Board Governance

Building Diversity on Your Board or Advisory Council

Many organizations talk a good game when it comes to diversity, but talking about diversity and achieving it are two different things. Too often diversity is that item on the "to do" list that the board talks about but never seems to be able to achieve. Or, perhaps more damaging, diversity is really nothing more that tokenism, where one person is brought on to represent the needs and voice of all people of color, all economically disadvantaged individuals, or all clients.

The reality is that building a truly diverse board (however you define "diversity" on your board) is not easy and requires a genuine commitment. A study by BoardSource, titled: "Vital Voices: Lessons Learned from Board Members of Color" is tremendously instructive for any board or advisory council that is seeking to build or increase diversity. While the study focuses on people of color, we think you'll find the lessons here instructive no matter how you define diversity.

Here are a few lessons we took away from the study:

Five Internal Controls for the Very Small Nonprofit

Five Internal Controls for the Very Small Nonprofit

We love "Blue Avocado" and the nonprofit advice offered there: http://www.blueavocado.org/.org. In this case, we want to recommend to you an article by Carl Ho that suggests some strategies that really small nonprofits can use to protect themselves from financial improprieties.

Experience tells us that some of the standard advice that is offered by accountants to nonprofits doesn't always work well with the smallest organizations (where separation of duties, for example, may seem impossible).

See his advice (and the follow-up comments), and consider subscribing to Blue Avocado. We do.

http://www.blueavocado.org/content/five-internal-controls-very-small-nonprofit

Understanding the Cyclical Nature of Board Behavior

We often talk in workshops and with our clients about the stages that nonprofit boards pass through in their "evolution." It turns out that those "stages" might be "cycles" that boards are destined to repeat again and again.

Even the highest performing boards can struggle to stay at the top of their game, and it may be just a matter of time until they are facing some of the same kinds of challenges they thought they left in their distant past. As gloomy or ominous as that may sound, there is also lots of good news for those nonprofit boards that are really struggling to build their strengths. You may be poised to take advantage of where the cycle will take you next!

Check-out "Here We Go Again. The Cyclical Nature of Board Behavior" from the Nonprofit Quarterly. The article is a recent update on a 1992 study and is well worth your time!

Keys to Highly Efficient Meetings

Don't meet to report. Today our most valuable commodity is our time. If you are lucky enough to get people in the same room together, don't waste their time with reports and updates that could easily be shared in writing before or after the meeting. Instead, focus this valuable face-to-face time on items that can really benefit from discussion or are of strategic importance to the organization.