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What a Finance Committee Can Do for Your Board of Directors
Implementing a finance committee of the board of directors was one of the best things our organization ever did—here’s why. Baby Bear Hugs’ mission is enhancing family strengths for happy and healthy children, families, and communities. The program pro …
Board Assessments with Sample Management Questions
With the pandemic enduring and uncertainty on the horizon, now is an excellent time to reassess your board’s performance. A check-up now can ensure that you are not just surviving, but thriving. To test your boards critical performance or to put …
How Nonprofits Can Return to In-Person Board Meetings and Retreats as the Covid-19 Pandemic Winds Down
It’s Spring 2021 and your board retreat approaches. Half of your board members—and all of those over 65 or with chronic health conditions—have received a Covid-19 vaccine. In this near future, perhaps new Covid-19 cases have dropped below 60,000 …
Strategic Planning 101 for Nonprofits: Strengthen a Nonprofit’s Board-Executive Director Relationship
When I talk to nonprofit leaders about strategic planning, they often voice some of the obvious benefits of aligning teams around organizational identity (mission, vision) and organizational priorities (goals). In contrast, they rarely voice a benefit …
Creating a Roadmap to Synchronize the Board to Your Nonprofit Mission
When I joined a nonprofit five years ago, I observed during our annual budgeting that we rarely launched new ventures or events. We were marching along the “status quo” path and the conditions for our clients, staff, and donors weren’t improving. Somet …
Time to Fold: Keys to Gracefully Winding Down a Nonprofit
It looked like the Cancer Prevention Institute of California had a royal flush of a winning hand—a 40-plus-year track record of groundbreaking research, a stellar global reputation, 85 dedicated employees, a balanced $13 million budget, and one of the …
Engaging Board Members: AAA Then and Now
Philanthropy has been changing at a dizzying pace, but one thing that has not changed is our desire to more fully engage our boards. It has been almost 20 years since a client called me as we were preparing for their annual board r …
Creating A Board That Works
Let’s face it. Board bashing is something of a sport amongst nonprofit leaders, especially executive directors and CEOs. There are two primary complaints I hear all the time, both of which are surprisingly solvable! First, too many nonpro …
Top 10 Nonprofit Board “Worst” Practices
Hey board members, let’s face it, navigating your position can be tricky. On top of your day job, you’ve agreed to contribute your best thinking to a nonprofit. If you don’t have much experience in the nonprofit world, it has its own set of rules, and …
Process, Process, Process: The evaluation model you shouldn’t ignore
In a nonprofit’s toolkit, evaluation is key for making meaningful adjustments that cultivate success. As nonprofits, we are expected to be accountable to our boards, our staff, our funders, our partners, and most importantly, our clients or cons …
