Note: This guest post is by

A payment is late. A staff member needs access to a system. A new project is ready to launch, but no one has created the process. Someone needs to figure it out.

What do you do? You send it to Admin.

Each request may be reasonable on its own. But when the people responsible for your organization’s operations become the place where everything lands, you’re creating a problem much larger than an overworked team.

A strength and a trap

I spent years leading nonprofit operations/administrative teams that were good at figuring things out. That was both a strength and a trap.

When something became urgent, we could usually solve it. When a responsibility didn’t have a clear home, we could usually find a way to handle it.

But the ability to figure something out doesn’t mean that Admin or Operations should own it. In fact, whenever we accepted the role of “organizational junk drawer,” we were enabling other departments and leaders to avoid difficult tasks and decisions.

All about infrastructure

Consider the foundation of a home. Most of us don’t spend much time thinking about the foundation when it’s doing its job. Lacking a solid foundation, however, the house cannot stand.

Similarly, a nonprofit cannot function well and strategically without administrative infrastructure that supports its work. Finance, human resources, technology, compliance, policies, processes, and decision-making structures may not always be visible in your programs, but they shape the organization’s ability to deliver it.

How this impacts your programs

Consider a hypothetical fellowship program. Participants apply, interview, receive acceptance notices, complete onboarding, attend sessions, receive payments, and eventually graduate. The organization then follows up to evaluate and understand what changed for them.

We might describe all of that as programming. But every stage depends on operational decisions. Who collects participant information? How is it protected? Who approves payments? When do instructors receive agreements? What information does the organization need to evaluate the experience?

If those systems are incomplete, participants feel it. They receive information late. Payments are delayed. Staff give different answers to the same question. The organization keeps apologizing for problems that could have been anticipated.

Your administrative expertise (or not) is a big part of how people experience your mission.

Integrating Admin and programs

That is why program leaders should incorporate administrative systems early and often. Designing a program and then asking your admin team to build the relevant processes puts your organization in a reactive position.

Program leaders understand what participants and communities need. Administrative leaders understand the infrastructure required to deliver that work effectively and sustainably. As you plan, both perspectives belong.

What can you learn?

Daily transactions matter. People must be paid, records need to be accurate, and systems need to work. But those transactions also provide information.

A delayed payment may reveal unclear approval responsibilities. Repeated requests for system access may reveal an incomplete onboarding process. A recurring workaround may tell us that a process no longer fits how the organization functions.

All of that is discovery. Your administrative team needs the capacity to not only respond, but to also understand what those patterns reveal and strengthen the systems producing them.

Three action steps

For executive directors, boards, and program leaders, here are three places to begin.

1. Clarify ownership. Look at the work that repeatedly lands in the laps of your Admin team. Does it belong there? They can help to design or manage a process without owning every step within it. Make shared responsibilities explicit.

2. Plan with your administrative leaders, not around them. Before announcing a new initiative, discuss the people, money, systems, time, and processes required to deliver it. Bring operational thinking into the conversation while there is still time to shape the work.

3. Protect time to improve the infrastructure. If every hour is prioritized for urgent requests, systems improvement will keep getting postponed. Agree on infrastructure priorities and invest time, resources, and leadership support to make them happen.

Close the junk drawer

The next time something lands in your administrative department because no one understands where else it belongs, ask why it landed there.

Then ask a second question: What could Admin be planning, building, or strengthening if the people who work there weren’t always being asked to figure everything out?

Your mission depends on the answer.

The post Your Admin team is not your organizational junk drawer appeared first on Train Your Board.

Note: This guest post is from Abbey Harlow, host of the

This winter, a nonprofit leader in a rural area told me that his list of prospective foundations was running dry. His organization has spent most of a decade renovating its building, winning the same facilities grant three times.

To add some cushion, they’d pieced together a long string of $2,000 to $5,000 grants. He’s good at this, but he didn’t know where else to look. Funders kept telling him the same thing: more organizations were applying, so the competition was increasing.

Rural Rule 1: The funding pie is small, and everyone brought a fork

In a typical metro area, a development director can build a list of dozens of prospective funders. In a rural county, the same handful of regional funders appear on every organization’s list. When federal dollars get slashed, bigger organizations start applying for the small grants rural groups have counted on for years.

Now there’s a line at the pie table, and someone from the city brought a really big fork.

Rural Rule 2: Everyone wears every hat

A lot of nonprofit training assumes that someone else is available to help: for example, delegating work  to communications staff or a finance committee that meets on a regular schedule.

