Thinking about a new staff hire vs. a fractional hire
I have been on both sides of this conversation. As a Development Director and later as an Executive Director, I have written job descriptions just like the ones I see in my inbox now, posted them, sifted through applicants, made offers, and then watched new hires spend their first four to six months learning the organization before doing the work I actually needed them to do. I have also been the consultant who came in when that hire didn't work out, or when the role was vacated before it was ever really filled.
That experience is what I keep thinking about when I look at what's happening in the sector right now.
According to the Urban Institute's 2025 National Survey of Nonprofit Trends and Impacts, a third of nonprofits experienced disruptions in federal, state, or local government funding in the first half of 2025. Among those organizations, nearly 30% reduced staff. Hiring plans that looked ambitious at the end of 2024 collapsed by mid-2025, dropping from 52% of nonprofits planning to hire to just 38%. The Center for Effective Philanthropy's 2025 State of Nonprofits report found that nearly two-thirds of nonprofit leaders reported difficulty filling vacancies, while more than half said they lacked sufficient funding to offer competitive compensation. And this is all before accounting for the cascading effect on private philanthropy: even organizations that don't receive government funding are feeling the pressure, as federal dollars shrink, with foundations and individual donors shifting resources toward larger organizations with more established track records.
This is the environment in which smaller nonprofits are trying to hire. And in many cases, they are still trying to hire the same way they always have.
Here is what I have seen happen more times than I can count. An organization identifies a real gap, usually in fundraising, grants management, or development strategy. They write a job description that captures everything the function needs to do. The salary is what the budget can support, which in the current landscape often means somewhere between $65,000 and $80,000 for a role that requires significant expertise and a near-immediate impact on revenue. They post it, they hire, and then the clock starts. Not the clock on results, but the clock on learning, on relationship building, on getting oriented to systems, funders, and the organization's history and voice. That clock often runs three to six months before the new hire is genuinely producing at the level the role requires.
None of that is a failure on the part of the person who was hired. It is just what onboarding looks like in this kind of work.
A fractional consultant doesn't have an onboarding period in the same way. The expertise is already there. The systems knowledge, the funder relationships, the writing capacity, and the strategic thinking are applied to your organization from week one. Cindy Wagman, one of the leading voices on fractional work in the nonprofit sector, put it plainly in a recent session with The Good Growth Company: "Fractionals fill that in-between stage when hiring junior feels risky, but you need strategic leadership to grow." That framing resonates with what I see constantly. The organizations that need the most help right now are not under-resourced because they haven't tried hard enough. They are under-resourced because the gap between what they can afford to pay and what the role needs to deliver is genuinely wide, and a full-time hire at a constrained salary is often not the fastest or most reliable way to close it.
Fractional consulting is not always the right answer. If an organization is at the stage where it needs embedded, daily operational support across a full function, a staff person may be the better fit. The distinction the nonprofit sector is increasingly recognizing is that fractional engagement is not a cheaper version of a hire. It is a different structure entirely, with different strengths. A fractional consultant leads a function, brings judgment and strategy, and produces deliverables. They are not there to fill a seat or be managed hour by hour. As The Good Growth Company noted, the work should be guided by a detailed plan with deliverables, timelines, and goals, not by timesheets.
What that means in practice is that the organizations that benefit most from fractional support are those that know the outcome they're trying to achieve and are ready to invest in it, without the 18-month commitment and overhead of a full-time hire. For a small nonprofit trying to grow a grants portfolio from $500,000 to $800,000 during a period of sector-wide funding instability, a fractional grants strategist with an established track record can often move that needle faster and with more predictability than a new hire who is still building relationships with program officers six months in.
The broader context here is worth naming directly. The National Council of Nonprofits has documented persistent workforce shortages across the sector, with nearly three-quarters of nonprofits saying that salary competition affects their ability to recruit and retain staff. The organizations hiring right now are competing for a smaller pool of candidates than they did two years ago, and candidates with the deepest expertise have options. Some of them are choosing to consult precisely because the fractional model allows them to do the work they're good at across multiple organizations, rather than overextending in a single under-resourced role.
That is not a criticism of those candidates. It is a structural reality that more nonprofit leaders would benefit from understanding before they commit to a hiring process that takes three to four months, produces a new employee, and then requires another three to six months before that person is generating the results the organization needs immediately.
If you are staring at a development gap right now and wondering how to fill it, the most useful question is not "who should we hire?" It is "what does this function need to produce in the next 12 months, and what is the fastest path to getting there?" Sometimes the answer is a full-time employee. Sometimes it is a fractional engagement. And sometimes the most valuable thing an outside advisor can do is help you figure out which one is actually true for your organization before you post the job.
Ellie Brown is the founder of Brown Catalyst Consulting, a women-owned consultancy working with equity-focused nonprofits on strategic planning, fundraising strategy, and capacity building. Her work is evidence-informed, co-designed, and built to last. You can reach her at ellie@browncatalystconsulting.com or learn more at browncatalystconsulting.com.
Sources referenced:
Urban Institute, How Government Funding Disruptions Affected Nonprofits in Early 2025 (October 2025)
Center for Effective Philanthropy, State of Nonprofits 2025: What Funders Need to Know
National Council of Nonprofits, The Nonprofit Workforce Shortage Crisis
The Good Growth Company, Fractional Consultants: 10 Things Nonprofits Need to Know (October 2025)
