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Founders and Leaders
Founders and Leaders
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Founders and Leaders

Resources for new Nonprofits

Special thanks to Carly Tryens for getting this Wiki started and providing a lot of recommendations! (Last reviewed September 2025)

🧭Other Wikis you might find Useful

  • Meta-Resources
  • Community Building
  • Operations
  • Monitoring, Evaluation, and Learning
  • Fundraising for Animal Advocacy
  • Personal Improvement
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đŸŒ±Services

Given the large variety of challenges you might face as a founder, we recommend you checking out our full list of Organisations and Services here! ⭐ The following organization-building related organizations might be particularly useful:

  • Scarlet Spark - a nonprofit that provides free leadership and organizational consulting, coaching, and training to accelerate the speed-to-mission of organizations that help animals.
  • ReGrow - a nonprofit that aims to help you create “exceptional work environments that foster healthier communication, improved conflict resolution, and increased employee satisfaction and motivation.”
  • Culture Canopy - A people and culture support organization that is “here to partner organizations in the animal and vegan advocacy movement - to support them in being as impactful as they can be - by creating high performing, collaborative, inclusive, rewarding, professional and equitable team environments where everyone can be successful.”

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📃List of Lists

  • Research on developing management and leadership expertise
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Charity Entrepeneurship Resources
  • Videos by CE
  • Videos recommended by CE
  • Reading List
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So you want to be a charity entrepreneur. Read these first.
  • Blog posts such as “How to increase your odds of starting a career in charity entrepreneurship” or “What traits make a great charity entrepreneur”
  • Books such as “How to Start a High-Impact Nonprofit” or “Managing to Change the World”
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The (Allegedly) Best Business Books
  • Gives a rough overview of a few senteces to each book.
  • Only four books made it to the “Very Good” Section:
    • Turn the Ship Around!: A True Story of Turning Followers into Leaders
    • Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity
    • Thinking, Fast and Slow
    • The Advantage: Why Organizational Health Trumps Everything Else in Business
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A list of EA-relevant business books I've read
  • Also has a category for Entrepeneurship/Startups
  • Top List for Leadership/Management:
    • The Hard Thing About Hard Things: Building a Business When There Are No Easy Answers
    • The Advantage: Why Organizational Health Trumps Everything Else In Business
    • The Coaching Habit: Say Less, Ask More & Change the Way You Lead Forever
  • Books that almost made the cut for Leadership/Management
    • The Outsiders: Eight Unconventional CEOs and Their Radically Rational Blueprint for Success
    • The Five Dysfunctions of a Team: A Leadership Fable
    • Death by Meeting: A Leadership Fable...About Solving the Most Painful Problem in Business
    • High Output Management
    • First, Break All the Rules: What the World's Greatest Managers Do Differently
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The Personal MBA Recommended Reading List: The 99 Best Business Books

Includes Categories such as:

  • Productivity & Effectiveness
  • Problem Solving
  • Behavioral Change
  • Personal Growth
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Encompass’ Resources for Leadership

“These resources were shared during Encompass’ Executive Development program in 2021.”

They cover everything from Basics, to Goalsetting, Social Media and more.

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📚Books

Naturally, there is a ton of value in books, but they are kind of a lot to read. We try to link a summary whenever possible to help you choose which book you want to dive into further. There are probably a billion videos on Leadership online, so we kept this list to videos that have been specificallly recommended by others

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How to Launch a High Impact Non-profit by Charity Entrepreneurship ⭐

“In How to Launch a High-Impact Nonprofit, a team of experts who themselves have helped launch 18 evidence-based charities (and counting) break down what it really takes to build impactful organizations.

Even small charities can improve hundreds of thousands of lives each year if they are focused on cost-effectiveness and based on rigorous research. The authors unpack the profile of these rare, much-needed organizations and invite you to consider your own potential for success in what might be the highest-impact career path in the world.

This book is the distillation of years of both running and teaching effective charity practices. It forms the backbone of the annual Charity Entrepreneurship Incubation Program and is designed to help you understand the mindset of the most effective founders and how they shape their start-ups to maximize impact per dollar donated.

It’s a no-nonsense, accessible handbook. The authors tackle tough questions, shining a light on the limits and shortcomings of their knowledge and the challenges you’ll face. It’s also a practical resource guide where you’ll find direct examples, valuable templates, thoughtful discussions, and next steps.”

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Managing to Change the World by Alison Green and Jerry Hauser ⭐

⭐ Notes by Peter Wilderford (Co-CEO @Rethink Priorities)

“Why getting results should be every nonprofit manager's first priority. A nonprofit manager's fundamental job is to get results, sustained over time, rather than boost morale or promote staff development. This is a shift from the tenor of many management books, particularly in the nonprofit world. Managing to Change the World is designed to teach new and experienced nonprofit managers the fundamental skills of effective management, including: managing specific tasks and broader responsibilities; setting clear goals and holding people accountable to them; creating a results-oriented culture; hiring, developing, and retaining a staff of superstars. This important resource contains 41 resources and downloadable tools that can be implemented immediately.”

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Fall in Love with the Problem not the Solution by Uri Levine ⭐

⭐ Video of key takeways by Uri Levine (3 min)

As the cofounder of Waze—the world’s leading commuting and navigation app with more than 700 million users to date, and which Google acquired in 2013 for $1. 15 billion—Levine is committed to spreading entrepreneurial thinking so that other founders, managers, and employees in the tech space can build their own highly valued companies.

