The Friday Five: Assessing the Board of Directors

I have a friend who is considering a job opportunity as an Executive Director for a nonprofit organization, but has some concerns about its board. He asked me, What are the key questions to ask a board before accepting the Executive Director position?

There are many questions to ask, but here are five areas to consider:

1. Mission Clarity

Does the board have a clear understanding of the ultimate mission of the organization it is serving, or are there significant differences in each member's articulation of the mission? Is there agreement among the board as to what kind of chief executive they are seeking to hire, according to their understanding of what the mission will require? If the board were to be looking at a mountain range, would they all point to the same mountain that they are trying to climb?

2. Role Clarity

Does the board have a clear understanding and practice of how a healthy board operates? Do they have a track record of governance fueled by integrity, humility and appropriate boundaries of staff/board roles? Do you get a sense of whether they might micro-manage your leadership or be so hands-off that they leave you on your own?

3. Vision for Growth

Does the board have a vision for the organization to grow - both in health and in impact? Many boards prefer the comfort of small operations, and therefore, greater control. Are they recruiting you because they want to keep the status quo or because they see the need to grow beyond its current capacity and operation?

4. Serious About Success

Is the board going to give you the support that you need in order to succeed as its new chief executive? Will they hold you accountable to performance of mission-related objectives? Will they entrust you with personnel and programmatic authority to meet those goals? Do they have a competent board chair who is available and committed to ensuring your success?

5. A Commitment to Learning

No board is perfect, and most boards are far from flourishing. You don't need a five-star board to accept the job. But what you do want to be a part of a learning organization. Boards everywhere are a work in progress. The most rewarding board to work for is the one that is committed to learning and adapting along the way.

A quote in my college journal

Why Words Matter

Last week, I stood in line at a cafe behind a couple of Vanderbilt University students who just returned to campus for the beginning of the school year. The girl in front of me, dressed in her fashionable summer clothes and dangly jewelry, was inconvenienced that she could not use her meal card until next week. "Well, how am I supposed to pay for my meal then?" she asked in a huff. "I'm poor!"

Healthy women call themselves "fat."

People who haven't yet had lunch call themselves "starving."

A person annoyed with his 30-minute circumstance proclaims, "Just shoot me now!"

The words we use are relative to our experience. So you are very hungry, relative to what your stomach normally expects. Or you are not as skinny, relative to the airbrushed models on today's magazines. Or you are low on immediate cash, relative to what it was like before you had to take out student loans for a world-class college education.

Of course, the Vanderbilt student knows she isn't poor in the way the term was intended. And no American with a growling stomach from the long stretch between breakfast and lunch truly believes he or she is starving. And I imagine that someone who is annoyed just wants the annoyance to go away, and is not actually suffering something so drastic that dying would be better.

It just reminded me that words matter, and I want to be more careful about the statements I make without forethought.

The Friday Five: Surprising Practices of the Luo Tribe

I have spent several years visiting various tribes and cultures across Africa. The one people group that James and I are most familiar with are the Luo tribe of western Kenya.

Here are five surprising practices of the Luo.

1. Luo names describe the circumstance of your birth. Were you born in the morning? You will be named Onyango (for a boy) and Anyango (for a girl). Born at night = Otieno/Atieno. Born when it was raining = Okoth/Akoth. Born in a prostrate position facing down = Ouma/Auma. Born with the umbilical cord around your neck = Owino/Awino. And it keeps going - born in a time of abundance, born as a twin, born in famine, born while it was cloudy...

2. Polygamy is a common practice. A predominantly Christian tribe, the Luo have continued to follow the practices of the Old Testament of keeping multiple wives. Co-wives share in the household and child rearing responsibilities of the home. Polygamy is not practiced by everyone - many more progressive Luos have denounced it and have committed to a monogamous marriage.

3. There is a specific role of a twin in a funeral. It turns out that if your identical twin dies, you are not permitted to attend his or her the funeral. It brings too much pain to everyone who is reminded of your twin by your common appearance. 

4. Punctuality is not practiced, except for times of honoring the dead. The Luo, and most of African culture, do not carry a concept of time like Americans do. In fact, the saying is The Americans have all of the watches, but the Africans have all the time. Which is why I am shocked to see community members arrive promptly on time (if not early) in circumstances of funerals and events of remembering those who have passed. I asked my Luo friend, Robert, about it and he said that people believe that the spirits of the dead are as powerful, if not more powerful than God. So they make sure they come on time.

5. Once a young couple is married, the in-laws must never stay the night in the couple's home. Taking seriously the Biblical role of a child leaving their parents and the man and wife cleaving to one another, this Luo practice protects the complications of parent and adult child relationships. Robert told a story about how he was getting so tired of finding alternate places for his parents to stay when they visited, that he finally just pulled out a mattress in their main room and told them to stay there. Robert walked out at 2am and his dad was just sitting on the mattress refusing to sleep. Robert's parents stayed for five days, so eventually his father gave in, but it was not for lack of trying!

