After 22 Years, I'm Taking a Sabbatical: A Message from Sara

5 days ago

8 min read

Updated: 2 days ago

After 22 years of leading Embolden WI, I am taking my first sabbatical. From November 9 through January 11th, I will step away from email, meetings, and deadlines to rest, reflect, and recharge.

Writing that sentence still feels a little strange. For more than two decades, I have shown up through funding crises, policy fights, a pandemic, and more urgent deadlines than I can count. Like so many nonprofit leaders, I got very good at pushing through. I got far less practiced at stopping.

This sabbatical is not a sign that something is wrong. It is a sign that something is right. Our team is strong, our partners are thriving, and Embolden WI has grown into an organization that can hold the work while I rest. We did not leave that to chance, either. We wrote a sabbatical policy, on purpose, so rest is something every person on our team can count on.

Burnout is not a personal failing

Burnout in our sector is not a few people struggling. It is a pattern. In the Center for Effective Philanthropy's State of Nonprofits 2026 report, nearly 90% of the 380 nonprofit leaders surveyed said they were concerned about their own burnout. The share calling it a very significant concern jumped from under 30% in 2025 to 46% this year.

It shows up in the work, too. Two years earlier, CEP found that 76% of leaders said burnout was affecting their organization's ability to achieve its mission. In 2026, more than half said the current environment has lowered staff morale and heightened stress.

In their book Burnout: The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle, Emily Nagoski and Amelia Nagoski name something many of us in this sector will recognize: "human giver syndrome," the belief that we must give every bit of our time, energy, and attention to others, at any cost to ourselves. They also make a crucial point. Dealing with what causes our stress is not the same as dealing with the stress itself. Our bodies need to complete the stress cycle, through rest, movement, connection, laughter, and creativity, or the exhaustion keeps building. As they put it, wellness is not a state of mind but a state of action.

Burnout is what happens when people who care deeply are asked to give endlessly, with too few resources and too little recovery. The answer is not more grit. It is better systems.

Rest is resistance

Tricia Hersey, founder of The Nap Ministry, teaches that rest is resistance. In her book Rest Is Resistance, she names grind culture for what it is: a system that tells us our worth is measured by what we produce. Rest is a way of reclaiming our bodies and our time from that system.

That idea sits at the heart of our mission. At Embolden WI, we work for health equity and health justice in Wisconsin. We know exhaustion is not distributed equally. The people carrying the heaviest loads in our communities, and in our movement, are too often the ones with the least room to rest.

So rest cannot be a reward we earn only after we burn out. It has to be built into how we work. If we want healthier communities, the people doing this work deserve to be well too.

Why we put a sabbatical policy in writing

We did not want rest to depend on who asks, who feels entitled to ask, or who can afford unpaid time. So Embolden WI adopted a formal sabbatical policy for every employee.

That puts us in a small group. In a regional survey of 70 nonprofits by the Center for Nonprofit Advancement, only 30% had a formal sabbatical policy, and only half of those covered all staff. The most common reason the others gave was not cost. It was that they had never considered it.

Here is what our policy offers:

Four weeks of paid sabbatical once an employee reaches ten consecutive years with the organization.
A one-year window to use it, following the ten-year anniversary.
Flexibility. Time can be taken all at once or in smaller segments, and can be combined with other paid time off, with supervisor approval.
Advance planning, so coverage can be handled smoothly.
A clear purpose: rest, renewal, and well-being, offered in appreciation of long-term commitment.

Sabbatical leave does not accrue and is not paid out if unused. That is intentional. This benefit exists to be taken.

What the research shows

Sabbaticals do not just help the person who takes one. They strengthen the whole organization.

The most detailed look at nonprofit sabbaticals is Creative Disruption, a study by CompassPoint Nonprofit Services of leaders who received funded sabbaticals. It found:

Staff grew. 83% of leaders said the people who report to them gained skills while they were away, and 77% of those staff agreed.
Leaders came back healthier. 82% reported better work-life balance, and 68% said their physical health improved.
Boards got stronger. 60% of sabbatical takers said their board became more effective through the planning process.

The Durfee Foundation, which has funded more than 100 nonprofit leader sabbaticals since 1997, reports similar results: stronger second-tier leadership, better succession planning, and leaders who return delegating more and focusing on strategy.

Timing matters, too. A 2022 study highlighted in Harvard Business Review, and cited in NAA's toolkit, found that when sabbaticals were offered before people showed signs of burnout, most came back with fresh perspective, more energy, and a clearer sense of how they wanted to contribute. In other words, the best time to rest is before you are running on empty.

How to build a sabbatical policy at your nonprofit

If your organization is ready to consider one, here is what we learned, drawn from our own process and the toolkits and research listed at the end of this post.

