“Bottom line: the folks who work in the sector are the sector.”
– Survey Respondent
Independent Sector CEO Dr. Akilah Watkins conducted a listening tour in 2023-24 and heard about the challenges facing dozens of organizations around the country. The most consistent concerns raised by nonprofits were workforce issues. Nonprofit workers are struggling with burnout and financial insecurity, and nonprofit organizations are struggling to recruit and retain the staff they need. In response to that tour and concerns raised in other contexts, Independent Sector decided to launch its Center on the Nonprofit and Philanthropic Workforce.
The Independent Sector Research team began laying the informational groundwork for the Center in 2025 with a comprehensive review of existing research, programming, policies, and funding connected to the nonprofit workforce; a multipronged stakeholder engagement campaign; and a nationally representative survey of nonprofit employers. Below, we describe that research in more detail and share a few initial themes and findings, including some from the first research brief highlighting new data from our survey of nonprofit employers.
Where Did We Start?
Our comprehensive review of existing information on the nonprofit workforce began in early 2025 and took about one year. In coordination with other teams at Independent Sector, we reviewed:
- Research published on nonprofit workforce issues within the past 10 years, which yielded 61 research articles on the U.S. nonprofit workforce;
- Public policies affecting the nonprofit workforce that were proposed or enacted within the past three years, which yielded 80 national, state, and local policies;
- Capacity-building and workforce development programs for nonprofit staff, which yielded 64 current programs ranging from free online programs to a year-long leadership cohort program costing tens of thousands of dollars; and
- Funders currently addressing workforce issues and nonprofit capacity, which yielded 50 funders and funder collaboratives and information about their funding models.
In addition to these reviews, over the course of 2025 we engaged with nearly 300 stakeholders from around the sector — including charitable nonprofits, academic programs, foundations, and subject matter experts — to get a more detailed sense of the challenges facing nonprofit workers and employers:
- Input was collected from 107 stakeholders through an online survey;
- Approximately 160 stakeholders were engaged through input sessions; and
- IS staff conducted interviews with 17 experts on key workforce topics.
The reviews and stakeholder engagement informed the development of a nationally representative survey of 501(c)(3) nonprofit organizations with at least one employee — the Nonprofit Sector Workforce Survey (NSWS). The NSWS was created in partnership with the Urban Institute’s Center for Nonprofits and Philanthropy, American University, and George Mason University, and data collection occurred in early 2026 in tandem with the National Survey of Nonprofit Trends and Impacts. Survey topics included:
- Number of staff, volunteers, board members, and consultants;
- Pay and benefits;
- Staff turnover and obstacles to retention;
- Training and development needs;
- Volunteer management; and
- Resource sharing with other organizations.
Though this project was primarily meant for internal decision-making at Independent Sector, we’re sharing our learnings for several reasons:
- This information will inform which challenges and opportunities the Center on the Nonprofit and Philanthropic Workforce works on and how Independent Sector approaches those topics. As we build the Center, we hope this foundational information will help people and organizations connect with the Center’s work.
- We believe the task of strengthening the nonprofit workforce must happen in coalition and partnership with other organizations. Sharing findings and ideas may help build those relationships.
- We aim to provide useful information for nonprofit leaders, grantmakers, policymakers, and others advocating for nonprofit workforce development and resources.
- We hope that researchers and practitioners will reach out to share information with us at research@independentsector.org when they encounter our work.
What Do We Know?
Our comprehensive reviews and stakeholder engagement identified complicated, interconnected challenges facing the nonprofit workforce, as well as information and resource gaps. Highly visible workforce challenges reflect less visible structural features of the nonprofit sector: funding models that inadequately support organizational capacity and staffing (e.g., overhead limits and inadequate reimbursement rates); the belief that nonprofit workers can or should accept worse compensation because they care about missions (the ‘passion tax’); and social and economic systems and biases that affect workers across the American workforce.
We identified six top challenges for the nonprofit workforce and five areas where stakeholders need more information and resources. These categories are not mutually exclusive; new research would inform some of the challenges, and the areas with information and resource gaps are also challenging many organizations. These challenges and gaps can also be seen as opportunities for action and change. Both lists are presented in alphabetical order and are not ranked in importance or magnitude.
| Top Challenge Areas | Information & Resource Gaps |
| Diversity, equity, & inclusion | Employee morale & engagement |
| Employee well-being & burnout | Public perception of nonprofit work |
| External instability (funding & politics) | Technology & AI |
| Leadership & organizational culture | Unionization in the sector |
| Pay, benefits, & pay equity | Volunteer engagement |
| Retention & workforce shortages |
Though funding and political disruptions exacerbated these challenges in 2025, workforce issues are chronic across the sector. We do not expect that Independent Sector will be able to address most of these challenges right away or on our own. These issues are complicated, interconnected, and systemic; addressing them will require long-term investments and careful work across coalitions. Nonetheless, identifying these areas of opportunity is a starting point.
We are still reviewing the findings from our 2026 survey of nonprofit employers, but we have published the first results emerging from that survey. We found that among organizations with at least one paid employee, 15% reported having fewer than four employees and 14% had more than 50. Nearly all have board members, most report having volunteers other than board members, and most report hiring paid consultants or contractors. The work of nonprofits is being done by people in a variety of roles. (See Doing the Work of Nonprofits for more detail, including which functions nonprofits rely on these groups to perform.)
What’s Next?
The Independent Sector research team will continue to share the findings of our initial nonprofit workforce research in blog posts, research briefs, and virtual town halls on select topics. Our next focus topics in this series will be volunteers in the nonprofit sector and burnout in the nonprofit workforce. We are pursuing follow-up projects on some of the topics above, including mental health and wellness benefits, and working in collaboration with other researchers and organizations. The data from the 2026 Nonprofit Sector Workforce Survey will be made available for public research use alongside data from the National Survey of Nonprofit Trends and Impacts in late 2026 or early 2027.
If you want to hear about our research, the activities of the Center on the Nonprofit and Philanthropic Workforce, and the other ways Independent Sector advocates for the nonprofit sector, please subscribe to our newsletter.
