Former state senator David P. Magnani will today be named the first executive director of the Massachusetts Nonprofit Network, a new association intended to give a unified voice to the state’s roughly 25,000 not-for-profit organizations.

Nonprofits employ an estimated 15 percent of the state’s workforce and pump close to $50 billion into the Massachusetts economy each year.

Former state Sen. David Magnani has been named the first executive director of a new statewide organization charged with raising awareness of the state’s 25,000 nonprofit groups.

Magnani will run the Massachusetts Nonprofit Network, a new agency that was established to promote agencies that help people in need, advocate on behalf of its members, and develop services to expand social service programs.

“Oftentimes, there’s a perception that nonprofits are less professionally run than the for-profit corporations,” said Magnani, a longtime Framingham resident. “We want to make sure we improve the images of those types of organizations.”

Former State Senator David P. Magnani has been named the first executive director of the Massachusetts Nonprofit Network, a statewide organization established to raise awareness of the state’s nonprofit sector, advocate on behalf of its members, and develop services and programs to build capacity for individual member organizations.

The Massachusetts Nonprofit Network (MNN) was given a “soft launch” in January of 2007, after a three-year process of convenings and conversations with leaders and stakeholders in the sector. The new entity was designed to balance geographical concerns, as well as challenges related to the number and diversity of potential member organizations.