Mastering Board Best Practices: Essential Skills for Effective Non-profit Leadership

Mastering Board Best Practices.pdf

1. Mastering Board Best Practices:
JULY 2024
Presented For
OnBoard
ESSENTIAL SKILLS FOR
EFFECTIVE NONPROFIT
LEADERSHIP

2. The Nonprofit
Help Center
Training the people who power your mission.
The Nonprofit Help Center helps hundreds of nonprofit
teams train, sustain, and retain their people through a
unique suite of professional development and capacity-
building services.
[email protected]
nonprofithelpcenter.com
nonprofitboardmemberbasics.com

3. Today’s Board
Leadership Lens
AgendaAgenda
Understanding
Key Leadership
Styles
Implementing
Board Leadership
Assessments
Fostering
Collaboration &
Strengthening
Relationships

4. Importance of
Board
Leadership
11
22
Leadership is:
influencing people to accomplish a common goal
Not the same as managing
Traditional leadership
Focuses on ability to inspire and motivate others
Leader-follower vertical relationship
Directive (telling) or participative (inviting)

5. 30%37%
Top Challenge:
Staffing Capacity
Top Challenge:
Recruitment & Retention
Nonprofit Facts:
Leadership Lens
10%6%
Nonprofits’ Share of GDP Nonprofits’ Share of Total
Workforce

6. Board vs. Staff
Future Focused
Sets the course through
identiifcation of goals, vision,
values
Responsible for top staff
Typically includes:
Strategic Planning
Decision Making
Financial Oversight
Now Focused
Supporting and implementing
goals and values set by board &
organizational charters
Operational Decisions
Typically includes:
Hire, train, retain staff
Translate & activate on goals
Enforcing policy
Accountability
Governance Management

7. Is your board
balanced?
Yes
Too much governance-focus
Too much management-
focus
We’re a mess!

8. Key Leadership Styles
0101
Democratic
0303
Coach-Style
0202
StrategicStrategic
0404
TransformationalTransformational
Equity-oriented
Discussion, brainstorming,
and group decision-making
Leader guides the process,
but only to discover the
“voice of the people”
Focus on inspiring others to
realize their goals
Focuses on values, mission,
and personal connection
Draws out strengths of others
and encourages personal
growth
Setting direction
Aligning & Mobilizing
Leader typically likes order,
control, and planning.
Creates a strong, clear,
compelling vision that is
shared with others.
Excites and compels others.
Lets the vision lead the action.

9. Democratic
Leadership
Promotes creativity
Inclusive
Collaborative
Builds Trust
Empowering
Increases team
satisfaction
Slower decision-making
Can cause communication
failures
Great for encouraging creativity, working with younger
team members, and engaging experts.

10. Strategic
Leadership
Effective
Communicator
Structured finisher
Focus on details of the
future
Challenge the status quo
Objective
Builds commitment to
& clarity around tasks
Future focus is distracting
Inflexible
Expensive
Great for evaluating new initiatives, developing and
monitoring plans, and when matters are timely.

11. Coach-Style
Leadership
Collaborative
Interested in others’
progress/experience
Comfortable with feedback
Focus on empathy and
building trust
Expectations are clear
Transforms deficits
into strengths
Time intensive
It’s hard to do well
Can impact progress if
done poorly
Great for subsets of teams or committees, when
decisions are not pressing, and with long-term
relationships.

12. Transformational
Leadership
Alignment focused
Pull toward
accountability
Emphasis on individual
control of work approach
Growth orientation
Promotes motivation
Encourages
development
Prioritizes long-term over
short-term
Potential for burnout
Great for big-picture initiatives where vision can be
rallied, as well as clearly connecting the org’s goals
with individual roles.

13. What’s your
style?
Democratic
Strategic
Coach-Style
Transformational

14. What’s your
board’s style?
Democratic
Strategic
Coach-Style
Transformational

15. Board vs. Staff:
Leadership Roles
Future Focused (D, S, C)
Sets the course through
identification of goals, vision,
values (T)
Responsible for top staff (S, C)
Typically includes:
Strategic Planning (S, T)
Decision Making (D, S)
Financial Oversight (S)
Now Focused (S, D)
Supporting and implementing goals
and values set by board &
organizational charters (C, D, T)
Operational Decisions (S)
Typically includes:
Hire, train, retain staff (C, S)
Translate & activate on goals (S, T)
Enforcing policy (S, C)
Accountability (S, T)
Governance Management

16. Today’s Board
Leadership Lens
AgendaAgenda
Understanding
Key Leadership
Styles
Implementing
Board Leadership
Assessments
Fostering
Collaboration &
Strengthening
Relationships

17. Leadership
Self-
Assessment
Complete an online or in-person assessment
Assessment
Consider attributes of leadership styles and which are
most active in your own approach
Self Observation
Ask for reflections from others on what they see in you
Feedback
Experiment with different leadership styles
Sandbox

18. Value of Self
Evaluations
A means of getting what we want: Our leadership style,
whether we know it or not, typically also serves to meet our
basic human needs around respect, belonging, self-esteem,
confidence, personal growth and actualization.
How we think we show up as in leadership roles: The
leadership style that we think we show up as, even if our
behavior doesn’t follow. Often we revert to mannerisms that
worked for us as adolescents.
Style in Use
Espoused Style

19. Interpreting
Self-
Evaluations
Common gap results include lack of accountability,
no “bench,” repetitive communications, and silos
around activity and information. Where does your
natural style align with org needs? Where do you
need to adapt and flex?
Look to develop one or two leadership attributes
around your key board responsibility/area of focus.
Structure how you’ll determine if you’re improving!
Identify and lean into your “secret sauce,” and
develop parameters around where you want to take
your leadership (and where you don’t!).
Identify Personal Leadership Gaps
Develop Improvement Plan
Better Sense of Self

20. Today’s Board
Leadership Lens
AgendaAgenda
Understanding
Key Leadership
Styles
Implementing
Board Leadership
Assessments
Fostering
Collaboration &
Strengthening
Relationships

21. Collaboration Strategies
0101
Anticipation
0303
Adaptation
0202
ArticulationArticulation
0404
AccountabilityAccountability
Process of sensing and
making meaning of an
ambiguous and rapidly
changing reality.
Process of gathering
feedback data and
normalizing continuous
learning.
The way we communicate our
anticipation.
Goal: build collective
understanding and support
for action.
The way that we keep
ourselves focused on “who
will do what by when.”
Seeks to maximize
transparency in decision-
making.

22. Which of these is
strongest on
your board?
Anticipation
Articulation
Adaptation
Accountability

23. Relational Awareness considers how
we think, feel, and act in three lenses:
within us, between us, and around us.
Understanding that there are a variety
of leadership styles and means of
applying them helps us develop trust
in honoring the diversity of talent
around the board table.
Relational Awareness Trust in Others
Self awareness is an antidote to
leadership struggles, including imposter
syndrome and feelings of inadequacy or
self doubt.
Leading Yourself
Strengthening Relationships
Through Leadership AwarenessThrough Leadership Awareness

24. Top Tips:
Taking Action
Create a leadership scorecard for use during
meetings; track your leadership moments.
Recognize your intuition.
Review agenda items in advance and categorize
according to the most suitable leadership style.
Connect with another board member to share
feedback. (Typically, avoid open-ended.)
Ask your exec or chair where they see
leadership gaps.
Perform a post-mortem on a recent issue you
were involved with.
Try one new thing.
Share with a trusted peer.

25. Mastering Board Best Practices:
JULY 2024
Presented For
OnBoard
ESSENTIAL SKILLS FOR
EFFECTIVE NONPROFIT
LEADERSHIP