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UDREY
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ELLS IS
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AMILY
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ERVICE
of Morris County in New Jersey. The non-
profit organization has a very specific mission: to strengthen the community by empowering individ-
uals and families to meet and overcome life’s challenges. Wells recently appeared in a CFO Studio
interview hosted by Andrew Zezas.
Tell me about Family Service of Morris County.
Wells:
We’re about a $3.2 million organization with about 90 employees. We’re located in Morris
County and do services for the most part in Morris County, although we do go outside the county on
occasion. We concentrate on four areas of impact. The first is giving children the best start in life. The
second is keeping seniors independent and in their homes. The third is maintaining healthy families,
and the fourth is preventing substance abuse.
There are many in the for-profit world who would suggest that not-for-profit isn’t really about
business, it’s about other things, and that not-for-profits should run themselves more like
for-profit organizations. How do you respond to that?
Wells:
I totally agree with that assessment. But, a lot of not-for-profit organizations, and I’d like to
think that ours is one of those, already run like a corporation to a certain extent. There are many,
many things that we can learn from what corporations do well while still keeping the different sort
of atmosphere that you have in a not-for-profit organization. A not-for-profit organization usually has
a very passionate workforce, very mission-driven, maybe a little more laid-back than a corporation,
but there are certain things that you can definitely carry over from the corporate world.
For example, streamlining procedures – you know… touch each thing once and move it along, don’t
do things that aren’t necessary. Another would be in the area of technology. We should be
making better use of technology to make our jobs more efficient, to be able to collect data more
efficiently, analyze and report more efficiently. A third example is doing complete financial analysis.
You’d be surprised how many organizations really haven’t figured out how to analyze their programs
separately – figure out where their actual revenues are going and how they’re being used. We may
not do the same thing with the analyses that a for-profit corporation would do, but it’s really important
to know where your dollars are going and at least have a basis for making good decisions.
There is really a primary difference between how a for-profit and a not-for-profit views its
ultimate objective. A for-profit’s job is to maximize revenue, minimize expenses and return as
much back to the shareholders as it can. But I’ve heard you say that from a not-for-profit
CFO Audrey Wells provides insights into the world of not-for-profit organizations.
Written by
Jennifer Duell Popovec
Interview by
Andrew Zezas
Making a Difference
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Q