Creating a Culture of Learning at Your Nonprofit: 5 Tips

Recruiting and retaining employees can be a challenge for nonprofits. Often working with limited staff and resources, many organizations struggle to compete with businesses in attracting knowledgeable, experienced talent. 

Fortunately, nonprofits can build a strong workforce and improve recruitment and retention rates at the same time by developing a culture of learning. When your work environment encourages and supports employee skill development, your team will provide greater value to your organization. Plus, many employees will likely feel more loyal to an organization that invests in their professional growth. 

To help your nonprofit improve its training programs, this article will cover five strategies for building a culture of learning. 

1. Assess your current training programs.

Before creating new skills development programs, take stock of your current processes. Work with your nonprofit HR team to:

• Gather your team’s perspective: Reach out to employees to gauge where your current training programs are working and where they’re falling short. Develop custom employee surveys that ask targeted questions about all your skills development offerings, particularly your onboarding process, which provides employees with baseline training.
• Determine organizational needs: Look at your nonprofit’s overall performance to identify areas where your team may be falling short. For example, your fundraising team may struggle to develop lasting relationships with major donor prospects, or one of your programs may need someone with a skill set your team currently lacks.
• Evaluate training resources. Before building a new training framework, take stock of the resources you already have. If you can reuse, repurpose, or refine existing materials and processes, you can save time and stay within budget.

Evaluating your existing processes allows you to pinpoint where employees struggle and ensures changes to your training programs address these challenges. Continue to assess your training programs to update them routinely as in-demand skills change, your team expands, or your nonprofit’s strategic and operational goals evolve. 

2. Develop training materials.

High-quality training requires high-quality training materials. Assess what tools your nonprofit already has and what new ones you need to instill a culture of learning in your workplace. When designing your training programs and materials, consider:

• Format: Based on your training processes and goals, determine whether it makes sense to offer physical or online resources. Both options have their pros and cons. Online materials are more accessible, while printouts and in-person workshops add a tactile element to training that makes lessons memorable.
• Training program structure: There are many ways to learn, from formal courses to short modules to on-the-job training. Determine which approach best aligns with your team’s learning styles and the specific skills you want them to develop. For example, an easily shareable recorded walkthrough of how to use your CRM will likely be more efficient than sitting beside employees in person to teach them how to navigate the system.
• Development: Determine if your team has the ability and resources to create the materials you need. Based on your answer, you can decide whether your materials will be created internally by your team, purchased online, or developed in partnership with a consultant. A dedicated nonprofit training platform can help you meet in the middle by enabling you to personalize existing content to fit your organization’s needs and values.

In addition to communicating your training objectives, your learning materials should engage employees. Materials that feel relevant to their work, encourage completion, and make skills development interesting will lead to more employees getting involved, creating a culture of learning. 

3. Get your entire team involved in learning.

Everyone at your nonprofit—not just new employees and managers—should be involved in learning opportunities. When senior team members actively participate in skills development activities alongside junior staff, you can eliminate the stigma of needing help and foster a culture of learning. 

A few strategies for engaging your entire team include: 

• Cross-training: Instead of keeping employees siloed in their individual departments, you can help them expand their skills and get a better sense of how your entire nonprofit operates through cross-training. Cross-training teaches employees the basic duties of other roles by rotating them between departments. Plus, cross-training also encourages senior employees across your nonprofit to get involved in new employees’ training.
• Peer mentors: Pair experienced team members with newer staff to provide ongoing, personalized guidance. This gives new team members someone at your nonprofit, besides their manager, to turn to for help, while giving senior staff an opportunity to refresh their skills by teaching others.
• Peer-leadership opportunities: Give employees opportunities to step up and develop their leadership, managerial, and organizational skills by leading small teams. eCardWidget’s guide to motivating employees emphasizes how these opportunities “can motivate employees by strengthening interpersonal relationships and improving team dynamics. Not to mention, they’ll be able to develop essential leadership skills like communication and delegation.”

In addition to these formal strategies, you can also cultivate a culture of learning in small ways. For example, during daily stand-ups and all-hands meetings, you might encourage staff to share any insights they’ve recently uncovered, whether they’re updates about your sector as a whole or small tips for improving work efficiency. Making knowledge sharing a routine part of your nonprofit encourages collaboration and motivates all team members to expand their skills so they have something valuable to share. 

4. Offer professional development as part of your compensation strategy.

Training isn’t just for new employees. Professional development can be a huge draw to employees looking to advance their careers. In fact, Astron Solutions’ guide to total rewards compensation highlights advancement opportunities as a way for nonprofits to stay competitive in the job market. If your organization can’t compete on base pay, you can improve your compensation packages by including professional development opportunities. 

This can take several forms. You might pay for employees to attend sector-specific conferences and workshops, enabling them to expand their knowledge by connecting with other professionals. Or, you might cover the cost of online courses, giving employees the chance to develop specific skills or earn digital certifications while on the job. 

Highlight these development opportunities prominently in your job descriptions and recruitment materials. Candidates interested in long-term career advancement will value your nonprofit’s willingness to invest in their development, helping you attract motivated talent committed to learning.

5. Be open to feedback.

When you invite employees to play a role in shaping your learning process, you can increase their investment in your programs, ensure your training materials stay up-to-date, and continually measure your training’s effectiveness. 

For collecting feedback, there are two options: 

• Anonymous: When feedback isn’t attached to a specific name, employees are more likely to provide their honest opinions. This can help you gather critical feedback that employees might otherwise hesitate to share. However, this approach makes it difficult to follow up with specific employees regarding their concerns.
• Non-anonymous: By connecting employees to their feedback, you can better track their journeys through your training program and make targeted improvements. Additionally, this can lead to a collaborative development process, as you can reach out to them for clarification on their initial feedback.

No matter which approach you choose, share your overall results with your entire team. This shows you are listening to their concerns and invested in creating better training processes. Outline your improvement plans, and thank everyone who contributed by sharing their thoughts. 

This approach makes employees more likely to continue getting involved in your skills development opportunities, while also helping you make continuous improvements. 

A culture of learning benefits everyone at your nonprofit, from new employees getting their feet under them, to senior staff looking to advance their careers, to leaders happy to have a skilled team. Get started by assessing your current training processes, assembling training materials, and considering new types of professional development programs.