March 10, 2015

Over the past few months we have seen a dramatic increase in organizations using RFPs and RFIs as part of their evaluation process. So, to help your organization meet the new demands of this process, we have put together a few points that will help you see around some of the pitfalls and make your…

March 3, 2015

As a nonprofit, comparing a subscription-based (SaaS) cloud application for finance or donor management to similar traditional installed client/server application can be confusing. It is easy, but misleading, to focus on licensing alone as the basis of comparison.  In fact, this is not an apples-to-apples comparison since many of the costs associated with applications installed…

February 24, 2015

  How much is that?  Are you sure? Consultants, CPAs, attorneys and other professionals have long relied on time & materials billing as a cornerstone of project costing.  When a client approaches with a problem, they estimate the number of hours they will likely need to complete the work and then multiply that by the…

February 16, 2015

When considering a professional consulting resource for a back office systems project (accounting, donor management, HR, etc.), many people immediately assume that they want to find someone local who can complete the project.  The superficial reasons are obvious – why would I want to potentially pay travel costs any time I need to have a…

February 5, 2015

by Jacqueline Tiso I read an interesting article on CFO.com recently regarding “big data”, a term that we are hearing more and more about.  So what is “big data” and why is it important? Big data is the sum of information your organization captures for who it serves and the services it delivers.  So it…

January 21, 2015

In the absence of the right tools and processes, gathering, organizing, validating and presenting the information becomes a labor-intensive, manual exercise that must be repeated at each reporting interval.  Multiply this by the number of funding sources requiring reporting and it can overcome an organization’s finance team. When this goes wrong, there is not only…

January 16, 2015

Sometimes working in nonprofit finance can be frustrating.  A tremendous effort goes into carefully planning, recording and reporting financial information to meet regulatory and funder reporting requirements and provide actionable decision support information to the organization’s management team.  What we hear very frequently is that managers in some organizations seem indifferent about the information that…

December 17, 2014

I heard a great term coined recently: “spreadware”, and thought how apt the term was.  It speaks to the gradual expansion of spreadsheets, manual workarounds and paper processes that develop within an organization when systems are not working as they need to. Almost every organization I meet with has this malaise.  It is a serious…

We all know the story of the “Wizard of Oz” and Dorothy’s journey to follow the yellow brick road in order to reach Emerald City. She chose the path of the unknown and despite all obstacles, the path took her where she needed to be. Like Dorothy’s journey, it is frightening to many nonprofits to…

November 18, 2011

Do you receive payments from the New York State Office for People With Developmental Disabilities (OPWDD), Medicaid payments from the NYS Office of Mental Health (OMH), or the NYS Office of Alcoholism and Substance Abuse Services (OASAS)? If so, you’ll want to investigate late filing penalties association with Consolidated Fiscal Reports (CFR).   In the…

September 15, 2011

Ethics in Fundraising was the topic for last night’s #Fundchat. (#Fundchat is a Twitter chat that takes place every Wednesday night 9:00e.)  Given that participants are limited to 140 characters or less – it was a lively discussion.  Here were the 8 questions that the group discussed: Does your organization embrace the Donor Bill of…

May 12, 2011

By Jacqueline M. Tiso, Founder and CEO of JMT Consulting Group I had the privilege of attending the ITA Spring Meeting and hearing a wonderful keynote speaker, Lt. Col. Rob “Waldo” Waldman.  His topic was based on his business leadership book, Never Fly Solo, and was around the idea of leading with courage while understanding…