What is your board’s culture, and why is it important? Culture affects the way that organisations do things. It’s essentially the written, as well as unspoken, codes, values and principles that members of the NFP share.

Culture Shapes a Board’s Identity and Effectiveness

Culture determines what is, and is not, expected and required of its members. It also directs everything, from how members interact with one another, to how they communicate with supporters, service recipients, and, the world as a whole.

Building a strong, healthy culture is crucial for nonprofit boards that want to be successful in their oversight and governance duties. Creating an effective board culture is the key to creating a strong organisation that can be resilient enough to withstand and survive hard times. Of course, NFPs need to be creative enough to find novel solutions to obstacles and discover new ways of doing things that will enable it to provide greater service to its beneficiaries while allowing sustainable growth.

Culture at the Heart of Ineffective and Dysfunctional Boards

Many times, nonprofit boards struggle with defining their culture and creating the procedures that will enable it to function at a high level. When culture is unclear, or otherwise fails, the results are easily seen in the board’s inability to communicate and take action.

Meetings become bogged down in details or become entirely directionless, and little work is accomplished. Some board meetings spiral into a series of petty disputes among individual members, and there is little enthusiasm to cooperate with one another.

Creating an effective board begins with creating a strong, healthy board culture.

Defining Identity and the Ground Rules Can Strengthen Board Culture

The following is a series of questions that can assist your board to develop its culture by clearly defining its reason for being, and creating guidelines that enhance relationships as well as increase the effectiveness of the board.

Membership

One of the first areas that boards should direct their attention to is membership itself. What rules should be in place to determine who should, and should not be a member, and what guidelines should be used to manage the conduct of members? By clearly defining expectations, potential conflicts can be reduced, increasing cooperation, respect and trust among board members.

1. What should be the responsibilities and the rights of members? Under what circumstances can a member lose their rights?

2. How diverse and inclusive do you want your board to be? How large should it be?

3. How close do you want members to be outside of board meetings and other events conducted by your nonprofit? Will your board allow socialisation outside of board duties? Will it actively encourage it?

4. What process should there be for members to evaluate one another’s performance, to offer constructive feedback and potentially negative criticism?

5. What should members expect to receive from other members in terms of respect, loyalty and other values? How are members supposed to conduct themselves in their dealings with one another and with others outside of the board?

Communication

How well do your board members communicate with one another, the nonprofit’s administrative staff, beneficiaries, donors and other supporters? Improving your board culture starts with improving its internal and external communications.

1. When it comes to meetings, what is the primary purpose? What types of topics is it okay to discuss? What types of items should be left off of the agenda?

2. What should the ground rules be for meetings? How long should meetings last? How frequently should the board meet? Who should be in charge? What power do chairs of meetings have to direct and control the meeting?

3. What should be included in the minutes of the meeting? Where will the minutes of past meetings be kept, when will they be approved and posted? What are the rules for archives of the minutes and how is the access granted?

4. What is the procedure to handle disputes at meetings and overall within the organisation? What are the chain of command and the set of steps to take to address issues or conflicts that come up between board members. What is the process to resolve disputes between members, such as personality conflicts, or, conflicts of interest?

5. What are the guidelines for how email and other forms of electronic communication are used? What types of information is it okay for members to transmit by electronic mail, and what kinds of information should be conveyed by telephone, letter or in person?

Governance

Before the board can effectively fulfil its oversight and governance duties to the nonprofit, it must first clearly define its rules for its own internal governance.

1. What does your board require in a leader? What is your board’s definition of a leader and the qualities that they should possess?

2. How does your board select its chair?

3. What are the rights, responsibilities and powers granted to the chair?

4. How are committee assignments made and how is power distributed among members of the board?

5. What is the process for members to evaluate the board’s performance? Do members self-evaluate? What powers do board members have to question fellow members as well as the chair?

6. What is the process to evaluate the chair?

7. What should the process be to provide feedback to the chair and individual board members about their performance? What can be done to improve performance? Is there a process in place to address sub-par performance? What is the process for disciplinary actions for board members, including removal should it be necessary?

Of course, these questions are not meant to be an all-inclusive list of issues that your board should address to help it more thoroughly define its purpose or how it will conduct itself in its internal dealings. Rather, they should be viewed as a starting point for discussions that can help boards more clearly define the rules and expectations that members should have of themselves and one another.