Note: This is No. 20 in a series of blogs featuring wisdom from the 91-page gem by Max De Pree, Called to Serve: Creating and Nurturing the Effective Volunteer Board.
Max De Pree: “Hospitality has to do with equity for each member.”
Honest…my plan for this thin, quick-reading book was to crank out five, maybe seven or eight blogs—and then move on. Not! De Pree’s wisdom is so rich—so convicting. At least we’re 75 percent on our way to page 91, so stay tuned. The end is near.
I’ve never read a governance book, blog, or paragraph that said the practice of hospitality was a key ingredient of a board chair’s effectiveness.
De Pree explains with a few reminders:
• “Asking people to sit in a circle with no table is surely a distracting and ineffective way to work…”
• “…as is putting people at a long, narrow table where they can have contact with only those adjacent to them.”
He also reminds us about the tools of hospitality: pens, writing pads, agendas, minutes, records, reports—and how they’re organized. He notes that hospitality includes attention to social needs. “Things go better with snacks, drinks, timely breaks, and no anxiety as to where the toilets are—small matters that should never become distractions.”
The spiritual gift of hospitality, according to author Bruce Bugbee, is “the divine enablement to care for people by providing fellowship, food, and shelter.” If you were not blessed with that spiritual gift, however, it doesn’t let you off the hook. As board chair, discern who on your board or staff is specially enabled by God to practice hospitality—and invite that person to help you create a warm and inviting board meeting environment.
In the tremendously helpful new book from ECFAPress, Call of the Chair: Leading the Board of the Christ-centered Ministry, David McKenna, reminds board chairs to sense the need “for the white space of coffee and bathroom breaks,” and “pauses for prayer before casting votes.” (Read my book review here and watch for future blogs on the board chair’s role.)
By the way, practicing hospitality is not limited to the board chair. Board members will practice God-honoring hospitality by arriving on time (with homework done), pocketing all devices, listening, engaging, speaking thoughtfully—and not leaving early. And most important—every board member (and the CEO) will learn the spiritual gifts of colleagues around the board table—and encourage each person to leverage their spiritual gifts, their strengths, and their passions.
BOARD DISCUSSION: Do we practice God-honoring hospitality before, during, and after our board meetings? How could we be more hospitable? Why does this matter?
To order from Amazon, click on the title for: Called to Serve: Creating and Nurturing the Effective Volunteer Board, by Max De Pree, (Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company).
Note: This is No. 19 in a series of blogs featuring wisdom from the 91-page gem by Max De Pree, Called to Serve: Creating and Nurturing the Effective Volunteer Board.
Max De Pree: “A friend told me recently that when he gets his agenda package only a day or two before the meeting, he knows he is not being taken seriously.”
In his two-page section on “Be a Good Communicator,” De Pree touches a raw nerve—one that board members whine about frequently. He notes that effective communication between the CEO, the board chair, and all board members involves:
• Agenda packets arriving well in advance of the meeting
• “Producing usable minutes of the meeting in a short time.”
• Being a "lavish" communicator.
I was reminded of the helpful Harvard Business Review article, “What Makes Great Boards Great,” by Jeffrey A. Sonnenfeld. He, too, whines about late-arriving board meeting materials:
“What kind of CEO waits until the night before the board meeting to dump on the directors a phone-book-size report, that includes buried in a thicket of subclauses and footnotes, the news that earnings are off for the second consecutive quarter? Surely not a CEO who trusts his or her board. Yet this destructive, dangerous pattern happens all the time.”
I know. I know. It’s very, very challenging to gather all the materials and documents and get them out the door to board members on a timely basis. Solution? Some boards memorialize the frequency of board reports (and arrival dates for board meeting pre-reading materials) in their board policies manual. (See Fred Laughlin’s and Bob Andringa’s excellent resource on BPMs here.)
Effective communication is fueled by trust. As Dan Busby writes in Trust: The Firm Foundation for Kingdom Fruitfulness, there are eight teamwork examples from the Old and New Testaments, noting that trust starts at the top. (Raise your hand if you’ve ever given a board devotional talk using Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego from Daniel 3.)
Busby also writes, “The largest penalty paid by Christ-centered ministries is the ‘low-trust’ penalty.” Have you ever connected the dots between effective board communication and God-honoring trust?
BOARD DISCUSSION: Does trust fuel our motivation for effective communication? Do we communicate lavishly? Do pre-meeting materials, reports, and minutes arrive with adequate time to reflect and discern next steps? Are board members being taken seriously?
To order from Amazon, click on the title for: Called to Serve: Creating and Nurturing the Effective Volunteer Board, by Max De Pree, (Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company).
Note: This is No. 18 in a series of blogs featuring wisdom from the 91-page gem by Max De Pree, Called to Serve: Creating and Nurturing the Effective Volunteer Board.
Max De Pree: “…one of the great time wasters for any group is the routine of giving progress reports when there’s been no progress.”
In his excellent chapter on “A Chairperson’s Guide,” De Pree continues to dispense governance wisdom in chunky nuggets and tongue-in-cheek witticisms. It’s the chair’s role, he says, to check with subcommittee chairpersons “to ensure there will be substance to their reports. If not, don’t risk frustrating the commitment of good people.”
Perhaps your executive committee could invest two minutes per committee (and I hope that’s not more than 10 minutes total!) to review the committee reports presented at your last meeting. Were they fruitful or frustrating?
Here are three reasons they might be frustrating:
#1. No SMART Goals. The best committees have three to five annual “SMART” Goals (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, and Time-related). Without crystal clear goals (recorded in the minutes), you risk wandering into the foggy wilderness.
#2. No Clarity Between Board and Staff Roles. Too many committees (let me say that again)…WAY too many committees…become a volunteer arm of the staff instead of a sleek, mission-driven committee that addresses fork-in-the-road policy issues.
#3. No Alignment With the Vision, Mission and Strategic Plan. An astute committee chair will always introduce an agenda topic by connecting it to previous or future board action. Example: “As you know, our Rolling 3-Year Strategic Plan calls for us to introduce XYZ by the second quarter of next year—so our committee has been reviewing the staff recommendation on how this program might impact our Board Policies Manual section on outside audits of programs over X dollars.”
Bonus Reason #4. The BHAG is Just a BAG! Maybe…the reason that committee meetings (and their lack-of-progress progress reports) are so frustrating is because board members (or staff) pull trustees into the weeds—rather than into the heavens. If your BHAG (Big HOLY Audacious Goal) lacks the HOLY, then slow down and assess your “called to serve” core values and commitments. Do you experience holy ground moments—even in committee meetings?
Remember 1 Thessalonians 5:24 (NIV): “The one who calls you is faithful, and he will do it.”
BOARD EXERCISE: At your next board meeting, present a gift card to the first committee chair who courageously announces, “We have no progress to report, but we are working on our three to five annual SMART Goals that the board approved at the last meeting. Thus ends our report!”
To order from Amazon, click on the title for: Called to Serve: Creating and Nurturing the Effective Volunteer Board, by Max De Pree, (Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company).
