Effective Environmental Nonprofit Outreach & Stakeholder Engagement Strategies

Abstract

We collaborated with the local environmental non-profit MN350 over the course of a five month period to help them improve their organizational effectiveness. The goal of this project was to gather information from the literature as well as from staff and key volunteers within MN350 as a means of identifying opportunities to improve the functionality of the organization as a whole to more effectively engage a multiracial, statewide base of Minnesotans in the climate justice movement. We conducted a literature review to develop a foundation for our analysis, identifying the key areas from which to assess organizational effectiveness. Volunteer engagement and retention, effective environmental engagement and outreach strategies, as well as internal nonprofit communications strategies were identified by the graduate student team as crucial elements to address in the literature review. We found that the four key volunteer engagement strategies that lead to greater retention are volunteers’ ability to identify with the organization’s values, sense of community, perception of autonomy, and perception of competence. We also found that the literature highlighted the importance of knowledge sharing in nonprofit settings as a vehicle for innovation, problem-solving and enhancing organizational effectiveness. Knowledge sharing within an organization can occur via formal methods such as data management systems, digital communications, meetings, or informal methods such as conversations between staff members.