How to transition back to nonprofit from corporate?

August 7, 2024 5:46 PM

Started career in nonprofit. Then got my MBA and went corporate. Now I'm looking to go back to nonprofit, but I can't seem to get a response to any of my job applications. I have guesses as to why, but would like more perspective.

I've always wanted to do good with my career. After college, I very specifically only applied for jobs in the nonprofit sector. I ended up working jobs for large think tanks and universities, mostly focused on marketing. But I always felt underutilized and just extremely bored with my roles. I also couldn't tell if I was making the impact that I wanted to. So I decided to go corporate, but try to stay as mission driven as possible. And all with the end goal of transitioning back to nonprofit after I gained some great skills.

To do this, I got my MBA and then worked various roles at "do gooder" companies (bcorps, strong sustainability initiatives, etc). All still in marketing. I went from zero dollar budgets in nonprofit to owning $50 million marketing budgets in corporate.

I've learned a ton and also miss the nonprofit spirit. I think it's time for me to bring what I've learned back to the nonprofit sector. As I worked on the space before, I clearly understand the salary tradeoffs, etc. But I am not getting a single response to any of my job applications. I feel like I know why--when I was working nonprofit, I definitely thought MBAs were the worst and I certainly didn't want to work with one. But maybe something else is going on? I am confident I am qualified (probably overqualified). I talk about my nonprofit experience and love for the sector as much as I can in my letters and my resume. What am I missing?

posted by dede to Work & Money (8 answers total)

Having started my career in nonprofits and shifted to for-profit as well, and sat on a nonprofit board for several years, my guess would be that they think that you’re expecting a lot more in terms of salary than they can pay.

This post has some suggestions on ways to address this in a cover letter, which I don’t love personally, but might give you some ideas.
posted by anotheraccount at 5:55 PM on August 7 [2 favorites]

You may also want to emphasize, if this is the case, that you are looking for a long term position. Emphasize your connection to the local community if relevant and your alignment with the non-profit's mission (rather than your love of the sector). Job churn in marketing, communications and fundraising in the non-profit world can be high. If I saw someone who had switched roles a lot, had an MBA, had managed larger budgets than we could ever hope to have, and probably would be taking a major pay cut, I'd be pretty suspicious that this person was likely to stay for a year or two and then move on. But yes, I think the MBA could be working against you as well (depending on the type of non-profit).
posted by ssg at 7:26 PM on August 7 [2 favorites]

I work at a decently-funded national nonprofit, and $50 million is more than twice the annual budget for our whole organization. I assume you're providing that number to us for context and not including it in your resume and cover letter, but if by chance if you are - please take it out. You've made a good case above that you want to come back into nonprofit for the right reasons, but it can definitely smack of "I made my money, now I want to play" to focus on work that's more complex and resourced than the average nonprofit will ever need. So you can acknowledge the salary tradeoffs, but you also have to acknowledge the resource tradeoffs. Do you know how to do more with less? Are you willing to roll up your sleeves and write copy for flyers and edit the website? Because our VP does that. Our Chief Strategy Officer makes decks. Somehow you have to show that you won't get bored, or resentful of things you can't do because there's no money, and also that you won't try to be the smartest person in the room / on the Zoom just because you have an MBA. This is really hard to do in a cover letter!

I think you should consider a dedicated networking campaign and focus on finding your next job through personal referrals: people who can make warm introductions and assure their connections that you are sincere in your intent and realistic about the work you're about to undertake. You might even be able to find some project /consulting work this way, which could lead to a permanent job or bridge the gap from your current role. (Have you thought of being a consultant?)

One last thought: Have you considered universities? They often love advanced degrees and outside credentials, especially for professional staff within academic units. Before I moved into my current role, I worked in marketing/comms in higher ed for several decades. Our budgets fluctuated with enrollment and/or the economy, but we weren't trying to do everything on a shoestring. Large hospital systems might be another sector that would value, and not be intimidated by, corporate experience.
posted by Sweetie Darling at 7:38 PM on August 7 [11 favorites]

Have you thought about government roles? Especially local government.
posted by Barbara Spitzer at 12:45 AM on August 8

What sector are you looking at? In heath-related fields, many people working at large non profits have MDs, PhDs, or MPHs. Presumably legal organizations like ACLU hire a lot of JDs. I don't think anyone would think twice about an MBA, it would be expected for certain roles and you certainly wouldn't be considered overqualified. Smaller, grass roots orgs might be different though.
General advice- keep networking. Focus on large orgs that hire corporate people (BMGF, United Way, etc). Focus on a sector- saying "I want to work in non-profit" is the equivalent of saying you want to work in a private corporation. What do you mean? Environment, health, education, international development, community advocacy, civil rights? I wonder if you might be overestimating your experience if you're applying to roles in a field where you don't have subject matter expertise. You need to convince them why you would be a good fit for a particular job, not why you want to work for a nonprofit.
posted by emd3737 at 1:59 AM on August 8 [1 favorite]

The big CDFIs tend to have a lot of MBAs on their lending teams and people bounce back and forth between them and the banks, so there's less skepticism about MBAs and mission fit than at some other non-profits. Because that's a real thing and I can imagine it could be keeping you out of the interview pool at some of the more progressive non-profits.

