This document provides an overview of Charity Navigator's Leadership & Adaptability Beacon methodology and scoring criteria. It discusses key leadership practices like vision, mission, strategy, and adaptability. Charity Navigator evaluates whether nonprofits have a vision statement, mission statement, and strategic plan. It also looks at investment in leadership development and external resource mobilization. Adaptability is scored based on an example of how an organization adapted to external changes. The goal is to help nonprofits understand these best practices to improve performance.

1. Charity Navigator
Masterclass
Session 3:
Leadership &Adaptability Beacon

2. Today’s Experts
Laura Andes
Chief Program Officer
Charity Navigator
Jeremy Ladyga
Nonprofit Board Consultant
OnBoard

3. Our mission: Make governance simple, effective, and secure
Helping nonprofits simplify governance
so they can focus on their mission and
accelerate their impact
● Making board meetings informed, seamless, and uncomplicated
● Transforming board collaboration and communication
● Innovating every day to empower modern boards
Helping today’s leaders create a better world
About OnBoard

4. Our mission: Make impactful giving easier for all
Helping people turn their values,
passions, and beliefs into meaningful
change and impact
● Providing the data, ratings, and advice that cut through the noise
● Supporting donors to make informed choices that turn intent into action
● Partnering with nonprofits to define strategic objectives that matter
Building a bridge of trust for all to cross
About Charity Navigator

5. Help Nonprofits understand the importance of key Leadership
practices to improve their organization
Today’s Goals
Provide a deeper understanding of the Leadership &
Adaptability Beacon’s methodology and scoring criteria
Offer tips and best practices for effectively engaging with your
Leadership &Adaptability rating

6. A Quick Poll
Are you a board member or a nonprofit leader?
1. Board Member
2. Nonprofit Leader
3. Just interested

7. Our Ratings
RATINGS
Drawing from a knowledge base of research, analysis,
and constituent feedback, our team develops ratings that
are both analytical and responsive to the data needs of
our site users.
Eligible charities receive a zero to four-star star rating —
this is determined by the weighted sum of the
organization’s individual beacon scores (0-100).

8. Providing Guidance Through Beacons
Our Encompass Rating System provides a comprehensive
analysis of charity performance across four key domains, which
we call "beacons."
Nonprofit Effectiveness

9. Understanding A Charity Rating: What does it mean?
This is a four-star charity with
a 93% overall rating
They have earned two beacons:
- Accountability & Finance
(90%)
- Leadership &Adaptability
(10%)
These individual beacon scores
are combined* to create the
aggregate score.
Incomplete beacons are
“unscored”
This is a four-star charity
with a 100% overall rating
They have earned four beacons:
- Accountability & Finance
(32.5%)
- Leadership &Adaptability
(7.5%)
- Impact & Results (50%)
- Culture & Community
(10%)
These individual beacon scores
are combined* to create the
aggregate score
*We use a weighted average to of beacon scores to create the overall numeric
score. The weighting is based on the number of beacons earned. The weights are in
parenthesis.
Pro-Tip: 80% of donors say that they would rather donate to a
“complete” rating than one with just 1 or 2 beacons, even if it is a
lower overall score.

10. Leadership &Adaptability
Using the Charity Navigator framework to
improve your nonprofit’s performance

11. Defining Leadership
Multiple definitions and types of leadership.
The Bridgespan Group identified the
following skills and competencies for
nonprofit leadership:
- Leaders must lead the organization with
strategic thinking, decision making
change management
- Must lead others
- Endorse and embody the core values
and beliefs of the organization.
“Nonprofit leadership involves guiding
an organization toward its mission and
goals while adhering to ethical
principles, fostering collaboration, and
mobilizing resources to create positive
social impact.”

