My Life and My Work, in Brief

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Reporting Volunteer Labour at the Organizational Level: A Study of Canadian Nonprofits

Volunteer contributions in the production of services are an important resource internationally. However, few countries include volunteer contributions in their national accounts, even though many encourage their populations to engage in volunteering. At the organizational level, many nonprofit organizations using volunteers often limit their input to a footnote in annual reports acknowledging their contribution; few estimate their value in financial terms. As a result, their financial accounts lack information upon which to base decisions affecting the organizations and the communities they serve. Additional information is required to assess the impact of volunteers in individual nonprofits as well as the sector as a whole. This study focuses on Canada, one of the few countries that include volunteers in the national accounts, to examine to what extent nonprofit organizations estimate a financial value for these contributions and include this in their financial statements. This paper reports the results of an online survey of 661 nonprofits from across Canada. In order to understand why some organizations keep records for volunteer contributions and quantify them, two sets of explanatory factors are explored: organizational characteristics and the attitude of the executive director. We find larger organizations were more likely to engage in record keeping and estimating volunteer value, as were organizations with a relatively large group of volunteers and volunteer programs. The attitude of the executive director is important in determining which organizations engage in these practices

The Interchangeability of Paid Staff and Volunteers in Nonprofit Organizations

This article examines the interchangeability of paid and volunteer labor. It reports on estimates and prevalence of such interchangeability through a series of studies of Canadian nonprofits: two national surveys of nonprofit organizations and case studies of two hospitals. The first study found evidence that volunteers were replacing paid staff and that paid staff were replacing volunteers, sometimes in the same organization. The second study explored this pattern further and found the percentage of tasks that were interchangeable. The third study found that about two-thirds of the organizations in the sample agreed that the interchangeability of tasks occurred, but the data indicated that it was limited to about 12% of tasks, not dissimilar to the estimates from the case studies. The implications of the results are discussed, and a model for the interchangeability of paid and volunteer labor is presented

The Moral High Ground: Differentials Among Executive Directors of Canadian Nonprofits

There is a considerable literature, albeit inconclusive, on whether workers in the nonprofit sector are paid less than their counterparts in the private and public sectors. For example, a large national study in the U.S. showed positive and negative differentials for some occupations and industries, but no systematic differences that are sector wide (Leete, 2000). Other studies targeted to specific sub-sectors are mixed in their results: many support these negative wage differentials and others do not (Bond, Raehl, & Pitterle, 1999; Naci Mocan & Tekin, 2003; Naci Mocan & Viola, 1997; Preston, 1989; Shahpoori & Smith, 2005). In comparing the wages offered by for-profit firms and nonprofit organizations, it is helpful to note at the outset that nonprofits often have greater financial restraints than their counterparts in the for-profit sector and, hence, may offer lower wages. But the reverse may also be possible: for-profit firms that are subject to market discipline and responsibility to shareholders may have less scope to offer higher wages to workers. Thus it is not evident, prima facia, whether nonprofits or for-profits, would offer higher wages. Despite the lack of unambiguous evidence for negative wage differentials, nonprofit workers often perceive themselves as underpaid compared to their counterparts in other sectors. A recent survey conducted by the Brookings Institution (Light, 2003) found that nearly half of all paid nonprofit workers in the human services believe they could make more money elsewhere, but they see themselves as driven by mission not money. Another survey reported that current nonprofit executives across all sectors in the U.S. believe that they could have made more money working in another sector (Bell, Moyers, & Wolfred, 2006). Career counsellors and executive placement centres publicize the negative wage differential. For example, a prestigious business school in the U.S. offers financial aid to those students choosing to work in the nonprofit sector because students are interested in public service careers, but their educational debt burden may inhibit them from pursuing these jobs since they tend to provide lower compensation than the for-profit sector (Almanac, 2005, p. 2). Perpetuating the perception of lower wages are several leading websites focused on nonprofit employment. They explicitly inform individuals searching for employment that nonprofit salaries are lower than in other sectors on average. Lynda Ford, a human-resources consultant, maintains that nonprofits offer lower salaries because they compensate employees by creating a good work environment (Klineman, 2004). Furthermore, the hue and cry in the media about some excessive nonprofit salaries has given rise to a tendency to lower executive salaries in the nonprofit sector. In the last few years, federal agencies in the U.S. and Canada are also paying greater attention and giving more scrutiny to executive compensation in the nonprofit sector. Against this background, in this research we examine the perceptions of executive directors in Canadian nonprofits regarding wage differentials in the nonprofit sector compared to the for-profit sector. These perceptions, especially concerning their own wages, are important because it is in this context that executive directors make choices about where to work. This, in turn, determines the managerial labor supply for the sector. We first present a brief review of the theoretical explanations offered by scholars for wage differentials. We then turn to the empirical findings on wage differentials before presenting our findings

A dictionary of the Pathan tribes on the north-west frontier of India

Publisher - Calcutta: Office of the Suptintendent, Government Printing, Indi

An Interactive View of the Social Economy

ABSTRACT In general, the emphasis of social economy theorists has been sectoral; that is, research has emphasized the uniqueness of the social economy, almost as if it is a world apart from the rest of society. This article, in contrast, focuses on the differing forms of interaction between the social economy and other parts of society. The authors use a Venn diagram to illustrate differing forms of interaction between the social economy and other parts of society, and also the fluidity of the social economy. The model presented assumes that the social economy is embedded within society, and some players within the social economy support social norms and others challenge these norms and present a transformative vision.   RÉSUMÉ Généralement, les théoriciens de l'économie sociale se concentrent sur l'approche sectorielle, c'est-à-dire que leurs recherches soulignent le caractère unique de l'économie sociale, presque comme s'il s'agissait d'un monde en marge du reste de la société. Par contraste, cet article envisage les diverses formes que peut prendre l'interaction entre l'économie sociale et les autres sphères de la société. Pour illustrer ces différentes formes d'interaction ainsi que la fluidité de l'économie sociale, les auteurs ont utilisé un diagramme de Venn. Le modèle présenté tient pour acquis que l'économie sociale est partie intégrante de la société. Alors que certains acteurs de l'économie sociale défendent l'existence de normes sociales, d'autres mettent ces normes en doute et proposent plutôt une vision transformatrice.&nbsp