Transitioning from Nonprofit Life to Corporate Life
 

So, long story short, I want to work in external and community relations in the for-profit sector.

How I do dat?

My heart just let out a very sad, sigh. :(

Girrrrrrrl I need the stability. I can't believe I worked someplace for three years which doesn't have a Plan B to keep me.

At a Global Business Coalition event, I met this African dude who worked for a mining company. He had previously done community health work, but was now doing community relations stuff to prevent the spread of HIV among the mining community.

In lieu of actually falling in love with and ultimately marrying him (which was the first plan), I figure I could emulate his career path.

LOL! :D I'm wavering in my nonprofit career path myself. You're my superstar. When you start considering other options, I get skrrrd.

pj i thought you were skrrrd already lol. or maybe it was workplace specific.

Girl you didn't hear? I got suckered BACK IN. She won't let me go.

lol nah, i need an update.

Okay, so one of my pet peeves about looking for new work:

EVERYBODY'S DAMN SUGGESTIONS.

I am the Director of Development and Communications for a smallish nonprofit org with a budget of around half a million dollars.

My ideal job titles for my next job are:

• Director of Development and Communications
• Director of Development
• Director of Communications
• Director of Alumni Relations (At a private school)
• Associate/Assistant Director of Annual Giving, Donor Relations, Donor Stewardship, etc, etc (At a university)

If I take a step down in title, it needs to be for a larger organization, like a university, or something the size of the Human Rights Campaign or the Red Cross.

Please, friends of Senusret I, do not send me jobs with the title Operations Manager. Even if they have given that job fundraising responsibilities, it is because they are being cheap and want their secretary to write grants.

Also do not send me jobs I am not qualified for. Yes, the salary would be AWESOME, but I do not yet have ten years of fundraising experience. Have we met?

And just because I am a writer does not mean I want to be an editor in a communications department. I write novels.

Ultimately, if I stay in development, I really want to work with people, not complex and political government grants.

End rant.

Just a question - are you looking to stay in the DC area?

Yes.

Putting titles aside, because the equivalent job in one company/organization might not be the same in the next, here are some questions to think about. You can answer them here and people might be able to help, or you can use the answers to help frame the type of jobs you should be targeting.

• What are your current duties/responsibilities?
• If different (new things you want to do, or things that you definitely don't like/want to do), what duties and responsibilities are you looking for in your new job?
• What are deal-breakers?
• Are you more people-oriented or project-oriented? In other words, are you better at managing people, or managing projects? Can you do both, or are you better at one versus the other?
• Think ahead to the job after the next one you hope to get. What would you want that job to look like? What are the typical qualifications for that job?

Another question - have you looked into using a head hunter? My husband gets several calls a week for jobs (albeit in a different industry), and he's not actively looking.

Thanks for the help. I may think about using a head hunter.

Those questions are sort of personal, but I have answered nearly all of them on my own, and it's helped me to efficiently apply for the positions which I've interviewed for in the past year. The two most promising ones were Director of Development for a small scholarship fund (essentially a family foundation) which did not hire me, and Director of Development for a national student organization dealing with a health issue. That job decided to cancel the position and start a search for a Deputy Director instead, which I was not interested in. (It was not related to fund-raising)