Influence of the financial and non-financial information on the results of the public benefit organizations

Abstract

Public benefit organizations pursue non-financial and socially useful objectives that serve the well-being of individuals or wider public. Business corporations address their financial reports to investors who provide them with capital. A public benefit organization does not have any investors and uses grants and donations to attain its objectives without giving any guarantees that it will be successful, but only promising its motivation, efforts, determination and intention to assist the target group of beneficiaries. The paper aims to assess the importance of the information presented in the public benefit organizations’ financial and business reports for their stakeholders, as well as the impact of the organizations’ financial results on their capacity for raising funds in the next periods. Investigating the sample of 84 Polish public benefit organizations the authors intended to find out whether financial information determines the amounts of grants and financial donations the organizations receive. They also attempted to establish which financial factors make donors contribute to the given organization. Another objective of the study was to show whether the Polish donors examine the organizations’ financial reports and use information thus obtained to donate.