All Due Respect: Building Strong Organizations by Creating Fair Labor Standards for Organizers

National Research Report (April 2022)

Executive Summary

All Due Respect works with organizers, executive directors, and philanthropy to improve working conditions and set new movement standards. We believe that respect, security, and transparency are fundamental to organizing for social change and that all organizers deserve it.

But how do we get there?

In the fall of 2020, All Due Respect began an intensive, year-long research process, during which we surveyed and interviewed more than 200 organizers, executive directors, and funders to understand the state of our sector. What we found was a movement that was out of alignment—organizers burned out and contemplating leaving organizing work altogether; executive directors struggling to hire and retain organizers; and funders beginning to recognize their responsibility to ensure that the organizations they fund uphold a basic set of standards, but unsure how to communicate that responsibility.

These are not just individual challenges for individual organizers, or even organization-specific problems—movement-wide, we have a labor standards problem that directly contributes to the lack of efficacy in our organizing campaigns.

Ten key takeaways emerged from our research:

  1. The vast majority of organizers—nine out of ten—have experienced burnout. 

  2. Organizers believe that working conditions need to be improved. 

  3. Organizers believe that their working conditions have a direct impact on campaign success as well as on the effectiveness of the broader movement ecosystem.

  4. We cannot take for granted that people want to do these jobs, or that there will always be a steady stream of interested and available staff. 

  5. Directors don’t have the resources they need to pay more competitive salaries and build staff capacity.

  6. It is difficult to find, hire, and retain trained organizers, especially organizers who come from or represent the communities they are working with.

  7. Directors don’t have access to centralized information about wages, benefits, and best management practices on how to create and maintain sustainable jobs.

  8. There is a set of funders who understand the need to shift how they fund and support organizing, and who understand there is a disconnect between how we value organizing and how we actually treat organizers.

  9. Funders have a critical role to play in improving labor standards for organizers—but it must happen in partnership with organizations. 

  10. Funders and the broader philanthropic sector should view the current challenges organizations are experiencing with retention and burnout as a crisis that necessitates a response—and shift how they operate. 

The goal of All Due Respect is to work with our partners—organizers, grassroots community groups, and funders—to set new labor standards and make sure that community organizers get a fair wage and a fair shake—because supporting social justice means supporting the people on the frontlines. To that end, we propose a series of interventions that we believe will help ensure that:

  • Employees are supported in their jobs;

  • Organizations have the resources to build their teams for the long haul; and

  • Funders know they’re investing in organizations that practice what they preach, and that have the staff (both in numbers and experience) they need to win campaigns.

These possible interventions include, but are not limited to: a guidebook of standard working conditions; “Good Jobs” employer certification; training and resources focused on recruitment and retention of BIPOC organizers; further exploration of the role unionization plays in creating higher quality jobs for organizers; guidelines for fiscal sponsors and philanthropy-serving organizations (PSOs); and pooled funds to better support organizational efforts to hire and retain organizers. (To read more about these ideas, please see the "Interventions" section of the report.)

Success for us means securing a future in which organizers—especially organizers who come from or represent the communities they are working with—are valued and supported as the foundation and the future of the progressive movement. The people who are working day in and day out to build power and win big fights should be paid sustainable wages, receive good benefits, and work in a culture that holistically supports their livelihoods. Organizers shouldn’t burn out after a few years, and they shouldn’t have to make impossible choices about their futures and their families because they can’t support themselves. 

If we believe that organizing is truly important to our collective success, then it’s time to collectively create a future that values organizers.

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