The survey reveals both optimism for the future and an appetite for innovation. It also highlights gaps between aspiration and execution, particularly in artificial intelligence (AI) and technology integration.
Government leaders are the most optimistic about their organization’s financial stability.
Education respondents reported having the most advanced technology integration.
28% of nonprofit respondents reported having no formal approach to AI strategy.
Over half of nonprofit and government respondents 87% of education respondents detected unauthorized access to their networks or data within the past year.
Funding constraints are felt across the sectors — affecting everything from talent to technology upgrades. “When people aren’t sure whether their organization will be able to sustain operations or programs, they start asking themselves if they’d be better off somewhere more stable,” Wipfli partner Brian Gaumont said. “That uncertainty can push talented people out of the sector entirely.”
When it comes to technology integration, “Cost is often the barrier people name first,” Gaumont said. “But what we see underneath are integration hurdles: outdated systems that don’t talk to each other, limited IT bandwidth and teams stretched thin just to maintain what they have.”
Integration gaps can have real consequences, like cyberattacks. Nearly half of nonprofit and government respondents and three-quarters of education respondents said their organizations experienced multiple (more than three) cyber incidents within the past year.
The full report covers in detail:
- Talent remains a critical pressure point: Across all three sectors, leaders ranked attracting and hiring highly skilled people among their top three anticipated challenges for the next 12 months.
- Financial outlooks vary: Government respondents reported the strongest optimism about their organizations’ financial stability. Nonprofit respondents were moderately optimistic about their own organizations but less so about the sector as a whole. Education respondents expressed the least confidence in both their current and future financial outlooks.
- Technology maturity differs sharply: Only about one-third of nonprofit respondents described their organizations as “advanced” or “cutting-edge.” By contrast, roughly half of government respondents and nearly two-thirds of education respondents reported mature integration.
- AI strategies are emerging — but unevenly: While 84% of education respondents say they have a defined AI strategy, nonprofit and government respondents are more evenly split between exploration and focused implementation.
- Cost and complexity are persistent barriers. Across all sectors, the cost of implementation/integration was identified as the top technology challenge. Other obstacles included system interoperability, employee adoption, reliance on legacy systems and data-readiness.
- What’s next for NGE: Wipfli advisors add context, explaining how the data manifests in real organizations. They also offer strategies to help NGE leaders build resilience in a complex and changing environment.
Download the full report for deeper analysis, including an appendix with all the data. For media inquiries, contact Alicia O’Connell at alicia.oconnell@wipfli.com.
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