Latest / Nonprofit Launch Plan Podcast for Startup, Small, and Growing Nonprofits / How to Build Your First Nonprofit Board Without Regretting It Later (Ep #59)
Transcript
- Matt Stockman (00:00) Imagine you're launching your nonprofit tomorrow, and somebody tells you that one decision you make this month will either accelerate your organization's growth for years or you quietly create problems you'll spend the next 10 years trying to fix. What decision would you think they were talking about? Most people would probably guess fundraising or hiring somebody or writing a strategic plan, but in reality, It's who you invite to serve on your very first board of directors. I've seen nonprofit leaders build incredible partnerships with their boards that provide wisdom and accountability and encouragement and open doors they never could have opened on their own. And I've also watched other leaders spend years trying to untangle board decisions they made simply because they needed to put names on an IRS application. So today, let's talk about how to build a founding board. that doesn't just help you launch your nonprofit, but helps you build it well. Matt Stockman (00:59) Welcome to the Nonprofit Launch Plan Podcast for startups, small, and growing nonprofits. This podcast is here to help you build your nonprofit from the ground up on a strong, sustainable foundation by providing the clear frameworks, the practical tools, and the real-world guidance that you can actually put into practice I'm your host, Matt Stockman. I'm a nonprofit growth coach, and here at Nonprofit Launch Plan, we believe that every successful nonprofit has to be operating at peak performance across six key areas in order to be successful. Those areas are leadership, fundraising, marketing, programs and services, operations, and finances. So on every episode of the podcast, we focus on one of those six core areas to help you create lasting impact. without all of the unnecessary complexity. Now, before we dive into today's episode, if you like the kinds of things that you're learning on the podcast and picking up from listening to the podcast, there's more of that in my free weekly email. It's called the Nonprofit Launch Briefing. Every week I send out one meaningful email about something different than what we're talking about that week on the podcast. Strategies, practical tools, fundraising insight, real world guidance. For you for startup, small, and growing nonprofits. So if you're serious about building a healthy nonprofit with real impact, I'd love to have you on the list. Really easy to do, just shoot me a quick email with sign me up in the subject line. My email is Matt A T T at nonprofitlaunchplan dot com. Sign me up in the subject line, Matt at nonprofitlaunchplan dot com. Okay, let's dive in. A nonprofit board is a critical first ingredient for much more than simply getting the proper accreditation and your IRS tax exempt status. Your board, when it's built well, is meant to be a support system for you, giving you the wisdom, the encouragement, the accountability, and the insight from the collective experience of all of your board members that can help you move forward in the early stages of your nonprofit a whole lot faster. But here's the reality. I talk to nonprofit leaders all the time who are close to the beginning of their nonprofit or ministry journey, who have essentially chosen their board members based on one question: Will this person say yes to helping us out or not? And for each of these leaders, having names of people who agreed to be listed on the IRS application paperwork was all they considered. I also have regular conversations with other nonprofit leaders that are in later phases of their nonprofit flight path. And are stuck trying to undo bad board appointment decisions that they made previously, which can be really difficult and awkward and uncomfortable and can stall your forward progress to a standstill. So if you don't have any experience with choosing a board or knowing what to think about, what factors to consider and what questions to ask of potential board members, it's very easy and normal to end up in a situation with your board that is less than ideal or worse yet. One that can even hinder the growth of the organization before you ever get up and running. There's another consequence to choosing board members simply because they'll say yes. You create what I call the blind leading the blind. You invite people because they're willing, not because they're prepared. They accept because they care about you, but no one has ever actually explained what board service means. And the result a room full of good hearted people who sincerely want to help. But actually, I have no idea how to do it well. so in this episode, I'm going to give you some simple practical insights to consider when you're in the first couple of phases of your ideal nonprofit flight path. And building your board that if put into practice will mean a great partnership relationship between you and your board pretty much right away and will mean that your nonprofit will be able to grow healthy and stable much faster. Because your board will be acting like a support to you, an accountability partner for you, a cheerleader for you, and a guide to helping you make real impact. Okay, so first and foremost, as you're considering and selecting board members, resist the temptation to lean into your family and friends. Your family and friends might not be right for your situation. Now they might be, but more often than not, they might not be. But most of the time, whatever their motivation, your friends and your family are going to say yes the fastest. After all, they know you best and maybe have walked with you as you birthed this dream for some time. One thing to consider, though, in all of this is as the executive director of a new nonprofit, your board of directors is your boss. They will provide you wisdom, but also accountability. So you're selecting the people that, not that we're planning this to happen. Would need to fire you if things went horribly wrong somehow. And that alone is a recipe for every Thanksgiving in the future with your family being super awkward if you're not careful. One mindset shift that helped me think about this differently is realizing that in the early stages, your board isn't simply a governing board. They're a building board. You're looking for people who can help build something that doesn't fully exist yet. These people will need to be able to open doors and they'll need to introduce you to potential donors. They'll need to help you avoid expensive mistakes, bring experience to the table that you don't yet have. now later, boards often become more governance focused, but in these first few years, you need builders. So if I've made my point about taking care and using caution and selecting family and friends. To join your board, your next question is obviously going to be where do I look then? At a high level, let me recommend a few things that when you hear them will seem obvious. Yet a lot of boards that I work with end up