Beyond the Band-aid: Building HR Infrastructure Without Big Budgets

Even in the age of AI and automation, people remain the most critical decision-makers in organizations. Nonprofits are real businesses - often complex, fast-growing, and high-impact - and they require real strategies to support the people who power their missions. Without intentional HR infrastructure, even the most purpose-driven organizations experience burnout, turnover, legal risk, and stalled growth.

In this interactive and practical session, Candyce Hunt helps nonprofit leaders understand what HR infrastructure actually is, why it is often misunderstood, and how to build it intentionally within real budget and capacity constraints. Participants will identify common HR and leadership gaps that emerge as organizations grow, examine the real costs of relying on short-term fixes, and explore how unclear roles and reactive practices quietly undermine performance and retention. This session emphasizes clarity over perfection, equipping leaders to prioritize people systems that align mission, resources, and community impact - starting from where they are today.

Learning Objectives:

• By the end of this session, participants will be able to:
• Identify common HR and leadership gaps that emerge when organizations grow without intentional people systems.
• Understand HR infrastructure as a business necessity, not an administrative function, in mission-driven organizations.
• Recognize the risks and real costs of relying on short-term fixes, including burnout, disengagement, preventable turnover, legal exposure, and loss of institutional knowledge.
• Distinguish between must-have, nice-to-have, and non-essential HR systems based on organizational size, growth stage, and risk.
• Apply a practical prioritization approach to align people systems with mission, budget realities, and community impact.
• Leave with concrete, executable actions that create meaningful movement in onboarding, role clarity, accountability, or decision-making - starting from where they are today.
• What Participants Can Expect
• A highly interactive session that blends data, real-world insight, and guided application. Participants will engage in live exercises and leave with practical tools, language, and next steps they can immediately apply to strengthen people systems and leadership clarity within their organizations.

About the Facilitator:

Candyce Hunt is a TEDx speaker, leadership strategist, and organizational effectiveness consultant with nearly 20 years of experience developing leaders, strengthening talent systems, and driving results inside complex, high-performance environments. A former multi-unit operations leader, Candyce has led teams across multi-billion-dollar organizations and understands firsthand how leadership breakdowns impact performance, retention, and culture.
She is the Co-Founder of the 5 Minute Career Hack Podcast and the creator of the Get Off the Clearance Rack framework, which helps leaders and organizations address undervaluation, prevent burnout, and improve how leadership value is communicated and developed. Known for her relatable storytelling and practical frameworks, Candyce translates real workplace challenges into clear, actionable leadership strategies.
Her work focuses on self-leadership, talent leadership, and culture leadership - equipping leaders to communicate with clarity, lead with confidence, and build sustainable performance cultures that last.

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Host or Publisher Nonprofit Austin at ACC