In a lot of rural organizations, the executive director might write the grant, run the program, recruit the volunteers, and fix the toilet before the board meeting. Advice that’s built for specialists or department heads requires this part-time plumber to stretch even more.

When there’s no one else to do the work, the board often steps in, especially with newer or very small nonprofits. I talk with boards who can’t make time for a strategic conversation because every meeting is filled with questions about operations. One food shelf board explained that they were making every administrative decision, which left no room to step back and plan for what their neighbors needed.

Rural Rule 3: The nearest peer is two counties away

My mom recently described her drive home as “the one with two old stone walls.” No street names included, just landmarks she’s passed a thousand times. In rural areas, everyone has a route like that.

But rural nonprofit leadership doesn’t come with a clear route. When something goes sideways, there’s no well-worn, familiar path, because you’re often the first person in your community to drive it.

I live in Vermont, and our “big city” of Burlington has about 44,000 residents and sits in the northern part of the state. Naturally, that’s where most statewide events happen.

A while back, I led a workshop for a free nonprofit learning series in the southern half – and the room was packed. One woman told me, “We just can’t pay to go to conferences, even the smaller ones.” Another was thrilled that nobody had to drive to Burlington.

When the learning opportunity is hours away or costs more than your organization can justify, you learn to do without. You might figure it out on your own, piece by piece, with nobody living nearby who’s already solved the same problem.

Burnout: rural edition

Put all this together and you get a predictable result: Smart, capable people running at 110 mph for years, thinking that this is just normal. It might be normal, but it shouldn’t be. It’s neither healthy nor sustainable.

Rural leaders don’t need another webinar telling them to delegate. They need peers who understand their region without a map. They need to hear and accept that rest – self-care, time off, whatever you want to call it – must be near the top of the to-do list.

Introducing the Rural Nonprofit Leader Summit

That’s why I’m especially excited to host this new event. It’s free and virtual, October 20-23, featuring more than thirty speakers who know rural nonprofit work inside and out.

Virtual equals no travel budget and no two-hour drive. Each session is available for 48 hours, so you can watch after evening chores or first thing in the morning.

You’ll land in a community of people who already know that the board treasurer is also the guy who plows the parking lot when the snow flies. If you lead a rural nonprofit, come find your people!

The post Everyone grab a fork: What’s different about leading a rural nonprofit appeared first on Train Your Board.

Note: This guest post is from Nora Ellertsen of

Every summer, Giving USA – a comprehensive, annual report on charitable giving in the United States – lands in the inboxes of fundraisers everywhere.

I review the report and reference it frequently in workshops and coaching sessions. Although imperfect, to my knowledge it’s the most comprehensive look at where money comes from and goes within the nonprofit sector.

Giving USA offers a free infographic summarizing the data. In addition, a zillion webinars and think-pieces break down the findings, with the purpose of helping nonprofits make better research-informed fundraising decisions.

More dollars, fewer donors

The latest report, which analyzes charitable giving in 2025, dropped in June. The two biggest takeaways:

1. The number of dollars is up.
2. The number of donors is down.

People with the ability to give gave more, but fewer people felt they had the ability to give. In other words, donations to nonprofits look a lot like the broader social structure we’re surviving: the gap between the ultra-wealthy and everyone else is growing, so more people are becoming selective about how they use their limited resources.

I work with many small, systemically under-resourced nonprofits – grassroots groups that do so much with so little money – which are disproportionately affected by this shift in giving. Why? Because they have limited access to the people and institutions with significant wealth.

Invisible generosity

The GivingUSA data (and most fundraising research) tends to ignore the bigger picture of how people are working to make a better world.

And that’s the whole point, right?  To make the world better tomorrow than it is today?

So let’s talk about that bigger picture.

Giving beyond nonprofits

People give tons of money outside formal nonprofit structures. Think of crowdsourced donations to help with a medical bill, or family members and church congregants who pool their funds to pay a student’s college tuition.

Consider the informal but powerful mutual aid that supports people with no strings attached. After Hurricane Ida hit my home city of New Orleans in 2021, I donated to local nonprofits that responded to community needs. I also Venmo-ed two friends. One was buying groceries to cook daily meals for a dozen people. Another ran their generator for neighbors to charge electronics and keep cool while the power was out.

The donations I made to formal organizations are counted in Giving USA. The ones I sent to neighbors are not.

(Editor’s note: Giving USA also ignores the money sent by US-based workers to relatives and friends in other countries. These remittances are another form of mutual aid.)

