Nonprofit Board Leadership: An Opportunity to Serve and Learn

Serving on a nonprofit board is not only a rewarding experience, but also an invaluable experience for career growth and development. As a longstanding board member for three boards (serving as Chair/President of two), I’ve seen how board service can strengthen your community while also helping you put your time and talents to good (better?) use. In joining a board, I’ve been able to learn from the perspectives of people from different backgrounds, generations, and professions, build a stronger network, and work together to solve complex challenges.

How to Join a Board?

There are three primary ways to join a board.

• Volunteer: My company sponsored a volunteer day and I took the lead in organizing an event. I started by looking at organizations whose missions aligned with my values and reached out to New Endeavors by Women (NEW), an organization that provides shelter and support services to homeless women and children in Washington D.C. Connecting with the organization gave me a chance to learn more about their mission, goals, and how we could support. Additionally, it gave their team a chance to see how we could work together. I continued to stay engaged after the volunteer event and soon after, was invited to join their board, offer finance expertise, and fill a void as their Treasurer. Nearly four years later, I would become their first male Board Chair. Volunteering provides a great opportunity to connect, build a relationship, and see if you are a right fit for the board.

• Voice Your Interest: You may be in a position where you know your passions and missions are aligned. As an alumnus of Connecticut College, I was grateful for the education, experiences, and friendships that Connecticut College provided me. I continued to stay active and engaged as an alumnus (volunteer!) and sought ways to make a greater impact. After connecting with a few current Alumni Association Board Members to learn more about the role, I reached out to staff to share my interest in taking a more active role and let them know some ways where I could contribute. The following year I was voted on the board and four years later I would be honored to serve as the President of the Alumni Association. If you know that you are a good fit for a board and the timing is right, do not hesitate to reach out and share your passion for the board’s mission and advocate to join!

• Board Match: You may not know all of the great organizations out there looking for your experiences. As the son of a school teacher and as an alumnus of Teach For America (TFA), I am passionate about ending educational inequity and opening doors to an excellent education for all. I wanted to become more engaged in the education system of my community and reached out to Education Board Partners (formerly Charter Board Partners), which provided a service for vetting, educating, and matching prospective board members with charter schools. There are a number of organizations that provide these services for specific industries or across nonprofits and enable nonprofits to identify their skills gaps and fill them with talented people like you. I’m currently entering my second year on the Board of Trustees for DC Scholars and have leveraged change management experience to help support a leadership transition. You can find potential boards by selecting your interest to serve on a nonprofit board on your LinkedIn profile and searching organizations such as Idealist.org, Volunteermatch.org, and BoardnetUSA.org.

Board Expectations:

These will vary depending on the board and you will want to gain an understanding of the time commitment and expectations upfront. Many boards will have requirements for attending regular meetings (monthly, bi-monthly, quarterly), and may have outside requirements such as attending events supporting the organization or serving on task forces or committees that advance the mission of the organization. There may also be an expectation to donate to the organization and actively recruit donors, volunteers, or advocates to support the organization. Ask these questions about expectations during the vetting process and review your schedule to make sure you can devote the relevant time, talent, (and treasure, when necessary) to the board.

Remember that board membership is often limited, can be a long-term commitment (a typical term is 2-3 years and you may have an option for 2-3 terms) and you are filling a critical need for the organization. If you are unable to meet those expectations at this time, it is best to keep in touch and revisit at a time that works better for you, or find an organization whose expectations better accommodate your schedule.

Board Benefits: Beyond Service

While you are undoubtedly giving back to an organization because you are passionate about their cause, paying it forward, and want to serve your community, there are also professional benefits to joining a nonprofit board.

• Active Voice: Having a seat at the table enables you to better learn and understand the critical factors impacting a decision. Being an active member of the board enables you to shape those decisions and bring a perspective that can help the organization follow a better path. Additionally, it provides you with the opportunity to leverage your position and skills to uplift voices or grant a stronger voice to marginalized groups. As a board member for New Endeavors by Women, I have been able to better understand the blight of homelessness on the DC community. Our decisions position the organization to better serve a vulnerable community and advocate for resources in a region with a growing homelessness population.

• Stronger Network: Connecticut College’s Alumni Board of Directors has board members from the classes of 1958 – 2020 with diverse backgrounds, professional experience, and interests. Had I not been on the board, my interactions and experiences with many of these board members would have been limited. I’ve built lifelong friendships, gained valuable insights from board members’ personal and professional experiences, and have expanded my network by connecting board members with other members of my network. While we all have a pride and passion for the institution, our shared experience on the board have fostered friendships and connections that will extend far beyond our board service.

• Developed Skills: As a management consulting with expertise in change management and strategic planning, I had helped many organizations develop initiatives, programs, or implement solutions to support their business operations. Serving on boards provided a new arena to do so. There were distinct stakeholders to engage, different messages and forms of communication to utilize, and unique environments to adapt to. Each board position tested my skills, sharpened my capabilities, and extended my understanding. It enabled me to grow, develop leadership skills, and be able to work across a group with more diverse experience than my day-to-day. For instance, Connecticut College’s Alumni Board had representation from 5 generations and more than 10 distinct industries. Working in this setting required adapting communication styles, leveraging different tools and techniques, and trying to utilize the right board member(s) for the initiative based on their skills, interest, and availability. While I used many of the same skills and techniques, they often had to be modified to help us work more effectively.

Being a part of a board creates camaraderie and extends your network and helps you to develop and apply skills in new and distinct ways. Board service can be valuable at any stage of your career (and for those earlier in their careers, many nonprofits have “advisory boards” or regular volunteer groups that can enable you to participate in the organization and could be a stepping stone to a board seat). Leverage your network and skills for good and enrich your life, as well as the lives of others impacted by the cause, by joining a nonprofit board!

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