Nonprofit Leadership Conference – Request for Proposals

Attendees will include around 400 nonprofit leaders – emergent to middle to executive, philanthropy professionals, community leaders, students, and Leadership Institute alumni. If you attend the conference, you will be able to:

• Identify the inequities in leadership models and map ways to disrupt and dismantle them while imagining fresh alternatives 
• Find and share inspiration and guidance among peer experts for engaging with myriad areas of leadership 
• Have direct access to the latest leadership research (and researchers!) and discuss ways to incorporate academic findings into on-the-ground practice and strategy 
• Bolster foundational knowledge of nonprofit administration and operations as part of honing your advancement pathway and leadership capacity  

Past conference attendees included:

• Executive directors.
• Senior leaders in every area of nonprofit work (policy, development, finance, HR, DEI, etc.).
• New and emerging leaders.
• Board members.
• Volunteers and jobseekers.

MCN and the Humphrey School seek dynamic presenters who are inquisitive and bring nuanced, clear, and equitable approaches to leadership within the nonprofit sector and its subsectors. This year, we are particularly interested in sessions that bring the following content areas to life: 

Leadership Pathways

• Effective and sensitive coaching strategies for staff who have lived experience but no nonprofit programming job experience 
• How to make leadership mentoring accessible, relevant, and encouraged for NEWER and MID-LEVEL leaders
• Establishing inclusive cultures of growth

Executive Leadership Supports 

• Holding and addressing risk while also being a beacon for your organization
• Building skills for navigating systems of power (i.e., advocacy, philanthropy)
• Compliance with regulatory bodies
• Executive transitions in historically white led nonprofits—naming, disrupting, and repairing the bias and nuanced challenges experienced by leaders who identify as Black, Indigenous, and people of color 
• Knowing when executive coaching is needed and how to work with an executive director who is struggling when their organization outgrows their leadership skills 

Nonprofit Board Engagement 

• Boards effectively partnering with staff leadership
• Expectation setting and activation strategies for board members 

Nonprofit Volunteerism 

• Moving one-time volunteers into life-long fans and supporters
• Providing purpose and reason to the “new adult” generation (Gen Y) for giving their time   

Impact Assessment and Scenario Planning

• Evaluation methods for measuring program impact 

• Incorporating evaluation results into present and future work 
• Proactive and continual scenario planning

We also encourage sessions that engage topics and approaches relevant to and implementable by small nonprofits ($0-$99,999).

Proposals from our allies in for-profit companies are welcome; however, please note that preference will be given to sessions that demonstrate active involvement of nonprofit professionals and sector researchers and members from the communities they engage as session presenters or co-presenters.

Sessions that include nonprofit presenters will be given priority. 

Session presenters must demonstrate a depth of knowledge on the workshop topic. Sessions and presenters should reflect the racial, economic, cultural, age, and geographic diversity in the state of Minnesota.

Consultants and/or for-profit businesses with an overriding interest in selling their products and services, as opposed to contributing to a learning community will not be invited to present.  

To ensure the highest quality sessions for the conference, the planning committee will place priority on session proposals that incorporate modern adult education modes, formats emphasizing participant engagement and interaction, and are accessible.

• Your session should engage attendees so that participants are actively involved in dialogue, discussion, and idea-generation throughout the session in some form.
• Your sessions should allow attendees to connect with one another.
• Your session should provide specific takeaways that attendees can implement in their work.
• Your session should have no more than three presenters (including any moderator).
• PowerPoint slides filled with words should be kept to a minimum. Consider using pictures, short videos, and stories to convey your message. (Please include captions on videos as a point of accessibility and use visual description for images.)

Session speakers may elect to receive a stipend. We will pay individual presenters a stipend of $75, with a limit of $225 per session.

Presenting is complimentary; however, presenters attending the entire conference need to pay a “presenter registration rate” which is 50% of the early bird registration rate (available to 3 presenters per session). You may also register using the Pay What You Can (PWYC) rate.

Previous conferences have sold out, therefore registering allows us to gather accurate information to ensure everyone can fully engage in the conference.

The RFP for the 2026 Nonprofit Leadership Conference is now closed. We hope you can still join us May 21, 2026 as an attendee.

Interested in presenting at another MCN 2026 Conference? Check out our other open RFPs.