The professional community for people work in the mission-driven sector.
Mission Exchange is a paid membership community for the people who do people work in and around nonprofits and mission-driven organizations — HR and people leaders who are often doing a great deal with very little, and often doing it on their own. Conversations, resources, and members all live in one searchable place.
The people who power missions deserve to be supported, resourced, and seen.
The Mission Exchange exists to do two things.
Build community
Connection around a shared experience
Steady contact with people in the same position: peers to think out loud with, compare notes with, and call when a decision is harder than it looks. They understand the work from the inside: being the whole people function, the one everyone comes to, the one holding the hard conversations.
Accelerate impact
Put the group's expertise to work
A question about comp strategy. A manager support template you do not have to build from scratch. A second opinion while you narrow down an HRIS vendor. Answers from people who have done the work, credited to them, and findable the next time you or anyone else needs them.
What membership gives you
Answers you can find
A curated library of policies, templates, comp frameworks, and write-ups of how other members solved the thing you are facing, organized by topic and searchable when you need them.
Peers in the same position
People who carry the same work and can be asked a real question, at any hour, without translation.
Vendors already vetted
Providers we have brought in and stand behind, so you are not starting a search from nothing.
Membership also includes learning sessions on current topics such as AI, compensation, and labor and immigration changes, taught through a nonprofit lens; job opportunities and project-based work from across the sector; and wellbeing programming, because this work is sustainable only if you are.
Who it's for
- In-house people professionals — HR and talent practitioners at nonprofits and B-corps at every level, from CHROs and VPs of People to generalists and teams of one
- Leaders carrying the people function — Executive Directors, COOs, and Chiefs of Staff at smaller organizations where HR is part of a broader role
- Consultants, coaches, and fractional professionals who serve nonprofit organizations and leaders
Membership is defined by function, not title. An Executive Director carrying the people function belongs in Mission Exchange as much as a CHRO.
Membership
One rate, one community.
Membership is annual, and it covers everything: every space, the full resource library, the vendor directory, and all programming.
How to join
A short application, then you're in.
Mission Exchange is for people who do this work.
Apply
Tell us your name, your organization and role, and what you hope to gain.
We review
We read every application ourselves. You will hear back within a few days.
Join
If it is a fit, we send you a link to set up your membership.
Start exchanging
Introduce yourself, bring your first question, and share something from your practice.
Our values
Generosity
Members share what they have built, in full.
Recognition
Contribution is credited to the person who made it.
Access
Low barriers and minimal rules.
Belonging
In-house, independent, and formerly in-house professionals all belong.
Wellbeing
Sustainable careers for the people who make missions possible.
Co-founders
Jennifer M. Anderson
Co-founder
For more than two decades, I've worked inside mission-driven organizations with a front-row seat to the opportunities and challenges facing nonprofit HR professionals. As a co-founder and long-time administrator of the Talent Collaborative, a free community for nonprofit HR practitioners, I watched a simple listserv grow into a community helping each other do hard work well. Mission Exchange grew out of that experience.
I co-founded it with Presceia Cooper, my long-time collaborator from Jobs for the Future, where together we transformed the organization's people function and learned how much stronger this work is when it's shared. I am a two-time Chief People Officer who has built talent functions from the ground up for nonprofits, and today I run JM Anderson Consulting, where I help nonprofit leaders design people strategy, structure, and culture.
I do this work because I believe nonprofits should never have to choose between advancing their mission and taking care of their people.
Presceia O. Cooper
Co-founder
I co-founded Mission Exchange with Jen Anderson. We built our partnership at Jobs for the Future (JFF), where together we put the organization's people practices in place, and the spirit of Mission Exchange grew out of that place. I'm also the founder of The HR Human, a coaching and advisory practice serving clients nationally, where I work with executive teams navigating consequential change and with HR leaders who spend their days holding everyone else.
My whole career has been in service of one thing: people being able to thrive at work, especially communities historically marginalized by systemic inequity. What I care most about is building the systems inside organizations that make that possible. By way of background, I've served as a Chief People Officer, and I hold a Master's in Organizational and Leadership Psychology from William James College, where I serve as adjunct faculty, and I'm a Professional Coach trained in healing-centered coaching through Blooming Willow.
Two beliefs guide the work I do: feelings are data, and how people are treated at work matters.
Apply to join Mission Exchange.
A short application so we can learn more about members. We read every application ourselves and reply within a few days.