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In the Board Room: Staying In the Loop And Out Of the Weeds
Recently, a nonprofit CEO requested that I help him keep his incoming board chair “in the loop but out of the weeds.” A catchy slogan, but what does that really mean? Those who have been through board leadership changes know the de …
Building a More Diverse Board with Intention
According to a report from Boardsource, a third of 1,300 nonprofit CEOs surveyed say that their boards are 100 percent white. They also report that 45 percent of board members are women. That means that a lot of important voices never get invite …
Divorce and the Nonprofit Board Member
Over the course of seven years, I have served on the boards of two nonprofit agencies and on the education committee of a third. I’m a professional academic, with the organizational skills and the flexible schedule that make me valuable as a vol …
If Your Board Looked Like Your Community
Moving board diversity from a ‘problem to solve’ to ‘something to practice.’ Staff and board talk common hurdles and how to overcome them.
A Board Member’s Guide to Nonprofit Overhead
Calculating overhead rates and managing overhead expense are important staff roles. Board members are not required to know how do staff accounting work, but we do need to bring an informed perspective to our oversight: Harvard’s indirect cost ra …
Who’s the Boss? The Board or the Executive?
There is an abundance of advice for nonprofit boards and EDs that speaks to the advantages of “partnership” and “open communications.” But sometimes that advice just doesn’t feel like enough. Who’s the boss? The board or the executive director/C …
The Very Good but Seriously Flawed Executive Director
No executive director has all gifts, and many are brilliant. But what about the nonprofit CEO who is terrific in some ways but whose strengths are matched with some troubling flaws as well? It’s uncomfortable to be a board member when you have s …
I Followed A Founder: A First-Person Nonprofit Tale
Too often the focus on nonprofit executive transitions is about the departing executive. We’re in the middle of interviewing 58 executives who followed founders or long-time leaders. Here’s just one of their stories; we’ll call her “Amanda”: The …
Ten Things Boards Do Right (Without Even Realizing It)
No matter what goes wrong in a nonprofit, somehow the board gets blamed. If the executive director embezzled money, people say, “Where was the board?” Why don’t they say: “Executives are always at the root of the problem. Why don’t we just stop having …
DIY: Make a Bylaws Cheat Sheet
“What does it say in the bylaws?” “Does anyone have a copy of the by-laws?” “I know I got one when I started on the board but . . . ” Here’s a new idea: a Bylaws Cheat Sheet. Even if there is a copy of the by-laws handy, it’s tedio …
