Non-government organizations, or NGOs, are not conventional businesses. They differ from the norm in both their needs and the challenges they face. And most of the time, they’re started and run by leaders with the passion-turned-mission to make a difference in this world.
But passion alone can’t sustain them – at the end of the day, NGOs still need to think business. While they aren't meant to be profitable, they need funds to serve the causes they're passionate about. And losses can have crucial consequences.
Like any other business, NGOs rely on skilled individuals to perform their essential functions, from raising awareness and funds to taking action at every opportunity. But unlike other businesses, they also heavily rely on the generosity of benefactors to invest in them without being able to offer any ROI. Because of this, volunteers are often brought on board as an invaluable resource to help run a tight ship.
Between their unpredictable schedules and a similarly unpredictable budget, planning for success can be nearly impossible.
Since NGOs are constantly working towards fulfilling the pressing needs of society, every cause is time-sensitive and each project is top priority. Unfortunately, they rarely have the resources to work simultaneously on multiple demands.
This results in a need to prioritize certain projects over others and postpone other important work, which only leads to one thing: missed opportunities and stunted growth (okay, two things).
While the problem is easy enough to identify, finding a solution has proven to be more challenging. Hiring long-term or contracted employees for every skill niche comes with low flexibility and a tall bill. As you scale and start working on different causes and activities, the people you initially hired might not have the skillset to tackle changing demands. – and in an industry where funds are already scarce, this could cause more harm than good.
On top of these challenges, the COVID-19 crisis has left conventional, on-premise work behind and teams scattered, out of sync, and inefficient. Remote work may now often be the norm, but teams working remotely can only adjust to this change as quickly as their resources let them. And right now, with crises on the rise and governmental pockets emptied, NGOs have more work than ever.
In order to fulfill missions effectively, NGOs need to work as efficiently as possible. Luckily, long-term or contracted employees are not the only solution.
When the funds are insufficient to hire a full house, qualified freelancers are waiting with quality work to contribute. From running campaigns to building strategy and more, outsourcing everything but your core work will free up the in-house team to focus on what’s most important with fewer burdens.
Just a few of the back-end activities and processes that can be outsourced to freelancers include marketing strategy and planning, risk management, information technology-related activities (like managing software, setting up websites, and setting up communication lines), financial management and bookkeeping, human resource management, awareness campaigns for specific projects, and more.
Outsourcing offers several benefits, including:
The biggest benefit of outsourcing your work to freelancers is cutting down those operational costs. The average salary of full-time employees at NGOs in the US is about $50,000. Factor in the cost of IT support, equipment, training, benefits, tax deductions, and other overheads, and it’s clear why the costs of hiring a single extra employee may be too much for the average NGO to handle.
If you outsource your needs instead, you'll pay only for the work you need done and nothing more.
As you work on your various causes and activities, your needs are likely to keep changing. The types of content you need to raise funds, the activities you do to serve your cause, and the campaigns you conduct to spread awareness about your activities may all change based on the project you're working on. The experts working on one might not have the appropriate skills to work on another.
Outsourcing your needs will let you hire different freelancers for different causes, and you'll have the flexibility you need to serve each one more effectively without long-term commitments resulting in compromises.
Another important benefit is the focus and dedication among core employees that outsourcing can clear the way for.
Functions like planning beneficial activities, creating effective plans for achieving goals, preparing budgets, applying for grants, and the list goes on – these can all be done more efficiently with the budget and manpower that outsourcing preserves.
To make the outsourcing process smooth and seamless, and to manage your freelance team easily, Fiverr is now offering a new feature: the Fiverr Business platform. It allows you to perform all outsourcing functions in a single place, making your working quicker and more efficient.
With Fiverr Business, you can curate a smart supply of highly skilled freelancers. You will have access to a dedicated team of Fiverr Business Success Managers, who will help you find people with the right skills and business experience to be the perfect fit for your team.
The Fiverr Business platform is a digital replica of the organizational structure of physical teams. The workspace on the platform enables teamwork, brainstorming, and communication, all in the same place. Since the remote platform replicates a physical workspace, the communication and teamwork are smooth and frictionless.
Fiverr Business is free for the first year and costs only about $149 annually in the following years. So, at just $149 per year, you get a platform that allows you to curate a list of freelancers perfect for your needs, communicate with them as a team, get VIP support for every team member, simplify and enhance controls of workflows, budgets, and payments, and more.
With Fiverr Business, you can outsource your work and manage your freelancers in a smooth and efficient manner so that your in-house team can focus on the core functions critical to your mission. To learn more about the platform, visit the Fiverr Business website and create an account. Since the platform is free for NGOs, you can learn how to hire and manage freelancers and get a feel for the platform, even with a limited budget. Visit today and see how the Fiverr Business platform can work for you.
