Working for associations for 13.5 years, you begin to pick up on the culture, tendencies and motive of an evolving board. By far one of the trickiest acts for an executive or manager is getting the right mix. By mix, I am suggesting a unified group of volunteers who work together in favor of the betterment of the organization. This may also mean having the right personalities who deliver on a wide spectrum of tasks. Lastly it involves the right amount of volunteers for your board. This is by far the trickiest of tasks. The composition of most boards is outlined in association bylaws, which are often dated and less reflective of how an association has grown or diminished in size.
Personally, I am in favor of boards that are proportionate to the size of the association. I will define specific numbers later on this blog but the key here is that thinning our boards should not be exercise simply because you do not like certain board members, although I admit this could be an unintended benefit. The reason why the number of board members is so important is because it is what makes your organization run efficiently.
In the book, “Race for Relevance: 5 Radical Changes for Associations” the authors argue that bigger boards are a “…waste of time. They underutilize the talent and abilities of their directors.” They are reactive.” They continue by saying that larger boards are a liability, “Millions of hours of association staff time each year are squandered on unproductive board activities.” In my professional opinion I agree with the premise but for slightly different reasons. As with anything in life, people serve to fill a need of power or notoriety or worse to push a singular item that they may only care about.
Allow me to cite some case samples. Early in my career, I worked for a 3000-member trade association. To date, they have the largest board I’ve ever seen. It consisted of 5 executive members and 20 members-at-large. Most of the board members did not actively participate in monthly board meetings. To add to the inefficiency of it all is they had a bylaw stating that any board member who misses at least 9 meetings would be kicked off the board. Many serve a 1-year term, which means they can miss their first 9 months of activity before being booted. This made very little sense to me. Sadly many of them only attended the minimum meetings (3). The true purpose of their board involvement was to pad professional credentials and utilize it as leverage for clients who seek to utilize their services. In other forums, I have seen boards literally keep counterproductive board members in place just because the bylaws require roles to be filled.
In a current association that I’m working with we have a mixture of two prototypical board members. We have one board member who seeks to monopolize everyone’s speaking time, purposely extends meetings and feels as though their opinion is the only one that matters. In another example, we have a board member who refuses to read an board documents and comes to each meeting to pontificate upon 1 policy, which is relevant to them but not much of an association priority but because of their persuasion, the board bowed to this issue and has appropriated a lot of time and resource into an item, which did not demand.
This blog is not to denigrate, minimize or dismiss the voices of those who serve your organization. To the contrary, I am a huge proponent of collaborative participation and volunteerism. The root of my issue stems from my ability to recognize that inefficient boards dramatically inhibit the advancement of an organization. Thus my solution is to strongly encourage a board audit and consider implanting policies that bring your board sizes to the proportionate levels of the organization.
Here is what I recommend:
All Boards should have an odd amount of members (This is to solve any ties in votes)
Organizations with 200 members or less should consider a board structure with 3 members (Typically a President, Secretary, and Treasurer).
Organizations with 200 – 500 members should consider a board structure with 5 members (Typically Chairman/Women.
Organizations with 500 – 1000 members should consider a board structure with 7 members (Typically Chairman/Women.
Organizations with 1000 members or more should consider a board structure with 9 members (Typically Chairman/Women.
Lastly, another way to keep your board fresh with ideas and to avoid the same people from continuously serving, I would recommend term limits, especially with the Executive Committee. Many models follow a succession plan, where the President is succeeded by the Vice President, Vice-President is succeeded by the Secretary and Secretary is succeeded by the Treasurer. Regardless, you should ensure that your board is serving for the best interest of the organization and not for themselves.