Nonprofit treasurers are responsible for more than financial management. As a key member of your board of directors, the treasurer plays an important role in all financial aspects of your organization. This might include providing detailed reports, ensuring transparency, effectively communicating your organization’s financial strategies, and complying with all laws and regulations. Read on for more!
The role of a nonprofit treasurer extends beyond just managing or overseeing your organization’s finances. As a leader in your board of directors, your treasurer will navigate complex financial details, remain transparent, and clearly communicate your organization’s financial needs and strategies.
Finding an individual with critical and strategic thinking skills is crucial when choosing your nonprofit treasurer. It’s also important that you provide this person – and your entire financial team – with tools and software to help them perform their duties.
A nonprofit treasurer is an essential member of your organization’s board of directors. Nonprofit treasurers are responsible for overseeing all financial aspects of your organization, including regular financial reports, financial transparency, and compliance with IRS and state laws and regulations.
Before you choose someone to fill this role, create a nonprofit treasurer job description that details role responsibilities and includes the following qualities:
A nonprofit treasurer’s duties may be more varied than you think!
As a board member, your nonprofit’s treasurer is responsible for several duties attributed to all members, including:
A treasurer holds a leadership position on your board and has the following additional responsibilities:
The tools your nonprofit treasurer may use will depend on the size and needs of your organization. You can integrate many of these tools and streamline financial processes, improve accuracy, and enhance transparency across your nonprofit.
All nonprofits must produce the following four financial statements annually for the IRS and include them with their taxes. Your treasurer can assist in creating or reviewing these statements.
As you research software tools, look for options to help develop these statements to save your finance team valuable time and effort.
A primary role of your nonprofit treasurer is assisting with fundraising, primarily from the donor and funds management side. Many online fundraising platforms offer donor management systems that can help your treasurer track and analyze donations. These donor management tools let treasurers view when and why revenue came into your organization and help them know which gifts are restricted to specific programs and projects.
Donorbox has a simple and comprehensive donor management system where online donor and donation information is automatically stored when a gift is made. Nonprofits can also easily import offline donations and tag the solicitation communication channel, event, or campaign. You can natively integrate Donorbox with other third-party tools like Salesforce for advanced capabilities.
In addition, organizations can further automate their accounting process by sending automatic, customized tax receipts to donors and integrating Donorbox with Quickbooks or Stripe.
Donorbox also makes developing financial reports simple for treasurers and other members of your financial team with Donor Reporting Templates. Easily access New Donors, Donor Overview, and LYBUNT reports using the Donorbox platform.
A well-known platform, Blackbaud has several fundraising and data management services for nonprofits. Blackbaud Raiser’s Edge NXT helps nonprofit treasurers develop financial reports and strategies. This tool includes several features to help your organization save time and effort, including:
Pro tip: Integrate Blackbaud with Donorbox to get the most out of these powerful platforms!
Accounting software can streamline several processes for your financial team and treasurer. It also ensures that data is stored accurately and securely, and helps with pulling this data into financial reports and statements.
Quickbooks is the most well-known accounting software tool. Nonprofits benefit from its simplicity and in-depth record-keeping process. This software can also help nonprofits stay compliant with IRS and state regulations and laws and develop the required financial statements. Plus, you can use Zapier to integrate Donorbox with Quickbooks to make keeping track of your donor records even easier.
There are discounted prices available for nonprofits using Quickbooks. Each of Quickbook’s three plans allows nonprofits to import and export income and expenses, send invoices and payments, create detailed reports, and manage cash flow.
The Advanced plan lets organizations manage employee expenses and batch invoices and expenses. Its Enterprise plan includes built-in templates and advanced reporting to further help your nonprofit treasurer.
Wave’s accounting and invoicing features are entirely free. The platform does offer paid features like online payment processing, payroll software, personalized bookkeeping services, and coaching.
Nonprofits can invite team members and accountants to view and update Wave’s accounting software, making it easier to collaborate during audits. Wave’s accounting tool also works with nearly 10,000 bank and credit card accounts to make transferring financial details easier and more transparent.
Looking for more tools that can aid in various financial processes? There’s something to help with just about anything, including –
Nonprofit treasurers oversee financial operations, ensure compliance, and fortify your organization’s well-being. Treasurers who combine financial knowledge and strategic thinking with quality technical tools are a step ahead.
Form a financial team to support your nonprofit treasurer and find tools that will streamline their job. Visit our website to see how Donorbox’s donor management system and other fundraising features can help your organization create detailed fundraising reports and personal donor communications.
Looking for more nonprofit and fundraising tips? Check out the rest of our Nonprofit Blog and be sure to subscribe to receive new articles, resources, and more in your inbox.
Kristine Ensor is a freelance writer with over a decade of experience working with local and international nonprofits. As a nonprofit professional she has specialized in fundraising, marketing, event planning, volunteer management, and board development.
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Kristine Ensor