Governing Boards In Nonprofit Organizations

For individuals that are interested in starting their own nonprofit should be aware that they will not be in full control of the organization. It is not like starting a business where the founder would be in control of everything. In the nonprofit sector the board will be handling majority of the decisions and strategic planning for the organization. In addition, there are several types of boards that are used in the nonprofit sector. For instance, one type of board is the advisory board. However, the advisory board does not have too much authority in the organization. But, the advisory does serve for a few purposes in the organization. The advisory board allows former board members or prospective bard members to participate in the organization.
Even donors have been place on the advisory board as they want to get more involve but does not want the full responsibility of a board member. The advisory board is good for a sounding board to ensure the organization’s board is making the best decision. However, the advisory board can have some negative effects; such as being a waste of time or irritating towards the people that are coming to the meeting because the decisions do not have a serious effect. Furthermore, Governing Boards purpose is to represent the community/stakeholders; their purpose is similar to a for-profit board as well.
If the governing board does not perform well, then they will be held responsible. Thus, it can be hard for a nonprofit organization to represent the community due to the lack of guiding forces. Additionally, the customers are in a competitive environment and the dual bottom line. Therefore, the nonprofit board has responsibilities that they must follow. The governing board is expected to follow legal responsibility of the duty of care, loyalty, and obedience. The board is held to the highest responsibility as at the board level is where the funding will stop; the staff does not stop the
funding. Moreover, the hierarchy of needs for a board is they must do the governance function, fundraising, specific operating task, and operating. Organizations must do the governance and may have to the fundraising but these are the top two needs. However, governance requires a lot of work, so when an organization keeps adding more it makes it challenging to do great governance. Also, governing boards set the mission, vision, goals and objectives. Not to mention, how the governing board establish measurement and monitor the progress, ensure proper stewardship, oversee the organization, and hire/fire the CEO. Also, legally the governing board must have at least three members, but a organization does not want too many board members.
A large numbers of board members can make it harder to discuss the needs of the organization. This can also cause the large board to create a smaller board within the board. In addition, depending on the organization there can be clients on the board and the board can try to have some type of diversity on the board. As well it is important for the board and staff to understand where each stand in the organization. The staff does now a lot when it comes to the operations of the organization. Then the board represent the need of the community. Further, the operating board performs operating and the governing functions too. This happens when the operating board is faced with limited staff; doing this can have the organization to develop some blurred lines. Therefore, the operating board must determine what the organization really needs. Over time the needs of the organization needs should evolve and the board to be careful to not cause too much
friction. In addition, there are some pitfalls that boards should be aware. Bringing preconceptions on operations, be aware of timeframe, operations are fun, random power, and blindly following the CEO. Also, some of the board members might not understand double bottom line, easy to lose focus, or bringing the wrong people aboard. While if the board want to be consider as high performance they must do a few things. Such as determine what they want to be and set policies, have a relationship with the CEO, have a mission and vision statement, and measure progress. However, before this is done the organization must acquire board members. When hiring a new board member, they must have a job description, consider the cost of bad hire, orientate, diversity, recruiting up, term limits, and expectation. Finally, ways to improve the board performance the organization must get the chair on board, individual performance, and group performance. In addition, there needs to be a thoughtful agenda set for the board meeting, discuss and decide, do not get distracted, and meet as much as the organization needs depending on the type of board. Also, the board can have different committees for the organization; type of committees is finance, governance, stewardship, executive, development, and specialized.