More than money

Let’s think about all the ways people show up for nonprofits, their communities, and the world having nothing to do with cash donations. For example, someone who cares about food insecurity volunteers at a local food bank. An attorney takes a pro bono immigration case. A parent covers a shift at the nonprofit child care center.

However, just like money, people also donate their time and attention outside formal organizational structures. Residents of Minneapolis who put their bodies on the line to keep their neighbors safe. Locals who voice their opposition to AI data centers. Activists who knock on doors and remind people to vote. Neighbors who cook casseroles for other neighbors.

Maybe the bad news isn’t that bad?

Returning to Giving USA: All this volunteerism and mutual aid is a gift of hope. I’m not that dismayed by declining donor numbers because they don’t reflect all the ways people take action with their dollars, time, talents, solidarity, and basic human decency. Let’s not tunnel-vision ourselves by focusing on one corner of a much bigger picture.

As a fundraiser, you encourage people to donate to your own organization, which is worth celebrating. However, we can also celebrate when someone:

• Can’t give money but volunteers.
• Can’t volunteer but refers a friend.
• Doesn’t give to your group but supports an allied organization.
• Learns about the root causes of the problems you’re addressing.

Heresy … or maybe not

Coming from a career fundraising professional, this post might read like heresy, given your ever-present need to generate money. When you’re busy working miracles and making sacrifices to cover payroll and meet community needs, it’s not so easy to wax philosophical – as I’m doing here – about the value of community engagement.

For me, the bottom line is this: We’re not here to create institutions that exist in lonely silos, but rather to achieve a more beautiful, just, equitable world. That only happens when we understand the fundraising data for what it is: a small piece of a much larger whole.

Do you have thoughts on this piece and how it relates to your fundraising story? Please drop me a line! I’d love to hear from you.

P.S. If you’re looking for a deeper dive into the history of how this kind of big-picture solidarity has helped build tools to survive and thrive, especially in Black, immigrant, and LBTQ+ communities, this piece from NonProfit Quarterly is a strongly recommended read!

The post Giving USA: The good, the bad, and the stuff they leave out appeared first on Train Your Board.

Note:

If you can’t build trust, you can’t create social change.

Ineffective language choices are one of the quickest ways to lose trust … and if people don’t trust you, they won’t listen, join, volunteer, donate, or take other actions.

People don’t hear what you mean

We want to believe that words function like math: you say something, the listener receives it, and the meaning transfers cleanly.

That isn’t how the human mind works. Listeners filter messages through experience, emotion, and memory. A word that sounds neutral to you can feel like an accusation to someone else. A phrase that feels ordinary inside your social movement can sound cold, academic, or moralizing to an outsider.

As a writer or speaker, you can’t control how others filter your words. You can, however, choose words that are less likely to trigger a reaction.

Why activists drift into jargon

Within social movements, we tend to reward complexity.

We read more, argue more, sit through long policy meetings. Over time, we start to sound like the rooms we sit in. No judgment here: this happens with every group. We develop an internal language that’s understood within the group but can alienate outsiders.

Your communications should serve as an invitation – join us, support us, volunteer, donate – rather than a test of who belongs and who doesn’t. If you use insider terms that can confuse or shame people, potential supporters will quietly back away.

Furthermore, your opponents gain an easy advantage, “See, these people are out of touch,” they say, without ever engaging with your ideas.

Confusing language creates suspicion

When people don’t understand what you’re saying, they rarely blame themselves – they suspect you. Unclear language can sound legalistic, corporate, or academic. That’s why clarity isn’t a style preference; it’s good strategy.

A quick test: after reading your email or donation page, can a supporter explain what you do in one sentence, using everyday words? If not, your message isn’t as effective as it needs to be.

Translating without lecturing

Plain language isn’t about watering down ideas. Rather, it’s how you highlight ideas while changing and improving the packaging.

Even when a term is technically accurate, I suggest you define it once in plain language. Then stick to the meaning, not the label.

If your target audience needs to Google a term to understand it, that reduces public support. Most people will simply dismiss the message.

Words that travel across borders

When you work in any multilingual region, simple language becomes even more vital. As you choose words, lean into the values people prioritize: safety, fairness, respect, dignity, family, decency. Those words feel human. They are emotionally inviting.

You can and must discuss human rights, inequality, racism, poverty, and climate risk. Avoid wrapping those truths in language that shuts the door on the people you need to reach.

A practical, quick fix

1. Do a jargon audit. Print your homepage, donation page, newsletter, and your last five emails. Circle any word you wouldn’t hear in a normal conversation with a neighbor.

2. Decide what stays. Some technical terms matter; for example, in law, medicine, or policy. Keep these phrases but define them first in plain language. Then replace the label with its meaning.

3. Test with outsiders. Not staff, board members, or activist friends. Buy a stranger a cup of coffee, ask them to read your first paragraph, then ask, “What do you think we do? How do you feel about this?” Look for their emotional response. If they hesitate, rewrite.

4. Use AI as a tool, not a voice. If you’re stuck, ask AI to simplify your copy. Then edit it so it sounds like you and remains accurate.

The standard that matters

Your supporters should be able to describe what you do, in their own words, without stumbling. If they can, there’s a better chance they’ll share your work, defend it, and support your efforts. If they can’t, then you’re building a smaller movement that mostly talks to itself. This is no way to win.

Communication matters. We need to get this right, because our rights and our democracies are at stake.

For more information, check out this material from Matt Watkins and Joan C. Williams.

The post Stop losing people with your language appeared first on Train Your Board.

The webinar included a panel of four nonprofit professionals – one based in Minnesota, the others here in Vermont – describing their strategies, challenges, and evolving thinking about how to protect their clients, consumers, employees, volunteers, partners, and workplaces. What follows is a summary of our conversation.

To be explicit: none of this constitutes legal advice. As appropriate, consult with your organization’s legal counsel.

Policies and protocols

Throughout our conversation, one consistent theme was the necessity of creating strong policies and protocols.

Public vs. private spaces. Federal agents can enter public areas, but nonprofits can deny access to private areas. Organizations can place simple “Private,” “Staff Only,” or “Authorized Personnel Only” signs on doors.

Who is authorized to speak with agents? Establish clear guidelines for who to call and what to say if agents show up at your door. This includes sharing information via phone trees. Practice in advance!

Protesting and political engagement by employees. Create explicit policies delineating what staff can do at work versus their free time. For example, staff should avoid wearing organizational logos and branded merchandise during their own political activities.

Data security. Protect client data and internal communications.

General legal compliance and audits. Ensure that your organization is registered with your state’s attorney general, your tax returns are up to date, you follow document retention policies and secure your financials. This helps to protect your group from government audits designed to disrupt operations.

Real stories, real lessons

Based on their own experiences, panelists shared the following stories and operational responses.

• One organization worked closely with community partners and co-tenants in their building to establish shared, unified policies. Their key takeaway was the importance of keeping rules simple so staff can easily remember them during an emergency.

• Another group spent $200,000 on security upgrades. They put “Private” signs on every door, reviewed their website to protect client images, established scripts for staff interacting with immigration agents, and actively practiced potential responses.

• An organization with less public foot traffic has focused on addressing staff anxiety. They implemented simple operational changes, such as locking the front door and installing wireless doorbells, and prioritized communicating to staff that leadership has a clear response plan.

One common thread: staff leaders are walking a difficult line between the “heart” (staff wanting to resist compliance) and the “head” (boards worried about legal risks and defunding). The correct balance isn’t easy to discern and can often change.

Things to think about

During the conversation and audience Q&A, several themes emerged.

Avoid “saviorism” and center the community: A major talking point was the harm caused by acting with “urgency” without consulting marginalized communities. For example, the use of whistles to alert people has both supporters and detractors. The fundamental rule is to include the community in conversations about how they want to be supported.

Engage your board appropriately. Nonprofit boards can be helpful by stepping up as thought partners, rather than solely relying on exhausted executive directors. Boards can review bylaws, assist with succession planning, and hold peer board members accountable. Your goal is to prevent nonspecific offers of board help that create more work for staff.

Continuing with your work is a form of resistance. An attorney noted that the threat of being labeled “domestic terrorists” or facing audits is a deliberate strategy designed to paralyze nonprofits. By simply showing up and continuing to deliver services – doing the work, day by day – nonprofits are actively resisting these tactics.

Prioritize self-care and redundancy. Leadership burnout is rampant. One speaker emphasized that executive directors must take care of themselves by utilizing paid time off and, when possible, taking sabbaticals. Organizations must build redundancies so that institutional knowledge is shared, which ensures the organization can survive if a leader needs to step away or is detained.

The bottom line

This is a difficult, complex moment for U.S. nonprofits. Leaders must give themselves grace and accept that they don’t have the perfect answer for every hypothetical.

Utilize your knowledge, wisdom, resources, and relationships. When needed, ask for help. Do the best you can with what you have – then take a break.

Note: For a deeper dive, check out this Know Your Rights video training from ACLU of Vermont and US Representative Becca Balint.

The post Nonprofits: Immigration enforcement preparation and response appeared first on Train Your Board.

Let me say this plainly: Some of y’all don’t have a board problem, you have a belonging problem.

We spend so much time trying to get the “right people” in the room. Smart people. Connected people. Diverse people. And then we make it real hard for them to actually be there.

• To speak.
• To question.
• To challenge.
• To show up fully.

No more folding chairs

That’s the gap I’m working to name and address in my new book, No More Folding Chairs, Building a Board Where Everyone Belongs. I’m writing this book because I’ve seen what happens when people are invited into leadership spaces and then quietly managed once they arrive.

• Told to soften their tone.
• Told to wait their turn.
• Told – without anyone saying it out loud – not to rock the boat.

Let’s be honest, some boards don’t want new thinking. They want new faces that think the same. When that happens, your board might look good on paper, but it’s not doing the work it’s supposed to do.

When people don’t feel like they belong, they don’t stop noticing what’s wrong. They just stop saying it. Then they start looking for the exit. That’s why I use the “folding chairs” metaphor: they’re just placeholders on nonprofit boards that claim to be inclusive but aren’t committed to real change.

When things go wrong

Let’s talk about someone I profile in the book. We’ll call him Stan. He’s a Black man, a logistics manager at Home Depot. Sharp. Prepared. Asking the kind of questions that actually move a board forward.

Every time he spoke, the room shifted … not in a good way. People got uncomfortable. They redirected. They shut it down – nicely, of course.

Stan eventually resigned from the board … and no one followed up.

• No phone call to check in.
• No “What happened?” or “What did we miss?”
• No thank you note.

Nothing. That’s what it looks like when belonging is missing. It’s nothing dramatic; just quiet loss.

This is bigger than race

Before we make this only about racial identity, the problem is way bigger than race. Belonging shows up around social class, age, gender, disability, lived experience … all of it. It’s about whether people feel like they can tell the truth, in real time, in the room.

Because if they can’t? You don’t have a high-functioning board … you have a polite one.

If this feels like your board, here’s something simple you can try.

Try this at your next meeting

At your next board meeting, don’t jump straight into reports and Robert’s Rules. Ask these questions first:

• What helps you feel like you belong here?
• What gets in the way?

Then be quiet long enough to hear the real answers. This simple exercise will tell you more than any dashboard you might use to evaluate your board.

Bring your voice to this project

My new book isn’t a how-to manual. It’s a call out… and a call in. And I’m still shaping it.

I want to include your voice. Here’s how: Take a few minutes to complete the survey and tell me about your board experience – the good, the messy, and the stuff nobody says out loud.

If you’re reading this thinking, “Yeah… we’ve got some folding chairs in our boardroom…” you already know where this is headed. This is the work I lead every day through The Board Pro: real conversations, real shifts, boards that actually function the way they’re supposed to.

My goal: no more folding chairs. If this is your goal, too, let’s build something better … together.

The post Why belonging is the core work of boards – not the extra stuff appeared first on Train Your Board.

Nearly one year ago, we created the Vermont Immigration Legal Defense Fund. Our goal was to support and expand legal resources available to organizations that protect asylum seekers, immigrants, and other marginalized people facing deportation or detention.

We set a goal of $1 million, announced our campaign at a news conference, and asked for online donations. As our volunteer fundraising advisor Andy Robinson told us, we were using an “upside down and backwards” approach for our campaign … and he’s right!

Nonetheless, we’ve raised more than $930,000 from thousands of donors, living in every Vermont county and 39 U.S. states. Most of the money has already been distributed to legal aid partners to build their capacity, hire more staff, and train more volunteers.

We expect to complete the campaign this month, a year from when we began.

The traditional approach

As we discussed in our planning meetings, the traditional campaign model looks like this:

1. Clarify the case for your campaign; set a financial goal and build a gift chart. (Yes, we did these things.)

2. Start with a quiet or silent phase. Reach out to major donor prospects first, starting with those who have the strongest connection to the mission. This is sometimes called the “top down, inside out” approach.

3. Once you’ve secured commitments for the majority of your goal – traditionally, 60% to 80% of your target –then announce the campaign and seek a more diverse mix of gifts. That’s the public phase.

Here’s the upside-down part: we went public without a quiet phase. At our kickoff event and news conference, we promoted our web page and asked everyone to donate. Through online giving, plus an anonymous lead gift of $100,000, we were well on our way.

Since then, we’ve been using a combination of major and matching gifts, fundraising events, house parties, and online giving. Here’s what we learned.

Begin with partnerships

Our success began with strong partnerships. In early 2025, state Treasurer Mike Pieciak, a founder of the Defense Fund, organized a task force to study how changes in federal policy would impact the state’s economy. The anticipated decline in federal funding was a significant risk for a state reliant on both federal money and immigrant labor.

The task force identified a big problem: to serve a population of about 30,000 immigrants and refugees, Vermont had only two (!) attorneys with relevant experience in defense removal proceedings.

That system needed to change. We launched the Defense Fund to address this problem and recruited a politically diverse organizing committee – with Democrats, Republicans, and independents – to lead the effort.

Cast a wide net

After a great kickoff event, which followed the internationally publicized release of advocate and Vermonter Mohsen Madawi (who spoke at our news conference), we had some momentum.

The United Way of Northwest Vermont stepped forward to manage the funds so donations would be tax deductible. Partners like the Vermont Green soccer club adopted the cause. When the Green went on to win their league’s national championship, they helped us raise money and spread awareness at every sold-out playoff game.

Everybody host a party!

This attention helped validate the effort and led to a series of fundraising house parties around the state from Brookfield to Burlington.

House parties led to public events with Vermont companies, including The Alchemist Brewery, Phoenix Books, Brattleboro Museum, Brattleboro Development Credit Corporation, Hula, Twincraft, and many more.

Even as our organizing committee was scheduling fundraisers, others popped up independently: a bluegrass concert in Calais, a garden party in East Montpelier, an auction in the Mad River Valley … a long list of independent actions to support immigrant rights.

Pairing a strong message with tangible action

This campaign was (and remains) a tangible response to the deeply problematic actions of the current federal administration. Their disregard for due process, rule of law, and human dignity remains a unifying force for our donors.

The Vermont Immigration Legal Defense Fund sends a clear message: Due process matters. In immigration court, the presence of an attorney – unsurprisingly – makes a massive difference in outcomes … and we need more attorneys.

This message was paired with a simple action step: Donate! These donations create an immediate impact on the lives of their neighbors, friends, and co-workers.

Demonstrating impact

Last month, we completed our fourth grant round, awarding $316,000 to the Association of Africans Living in Vermont, Vermont Asylum Assistance Program, and Vermont Law and Graduate School. Prior rounds went to AALV, VAAP, The Family Room, and Vermont Afghan Alliance. These awards funded:

• Eight attorneys who were newly hired and/or shifted their time to provide more legal defense services.
• Training roughly 100 attorneys, paralegals, and interpreters for pro bono (free) legal support.
• Creating improved intake systems.
• More in-person visits with prisoners.
• More people safely returned to their families and communities after unlawful detentions.

These results have been shared and re-shared with donors and partners. In many cases, this feedback loop has prompted additional donations.

You don’t need to do this perfectly

To summarize: If you have strong partners; a clear message; a compelling, timely cause; and concrete ways to demonstrate your impact, don’t feel bound by the conventional model. Under the right circumstance, upside down and backwards can work well enough.

Create your own model – then get out there and do the work.

The post How we raised $1 million upside down appeared first on Train Your Board.

That post was a shout-out and a gift to my fellow trainers, facilitators, and group leaders. Like I said then: Steal these lines!

Here’s another round of insights, zingers, and stories specifically about boards, based on decades of facilitating board workshops, webinars, and planning retreats. If you engage with nonprofit boards as a consultant, coach, trainer, or facilitator, you might find these useful.

As before, I’m crediting those who shared these lines with me … when I can remember who they are. If you want to claim credit (why not?) or direct us to the originator, please use the comments section to set the record straight. It’s good to acknowledge the wisdom of others.

As noted in the last piece, I’ve workshopped this material in many ways and in front of many groups, testing different phrasing and timing. I encourage you to do the same.

Where board members come from

Nobody emerges from the womb as a board member. It’s not like the midwife says, “It’s a girl … and she’s a board member!” (With thanks to Kim Klein)

Why do we reach out to complete strangers and ask them to lead our organizations? Why aren’t we filling our boards with the donors, volunteers, clients, alumni, and allies who already understand and appreciate our work?

If you’re not consciously designing your board to include specific skills, qualities, and representation, then your default strategy is “I know a guy…” Random recruitment yields random results.

Desperation won’t work in your personal life, and it doesn’t work when recruiting board members. “Anyone who’ll say yes” is a pretty low bar.

Board expectations and operations

On the value of board job descriptions: You might be thinking: If we specify what we want, we’ll scare away potential board members who can’t fulfill our expectations. Well, if people can’t meet their obligations, would you rather find out before or after they’ve been voted onto the board?

A clear, concise board agreement is attractive. Prospective trustees review the document and say to themselves, “Wow, this group is organized. It’s impressive how they’ve thought through this stuff.” And they’re more likely to say yes.

The purpose of meetings (especially board meetings) is to make decisions. If your agenda doesn’t include any decisions – it’s just report after report after report – consider cancelling the meeting. There are so many other ways to share information.

To deal with random brainstorming, I propose the following policy: All suggestions must be followed by the phrase, “If my idea is approved, this is what I am personally willing to do to implement it.” Because it’s way too easy to dream up cool stuff for other people to do.

If your board spends a lot of time debating ideas that aren’t actionable because you don’t have the resources to take action, you may not be using your time wisely.

Boards and fundraising

The vast majority of nonprofit boards stink at fundraising. If your board struggles to raise money, you are not alone. In fact, that makes your group normal.

If you want your board to raise money, start by redefining the word fundraising. It’s not about money – it’s about relationships and how you treat people. Everyone can be an ambassador.

Why board members need to give: There’s karma in fundraising. How can you ask someone to do something that you’re unwilling to do yourself?

Succession planning

Upon joining a board, one of the first questions to ask yourself is, “What am I going to do today to replace myself?” (With thanks to Kim Klein)

Part of leading well is leaving well. (With thanks to Don Tebbe)

Broken boards

Somebody said to me, “All the important conversations at our board meetings happen out in the parking lot after the meeting is over.” This is the definition of dysfunction.

We’ve created a nonprofit governance model based on volunteers supervising professionals. (pause) And this is a good idea because…?

“I’d like to fire my board,” said the executive director, “but then who would I complain about?”

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During our conversations, I learned that the employees who handle intake at their facility – greeting clients and connecting them with services – are warm and welcoming. This behavior essential, given their role. At the same time, their record-keeping and administrative skills are less than perfect, which creates bottlenecks and additional work for others.

Despite significant coaching and training, their productivity (using the traditional, cost-per-task definition of the word) hasn’t improved much. Nonetheless, they are highly valued (and in many ways, highly effective) staff members. The organization’s leadership is committed to keeping them in their current roles.

Hiring for culture rather than skills

Upon hearing this story, I asked a question. “Are you prioritizing organizational culture over specific job skills?”

“Absolutely,” said the executive director. “When people walk in the door, they’re greeted with warmth and respect – and their stress level goes down. That makes everything easier for everyone. If staff struggle with paperwork or their desks are cluttered, we can live with that.”

I’ll be honest: this blew my mind.

Most job announcements and job descriptions tend to focus on specific, tangible skills. To the degree that they mention organizational culture, the language sounds like this: “Must manage multiple tasks simultaneously” or “Must be comfortable in a fast-paced environment.”

Very few of these documents emphasize kindness, empathy, humility, or deep listening. Why?

Avoiding a false binary

To be clear: compassion and competence are – or at least should be – complementary values. One can (and often must) handle the logistics of one’s job while being empathetic and generous with others. Nonetheless, people are imperfect and organizations become overwhelmed. Things fall apart.

As the story above illustrates, sometimes we need to choose. If you had to prioritize among these values, where would you land?

At the peak of my business life, I was traveling across North America and working with about 50 organizations per year. While juggling all these client relationships, I had a modest epiphany (which, these days, I’m a little ashamed to admit): If I have to choose between competent jerks or nice, well-meaning, less-than-competent clients, give me the jerks.

Thankfully, I’ve seldom been confronted by that choice. Nonprofit-World is filled with an infinite number of kind, effective, skillful, powerful people.

However, as I’ve grown older, my epiphany is gradually flipping: If forced to choose, I would choose those who lead with kindness but may not have their act completely together.

When culture means something else

It’s worth noting that, for generations, “organizational culture” has also been used as an opportunity for exclusion and oppression.

Many people – often women and/or people of color – have been denied jobs or promotions because they were perceived as not fitting into the (white male) culture of their nonprofit or for-profit organization. Because culture is hard to measure, it’s a flexible tool for discrimination.

Indeed, an entire cadre of trainers, facilitators, consultants, and thought leaders have been working – for decades! – to help us make our workplaces more inclusive and less oppressive.

I believe that elevating compassion and empathy is one aspect of that work.

Yes, we’re talking about capitalism

As noted earlier, very few job descriptions emphasize kindness, empathy, humility, or deep listening. Here’s why: In a capitalist system like ours, productivity (again, using the economist’s definition) has the highest value. The goal is to generate more work product – goods, services, whatever – for lower cost and fewer hours of labor.

The assumptions behind this model are flawed in many ways, but I want to focus on one that creates a dilemma for nonprofits. How do you place a monetary value on dignity, respect, and human connection? What’s the economic value of long-term, mutually beneficial relationships?

Long live inefficiency!

Building and maintaining human connection can be highly “inefficient.”

When someone walks in the door and needs help – recovery services, housing, health care, food, childcare, legal services, eldercare, disaster response, etc. – how do you place a cash value on that initial conversation? How do you measure the efficiency of love?

With that question in mind, it’s encouraging to discover a nonprofit – frankly, one of many nonprofits – that prioritizes compassion without worrying too much about efficiency.

This is a subversive act. Let’s honor that.

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I am not clergy, so I was surprised by the invitation. The word devotional sounds religious, doesn’t it? As I’ve learned, the House casts a pretty wide net for inspiration. You don’t need to be ordained. For example, a local forester – who is also an author and spiritually thoughtful guy – made an impression with his three-minute devotional.

A peek behind the curtain

Photo: Vermont State House, Montpelier — via Wikimedia Commons.

The Vermont Statehouse is a somewhat informal place. Yes, people tend to wear suits and the usual parliamentary decorum applies, but regular Vermonters wander through the building (it’s literally called “the building”) and the halls are alive with informal conversations. I’ve visited many times as a citizen-lobbyist and always enjoy the experience.

I was escorted to the office of the Speaker of the House, given a quick orientation, then directed through a couple of black curtains, emerging behind the podium. I met the Speaker (she wields an actual gavel, which is bigger than you’d imagine), chatted with my representatives, and hung out with the legislative pages: eighth grade students in matching green jackets who keep the place running.

The Speaker called the session to order – bang the gavel! – and introduced me.

Here’s what I said. These remarks were intended for the legislators, but they’re relevant to many, many nonprofit organizations.

You won’t complete the work

Good morning. My name is Andy Robinson, I live in Plainfield and I’m the former board president of Beth Jacob Synagogue here in Montpelier.

Page from Pirkei Avot 2:16 in The Library of The Jewish Theological Seminary. Lisbon, late 15th century. MS 8235, Folio 174v.

I want to introduce you to a very old book of Jewish wisdom called the Pirkei Avot, which translates to Ethics of the Ancestors. Compiled nearly 2000 years ago, Pirkei Avot is a collection of aphorisms, sayings, and instructions from the ancient rabbis.

There’s a lot of good stuff in there, but I have a favorite. Rabbi Tarfon said, “You will not complete the work. Neither are you permitted to put it aside.”

What kind of work?

What work is he talking about? Pretty much anything important, substantial, generational, or sacred. From the perspective of the legislature, here are a few examples:

• Creating affordable, equitable housing: “You will not complete the work, neither are you permitted to put it aside.”
• Ensuring that everyone has access to health care: “You will not complete the work, neither are you permitted to put it aside.”
• Protecting our communities from floods, droughts, and other climate disasters: “You will not complete the work, neither are you permitted to put it aside.

You can’t put it aside

You see how this goes. Indeed, I imagine that every day at the legislature feels a little like this: Chipping away at massive challenges. Understanding that the hard stuff won’t be solved in one session, or maybe ten sessions.

Nonetheless, you keep doing the work – because you’re not permitted to put it aside.

Photo: Marion S. Trikosko for U.S. News & World Report.

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. famously declared that “the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.” I’m imaging a Jewish response: That’s true, but it doesn’t bend itself. We need to lean on that arc, throwing our weight into it, to ensure that it bends in the proper direction. This requires stamina and persistence; may you be blessed with both.

I’ll conclude with another quote from the Pirkei Avot: “On three things, the world continues to exist: On justice, truth, and peace.” May you seek justice, speak the truth, and create peace. Thanks for your work on behalf of Vermont.

If they ask, I’d do it again

If this content sounds familiar (shout out to long-time readers), I explored it in a previous post long ago. Apologies for repeating myself, but the message feels more timely than ever.

As someone who teaches workshops and leads retreats, my role requires me to facilitate for hours or even days at a time. This was a totally different format, which I appreciated: Say something meaningful in less than three minutes. Speak your truth, keep it brief, then be still. How great is that?

Maybe they’ll invite me back next year.

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