Levine offers an inside look at the creation and sale of Waze and his second unicorn, Moovit, revealing the formula that drove those companies to compete with industry veterans and giants alike. He offers tips on:

  • Firing and hiring
  • Disrupting “broken” markets
  • Raising funding
  • Understanding your users
  • Reaching product market fit
  • Making scale-up decisions
  • Going global
  • Deciding when to sell

Fall in Love with the Problem, Not the Solution offers mentorship in a book from one of the world’s most successful entrepreneurs, and empowers you to build a successful business by identifying your consumers’ biggest problems and disrupting the inefficient markets that currently serve them.

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Other common book recommendations:
  • The Culture Code by Daniel Coyle
    • Video of key takeaways (3 min)
    • Video of key takeaways (8 min)
    • Summary by PISE
  • Quiet Leadership by David Rock
    • Video of key takeaways (3 min)
    • Book Review (20 min)
  • The great CEO within by Matt Mochary
    • Video of key takeaways (13 min)
    • Notes on Mochary's "The Great CEO Within"
    • Overview of the book (includng tons of resources and a link to an earlier, free, ebook version of book)
  • Lean startup by Eric Ries
    • Video with key takeaways (13 min)
    • Video with key takeaways (8 min)
  • How to be a founder by Alice Bentinck and Matt Clifford
  • 15 commitments of Conscious Leadership by Jim Dethmer, Diana Chapman & Kaley Klemp
    • Find short videos about each commitment in this playlist (2-3 min each)
  • The Checklist Manifesto by Atul Gawande
    • Video of key takeaways (8 min)
    • Talk by Atul Gawande about the book (1 hour)
  • Startup Playbook by Sam Altman
    • More like a series of articles, very quick read (~30 min)
    • Available for free
  • The Effective Manager by Mark Horstman
    • Talk by the Author
    • The author went on to found Manager Tools
  • The Leader Lab: Core Skills to Become a Great Manager, Faster by Tania Luna and LeeAnn Renninger
    • Video of key takeaways (20 min)
  • Turn the Ship Around!: A True Story of Turning Followers into Leaders by David Marquet
    • Author went on to make a bunch of short YouTube videos if you want more exposure to his ideas
  • The Hard Thing About Hard Things: Building a Business When There Are No Easy Answers by Ben Horowitz
    • Video of key takeaways (7 min)
  • The Advantage: Why Organizational Health Trumps Everything Else In Business by Patrick Lencioni
    • Video of key takeaways (20 min)
  • The Coaching Habit: Say Less, Ask More & Change the Way You Lead Forever by Michael Bungay Stanier
    • Video of key takeaways (6 min)
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📒Articles

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On the EA Forum

  • Traps that doom your org (8 min read)
  • Impact Roadmap (post series, between 9 and 34 min)
    • Impact Roadmap
    • Programme Development Methodologies
    • Decision-Making Tools
    • Creative-Thinking Tools
  • Effective Org Planning for a Calm, Growth-Oriented and Impactful 2024 (4 min read)
  • Impactful Budget Tips + Budget Sample from EASE (EA org service providers)
    • Expert opinions on impactful budgeting
    • Sample Budget Template
  • Writing about my job: Co-founder of a new charity (early stage) 
  • Some notes on common challenges building EA orgs (4 min read)
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The AIM (formerly Charity Entrepreneurship) Blog

  • Starting a Charity
  • Running a Charity
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By Paul Graham

Most notably

  • What You'll Wish You'd Known
  • How to Start a Startup
  • Do Things that Don't Scale
  • Schlep Blindess
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Other Recommended Articles

  • 13 Common Fundraising Mistakes Made By New Nonprofit Organizations - Forbes
  • Common Mistakes Made By Nonprofits — And How to Fix Them - BoardBuild
  • 6 Financial Mistakes Nonprofits Make (+How to Avoid Them)
  • Things to consider when launching an entity - Impact Ops
  • Animal Advocacy Careers Skill Profile on Management and Leadership
  • Facilitating Interdisciplinary Meetings: A Practical Guide
  • So You Want To Start A Nonprofit?
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🔊Podcasts

  • Top 10 Mistakes People Make When Setting Up and Operating a Nonprofit - Anderson Advisors
  • Manager Tools by Mar Horstman (author of The Effective Manager)
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🎞Videos

There are probably a million videos on Leadership online, so we kept this list to videos that have been specificallly endorsed by others:

  • Leadership Nudges with David Marquet is a YouTube Channel with ton of short (1-2 min) videos. David Marquet is the Author of “Turn the Ship Around!: A True Story of Turning Followers into Leaders”
  • What Does It REALLY Mean To Do Things That Don't Scale? By Dalton Caldwell and Michael Seibel
  • Robert Steven Kaplan | What to Ask the Person in the Mirror: Critical Questions for Becoming a More Effective Leader and Reaching Your Potential
  • What You're Really Meant to Do | Robert Steven Kaplan | Talks at Google
  • Interview with Frances Frei, Harvard Business School Professor, and Author of the Book “Unleashed: The Unapologetic Leader’s Guide to Empowering Everyone Around You.”
  • 15 Most Common Errors Made by Nonprofit Organizations
  • Animal Advocacy Careers: Inclusive Hiring Program
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đŸ’»Websites and Tools

  • The Management Center
    • For courses, coaching, templates etc.
  • Training for Change
    • Tools, Trainings, and Programs for activists and organizers
  • Tools4Dev has a bunch of Templates and Tool Reviews
  • The Effective Manager - Manager Tools
  • Top 13 Tools for NGO Founders by Charity Entrepeneurship
  • Animal Charity Evaluators’ Tools for Charities
  • Stay up to date on new tools at Product Hunt
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đŸ§·Other

  • EA Manager’s Slack
    • In the same vein as the EA Ops slack but for Management
  • If applicable, check out this Thread on CRM Recommendations!
  • Slack offers diccounted/free workspaces for Charities