WELCOME TO ELA NONPROFIT CONSULTING
Effective Leadership Advisors (ELA) Nonprofit Consulting
Leadership, Cooperation and Dialogue
MISSION
Effective Leadership Advisors (ELA) Nonprofit Consulting is a Maine, USA 501(c)(3) and Bolivian nonprofit organization dedicated to strengthening leadership, cooperation and dialogue. We leverage the power of senior consultants, including legal, business and social science experts, to answer program management and practice questions, helping people meet leadership challenges on the basis of best evidence, for charitable purposes and the public good.
Do you have a leadership, cooperation or dialogue challenge? That is the work we do.
Our work rests on the conviction that individuals, organizations, and communities succeed when they have capable leadership, workable cooperation and honest dialogue. Everything ELA does serves one of those three ends.
LEADERSHIP. We develop the people who carry or will carry responsibility — board members, executives, public servants, scholars and emerging professionals — so that authority is exercised wisely, compassionately, competently, lawfully and accountably.
COOPERATION. We help parties who are best off continuing to work together, reach durable agreements and build systems that prevent or manage destructive conflicts, while optimizing constructive conflict.
DIALOGUE. We create the conditions for productive conversation and supply the evidence that makes it worthwhile: facilitation, research and analysis that give families, organizations and communities a shared and verifiable factual footing.
FEES
Our senior consultants provide clients with rigorous, cost-effective support, on a sliding scale. As a non-profit organization dedicated to charitable purposes and the pubic good, ELA offers the folllowing subsidized fee schedule, adjusted from U.S. currency by the value of currency and cost of living in the country of residence of the client.
U.S. figures (effective for 2026-2027), adjustable cost outside the USA :
Students: $50 an hour
Professionals: $100 an hour
Small non-profits/very small businesses: $100 an hour
Large for-profit companies: $200 an hour
Fortune 1000 companies: $400 an hour
ORGANIZATIONAL STATUS
ELA is a 501(c)(3) not-for-profit corporation incorporated in Maine, USA. We were founded in 2005 as Environment Bolivia and have been doing business as (dba) ELA Nonprofit Consulting since 2024.
WHOM WE SERVE
ELA advises nonprofit organizations, public servants, students and other individuals who are facing barriers to advancement in their missions, their organizations or their careers. We advise, we coach and we teach. We lead professional development education for aspiring and current public servants, and we train nonprofit organizations, public servants and students in optimal applied social scientific, legal and policy research strategy in the face of increasingly complex and challenging environments.
ADVANCED APPLIED RESEARCH
Sound leadership, optimal cooperation and honest dialogue all depend on accurate, shared understanding of the facts and systems designs that promote them . ELA's consultants work with advanced electronic research systems, including databases reaching billions of sources and citation-verification tools that rank and validate the evidence behind claims and designs. Every source we rely on can be traced, checked and defended. We do not assert what we cannot document.
SERVICE INDEX
I. LEADERSHIP
1. Nonprofit Governance and Board Leadership
2. Legal Foundations of Nonprofit Leadership
3. Executive and Professional Development
4. Emerging Leaders: Internships, Higher Education and Fellowships
II. COOPERATION
5. Conflict Coaching and Strategy
6. Mediation and Facilitated Resolution
7. Negotiation Consulting
8. Restorative Practice and Justice Reform
9. Conflict Systems Design
III. DIALOGUE
10. Facilitation and Difficult Conversations
11. Research and Analysis for Informed Decision-Making
12. Scholarly Inquiry: Thesis and Dissertation Advising
I. LEADERSHIP
Leadership is the exercise of responsibility on behalf of others. ELA develops it at every level: the board that governs, the executive who is accountable to that board, the professional building a career of consequence and the student who will lead next.
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Board bylaws auditing, revision and compliance review
Board member onboarding, orientation and self-evaluation
Committee design and restructuring (Finance, Audit, Governance and others)
Conflict-of-interest policy development for boards and senior staff
Board recruitment and diversity strategy
Executive director and CEO governance coaching
Succession planning for board leadership and key staff
CEO and executive director performance evaluation frameworks
Executive compensation policy review and IRS intermediate sanctions compliance
Form 990 review for board-level accountability
State and federal charitable registration and reporting guidance
Governance risk assessment and mitigation
Whistleblower and document retention policy development
Grant compliance oversight advising
Organizational benchmarking and peer research
Merger, affiliation and dissolution advising
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(Legal services are provided by licensed attorneys on the ELA team.)
Legal entity selection for new nonprofits
IRS Form 1023 and 1023-EZ preparation for 501(c)(3) status
State charitable registration and multi-jurisdiction annual reporting
State attorney general oversight compliance
Unrelated business income tax (UBIT) analysis and risk mitigation
Lobbying and political activity compliance, including IRC 501(h) elections and 501(c)(4) considerations
Fiscal sponsorship structure advising
Vendor, consultant and service contract review
Worker classification advising (employee vs. independent contractor)
Executive employment agreement review and drafting
Gift acceptance policy and restricted fund compliance
Grant agreement review and risk identification
Intellectual property ownership and licensing advising
Merger, affiliation and dissolution legal guidance
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(Coaching and advisory services. ELA is not an employment agency, does not guarantee placement and does not charge candidates contingency or placement fees.)
