Why isn’t it working? Agencies seek out top business leaders to put on their Board, hoping that they will bring their professional acumen to the Board room-often only to be disappointed. Did these leaders check their business experience at the door? Why do they often make such poor business decisions in guiding the agency’s future?
After many years and many Board Development projects, I think I’ve found the answer. They don’t get it. They are put off by the unfamiliar nature of the voluntary board, which requires consensus leadership. On voluntary boards, people don’t do things because they are told to do them, but because they have been involved in making the decisions, and own them.
People must participate to own decisions: The process of making decisions and taking action in a nonprofit can be frustratingly slow. In order to have an effective decision making and implementing machine, people have to own their decisions. The leadership skills of the marketplace are often not appropriate in voluntary boards. So the types of clear, crisp actions taken in the corporate environment don’t happen easily on a Board of a nonprofit agency.
Boards and Corporations: I have found it very helpful to frame the governance structure to a Board in terms which business people are familiar, and when I do, they say, “that’s common sense”. I stress that “form follows function.” The Board is the corporate management and the committees are the company’s departments. The departments (committees) are where the work is done, laying out the strategies and providing the human resources and skills to get the job done. The corporate management (the Board) makes the major business decisions, sets priorities, and looks ahead to the future.
If you buy into the analogy, then committees (or task forces) should be manned by experts, whether it’s marketing, fiscal management, facilities, service delivery, etc. These are the human resources that the staff of most agencies need to supplement their own skills and experience. The team of committee and staff can make the best decisions and, if necessary, bring them to the Board (corporate management). Too many boards spend their time making all the decisions, often without the expertise to make good decisions. Board meetings go on, and on…boring the Board members.
Let Board members fulfill the Mission: people come on Boards because they support the Mission. They want to help the agency fulfill its Mission, and yet they spend most of their time dealing with operational trivia. No wonder we can’t get the best people to serve on agency boards. They’ve been exposed to too many “boring boards.”
Bring the best together: The best committees are made up of interested board members and talented outsiders. They therefore represent the culture of the agency and the best knowledge in the field. In this way the best of the practices of businesses will guide the destiny of the agency, and board meetings can be do the work they are charged to do-making sure the strategic plan is being implemented and guiding the future destiny of the agency.