Charities Say Staff Shortages Hamper Their Ability to Deliver Services

Nearly 40 percent of American charities say they have too few staff members to effectively deliver their programs or services, according to a new survey released Wednesday.

The survey also found that about one out of every three nonprofit groups had cut staff size in recent months and that many more had taken a variety of steps, including increasing employee workloads, that usually strain a work force.

The survey was conducted by the Johns Hopkins Center for Civil Society Studies, in Baltimore, as part of the Listening Post Project, a research effort to examine issues facing nonprofit groups.

It included 526 nonprofit organizations and covered the six-month period from October 2009 through March 2010.

A similar Listening Post survey covering an earlier time frame — from October 2008 through March 2009 — also found significant job losses and other employee cutbacks.

“The pressures on nonprofits have accelerated and are clearly taking their toll,” Lester Salamon, the report’s author and director of the Johns Hopkins center, said in a written statement. “Organizations have shown enormous resilience and commitment to their critical missions, but this has come at a price.”

Adding to Duties

To weather financial difficulties brought on by the down economy, nonprofit groups have taken other measures that place a strain on their employees and impair their ability to provide programs and services, the report says.

Nearly half of the respondents in the survey said they had refined job descriptions, often a euphemism, the report says, “for increasing employee workloads and assigning responsibilities of laid-off staff to the remaining employees.”

Nearly 40 percent of the respondents had instituted a salary freeze, and 36 percent had postponed filling new positions. About one-quarter of the groups had increased the number of hours employees work, and the same proportion of respondents had reduced benefits or cut them altogether.

The survey also found that many charities are leaning on volunteers and contract or part-time employees to maintain existing levels of operation.

This was especially true, the survey found, among arts and culture groups.

Well over half of all the museums, orchestras, and theaters in the survey said they had increased their reliance on volunteers, compared with 34 percent that reported doing so over all.

Slight Employment Gain

In spite of all the cutbacks, the report says, overall employment among the responding organizations actually increased by 0.4 percent between October 2009 and March 2010.

That finding contrasts with the overall 0.4-percent decline in all nongovernment jobs in the country during the same time, according to the report.

Indeed, 23 percent of the survey respondents added jobs during the six-month period and 46 percent reported no change.

Only 21 percent of the respondents say they expect to cut their work force over the next six months.