Design the Perfect ‘Career Ladder’ to Develop an Outstanding Board Chair

Published date01 March 2018
Date01 March 2018
DOIhttp://doi.org/10.1002/bl.30099
4 BOARD LEADERSHIP
News
(continued from front page) Design the Perfect
‘Career Ladder’ to Develop
an Outstanding Board Chair
By Jeff Stratton
Preparations for developing a board’s top leader need to begin at the board
recruitment stage. Here is one way to go about building a career ladder to develop
competent leadership in the chair position.
Board chairs are sometimes unpre-
pared for the job. That was a key
finding of “Voices of Board Chairs, A
National Study on the Perspectives of
Board Chairs: How They Prepare for
and Perceive Their Role in Relation
to the Board,” from the Alliance for
Nonprofit Management’s Governance
Affinity Group.
Here is one important finding: 55%
of chairs have fewer than three years
on the board, with 16% having served
less than one year.
Terrie Temkin, CoreStrategies for
Nonprofits Inc., said preparations
for developing the board’s top
leader need to begin at the board
recruitment stage.
Does this happen at your
organization? When a board member
is “promoted” to chair without a
proper onboarding and education
process, the organization often finds
itself six months later with a chair
who can’t do the job, Temkin said.
Here’s how to go about building a
career ladder to develop competent
leadership in the chair position:
1. Start work on chair development
early. Chair prep begins at
onboarding. When the board
recruits new members, it needs
to view every person it recruits as
having the potential to become
a board chairperson. “That’s very
important,” Temkin said.
To develop these types of
high‐quality individuals into
board leaders, the board
needs strategic programs for
board orientation and ongoing
board education. “Those are
the programs that provide
the background about the
organization, the knowledge of
the mission, the understanding
of the community and the
organization’s impact to board
members,” Temkin said.
The orientation should also
introduce board members to the
governance function, the board’s
job, and how to do it well, she
said.
“When the ongoing education
provided covers these skills
or dimensions of board
service, people are far more
knowledgeable and can use
that knowledge in a way that
strengthens them when they
are in positions of leadership,”
Temkin said.
After the onboarding occurs
and with a strong education
component in place, the
organization then should identify
early on the board members
it wants to groom for board
leadership positions.
2. Provide those identied with
opportunities to develop. Once
the organization has selected an
individual to groom for leadership
positions on the board, he or
she needs plenty of chances
to grow and develop. This can
occur through the opportunity to
attend conferences, or through
classes at a local community
college or a United Way, for
example, Temkin said.
“It would be great if this
could be accomplished at the
organization’s expense, because
that would allow all potential
leaders to have the experience
regardless of their nancial
situation,” she said.
Realistically, some
organizations are opposed to
spending on board development
philosophically and others won’t
have the budget, “but it sends
a very important message that
preparation and education
are essential to you as a
leader and to the future of the
organization,” Temkin said.
For organizations with limited
funds for board education,
getting creative provides
opportunities for board member
development. “This can occur
at each meeting, in the form
of a quick quiz on a topic that
gives people a chance to test
themselves on what they know,”
Temkin said. Other ideas:
Program tours.
Visits to state legislators to
work on advocacy.
Creating a board education
calendar.
Bringing in outside expertise.
Opportunities for networking.
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