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Mission, Vision &
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CORE ASSUMPTIONS
● Nonprofits are at various stages of maturity,
have different business models, constituencies,
and resources
● Our approach to Leadership and Adaptability
focuses on critical components that evidence
suggests is necessary for nonprofit
effectiveness.
● We score only on the presence or absence of
these components
● We do not score on their quality.
● We do believe that an organization that
demonstrates each of these components is
likely to be MORE IMPACTFUL & MORE
EFFECTIVE than those without.
Charity Navigator’s View of Leadership &Adaptability

13. Mission, Vision
and Strategy
Charity Navigator metrics
❏ Presence of a vision statement
❏ Presence of a mission
statement
❏ Presence of a strategic plan
and goals

14. Vision Statement
Vision statement describes how the world would
look if you completed your mission.
● Gives your beneficiaries, donors, and
volunteers a clear idea of the impact of your
work
● Vision statements are usually between
5-20 words
“Organizations with a well-defined
purpose/vision statement perform
better than the industry average”
~Harvard Business Review
Examples:
Create a world where no child
goes to bed hungry.
~Feed the Children
To make our oceans as rich,
healthy, and abundant as they
once were.
~Oceana

15. Mission Statement
A Mission Statement is a definition of the nonprofit’s focus,
who it serves, what it does, its objectives, and its approach to
reaching those objectives.
Evidence suggests that:
● a strong mission and vision statement sets the
“tone & statement of purpose” for an
organization 1
● Effective mission statement generate “feelings
that a particular organization is successful” and
it is “inspiring and motivating” 2
● Donors are motivated by missions statements
1. Bart 1998, Mission Matters, Business Horizons 40, (6) 9-19
2. Cochran et al 2008, “ A framework for developing an Effective Mission Statement” J. of Business Strategies.
Examples:
Our mission is to provide a free,
world‐class education for anyone,
anywhere.
~Khan Academy
Bringing clean and safe drinking water
to people in developing countries
~Charity Water

16. What makes a good mission statement?
Last year, Candid did a study of the relationship between mission statement and
fundraising.
They offered the following tips:
● Include your organization’s beneficiary and philosophy as central pieces of
your nonprofit’s mission statement.
● If your organization’s annual budget is less than $1 million, make the tone
of your mission statement as positive as possible. This should be a hopeful
message focused on your philosophy and vision for the world you’re
working to create.
● Conversely, if your organization’s annual budget is more than $1 million,
consider putting more emphasis on the problem you’re working to solve
and create a statement with language that skews slightly less positive in
tone
https://blog.candid.org/post/non-profit-mission-statement-fundraising-success/
Charity
Navigator does
not score the
quality, content
of your
mission/vision
statement- just
that you have
one.

17. 49%
The number of nonprofits without a strategic plan based on a
2016 survey of nonprofit leaders.

18. Strategy & Goals: Linking Mission and Vision to Action
Evidence suggests that
● Strategic planning has a positive
impact on organizational
performance in the private and
public sectors, across
international settings.
● The formality of the strategic
planning processes (i.e., the
extent to which strategic
planning includes internal and
external analyses and the
formulation of goals, strategies,
and plans) is important to
enhancing organizational
performance.
Charity Navigator’s view:
● Charities are asked to provide
their three most important
strategic goals, along with primary
reasons their organizations have
committed to implementing these
goals.
● The presence of a well
thought-out strategic plan
indicates a thoughtful considered
approach to carrying out an
organization's mission
● It should include strategic goals
and strategies to achieve those
goals.
● The absence of a plan indicates
either an immature organization
or an unfocused one.

19. Leadership
Charity Navigator Metrics
❏ Does the organization invest in
Leadership Development?
❏ Does the Leadership have a
focus on mobilizing for mission?

