Yes, this is the title of my latest book, now available from Civil Sector Press.

However, it’s also the inspiration for a recent conversation with Tammy Zonker, one of North America’s great fundraisers and fundraising trainers.

I joined Tammy on her podcast, The Intentional Fundraiser – and she asked the know/do/avoid questions. This post offers some highlights of our conversation. You can listen to the full episode here.

What every board member needs to KNOW

How much time is required.

Whenever I’m recruited to join a nonprofit board, I always ask about the time commitment. Sadly, most people stumble through their answer.

“Well, we meet once a month for ninety minutes.”

“But surely,” I respond, “you expect more than that.”

Pause. “You need to prepare for meetings and pay attention to emails throughout the month. We encourage each board member to be active on one of our committees.”

“How many hours, in total, are we talking about?”

Long silence. “It depends on the board member.” 

Lacking a clearer answer, that’s usually the end of the conversation.

You can (and must) do better. Here’s a post about the board’s time commitment, including a sample time sheet you can use to determine how much time your board members are currently spending. This can provide useful baseline data for answering the question, “How much time?”

Understand the business model.

Every organization has a somewhat different mix of revenues and expenses. Because board members are fiduciaries, they are legally obligated to both understand the business model and actively work to strengthen it. (Yes, we’re talking about fundraising.)

When interviewing potential clients, I always ask a simple question: “What’s your budget?” A surprising number of board and staff can’t answer this question, which continues to amaze me. 

One solution: Better financial training. In the interest of transparency and accountability, everyone should know where the money comes from and where it goes.

What every board member needs to DO

Be an ambassador.

Board members wear many hats. One underappreciated role is ambassador: making contacts, making friends, and representing your organization in the wider community. 

Everyone has a network. Your board’s job is to deepen those connections on behalf of the organization.

To do this well, you may need to provide ambassador training for your board. 

Trust the staff.

Here’s an old joke: I get paid to tell board members what the staff has been telling them for years. Oddly, they hear it differently coming from me … maybe because I’m an “outside expert.” Maybe because I’m an old white guy. Maybe because I traveled a distance to work with them or appeared on their computer screen from across the continent. 

(An even older joke, adapted from Mark Twain: An expert is anyone who comes from more than 60 miles away.)

This is profoundly disrespectful to staff. Nonprofits hire professionals and then, far too often, the board disregards or undermines their professional judgment.

Note to board members: Don’t dismiss staff input just because you don’t agree, or because you don’t want to do the work your staff requests of you. Please.

What every board member needs to AVOID

Micromanagement.

With the understanding that the board’s role changes over time – see next item below – you must create clear boundaries between board work and staff work. This will vary, to some degree, by organization and circumstance, but it’s helpful to begin with a general understanding of who does what. 

If you’re struggling with micromanagement, use this one-pager to initiate a conversation about clarifying those boundaries.

In some ways, this point echoes the previous note about board members trusting staff, because micromanagement usually reflects a lack of trust.

Staying on the board forever.

The board skills required to lead an all-volunteer, grassroots group are very different from the skills needed to govern a fully staffed, established institution. As nonprofits grow and change, the board’s role evolves. Ideally, new members are recruited with different qualities, perspectives, and expertise.

As noted in a previous post, board service is not a life sentence. By encouraging turnover – or mandating it through term limits – you can orient your organization toward the future, rather than repeating or rehashing the past.

As board members “term off,” look for ways to keep them appropriately engaged. As they transition to a different role, you want to retain their enthusiasm, wisdom, and generosity.