Executive presence and leadership communication coaching
Coaching for first-time supervisors, and coaching on managing up
Performance review preparation, both giving and receiving
Promotion and internal advancement strategy
Burnout, boundary-setting and sustainable workload coaching for mission-driven professionals
Career direction assessment for early-career, mid-career and sector-switching professionals
Nonprofit and public-interest sector orientation for candidates coming from private-sector or academic backgrounds
Resume, CV, and academic-to-professional translation
Cover letter, writing sample and application portfolio development
Professional presence and profile review
Job search strategy: target mapping, pipeline building and application cadence
Informational interview strategy and outreach scripting
Networking coaching for candidates without an existing sector network
Interview preparation and mock interviews, including panel and board-facing formats
Behavioral and case interview practice
Multiple-offer evaluation and decision frameworks
Onboarding and first-90-days planning
Exit strategy, resignation and reference planning
Employer-side services: job description development, hiring process design and structured interview rubrics for nonprofit clients
(Salary, offer and severance negotiation coaching appears under Cooperation, Section 7.)
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Internship Program Creation and Management
Organizational readiness assessment for hosting interns
Internship program charter and goal-setting
Intern role description and scope-of-work design
Supervision frameworks and accountability structures
Program policies covering conduct, confidentiality, remote work and accessibility
Paid, unpaid and academic credit compliance guidance
University and college partnership development for intern pipelines
Equity-centered recruitment and selection processes
Intern onboarding curricula
Mentor-matching protocols
Learning agreements and academic credit coordination
End-of-term evaluation and program assessment
Intern-to-employment conversion pathway advising
Internship stipend grant-writing support
Program benchmarking against sector best practices
Intern alumni engagement strategy
College, Graduate School and Scholarship Placement Advising
Academic profile assessment and college list development
Course selection and AP/IB strategy
Common Application, Coalition Application and school-specific portal guidance
Personal statement coaching and multi-draft editing
Supplemental essay advising for individual schools
Alumni interview and campus visit preparation
Financial aid guidance, FAFSA support and award letter comparison
Gap year, deferral and waitlist strategy
Graduate and professional school placement (law, MBA, MSW, public policy and others)
Test preparation strategy for the LSAT, GMAT, GRE and MCAT
Statement of purpose and diversity essay editing
Recommender selection and briefing strategy
Program fit and faculty alignment research
Graduate school interview coaching (MMI, panel and one-on-one formats)
Nationally competitive fellowship advising: Rhodes, Marshall, Fulbright, Truman, Gates, Udall and Goldwater
Institutional nomination portfolio preparation
Fellowship essay, research proposal and project statement editing
Fellowship interview preparation
Graduate funding, assistantship and loan forgiveness research
II. COOPERATION
Cooperation is what leadership produces when it works, even though conflict can be constructive. ELA helps people who disagree, and people who must keep working together anyway, reach agreements that hold — and helps organizations build the structures that keep productive conflict from becoming counter-productive.
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(Conflict coaching and negotiation consulting are advisory and are not legal representation.)
One-on-one conflict coaching for executives, board chairs and program leaders
Conflict diagnosis: separating interests, positions and identity stakes in a stuck dispute
Escalation mapping and de-escalation planning for disputes with a long history
Communication strategy coaching for written conflict, including email, text and board correspondence
Coaching for parties entering a mediation, arbitration or settlement conference represented by other counsel
Coaching for parents navigating guardian ad litem, evaluator or court-adjacent processes
Referrals to credentialed mediators, arbitrators and restorative justice practitioners
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(Mediation services are facilitative and do not create an attorney-client relationship with any party, except as explicitly contracted. Arbitration and legal representation may be referred out.)
