In a perfect world, the generosity of God’s people would be so extravagant that your nonprofit would borrow zero. But we don’t live in a perfect world. Sometimes there is an opportunity to grow before all the funding has come in. Sometimes there is a strategic expansion that feels urgent. Som...

  From an accounting perspective, net assets are simple. Assets minus liabilities equals net assets. But from a governance perspective? Net assets are one of the most misunderstood numbers on your financial statements — and one of the most important. After more than three decades in nonprofi...

 In my 3 decades of experience as a CPA, nonprofit CFO, and now a fractional CFO serving churches and nonprofits, I’ve sat through more board meetings than I can count. And across organizations of every size and mission, I see the same issue surface again and again: Board members are expected to...

     I often talk about the two most common financials of a nonprofit- the Statement of Financial Position and the Statement of Activities. Well, those two terms can be easily confused since they sort of sound alike. So today, I'm going to share a helpful way of remembering these two common repor...

     I’m often asked questions like, “What should a nonprofit treasurer be doing?” or “How should the board be engaged in the finances?” So, this is the first in a new series of articles to address questions like these. This series will not cover what the role of a treasurer is, because I’ve alre...

How can we create a reserve fund and manage it effectively?  How to Find Your Reserve Funds on Financial Statements      Reserve funds represent the net income after expenses from prior years that are held by the nonprofit and not needed for the current year’s operations. So how do we find our ...

  The most common question that I’ve been continually asked since starting my nonprofit financial consulting practice is, “How do you use QuickBooks to track restricted funds and how do you enter their transactions and find balances?” Well, in this three part series, I'm tackling that question. I...

    Year end financial planning is one of the most critical things you'll do in a nonprofit organization. So, as we approach the end of the calendar year, I want to encourage board members and Executive Directors by giving you some concrete steps to help you focus on your financial situation and ...

     As nonprofit organizations, we have to remain committed to protecting and stewarding all of our resources. Yet, I’m often asked, “What do you actually do? How do you even do that if you only have a small staff with one finance member?”  To help with these common questions, I've provided a se...

Nonprofit Ratios: Debt to Net Assets Decisions about debt can be very daunting. In fact, they can actually sink a nonprofit in a very short period of time. So today, let's take a look at the debt to net asset ratio, which is a very important metric to consider when evaluating the strength of you...