You just got elected. Maybe you ran unopposed. Maybe nobody else wanted the job and you got voluntold at the annual meeting while everyone else stared at their shoes. Either way, the gavel is yours now.
The outgoing president hands you a flash drive, a Gmail login, and a “good luck.” You go home, open the flash drive, and find a folder called “MISC” with 47 unsorted files. Half of them are from 2019.
Welcome to the presidency.
Your first 90 days will shape the rest of your term. Not because you need to overhaul everything by day 91, but because this is when you build (or lose) the trust and habits that carry you through. Only 29% of nonprofit organizations have a written succession plan, according to BoardSource’s Leading with Intent report. That means most new presidents are figuring it out alone.
You don’t have to. Here’s your week-by-week guide.
Weeks 1-2: Listen Before You Touch Anything
The biggest mistake new presidents make is changing things too fast. You’ve been a member. You have opinions. You’ve been mentally redesigning the newsletter since October. Resist.
Joan Garry, who advises nonprofit boards, puts it simply: the leaders who succeed are those who listen first and decide later. Your first two weeks aren’t about action. They’re about understanding what you’ve actually inherited.
Start here:
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Meet the outgoing president one-on-one. Not at a group event. Not over text. Sit down (or get on a call) and ask: what worked, what didn’t, what do you wish you’d done differently, and where are the bodies buried? That last question matters most. Every organization has unresolved tensions, and your predecessor knows them better than anyone.
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Read the bylaws. All of them. Not the version someone summarized in an email two years ago. The actual document. You’ll probably discover that your organization does three things that technically violate its own rules, and that’s fine for now. But you need to know what the rules say before you can decide which ones matter. (If your bylaws are outdated or nonexistent, that becomes a project for later. Here’s a guide to writing bylaws for community organizations when you’re ready.)
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Get access to everything. Bank accounts. Email accounts. The website admin panel. The member list. The storage locker key. Social media passwords. Whatever your organization uses, make sure at least two people (you and one other officer) can access it. Right now. Not “when we get around to it.” When a former president walks away with the only login to the organization’s PayPal account, you’re stuck.
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Collect every recurring obligation. When is rent due on the meeting space? When do insurance renewals happen? Are there annual filings with the state? Grant reporting deadlines? Build a calendar of everything that happens on a schedule, because nobody’s going to remind you until it’s late.
Don’t announce any initiatives yet. Don’t promise anything at the first meeting. Just listen, collect, and take notes.
Weeks 3-4: Talk to People (Not Just the Board)
You know the board. You’ve been sitting with them for months, maybe years. That’s the easy part.
Now go talk to the people who aren’t on the board.
Call five to ten regular members individually. Not a survey. Not a mass email. A phone call or a coffee. Ask three questions: What do you like about this organization? What frustrates you? If you could change one thing, what would it be?
You’ll hear patterns. Maybe everyone loves the annual gala but nobody understands why the monthly meeting runs two hours. Maybe three people independently tell you the communication is confusing. Maybe somebody who’s been a member for eight years says nobody’s ever asked them what they think. That last one should sting a little.
About 41% of volunteers say they got involved with their main organization because someone asked them directly, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics volunteering supplement. The same principle applies to engagement within your existing membership. Personal outreach signals that you care about individuals, not just filling seats.
The numbers back this up. Over 75 million Americans formally volunteered in 2023, according to Census Bureau and AmeriCorps research. That’s nearly 28% of the adult population. Your members chose to give their time, and they’ll keep choosing it only if they feel heard.
While you’re at it, meet with any paid staff or contractors your organization works with. The bookkeeper, the venue manager, the person who runs your website. These relationships matter more than most new presidents realize.
Week 5: Take Stock of the Finances
You don’t need to be a financial expert. You need to know three things: how much money the organization has, where it comes from, and where it goes.
Sit down with your treasurer. Look at the bank statements, not just the budget report. The budget says what was supposed to happen. The bank statements show what actually happened. If those two documents tell different stories, you’ve found your first real problem.
Ask your treasurer how they track everything. Is it a spreadsheet? A shoebox of receipts? Accounting software? Whatever it is, make sure you understand the system well enough to explain it to someone else. If your organization still runs on spreadsheets, now’s a good time to see the cost of that approach.
Here’s the uncomfortable truth: 67% of volunteer organizations in Canada report difficulty finding new volunteers, according to Statistics Canada. If your treasurer quits tomorrow (and burnout is a real risk for board members), someone has to pick up where they left off.
Write down what you learn. Not for a board presentation. For the person who’ll have your job in two years.
Weeks 6-8: Set Two or Three Priorities (Not Ten)
By now you’ve listened. You’ve talked to members. You’ve looked at the finances. You have a picture of what’s working and what isn’t.
Pick two or three things to focus on during your term. Not ten. Not a strategic plan with pillars and subgoals. Two or three concrete improvements.
Maybe it’s fixing the renewal process so you stop losing members every year. (If your club is hemorrhaging members at renewal time, that’s worth making priority number one.) Maybe it’s creating a proper budget for the first time. Maybe it’s getting the annual event organized three months in advance instead of three weeks.