20. Leadership Development
Charities are asked if they invest in leadership
development
● Nonprofits often under invest in nonprofit
leadership development!
● The for-profit sector spent around $1,200
per employee on professional development
last year.
● Charity Navigator wants & encourages the
sector to invest in leadership development
$29
The average amount per employee
the social sector spent on leadership
development in 2015

21. External Mobilization of Resources
How does the leadership of your organization
(staff and/or board) focus externally to
mobilize for the mission of the organization?
❏ Participate in networks or collective impact
efforts to develop shared goals across multiple
organizations.
❏ Engage in thought leadership activities such as
presenting at conferences, publishing research,
etc.
❏ Raise awareness of mission and cause through
marketing activities, social media, etc.
❏ Community building, training and/or organizing.
❏ Local, state, and/or federal policy advocacy.
❏ Other (please specify)
Why is this important?
Organizations can’t solve the big issues they
tackle without engaging stakeholders around
them.
“Management wisdom says that nonprofits must be
large and in charge to do the most good. But some of
the world’s most successful organizations instead stay
small, sharing their load with like-minded, long-term
partners. The success of these networked nonprofits
suggests that organizations should focus less on
growing themselves and more on cultivating their
networks.”
~SSRI The Networked Nonprofits

22. Adaptability Charity Navigator Metric
❏ Share a story of Adaptability

23. Adaptability
● Covid & 2020, taught us that
adaptability is key for nonprofit
success.
● Even in normal times,
organizations must have a
culture of learning to be
impactful.
● The nonprofit has an
opportunity to tell the story of
how the organization adapted
to any external changes in the
last year.

24. Great example
Submission of a large National Animal
Shelter Network
● Shows a finding using data
● Outlines several means of
adapting to the challenge to
improve their program!
“Charity X recently published our 2022 animal sheltering dataset and
analysis, the most comprehensive and accurate to date. With data from
85% of U.S. shelters, we learned that the nation experienced a setback in
lifesaving for the second year in a row. In 2022, around 378,000 dogs and
cats were killed in shelters just because they didn’t have homes. While the
number of no-kill shelters increased to 57%, our analysis revealed that
intake was up, the national save rate was down, and dog adoptions lost
ground to breeder purchases. We responded to external factors affecting
national lifesaving in these and other ways:
1. Expanded the shelter collaborative program, which facilitates
peer mentorships between no-kill organizations and shelters that
aren’t yet no-kill
2. Helped big dogs find homes through dog-focused initiatives,
local and national adoption campaigns, and behavioral programs
3. Fought housing and insurance policies that discriminate against
families with certain dog breeds because housing barriers are the
top reason dogs are surrendered to shelters
4. Helped tackle the veterinary shortage and a pandemic-induced
spay/neuter backlog through a new program that trains shelter
veterinarians to safely spay or neuter more animals in a day …..etc
(shortened for clarity)”

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Mission, Vision &
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Many free or low-cost resources on Leadership for
Nonprofits:
- National Council on Nonprofits has great
resources on Strategic Planning
- Nonprofit Leadership Lab has free resources on
leadership training
- Your local State Nonprofit Association has many
free or low cost resources for nonprofits
- Onboard has resources within the site.
More resources to support your Leadership Journey

26. Ask us About
Leadership &Adaptability!
Q&A Session

27. The Charity Navigator
Masterclass
Presented by OnBoard x Charity Navigator
Session 4: Impact & Results Beacon | Oct. 20 @ 2pm ET
Sign Up Now!
An exclusive four part series that explores how
and why Charity Navigator rates nonprofits,
covers each Charity Navigator Beacon in detail.
Next Session Details

28. Who uses Charity Navigator?
Small individual
donors
Every day donors who want
to make sure they are giving
to an effective, impactful &
trustworthy organization
“I will not donate to a charity
unless they receive a 3 or 4 star
on Charity Navigator”
- Debbie who gives $5-10K per
year
Foundations and
grant makers
Foundations of all sizes use
Charity Navigator as an
initial due diligence screen
“We use Charity Navigator as
an initial screening tool when
reviewing applications- if they
are not a 3 or 4 star charity,
they don’t move on”
- Foundation Program Officer
Institutional DAFs
Use it when researching
recommendations for high
net worth philanthropists
“I provide giving
recommendations to high net
worth individuals. A lot of my
research is on Charity
Navigator”
- DAF advisor