Otherwise, strongly co-signing everything Sweetie Darling wrote. And adding to the "smartest person in the room comment" that people from the private sector often love the idea that they'll bring efficiencies & best practices & lessons from the "real" corporate world to the poor/backwards non-profit sector - be really careful you're not bringing that vibe. It is so deeply off putting and just wrong in that most non-profit people are so used to doing so much with so little money that it's laughable someone with a $50 million budget could find an efficiency they haven't already discovered (not that new perspectives are bad, just sometimes people make weird assumptions).
posted by snaw at 3:07 AM on August 8 [7 favorites]

I work at a non-profit and hire people here. I've had way too many people thinking that the non-profit sector is somehow easier or backwards and just needs enlightenment from people leaving the corporate world to now do good things with their life. It's up there with people wanting to "retire" from their fancy tech gig to "give back" and take the obviously easy job of teaching school, I guess because since teachers are paid so little it must be easier?

Not saying that's where you are coming from, but I've had enough people thinking that because they made more money, that they know more, or know everything worth knowing, and are coming to help out us poor benighted underpaid non-profit workers. I'm not sure how best to undercut that, or make it clear that you are different, but probably not talking about the huge budgets you managed would help? Clearly describing your motivation in a way that doesn't imply that the non-profit sector is a place for former corporate folks to atone for their capitalist sins. Directly addressing the salary expectations and trade offs up front (ideally without implying that you're slumming it.) Articulate what you like or want from a job in the non-profit sector in a positive way. Consider downplaying the MBA - leave the initials off your name at the top of your resume, for example, unless you're applying for a finance position.
posted by gingerbeer at 10:13 AM on August 8 [1 favorite]

I work at a non-profit in a finance-adjacent capacity, and in a recent hiring process we had some MBAs apply. The credential alone was neither preferred nor disqualifying, but to build on snaw's and gingerbeer's comment, several of them spoke in their cover letters about how they would use that expertise to build our business. And that was a pretty strong indicator that they did not understand what we are trying to do.

We are a values-driven organization. We are not profit-driven, we are not looking to grow and make more money. There is talk of sustainability, but when we are being our best selves, we are trying to work ourselves out of a job; the sustainability should be in the programs leading to beneficiaries not needing the funding that flows through us to continue to reap the rewards of those programs. We did not invite any of those MBA applicants to further discussion. We did, on the other hand, seriously entertain applications from a few people who were overqualified in other ways, because their cover letters gave a clear sense of how the transition would still make sense for them personally.

One thing I don't think anyone has said yet is that right now the job market is flooded with applicants. That last hiring process we conducted we had over a hundred applicants for a posting that was live for two weeks. We interviewed five. Nobody has the time to given individualized feedback to that many people why we didn't advance them. It sucks. At least in our case, we have a hiring management system to assist us in letting people know definitively they weren't moving forward. But not hearing anything back is just the norm right now*, and may not actually reflect on your resume/cover much at all. I'm sure we missed some people who could have worked out great, the resume and cover just didn't tell us that story, and that's always going to happen when so many people are applying. Maybe it's also worth noting that of those 100+ applicants we had to reject pre-interview, less than a handful followed up to ask if we had any feedback as to why. And we DID have time to give more personalized feedback to the two or three who asked.

*And maybe forever more. There is a vicious cycle that has been happening for a while between automated application software on behalf of both applicants and hirers. As hirers get more applications, they are forced to be more selective. As hirers get more selective, applicants are forced to broaden their search and apply for positions that are at best a stretch. That was always, true, but the software makes it so EASY for applicants to send their resume to every position, and so easy for the hirers to batch reject. Or in some cases to never even see some applications because there's automated rejection based on keyword searches, but at least our system doesn't do that, and I hope it never does. I *like* exploring candidates with varied backgrounds, and I know I'm not alone in that. But some of the resumes we got were so off the wall, and with no cover letter making the case because it was just click-and-forget from monster.com or whatever, that all we could do was say "no thanks" and move on.
posted by solotoro at 10:49 AM on August 8 [3 favorites]