Whatever you pick, make sure each priority passes two tests. First: can you actually finish it during your term? “Transform the culture” fails this test. “Hold a new-member welcome event each quarter” passes it. Second: does it address something members actually told you about, or is it just your pet project?
Present your priorities to the board. Not as a mandate. As a proposal. “Based on what I’ve heard from members and what I’ve seen in our operations, I think these are the three things that would make the biggest difference this year. What do you think?”
Then shut up and listen to the response. You might be wrong about one of them. That’s fine.
Weeks 8-10: Delegate or Drown
Here’s where most new presidents go off the rails. You’ve identified the problems. You’re excited. You start doing everything yourself.
Don’t.
The average volunteer board role asks for 5 to 15 hours per month. In practice, presidents of small community groups often put in double that. If you’re already at 10 hours a week by month two, you’re heading for trouble. Statistics Canada data shows that 35% of volunteer organizations have had to cut programs or services because of volunteer shortages, and 26% report high volunteer burnout and stress. You don’t want to become the next cautionary tale. (Burnout is a real risk for board members.)
Delegation isn’t about dumping work on reluctant people. It’s about breaking big jobs into small, specific tasks and asking specific people to handle them. “Can you be in charge of the spring event?” is overwhelming. “Can you book the venue for the April picnic? Here’s the contact info and the budget” is doable.
Look at what you’ve been doing for the past two months. How much of it actually requires the president? Running meetings, yes. Representing the organization externally, sure. But updating the member directory? Sending event reminders? Posting on social media? Those are tasks anyone can own.
If nobody wants to volunteer for anything, the problem is usually how you’re asking, not that your members don’t care. The same Statistics Canada data shows that 51% of organizations struggle with volunteer retention. Small, bounded asks with clear end dates get better results than open-ended committee assignments. And if you need more hands in the first place, here are proven ways to recruit new members.
Weeks 10-12: Build the System That Outlasts You
This is the part almost every new president skips. And it’s the part that matters most.
75% of nonprofit leaders plan to leave their positions within the next five to ten years, according to a Wipfli analysis of sector data. For volunteer organizations, the turnover is even faster. Most club presidents serve one or two terms. That’s it.
So your job isn’t just to run the organization well while you’re in charge. Your job is to make sure the next president doesn’t start from zero.
Document everything. Where are the files? Who has the passwords? What vendors do you use? What’s the annual calendar look like? How does the budget process work? Who are the key contacts at the venue, the bank, the insurance company?
This doesn’t need to be fancy. A shared Google Doc with sections for each role is enough. The point is that when you hand over the presidency, you hand over knowledge, not just a title.
If your organization uses Somiti, a lot of this happens automatically. Member records, payment history, event attendance, communication logs. It’s all in one place, and it doesn’t walk out the door when the president’s term ends.
But even without any tool, you can build institutional memory intentionally. The complete guide to running a volunteer organization goes deeper on governance structures that survive leadership changes.
The Mistakes That Sink New Presidents
Every piece of advice above comes from watching real organizations struggle. Here are the patterns that repeat, year after year.
Trying to fix everything at once. You saw twelve problems during your listening tour. You want to solve all of them. You won’t. You’ll exhaust yourself, confuse the board, and accomplish nothing. Pick three. Finish those. If you still have energy and time, pick one more.
The other mistakes are quieter but just as damaging.
Some new presidents avoid difficult conversations. There’s a board member who hasn’t shown up in six months. There’s a committee that produces nothing. There’s a longtime member who dominates every meeting. These problems don’t fix themselves. The longer you wait, the harder the conversation gets.
Others forget to communicate outward. You’re doing a ton of work. Members don’t see it. They just see the same newsletter and the same events. Tell them what’s happening. A short monthly update from the president, even three paragraphs, keeps people connected to the organization’s direction.
And some new presidents make the opposite mistake: they make big changes without building consensus first. You might have a brilliant idea for restructuring the committees. If you announce it without discussing it with the people on those committees, you’ll get resistance, not enthusiasm. Change works when people feel included in it.
Your 90-Day Checklist
By the end of your first 90 days, you should be able to answer yes to all of these:
- Do you have access to every account, login, and document the organization uses?
- Have you read the bylaws?
- Have you talked one-on-one with at least five non-board members?
- Do you understand the finances well enough to explain them to a new member?
- Have you identified two or three priorities for your term?
- Have you presented those priorities to the board and gotten feedback?
- Have you delegated at least three tasks that don’t require the president?
- Have you started documenting institutional knowledge for your successor?
If you can check all eight, you’re ahead of most new presidents. Genuinely.
The job doesn’t get easy after 90 days. But it gets clearer. You know what you’re working with, who you can count on, and where you’re headed. The members who watched you listen before you acted will trust you when you start making decisions.
You didn’t sign up to be perfect at this. You signed up to serve your community for a while. The fact that you’re thinking about how to do it well means you’re already doing better than you think.