The Friday Five: My Favorite Rocky Mountains

I just returned from the mountains of Colorado where the majestic snow-capped mountains meet alpine tundra, rushing streams, brilliant wildflowers, rocky peaks, and towering lodge pole pines. When I was 12, I attended an outdoor adventure summer camp in Estes Park, CO and was too afraid of the adventure, so I spent my days on the archery range. But once I finally climbed my first mountain (they made me do it!), it changed everything. I ended up spending 9 summers there in the beauty of the mountains and the fellowship of young women who dared to face summits as courageously as they dared to face their own fears. I have climbed more mountains than I can count, but here are five favorites that remain with me. 1. Mt. Audubon (13,233 ft) is in the Indian Peaks Wilderness outside of Rocky Mountain National Park. The trail begins in the trees, but you quickly come upon miles of open tundra with stunning views of the Indian Peaks and the Never Summer Range. This is my favorite mountain to climb, and I love bringing friends (and James) along for this one.

2. Chief's Head (13,579 ft) is the third tallest mountain in Rocky Mountain National Park. If you look at it from a distance, the mountain looks like the profile of an Indian Chief. This is a great day climb to do from a backpack to Sandbeach Lake. This is where I learned how to glissade down snowfields (it's like skiing in your hiking boots) and how to let go and have fun.

3. Long's Peak (14,259) is the highest mountain in Rocky Mountain National Park and is the beloved goal for most adventurers to the park. I climbed it once as a 14-year-old camper and then returned as a counselor to lead a group of remarkable 12- and 13-year-olds for their first summit to Longs. Isabella Bird was one of the first women to climb Longs in the 1800s - wearing a hoop skirt! - so one time I climbed Longs in a dress to honor her (NOT pictured below :-).

4. Navajo Peak (13,409 ft) is another mountain in the Indian Peaks Wilderness. It is more of a technical climb that requires a lot of scrambling up a steep couloir as well as creative maneuvering to climb up the chimney of its peak. There was an airplane crash on Navajo in 1948 where three people died, and the wreckage of the plane remains scattered along the gully up to the mountain. There are still remnants of plane sidings and engine parts along the way which is surely terrifying to think about. It's hard to remember if I love this mountain because of the climb itself or because of the girls whom I climbed it with. It's probably both. The top of Navajo in the photo is the triangle mountain in the background.

5. South Arapaho (13,397 ft) will always be special to me because it was the first mountain I ever climbed. At 12-years-old I cried my way up as I struggled for oxygen, and ultimately, for courage. This mountain taught me that I didn't have to live a life of caution and fear - and that there is great reward in pushing beyond the boundaries of physical comfort.

What about you? Any mountain favorites?

The Most Crucial Part of a Nonprofit Organization

It is the hardest work to prioritize, and often the most difficult to execute. There is little external pressure from donors about it, and it will not be fully discovered through the ratings of watchdog organizations. But if you want to know the quality of a nonprofit organization and its service to mission, look at its Board of Directors. I am convinced that most of the controversial stories surrounding nonprofit organizations today (think Kony 2012, Susan G. Komen, Three Cups of Tea) are tied to an ineffective Board of Directors and to the lack of pressure from donors to ensure that the nonprofit board is doing its job. In my 8 years with Blood:Water Mission, I can count on my hands the number of times a potential donor has asked about our board composition, how the board is run, the time and financial commitments of the members or the values by which the board operates. If I were a philanthropist, those would be my first questions because they reveal so much about a mission.

I am concerned that CEOs of nonprofits are not investing enough time in ensuring that they have healthy, governing nonprofit boards. This is my public plea to request that you do your research on the organizations you desire to fund and find out more about its Board of Directors.

There are many questions you could ask, but here are a few to consider:

1. How many members are on the board? If the board is too small, there is not enough accountability within the group to protect itself from insular groupthink. If the board is too big, there is less ability for each board member to be engaged at the level required for them to be effective in governance.

2. Are there board members who represent the core competencies of the mission? While it is important that the board be sourced with experts in law, finance and business,  it is equally important to have experts in your core mission. This should ensure that the organization is performing at a level that meets or exceeds the standards for that nonprofit's specific sector and that it is truly meeting the needs of your beneficiaries.

3. What is the relationship between the CEO and the Board? You can learn a lot about an organization based on this relationship. Is there divisiveness or consensus on vision and values for the organization? Is the CEO in the driver's seat with a board full of nodding heads? Is the board losing sight of governance and instead micromanaging the CEO? A nonprofit board should set standards of excellence for the CEO's performance on delivering mission impact and then provide the support necessary for her to achieve it.

Gary Haugen has been personally mentoring me since 2005. In our first meeting, he gave me a book titled The Nonprofit Board Answer Book that has served as an incredible guide for me through the years. I recommend it for anyone involved in nonprofit work or giving. The leadership of any nonprofit has a huge responsibility in prioritizing the healthy development of its board. We are by no means perfect and are still working diligently to build an effective board, but I am proud of the work we have done thus far. And even though it is the grueling work that is less visible to the public, it is truly the most important.