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Creating Productive Boards,
by Timothy Schneider,
Publisher, Association
News
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 Los
Angeles, CA – June 2015 / Newsmaker Alert / The growth and vitality
of an association can hinge on whether its board of directors is willing
to embrace and employ good governance practices. The Stanford Graduate
School of Business, in collaboration with BoardSource and GuideStar, recently
surveyed 924 directors of nonprofit organizations about the composition,
structure and practices of their boards. The results revealed that the
skills, resources and experience of directors are often not sufficient.
To address these deficiencies, the study produced nine recommendations
to improve nonprofit board governance:
1.
Ensure that your mission is focused, and the available skills and resources
are well-aligned. An association’s mission is often too broad. Narrowing
your mission may help you better align your association with the skills
of your volunteer leaders.
2.
Ensure that the mission is understood by the board and key stakeholders.
Be sure you’ve stated your association’s mission clearly in writing.
3.
Establish explicit goals and strategies tied to achieving that mission.
As the chief executive, you’ll need to help the board develop goals and
strategies that will make meaningful progress toward achieving the association’s
mission.
4.
Develop rigorous performance metrics that reflect those goals. It’s
important to develop performance measures that are pragmatic and useful.
5.
Hold the chief executive accountable for meeting the performance metrics,
and evaluate the performance with an objective process. Some nonprofit
boards are reluctant to establish an annual evaluation process, but savvy
association executives know that a rigorous process is absolutely critical.
The evaluation process can also serve as a basis for thoughtful succession
planning.
6.
Compose your board with individuals who have the skills, resources, diversity
and dedication to address the needs of the organization. Excellent
board composition is not a conceptual challenge—it is about the hard work
of finding and adding one more strong board member (and then another).
7.
Define explicitly the roles and responsibilities of board members.
Volunteer leaders need to know what’s expected of them. These expectations
range from basics, such as attendance and engagement, to things that are
often not clearly defined, such as their financial commitment or the fundraising
they’ll be expected to do.
8.
Establish well-defined board, committee and ad hoc processes. All boards
need governance, development, finance and audit committees. Some may need
other committees such as programs, operations and marketing. An executive
committee and ad hoc committees for strategic planning or capital campaigns
can also be useful.
9.
Regularly review and assess each board member and the board’s overall performance.
Strong boards use their governance committee to ensure regular evaluations.
The governance committee must be vigilant to ensure that nonperforming
members are not re-elected or reappointed and that expectations are communicated
to those who are.
Plan
now to join us for Meetings Quest in Oakland, which will be held July 22–23.
For more information, please visit MeetingsQuest.com
or call 877-577-3700.
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 Timothy
Schneider is the publisher of Association
News and SportsTravel
magazines, which serve group travel planners responsible for generating
106 million hotel room nights annually. Schneider
Publishing also organizes Meetings
Quest, America's longest-running series of trade shows for meeting
planners, and the TEAMS Conference
& Expo, the world’s largest gathering of sports-event organizers.
TEAMS '15 is being held in Las Vegas, November 9–12, 2015. For further
information on advertising or sponsorship opportunities, please call toll-free
877-577-3700 or 310-577-3700 if calling from outside the United States.
The
current issue of Association
News can be viewed in digital format online by clicking
here.
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Media
Contact:
Timothy
Schneider
310-577-3700
Schneider
Publishing Company, Inc. |
