Folly #54: Boards
What if foundations made intros, not checklists?
I agree wholeheartedly when grant applications ask about a nonprofit’s board. It affirms the importance of having representation from those you serve. It’s also a reminder that a board should be active in its fiduciary responsibility, which includes fundraising.
Usually the question is asked in a way that sounds something like this:
Who serves on your board? Please provide bios.
How do board members identify by ethnicity? By gender? Categorize each by percentage.
What percentage of board members donate to your organization? (This is a whole other topic for a future Folly. Stay tuned.)
These are good and important considerations. But asking them this way isn’t all that helpful.
Defining Board Representation
Consider a nonprofit serving the unhoused. A white male case manager who works with a referring agency joined your board. Score! This is someone who brings deep knowledge in the issue area.
But on a form like this, he doesn’t appear to add any “diversity” to your leadership.
Phrased differently, this is an easy way for a foundation to offer substantive technical assistance to a grant applicant – and also to learn what kind of board representation is particularly difficult to recruit.
Most foundations specialize in an issue area and have staff dedicated to it. Typically, a program officer reviews applications and reports submitted by prospective and current grantees. As a result, foundations see a broad landscape of programs and impact. And they have dedicated resources that many nonprofits lack.
Rethinking the first two questions above, why not ask this instead…
Describe how your board represents the community you serve.
What audiences have been difficult to recruit for your board? Would you like help reaching new board members?
As a narrative question, these are game changers!
They offer much more meaningful information than board statistics. It creates a dialogue that respects a nonprofit’s deep expertise in its issue area. Questions like these provide quantifiable data and a chance to look beyond the obvious – and learn about specific challenges that grantees face.
How do you measure up? These kinds of questions are so one-sided. But coming from a place of curiosity – rather than check-off-the-box – opens up all kinds of resources for nonprofit success.
Issue Expertise
Foundations have so much to offer beyond a grant.
Think about the network that a foundation has in the issue area it funds! Now imagine introducing some of those connections to grantees.
Grantmakers can do more than judge whether nonprofits meet arbitrary standards of board diversity.
They can help connect nonprofits to diverse board members.
It can be simple and it doesn’t cost anything. A foundation can:
Leverage regular communications. You list your grantees anyway! So add a section to your website or newsletter and ask if a reader may be interested in board service for an organization doing this kind of work.
Or:
Have your program managers tap their LinkedIn networks on behalf of a nonprofit that asked for help diversifying board representation. A post about an organization and its board recruitment takes just a few minutes.
Foundations create applications that ask nonprofits for a lot of information. So it’s easy to forget that they are also in a position to provide significant technical expertise – resources that go well beyond grant dollars. Helping nonprofits recruit board members who represent the communities they serve is one example.
Know a foundation that does this? Please…