More than 1,000 nonprofit and government leaders gathered last week to share wisdom and learn from specialized trainers and experts at the 17th Annual Wipfli National Training Conference.
“We have people from 43 states attending this conference, and four US territories and the District of Columbia,” said Steve Lipton, who heads the nonprofit and government practice at Wipfli CPAs and Consultants. “It’s an ethnically diverse group, it’s a racially diverse group, certainly it’s a geographically diverse group who have come together all really fighting the same issues in their communities.”
Those issues range from poverty to early childhood education to health care access, and many more. More than 70 sessions offered training on topics like human resource management, diversity and inclusion, federal accounting regulations — even Microsoft Office tips and tricks
“You’re not going to be able to sit in every session,” Lipton said. “If you’re able to take one nugget of information, one piece that you can take home and begin to create change, change in your community, change in your organization, change in yourself so that you can go out and try to serve your community better. We’re not going to defeat this issues that we brought here in the big picture, but we are going to defeat them one person at a time, one organization at a time, one community at a time.”
That “nugget” can seem small and technical but could have a major impact. Tiffany Junkins, the fiscal manager at the Office of Early Education in the Chicago Public Schools, says she learned at the conference that the federal government had increased the micropurchase threshhold — the amount of money her organization could spend using a simplified acquisition process.
“I talk to federal government agents all the time, and grantees, and nobody had mentioned that before,” Junkins said. “That was something new. Immediately I got on my phone and started texting folks. Feds, fiscal consultants, asking, ‘have you heard this information?’ Surprisingly even some of the feds hadn’t heard this information. You get exclusive information from coming out to something like this (training conference). Immediately triggered me to say, ‘hey, I need to update policies and procedures.”
Junkins’ organization has recently partnered with the City of Chicago to consolidate its application process citywide, allowing parents “apply at any one of the sites throughout 77 different communities at any location. It’s no longer that you have to attend your neighborhood school. If you’d like to go ahead and travel and maybe get your child closer to your job, you can do that. We’re very proud of that work,” she said.
“I’ve been trained by Wipfli for over ten years now and I always take something away,” she said. “I always find something new. I think we can always continue to learn. Even though you come here and you know regulations, you never know when you might learn something new.”
“I’ve been here about 14 times and every time I learn something new,” said Dr. Janice Mercier Wade, President and CEO of the Akron (Ohio) Urban Minority Alcoholism and Drug Abuse Program. “I go back to my agency and I put it in.”
Mercier Wade, whose organization has recently installed a major electronic records system, said over those 14 years she has learned everything from techniques to acquire diversified funding to how to take better board meeting minutes. She said she also tries to bring at least a few of her organization’s board members each year.
“I’m fortunate in that every year, three or four board members come with me. It’s nice because they hear that we’re on point,” Mercier Wade said. “(Board members who attend) see why we make the decisions we make. As an executive, as a CEO, as financial people, there’s a reason why.”
Angele Thibodeaux Burns, CEO, East Central Illinois Community Action Agency, brought two board members to this year’s conference
“They’re new board members. What I’ve heard from my board members is that they feel more empowered to make decisions” after attending the Wipfli conference, she said. “They better understand their roles and responsibilities and they realize what an important role they actually do serve in the agency. They have communicated to me that they really do understand the difference between developing policy and implementing policy.”
Thibodeaux Burns, whose agency was recently approved to build an $8.5 million, 30-home subdivision of affordable housing in cooperation with a sister agency in the State of Illinois, also said nonprofit organizations should have non-fiscal staff attend this conference as well.
“Anyone in your agency who is authorized to spend should learn the standards so that we are all compliant,” she said. “Everyone is a leader and we are all held responsible. I think it’s important to have your whole staff, or as many staff as you can afford to send, I think it’ll be beneficial.”
Tina Viramontez, financial officer at Childstart in Wichita, Kansas, agreed.
“I’ve been bringing non-fiscal people with us because they are just overwhelmed,” she said. “Even though I can take everything back home with me, and I can do training every month, and I can do a training for program staff, and I can do a training for board members, it doesn’t matter, because it’s me telling them. It’s much better when they can hear it first hand. It has much more powerful impact. (Wipfli trainers) are great at really helping me bring it to them.”
The benefits of attending the Wipfli National Training Conference go beyond the training — it’s about creating and reinforcing relationships.
“Coming to this conference is almost like an energizing factor for me,” said Mercier Wade. “By the end of some place in the year, I’m emotionally, mentally, physically worn down. When I come here, I get new ideas, I meet new people. The networking possibilities of this conference are huge. I mean, you meet people and you instantly become friends. If there’s something we can help each other with, don’t be afraid to ask. Especially Wipfli. If there’s something you need from them, don’t hesitate. They’re there.”
