Claim OwnershipThe Nonprofit CEO Podcast
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Description
Nonprofit CEOs carry decisions they can't fully discuss with their board, their team, or their peers. So they carry them alone.
Each week, Adam Jeske, The Nonprofit CEO Advisor, sits down with a nonprofit CEO to go inside the decisions they carry: the agonizing restructure, the wonky board dynamic, the moment that defined their tenure.
Adam has been in over 230 of these conversations. The patterns are striking and valuable. This podcast surfaces them so you can lead with the perspective most CEOs never get.
For weekly patterns, synthesis, and peer intelligence between episodes, subscribe to The Nonprofit CEO Briefing at nonprofitCEO.com.
9 Episodes
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Jody Levison-Johnson had a big idea and had to decide whether to bet her organization's resources on it. A film was coming out that could either quietly fade or become an inflection point for how the country thinks about the nonprofit sector. She had to decide if Social Current should lead the campaign that followed, and how much to ask her board for. She also talks about the two ways CEOs drift into bad decisions: chasing off-mission funding and refusing to sunset programs they love, plus wh...
Curtis Chang set out to build a nonprofit nobody would ever know by name. He wanted Good Faith to be like Target: the store as the brand, not the founder. Four years later, Curtis, David French, and Russell Moore were at the center of the most prominent faith-and-politics curriculum in the country. A quarter million people had used it. This conversation is about how a founder navigates a pivot, and why market need and relationships sometimes rewrite the plan. He also talks about the two...
Andy Crouch uses a framework from Peter Greer to name a structural problem with honest at the heart of many nonprofits. It's the stakeholder gap, and he argues it creates built-in incentives to not tell the whole truth all the time. And the better you are at fundraising, the more danger you're in. Andy also traces the 40-year collapse of institutional trust to something deeper than politics: the unmasking of prestige as mere dominance. And he makes an unexpected case that the generation comin...
Olivia Mulerwa spent months carrying a decision she couldn't talk about with anyone who didn't already have a stake in the outcome. She needed to have a hard conversation with a beloved board member. The rest of the board was unwilling to even discuss it. She had to decide in isolation. This conversation covers how she made that call, the listening process she used in advance, and the one person she thinks of before making any major decision at Mission ONE. Olivia also talks about stepping ...
Dr. Jennifer Holloran walked into her first board meeting as CEO of American Bible Society and left with a $5 million crisis and a collapsing timeline, with no peers she could call. This conversation covers that decision, how she navigated a pressurized process, and what she wishes she'd had in those first weeks that was lacking. She also talks about the energy calendar she built after hitting a wall, the decisions that still keep her up at night, and what it looks like to lead a legacy organ...
On this episode of The Nonprofit CEO Podcast, hosts Adam Jeske and Krish Kandiah dive into the complex, consequential decisions that shape nonprofit leadership. Krish Kandiah, founder of the Sanctuary Foundation and a key figure in driving the UK’s response to refugee crises, shares his journey from fostering children in his own home to influencing national policy and launching innovative charities. Together, they explore the challenges of starting organizations rooted in personal conviction,...
Phil Buchanan had 48 hours to decide whether he would speak out when it seemed everyone else was staying quiet. We talk about that decision, the actual calculus, and the strategic mistake he thinks many nonprofit CEOs are making right now. He also talks about what nobody told him before he became CEO, the culture he has spent 25 years building, and why standing for nothing is the fastest way to lose trust. Phil is president of the Center for Effective Philanthropy, a research and advisory org...
The role of the nonprofit CEO role is isolating. The decisions are high-stakes, the support is often thin, and the margin for error can literally be life and death. The Nonprofit CEO Podcast is where those decisions get talked about honestly. Hosted by Adam Jeske, The Nonprofit CEO Advisor, this podcast goes beyond theory and best practices to the real choices that define careers and shape communities. If you're a nonprofit CEO navigating tough calls, or you know one who is, this is t...
Welcome to the Nonprofit CEO Podcast, where we dive deep into the toughest decisions leaders face in the nonprofit sector. In this episode, host Adam Jeske talks with Phil Buchanan, CEO of the Center for Effective Philanthropy, for a candid conversation about navigating high-pressure choices and the unique challenges of nonprofit leadership. They explore the delicate balance between organizational safety and mission-driven action, how courage can ripple through the community, and the crucial ...
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