Board and staff conflict facilitation, including chair-to-executive-director disputes
Workplace and interdepartmental dispute mediation
Family mediation, including intergenerational, caregiving and family-business disputes
Elder-care and end-of-life decision-making mediation among adult siblings
High-intensity custody conflict mediation, including high-conflict co-parenting dynamics
Parenting-plan and communication-protocol development for separated or divorcing parents
Screening for suitability: identifying cases in which mediation is inappropriate because of power imbalance, coercive control or safety concerns, and referring accordingly
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Negotiation preparation, BATNA analysis and concession sequencing
Multi-party and coalition negotiation strategy
Employment, separation and severance negotiation coaching
Salary, offer and scope negotiation coaching, including benefits and title
Vendor, contract and grant-terms negotiation support for nonprofit staff
Negotiation training for teams that negotiate regularly on the organization's behalf
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Restorative justice framework integration for organizational policy and programming
Restorative practice integration for organizations seeking alternatives to punitive internal discipline
Referrals to restorative justice processes: victim-offender dialogue, circles and community conferencing
Juvenile justice reform research and strategy
Youth-serving nonprofit program design within the juvenile justice system
Legal advocacy campaign and coalition-building strategy
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Design of collaboration systems that optimize how families and organizations work together
Internal grievance and dispute-resolution procedure design for nonprofits
Conflict-prevention audits: locating the recurring structural sources of disputes
Coalition and partnership agreements that anticipate disagreement before it arises
Post-dispute system repair after a conflict has damaged working relationships
Training staff and volunteers in the organization's own resolution procedures
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Design and facilitation of board, staff and stakeholder dialogue sessions
Mission and vision review facilitation
Strategic planning retreats with governance-focused facilitation
Pre-conversation preparation and rehearsal for high-stakes or long-deferred conversations
Difficult-conversation coaching for executives, supervisors and board chairs
Meeting design: agendas, ground rules and decision protocols that keep discussion productive
Facilitation of dialogue across difference within organizations and coalitions
Public and community dialogue design for organizations engaging their constituents
Listening-session and focus-group design for organizations seeking constituent input
Plain-language briefings that translate legal, technical and research material for lay audiences, in English and Spanish
Training staff and volunteers to facilitate their own internal conversations
After-action and lessons-learned review facilitation
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(Commissioned research is delivered as ELA work product. Reports are issued under ELA's name and may be co-authored or acknowledged by agreement. ELA does not ghostwrite work for publication under a client's sole byline.)
Commissioned research papers and white papers on client-specified topics
Literature reviews and evidence synthesis drawing on peer-reviewed and primary sources
Policy analysis and legislative tracking at the state and federal level
Landscape scans and field mapping: who is doing what, where, and with what funding
Comparative jurisdictional research across states or countries
Program evaluation design and implementation, including logic models and outcome measures
Needs assessments and community-level data collection
Survey design, administration and analysis
Qualitative research: interview protocols, focus groups and thematic coding
Descriptive and inferential quantitative analysis referral
Data visualization and reporting for board, funder and public audiences
Grant-supporting research: needs statements, evidence bases and citation support
Funder-commissioned research and learning agendas
Coalition and advocacy research briefs
Expert-facing research memoranda for attorneys, consultants and agency staff
Due diligence and background research on organizations, partnerships and mergers
Benchmarking studies against sector peers or comparable jurisdictions
Literature and evidence support for organizational strategy development
Research methodology consultation for organizations conducting their own studies
Fact-checking, citation verification and source auditing of existing documents
IRB and human-subjects protocol development for community-based research
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(Advising and coaching services. ELA advisors do not serve as academic supervisors of record, do not write or co-write submitted work and do not represent any institution. All work is conducted in conformity with the student's program integrity policies.)
Program selection and fit assessment across PhD, MSW, MA and MS programs in sociology, psychology, conflict resolution, law and related social science fields
Application strategy, personal statement development and recommender selection
Funding, assistantship and fellowship strategy for master's-level applicants
Orientation to program structures: thesis vs. capstone vs. comprehensive exam tracks
Research question refinement: narrowing a topic to a defensible, answerable question
Literature review strategy, search architecture and source management
Theoretical framework selection and alignment with research design
Research design consultation: qualitative and mixed-methods approaches
Sampling, recruitment and access planning for hard-to-reach or protected populations
IRB preparation: protocol drafting support, consent documentation and vulnerable-population considerations
Instrument development review: interview guides, surveys and coding schemes
Data analysis planning and interpretation coaching, not data analysis performed on the student's behalf
Thesis structure, chapter architecture and argument development
Writing-process coaching: milestone setting, drafting cadence and revision discipline
Feedback interpretation: translating committee comments into an actionable revision plan
Advisor and committee relationship coaching, including managing disagreement among committee members
Stalled-thesis recovery for students who have gone dormant or missed deadlines
Defense preparation and mock defense
Post-thesis pathways: publication, conference submission, doctoral applications and practice application
III. DIALOGUE
Dialogue is how leadership and cooperation are actually carried out: in conversations that are hard to start, hard to hold and easy to avoid. ELA designs and facilitates those conversations, and supplies the verified evidence that keeps them anchored to fact rather than assertion.
Featured
In the next fifteen years, data centers are expected to add an additional $160 billion to electric grid costs in the U.S. By one estimate, electricity rates for average households cold spike as much as seventy percent. While companies like Amazon, Meta and Google are making record profits, the rest of us are forced to foot the bill.
In the next fifteen years, data centers are expected to add an additional $160 billion to electric grid costs in the U.S. By one estimate, electricity rates for average households cold spike as much as seventy percent. While companies like Amazon, Meta and Google are making record profits, the rest of us are forced to foot the bill.