Stop Training Your Board (and Start Engaging Them)

If you had no interest in becoming a flugelhorn player, and attended a training on how to become a flugelhorn player, what are the odds that you’d emerge from that training a budding flugelhornist?*

Not totally zero. It’s possible you will start researching brass bands. But odds are, a training won’t motivate you to do something you have no interest in doing. There are plenty of other people in that one-off training that will handle flugelhorn duties, right?

You may have figured out I’m not really talking about musicians.

Question: Why do nonprofits keep training their boards on how to become fundraisers before asking the people on the board if they have any interest in becoming flugelhornists, err, fundraisers?

Because we cling to the notion (the hope, dream, prayer…) that when a person joins a nonprofit board, they are ready and willing to take an active role in fundraising. And when these board members don’t fulfill our fundraising expectations, we bring in a consultant to do a “training” to “teach” them real fast what we want them to do. Post-training, we hang our heads in frustration when they still don’t step up to the task. 

So why don’t our boards respond to all that training that we so kindly provided? 

Experience has taught me the following:

• Expectation is not motivation 
• Boards don’t raise (or give) money. People, some of whom happen to serve on boards, do
• Each board member is an individual with their own passions, life circumstances, interests, and capacity. Board members are complex human beings, just like you and me, and don’t respond well to a herd mentality
• Speaking of humans, it’s awfully hard to get our species to do things they don’t want to do—especially for a salary of $0

But there is hope! Stop treating your board as a conglomerate and start engaging with them as individuals. Take the time to meet with each one, ask about their motivations, and learn where your organization falls on their list of philanthropic priorities. 

Ask how they would be willing to help move the development function forward. From there, develop a plan for each individual and set your expectations accordingly. 

This may not result in your board of 10 or 12 or 20 being the world’s greatest fundraising board, but it very well may result in them being the best fundraising board your organization is blessed to have at this moment in its history.

*A flugelhorn is a cross between a cornet and a trumpet, and a predecessor to today’s bugle. 

 

Learn more about board motivation and raising funds in Chapter 14 of my new book “Finding Funding: How to Ask for Money and Get It.”