Non-Governmental Organizations (NGO) are unique in the development framework of India, in that they have fewer and more volatile resources, carry out social missions, rely on the discretionary work of their staff and, more than ever before, are expected to produce quantifiable impact. In these environments, recruitment, development, appraisal and reward are not administrative side-lines, but key factors in the survival and effectiveness of the institution. The study investigates the association between HRM practices, employee outcomes and organisational effectiveness of the NGOs in Bhubaneswar (capital of Odisha). Descriptive and analytical research design has been used and primary data were collected from a final sample of 120 employees (usable responses, N = 120) drawn from 18 registered NGO's of the city using a structured questionnaire that includes five demographic questions and 10 statements measured on a five point Likert scale. Four dimensions of HRM practice (recruitment and selection, training and development, performance appraisal, compensation and benefits), three indicators of employee outcomes (job satisfaction, organizational commitment, intention to stay) and three indicators of organizational effectiveness (service delivery, stakeholder satisfaction, adaptability) were captured. A mediation test was performed in SPSS version 26 using the causal-steps approach along with bootstrapping, while the Kaiser–Meyer–Olkin measure, Pearson correlation, independent-samples t-test, descriptive statistics and multiple linear regression were also used to analyse data. The results show that the HRM practices are significantly and positively related to the employee outcomes (r = .624, p < .001) and the organizational effectiveness (r = .568, p < .001), that the four HRM dimensions together account for 44.2 per cent of the variance in organizational effectiveness, and that employee outcomes are a partial mediator for the HRM–effectiveness relationship. The highest mean score was for training and development, whereas the lowest mean score was for compensation and benefits, indicating that NGOs in Bhubaneswar choose to go the extra mile in case of financial limitations through developmental and relational aspects. The study ends with implications for NGO managers/donors/policy makers.