Strategic management in the voluntary and not-for-profit sector
As with public sector organizations, it is important to recognize that this sector contains many different varying types of organization. However, it is again possible to generalize
regarding the extent to which there are differences regarding the nature of strategic management in such organizations.
One of the key differences in this sector is that values and expectations of different stakeholder groups will play a very important part in the process of strategic management. Moreover, the range of stakeholder groups is often much wider and sometimes potentially conflicting compared to its profit making counterparts.
Funding for organizations in this sector may come from several sources including, for example, funding bodies and public donations, and because of this openness and effectiveness in the uses of funds is often a high priority. Because, by definition, many of the organizations in this sector do not have profit objectives, clear objective setting is sometimes difficult and indeed objectives may often conflict.
Finally, in the past it has sometimes been the case that the management of companies in this sector have perhaps lacked some of the planning skills of their profit making sector counterparts. However, in recent years this has changed and now managers in this sector are now just as skilled in the strategic planning process and indeed often use the same concepts and techniques developed in the profit/commercial sector organizations.
