With some organisations, board members may often come from the same pool of people in the local community.

In some cases these board members may have been on the board for a significant amount of time.

There is nothing necessarily wrong with this as often their commitment and passion for your organisation has led to the success of your organisation but alternatively there may be circumstances where the performance of the organisation has stagnated or may be even going backwards.

While having this support from these local community members is important, your organisation could also benefit from having the input from people outside your local community.  These people may have a different perspective as they are not directly from the area or they may have relevant expertise that could help your organisation.

When your board seems stagnant and your ideas stale, take a look at the board members and ask yourself if it could do with some “new blood.”

For example, if you run a small health based organisation you may recruit someone who has a senior role within the health department.  Maybe you run a sporting club so consider recruiting someone who may work in sporting administration.

These are just some examples but the issue being highlighted is that not all your board members need to come from the same pool of people within your local community and that there are some other options that you could consider.

The next post discusses ways to recruit these type of targeted board members.