Design the policy

Make it paid. Unpaid leave only works for people who can afford it. Paid sabbaticals make rest an equity practice, not a privilege tied to pay scale or personal finances. As Sean Kosofsky of Nonprofit Fixer notes, if no one takes the sabbatical because they cannot afford the time, the benefit needs to be restructured.
Include everyone. Extend eligibility to all long-tenured staff, not just the executive director. Small organizations can start with three to four weeks to keep costs manageable.
Check it for hidden bias. Kosofsky urges organizations to ask whether a policy quietly favors certain employees, such as those with degrees, those with children, or those who are white or affluent. A written policy helps with consistency, but it does not erase structural bias on its own.
Put it in writing. The Nonprofit Risk Management Center advises writing down the criteria "to avoid any perceptions of unequal treatment." Get board approval and add it to your employee handbook.
Promise no retaliation. Include language making clear that no one will be penalized, subtly or openly, for using the benefit. Many workers leave earned time unused because they fear the consequences. Check your state's laws on paid leave, too, and make clear that taking a sabbatical is a choice, never a requirement.
Define it as restorative. Unlike an academic sabbatical, a nonprofit sabbatical should not require a book, a project, or proof of productivity. Rest is the purpose.
Start by listening. Survey your staff about what they need to rest and recover, and talk with peer organizations that already offer sabbaticals. Climate Advocacy Lab's policy, shared by Nonprofit Fixer, is a strong model to borrow from. It also shows how to handle the harder questions: how many people can be out at once, whether staff commit to stay for a year after returning, and what happens if someone resigns soon after.

Prepare the team

Map coverage early. List every responsibility, then decide who covers it, what pauses, and what can wait. Give backup staff time to learn new duties, and leave a one-page guide with key logins and contacts.
Invest in the people stepping up. The Durfee Foundation found that sabbaticals build staff leadership and strengthen succession planning. Recognize that stretch with extra pay, professional development, or coaching.
Time it with your calendar. Avoid your busiest season. The National AfterSchool Association's CEO took hers from the week before Thanksgiving into early January, so the holidays built on her time away. Climate Advocacy Lab's policy goes further and bars sabbaticals in the 60 days around national elections, its busiest season.

Protect the time away

Disconnect fully. Tell partners and funders in advance, set a clear out-of-office message, and name who to contact. If one task truly cannot be handed off, schedule a brief, planned check-in rather than staying half-connected.
Prepare emotionally, not just logistically. Ask how you want to feel while you are away and when you return, not just what you will do. NAA's COO hired a sabbatical coach with her professional development funds and called it one of her best investments.

Plan the return

Ease back in. Come back mid-week, protect a few buffer days, and ask the team for a debrief on what went well and what they handled.
Learn from each one. Survey the person returning and the team who covered. Many leaders come back delegating more and focusing on strategy. Use what you learn to strengthen the policy.

Pay for it

Ask funders. Foundations like Durfee and the Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation fund nonprofit sabbaticals directly. The Chronicle of Philanthropy notes that requests can be framed as professional development, technical assistance, or discretionary grants.
Compare it to turnover. Replacing an employee can cost 20% to 200% of their salary, according to research cited by NAA. A few weeks of paid rest costs far less than losing a leader to burnout.

How I plan to spend the time

A policy makes rest possible. Using that time well is its own practice. Here is the advice I am taking with me, and that I would offer any leader preparing for time away.

Set up a clean break first. Name someone who can handle emergencies, set an out-of-office message, and delete work apps from your phone. Time off only counts if your brain believes no one needs you.
Let the first one to two weeks be unstructured. Expect to feel restless, guilty, or oddly flat. That is decompression, not wasted time. Sleep, walk, and say no to big plans.
Then add a few anchors, not a schedule. Pick one or two things you have never had room for: a trip, a new skill, a long project, or time with people you have missed. Leave the rest of the days open.
Do something that has nothing to do with your mission. After two decades of purpose-driven work, play with no outcome is surprisingly restorative.
Save reflection for the middle or end. Around weeks three and four, once you are rested, write down what you missed, what you did not, and what you would change. Avoid big decisions about your role early on, when you may be too tired or too giddy to trust them.
Plan your return. In the last week, decide what you want to do differently when you are back, and ease in rather than jumping to full speed.

While I'm away

I am deeply grateful to our team for carrying our work forward while I rest. Their leadership is exactly what makes this possible.

I will be fully offline, and I am asking our community to help me honor that.

To my fellow nonprofit leaders: your team is watching how you treat rest. If you have been telling yourself the work cannot go on without you, I hope you will question that story. Talk to your board. Look at sample policies. Ask a funder. Start with a long weekend if that is what you can do right now. Rest is not a reward for finishing the work. It is part of how the work lasts.

I will see you in January.

With gratitude,

Sara Finger Executive Director, Embolden WI