Joanna*, the Executive Director of a multimillion-dollar organization focusing on food insecurity, reached out because she needed help with her board. In most areas, the organization was doing well: Since Joanna had taken over as Executive Director a year-and-a-half earlier, the work of the organization had expanded to serve many more clients. While the previous Executive Director had been content to serve a limited number of clients, Joanna saw the need in the community and found government funding and other funding sources to almost double the number of clients served.

Our process to strengthen the board

A while ago, I was working with the board and staff of a nonprofit social service organization on some strategic planning. In order to build shared vision, I did an exercise that I’ve done with a number of groups, “What’s My Why?”

“What’s My Why?” is fairly simple: Each person finds a partner. One person is the listener, the other one is the talker. The listener asks, “What is your why?” and the talker shares whatever comes to mind. In this case, participants were instructed to talk about their reasons for supporting the organization.

Daniel, a client with whom we had worked on governance projects and the executive director of a nonprofit organization, reached out to us with a request: several board members, Deanna and Kyle, complained that they felt “confused” about their participation on the organization’s board of directors. Each had been recruited by a member of the nominating committee, who gave an overview of his or her commitment as a board member.

Exploring where and how we are blocked is a critical step to forward motion.

I love leading board retreats. It’s one of my favorite things to do because groups dig into deep issues. Let me give you an example:

Halfway through a recent board retreat for a social service organization, important information surfaced.

Board members mentioned that the secretary had been inconsistent in her performance. She was not sharing meeting minutes in a timely manner. This hurt board members’ ability to govern the organization: Board members weren’t prepared to vote on issues and wasted precious time catching up.