I received an e-mail message this week from Crain's Detroit Business with "Special Report: Nonprofit Pay" in the subject line. Intrigued, I opened the message to see several friendly faces smiling at me. That's always a nice thing--happy, smiling people. Directly next to these smiling faces were the organization names that these happy people work for, along with the salaries earned by these same smiling people. In some cases (ok, all cases), those salaries would make me a happy smiler too...but that's not really the point, is it? So, what is the point, you ask? Let me tell you.
Those working in the top ranks of nonprofit organizations know (or should know) that information about their compensation is a matter of public record, a la the IRS Form 990. As Crain's Detroit Business pointed out in the e-mail, they "spent the past several months combing through 990 forms and conducting additional research to gather nonprofit salary, benefits and bonus information."
Embracing transparency through disclosure is a key concept for those "doing business" in the nonprofit sector. The same is true, I might add, for high-rank individuals in public companies. Disclosure about compensation is a federal requirement overseen by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Still, I would think that seeing your picture displayed along with what feels like very personal information would be somewhat jolting, even if you have embraced all facets of nonprofit transparency.
Crain's Detroit Business is by no means the only media company that publishes compensation information. The Chronicle of Philanthropy routinely reports on the compensation of nonprofit chief executives. In addition to Detroit, the Crain's family of business and special interest publications includes Crain's New York Business, Crain's Chicago Business, and Crain's Cleveland Business, but I couldn't locate a nonprofit salary survey being sold in any other Crain's city. It makes me wonder, why Detroit? And, can a similar survey for Cleveland be far behind?
--Cindy Bailie
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