with a name for what's been wearing your team down. No email needed to see your result. – Matt
  • First, who's answering?*
  • What kind of organization is it?*
  • Let's start with the gut check. Which one is loudest right now?*
  • Let's start with the gut check. Which one is loudest right now?*
  • Let's start with the gut check. Which one is loudest right now?*
  • In mission work the leader is often the last line of defense, and it shows. In the Center for Effective Philanthropy's 2024 survey of 239 nonprofit leaders, a third said they were very concerned about their own burnout. That's rarely a stamina problem. It's a design problem.
  • When you look at why the organization still depends on one person, what feels most true?
  • Programs grow on grants; management capacity rarely does. One estimate put nonprofit spending on leadership development at $29 a person, against $120 in the private sector. When nobody budgets for leading, people learn it on the job, and that's a design problem.
  • Where does growth show the strain first?
  • Burnout is the culture issue nonprofit leaders name most. In CEP's 2024 survey, 95 percent of leaders were concerned about it, and 76 percent said staff burnout was already affecting their ability to deliver the mission. That's a design problem before it's a resilience problem.
  • What's the clearest sign the culture is wearing thin?
  • Plans stall when the work to deliver them is never paid for. Bridgespan's "nonprofit starvation cycle" research found typical foundation grants allow 10 to 15 percent for overhead, while comparable service businesses run above 20.
  • Plans stall when the work to deliver them is never resourced. In MissionSquare's 2025 survey of 382 state and local governments, about a third rated managing the workload, when staff are at their limit and new staff can't be hired, as a very important issue. A plan that assumes spare capacity is a design problem.
  • When momentum fades, what do you notice first?
  • Nonprofit leadership changes hands more often than boards plan for. In BoardSource's national survey, only 27 percent of nonprofits had a written succession plan for the chief executive, so most new leaders inherit a seat nobody designed.
  • Public leadership changes hands more often than anyone plans for. In MissionSquare's 2025 survey, 61 percent of state and local governments had no formal succession planning process, so most new leaders inherit a seat nobody designed.
  • What feels most uncertain in the role?
  • What feels most uncertain in the role?
  • What feels most uncertain in the role?
  • Thanks. When things start to go off track, what's your instinctive move?
  • Halfway there. Your answers already point to one pattern. Two more and I'll show you what it is, why it keeps coming back, and where I'd start.
  • What kind of help would make the biggest difference right now?
  • Last one. Six months from now, what would make you say: that was worth it?
  • Ready to talk it through?
    Book 30 minutes with Matt
  • Ready to talk it through?
    Book 30 minutes with Matt
  • Should be Empty: