The Board Annual Performance Evaluation
One of the more overlooked responsibilities of a nonprofit board is the requirement to assess its own performance. Most nonprofit boards are familiar with their main responsibilities, such as hiring the CEO, conducting his/her annual evaluation, developing strategic plans and ensuring the organization has the necessary resources to carry out its mission.
However, they often forget to evaluate how well the responsibilities of the board are being carried out. And, how each member of the board feels about their level of engagement and motivation.
There are two credible options for your board to assess its own performance:
- Complete a board assessment questionnaire that asks a series of questions on the work of the board with a scaled response, such as 1 (lowest or strongly disagree) to 5 (highest or strongly agree).
- Engage a professional facilitator knowledgeable about nonprofit board governance best practices to perform the assessment with confidential interviews with all members of your board with open-ended questions. These questions can help measure your board members engagement, how fulfilling and meaningful their experience as a board member has been, and what, if any, recommendations they may have to remove obstacles and improve the work of the board.
The majority of boards that perform an annual performance assessment utilize a questionnaire format. Questions call for a numerical response on a wide range of issues dealing with the organization’s mission, programs and services, financial resources, fiscal oversight, CEO performance, board and CEO relationships, board meetings, etc.
A summary is usually prepared after all the responses have been obtained. The relative numerical score indicates areas of strength as well as areas of potential need for improvement. The advantage of this approach is the ease of execution and timeliness of the reports.
On the other hand, the problem with most, if not all, questionnaires are that they don’t easily allow for open-ended questions that get to “the heart of the matter” for improving the work of the board.
From my experience, the most effective way to assess your nonprofit board’s performance is to combine a questionnaire with a trained board facilitator who can ask important open-ended questions that will also measure the level of engagement and motivation of your board members. This approach can be done every few years to augment an annual questionnaire.
QUESTIONS:
- Does your board perform an annual assessment of its performance?
- Does your current assessment process ask open-ended questions?
- Would you be interested in measuring your board’s level of engagement and motivation?
- What are your board’s greatest strengths? Most important areas of needed improvement?
Closing Comments
Together, we have covered a lot of important topics in this course:
- The stages/life cycles of boards
- Characteristics and obstacles of high performing boards
- The roles, responsibilities and characteristics of high performing board chairs
- The challenges and recommendations related to board leadership succession
- The Board and CEO relationship
- Board meetings and agendas
- The annual CEO performance evaluation
- The Board’s role in achieving your strategic vision
- How to engage your board to actively participate in philanthropy
- Transitioning from the “tin cup” to the “investment” theory of fundraising
- Board committee structures
- Board recruitment best practices and reappointment criteria
- Challenges of dealing effectively with difficult board behaviors
- And, finally, addressing the board’s annual performance assessment
I hope you have enjoyed this course. I have enjoyed being here for you.
I applaud all of you for your tireless dedication and commitment to your organization’s mission and quest for excellence. It is my hope and intention that the information from this course will enable you and your fellow board members to assess your own strengths and decide what, if any, priorities you have for improving your work to become a high-performing nonprofit board. In addition to your own personal satisfaction, the ultimate beneficiaries will be those you serve.
I wish you continued success and happiness in your journey.