Managing public relations in nonprofit organizations

Nonprofit organizations play a significant role in American society. There are currently over 1.5 million nonprofit organizations in the United States and hundreds of new nonprofits are forming each year (Eadie, 1997). Nonprofit organizations hold $2 trillion of assets, have an annual income of $1.1 trillion employing one twelfth of the American work force (Carr, 2000).

Like any other organization, nonprofit organizations have public relations whether they know it or not. But the role of public relations in non-profit organizations is not well developed. This article reports on a preliminary investigation of public relations activity in 21 nonprofit organizations in the mid-west.

According to the Nonprofit Resource Center (2001), "a nonprofit corporation is an organization formed for the purpose of serving a purpose of public or mutual benefit other than the pursuit or accumulation of profits." The IRS and other government agencies use the term "tax-exempt" instead of nonprofit. Section 501 of Title 26 in the United States Tax Code lists several types of organizations that can be considered tax-exempt including charitable organizations, social welfare organizations, labor and agricultural organizations, business leagues, social clubs, fraternal societies, veterans' organizations, employees' associations and political organizations" (IRS, 1997). There are 25 different categories of tax-exempt organizations. The terms nonprofit organizations and not-for-- profit organization are most always used interchangeably. Even though the terms are used synonymously, even in legal documents, the IRS classifies a not-for-profit as an activity, such as a hobby, and a nonprofit as an organization established for purposes other than profit making.

What are nonprofit organizations doing for their public relations? To answer this question, we decided to ask the PR practitioners in nonprofits. This article is a preliminary report of our findings.

The 21 people we interviewed for this study were chosen to participate if their position in the nonprofit included responsibility for public relations-- like activities. The semi-structured interviews lasted between thirty minutes and one hour and were tape-recorded. Transcripts were made of the tape recordings. Documents collected from respondents were also studied.

Table 1 displays the list of interview questions used. Questions asked related to the subject of the study, the organization itself and the role of public relations in the organizations.

The number of individuals in public relations in the organizations...