Is It Good Enough to Be Responsible and Accurate?
| Author | Athens Kolias |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1002/bl.30118 |
| Date | 01 November 2018 |
| Published date | 01 November 2018 |
Is It Good Enough to Be
Responsible and Accurate?
By Athens Kolias
As Board Leadership readers increasingly see scandals at the board level
making the news, one question that arises is about how clearly expectations are
communicated. As board members go about their normal daily work, they often
operate under an assumption that everyone on the board has read from the
same dictionary, even as they increase efforts to bring more diversity into the
boardroom. Here, Athens Kolias, governance consultant and adjunct professor
at the San Francisco State University Center for Extended Learning, asks, “Do
boards realize they may not be speaking the same language?”
Remember the Abbott and Costello
routine “Who’s on First?”
How confused Costello was to hear
that the first baseman’s name was
Who? And the second base player was
What? Naturally, the usage of these
simple words out of context made for
hilarity! But in the boardroom? Not so
much.
Here we explore a few common
terms and the way in which we some-
times confuse ourselves in our usage
of them.
Responsibility vs. Accountability
In an effort to create accountability,
we define roles and assign responsibili-
ties. We often use the terms respon-
sible and accountable interchangeably.
For daily casual conversations, that
might be good enough, but for profes-
sional discussions, we need more pre-
cision and intention in our use.
•Responsible: “able to be trusted
to do what is right or to do the
things that are expected.”
•Responsibility: “the state of being
the person who caused something
to happen.”
•Accountable: “required to explain
actions or decisions to someone;
required to be responsible for
something.”
•Accountability: “an obligation or
willingness to accept responsibility
or to account for one’s actions.”
Notice that the definitions for being
accountable include words indicating
an obligation or requirement, while
being responsible says you caused
something to happen.
So how do we facilitate clarity
between these terms, beyond reading
the dictionary?
One way is in use of the RACI chart,
a common management tool that
maps out tasks to persons perform-
ing a role.1 For each task, we indicate
the person(s) Responsible, Account-
NUMBER 160, NOV.–DEC. 2018
www.boardleadershipnewsletter.com
BOARD LEADERSHIP
INNOVATIVE APPROACHES TO GOVERNANCE
View this newsletter online at wileyonlinelibrary.com
Board Leadership • DOI: 10.1002/bl • Nov.–Dec. 2018
(continued on page 2)
NEWS
Foundation Center webinar
explores basics of board
organization
The Foundation center will host
a webinar titled Organizing Your
Board to Get Things Done on Jan.
17, 2019, at 2:00 PM ET.
According to organizers, one of
the most challenging functions of
governance is how to structure the
board and committees to get things
done. To that end, this webinar
addresses how to best organize
board committees and meetings for
effective governance, and explores
many of the “nuts and bolts” such
as board materials, agendas, and
ongoing communications between
meetings. The webinar will also
explore the common committees
and board structures in use and
answer questions about governance
models and board organization.
Attendees will learn:
•Common mistakes in organizing
the board.
•Perspectives on appropriate
committees and meeting
expectations.
•Templates that are available
to implement structures
efficiently.
•Concrete next steps for
changing aspects of the
functioning of the board.
Registration fees for this event
are $49 until Jan. 10, after which
the fee will increase to $75.
For more information, visit
https://bit.ly/2DjXfoD.
(continued on page 6)
ALSO IN THIS ISSUE
Board governance and diversity
will Be more important than
ever in 2019 .......................... 4
Be Bold! getting your
nonprofit Board to think like
innovators ............................. 7
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