with members on them that don't align with what I'm about to say. So don't skip over this or tune out. First, every board member should be deeply devoted to the mission. Not just they like your cause, but really committed to seeing the problem. That you've identified solved in the world. You want people who genuinely believe this work matters and are excited to tell other people about it. Founding board members become ambassadors long before they become governors. Another non-negotiable ingredient: these board members have to have high character and integrity. Board members oversee finances, they make tough decisions, they represent the organization publicly. And they help establish the culture. Trustworthiness, humility, and good judgment are foundational. Another thing, Healthy chemistry with you as the founder is important. The relationship between the founder and the board will shape the organization. So you want to look for people who will both support and challenge you appropriately. You don't want neither a rubber stamp nor an adversarial relationship. You want somewhere in the middle, the healthiest boards combine encouragement with accountability. Now, drilling down into this a little bit more, determine what is needed and invite for those roles, not who will be the easiest to convince to join your board. I want to point you back to the six key areas that I say every nonprofit needs in order to be successful: leadership, fundraising, marketing, programs and services, operations and finances. Spend some time. Looking at your own skill set and those of your co-founders or the other key players in the organization. of those six key areas, where do your skills and superpowers lie? And what areas are weaker for you? Filling out your board with people who can bring expertise and experience to your team in an area that you are weak in will make a big difference. If legal or accounting are areas that are weak, inviting people who would be willing to join with you. To bring those areas of expertise will make life in general easier for you and hopefully will even save you some costs on legal and accounting fees over time as well. and here's some other important factors to consider. Try to include at least one board member on your team who has served in a nonprofit board capacity someplace before. That experience can normalize the process for the other people on the board who haven't done this sort of work before. I also want to encourage you to ask for a limited time of commitment, for example, one year, with the understanding that if all is going well and both you and the other board member is happy, that they can extend their time on the board at the end of that year. This gives you and the serving board members the opportunity to kind of kick the tires on the whole experience. without fear of being locked into anything super long term. That's good for you and for them. So a one-year commitment up front. make sure that anyone you invite on the board has a very clear understanding of the reasonable expectations of service. I strongly recommend that board members come into serving on your nonprofit board with eyes wide open about what is expected of them. related to their introducing you and the organization to their networks, for example, as well as what expectations there are around giving. I'm a big believer in every board member being a financial contributor to your organization. I've talked about this in previous podcast episodes. To me, this isn't a matter of equal giving in terms of the amount, but it does mean a lot to look at a potential donor and say with confidence that a hundred percent of our board financially supports the work. So, in my opinion, that should be an expectation. But you do need to spell that out clearly to potential board members when you invite them and before they accept. Also, be sure that your possible board members are aware of and can meet the capacity of the meeting schedule and the other commitments. What you don't want is a board member constantly opting out of the meeting rhythm because they're too busy and should have never said yes to begin with. And the last thing is this. I really recommend you invest in coaching to guide this relationship, whether that's me or another coach. This is a dynamic relationship with a lot at stake, including your own employment. And a coach can really help you and the board learn the best way to interact with one another, make expectations on either side as clear as possible, and set you and the board up for success. Just like investing in an accountant, even if it feels like you may not be able to afford an accountant, this kind of coaching is not something to skip over, if at all possible. So as you build your first board, remember you're doing a whole lot more than just filling seats around a conference table or satisfying an IRS requirement. You're choosing the people who will shape the culture, the credibility, and the future of your nonprofit. These are the people who will celebrate your wins with you, challenge your thinking, hold you accountable, and help you navigate some of the biggest decisions you'll ever make as a nonprofit leader. So don't rush the process, pray through it, be intentional, ask the hard questions, look for people who believe deeply in the mission, bring strengths that complement yours and genuinely want to help you succeed. If you build your board well from the beginning, You'll spend far less time fixing board problems later and a whole lot more time doing what you started the nonprofit to do in the first place, making a lasting difference in the lives of the people that you're called to serve. That's it for this episode of the Nonprofit Launch Plan Podcast. Remember, if you like what you're hearing on the podcast, you can get more of this same kind of teaching and coaching in your inbox every week. Sign up for my free weekly email called the Nonprofit Launch Briefing. Every week I send you one meaningful email with something you need to be considering or thinking about or working on as a nonprofit leader. It's always something different than what we're talking about on the podcast this that week. So never the same stuff. It's all designed to help you lead smarter and grow your nonprofit stronger more quickly. If you're serious about building a healthy organization from the ground up with real impact, I'd love to have you on the list. Shoot me an email. Simple sign me up in the subject line. My email is matt at nonprofitlaunchplan.com. I'll take care of everything else. Just sign me up in the subject line. And my email again, matt at nonprofitlaunchplan.com. Thanks again for listening. That's it for this episode of the Nonprofit Launch Plan podcast for startups, small and growing nonprofits. If you found the podcast helpful in any way, would you do all the podcast things? Like, share, subscribe. And also maybe consider sharing this with another nonprofit leader or somebody on your team who maybe is just getting started and needs the clarity. Until next time, keep building wisely and keep making a difference. Thank you.