ABOUT THE AUTHORS: Clare Yeowart and Jane Thomas,
New Philanthropy Capital (NPC)
When Susan Ringwood took over as chief executive of the eating
disorders charity Beat, it was clear there needed to be changes to
the trustee board. The board of 16 was drawn entirely from people
who had been directly affected by eating disorders, and the charity
had no business plan, aims, or objectives. ‘I couldn’t fault the
commitment of the board but they and I knew things couldn’t stay
the same’, says Ringwood. Today, after going through a major
overhaul, Ringwood says the trustees are energetic and engaged. ‘We
have stayed true to the core purpose of the organisation but we are
stronger as a result of this process.’
It takes time, effort and diplomacy to turn a failing board
around. But what exactly does a good charity trustee board look
like? And what distinguishes a good trustee from an average
trustee?
A good board is about more than just having the right structure
and processes in place. How a board operates is equally important.
The recent board crises in the City’s banks highlighted this point
– it was poor relationships and a lack of constructive questioning
within the boards that seems to have been at the heart of their
problems.
One key feature of a good board is how well it works together as
a team. Part of the success of this lies in having the mix of
skills on the board and the right number of board members –while
you need a board to be diverse and representative, you don’t want
it to become unwieldy. In recent years there has been a positive
trend for a reduction in the number of trustees on boards, to help
make boards more manageable and effective.
You also need to think about whether you have the right
individuals in the right roles. Tesse Akpeki, an independent
consultant for Bates Wells & Braithwaite’s OnBoard service and
expert in behavioural governance, argues it is not just about
having the ‘right people on the bus’ (to quote management guru Jim
Collins), but also about whether the right people are in the right
seats.
A good board also understands the context in which its charity
works. Building up this knowledge relies on regular communication
between the board and the senior management. Boards where members
do not have a background in the issue the charity addresses should
not let themselves be tempted to let management get on with
developing the strategy and only ‘jump in’ at the last minute.
Trustees can also bridge their knowledge gap by gaining hands-on
experience. The youth homelessness charity St Basil’s has developed
an ‘Active Governance Programme’ to ensure that trustees get
first-hand experience of the charity’s work. It has a youth
advisory board that feeds into board meetings, so trustees hear
about the charity’s impact directly from the young people. Trustees
also visit each of the charity’s services, to encourage them to
consider how each project contributes to the organisation’s mission
and values.
Knowledge building should start in the induction process. A
structured induction plan should outline the responsibilities of
the role and give trustees knowledge of the charity’s purpose, how
it works, and the context in which it operates. Induction should
not, however, just be a one-off process. Boards should be committed
to continuous learning, and induction programmes need to be
refreshed over time.
What is more, boards need to review their performance and learn
from, and respond to, findings from evaluations. Independent board
evaluations can be expensive, so Tesse Akpeki offers one solution
to boards struggling to find the money for an evaluation – a
‘trustee swap’. This involves making an agreement with another
charity working in a different field to do a peer evaluation. While
the process needs to be handled carefully, if done well, the boards
of both charities can benefit from a fresh pair of eyes at no
additional cost.
Six key areas
For trustees looking to become better board members, there are
six areas you should focus on to truly understand how your charity
is performing: activities; results; leadership; people and
resources; finances; and ambition.
Activities
As the figure at the top of a charity, rather than the front
line, it can be difficult to know if your charity is doing the
right things. Yet trustees have a crucial role to play in ensuring
a charity stays ‘on mission’ and that its activities are geared
towards achieving its objectives.
A good trustee should be willing to ask difficult questions,
challenge certain actions and make tough decisions. Think of
yourself as a ‘critical friend’, giving advice and asking questions
in a way that is tactful, structured and informal.
Results
The need for trustees to push their charities to collect results
is particularly pressing in today’s political climate. The spending
cuts have put charities under increasing pressure to demonstrate
that they are worthy of investment.
It is the board’s job to ensure that the evidence a charity
collects reflects the mission and vision of the organisation. As a
trustee, you need to prevent your charity from losing sight of its
purpose amidst pressure from different funders, and encourage it to
stay focused on collecting evidence that is meaningful for the
organisation. First you need to understand what good measurement
looks like and this requires time and effort.
A good board will also share its findings on what works and what
doesn’t, so that effective approaches can be replicated elsewhere.
The Brandon Centre supports young people with sexual and mental
health issues. It used internationally recognised methods to
evaluate its work and published the results. It then worked with
policy-makers and academics to develop the evidence base for its
approach and inform the roll-out of the intervention elsewhere.
Leadership
Ken Olisa, award-winning chair of UK homelessness charity Thames
Reach, says trustees are as central to a charity’s success as a
non-executive director is to a business. Boards have a crucial role
in driving vision and strategy. But as Susan Ringwood from Beat
notes, unless the board, the chief executive and the management
team jointly own the vision and are aligned to it, working on the
strategy is redundant.
People and resources
Staff is the greatest asset that charities have, and working out
how to support it, as well as how to make the best use of a
charity’s other resources such as IT or buildings, is vital.
It is difficult to generalise about how much contact there
should be between trustees and staff. If trustees have no contact
with staff it can create problems, such as making it difficult for
trustees to pick up if there are issues with the chief executive or
management team. In small organisations, trustees will have to ‘get
their hands dirty’ more often, whereas larger charities may need
more formal conduits for contact between trustees and staff.
Finances
Trustees need to provide authority and direction and to look at
finances from a strategic perspective – identifying trends in
income sources for example. A good board will also have an
understanding of whether a charity’s services are providing value
for money, to ensure it is not wasting money on ineffective
services.
Ambition
No charity should want to stay exactly how it is forever. As a
trustee you should be ambitious and push your charity to maximise
its impact.
A good trustee board will look to achieve long-term change by
setting realistic, achievable targets and goals. But a vital part
of the role’s board is also identifying risks to the charity’s
work. To be effective in your role, you should ensure that your
charity’s strategy is responsive to changes in the external
environment, such as a policy change or a huge rise in demand for
services, and adapt the strategy as needed.
Steering charities through the years
ahead
The UK held its first ever ‘National Trustees’ Week’ in October
and with the ‘Big Society’ calling people to get involved in their
communities, trusteeship looks set to become a hot topic.
Yet with nearly half of all UK charities having vacancies on
their boards, charities are crying out for professionals to sign
up. Legal, financial and HR skills are particularly in demand.
Those who have joined boards have found it to be a rewarding
experience. Carol Lake, Head of Corporate Responsibility, EMEA, for
the investment bank JP Morgan, says being a trustee has given her a
new perspective. ‘I was able to apply my skills, but I was also
able to refine them and develop new ones,’ she says. ‘I learnt more
about what it takes to be a good chair from one chairman that I
served under as a trustee than from anything I have directly
experienced elsewhere in my career.’
For those already sitting on boards, now more than ever,
charities need strong leadership to steer them through a world of
spending cuts and policy changes. As Ken Olisa from Thames Reach
comments, ‘Boards will have to be more hands on and closer to the
executive action until things settle down.’ Trustees need to get
more engaged and up their contribution if they are to ensure their
charity survives and even thrives in the current climate. We need
more good trustees, not just average ones. After all, who wants to
be average?
NPC recently ran a series of trustee seminars, which bought
together trustees from across the UK to share lessons on good
governance. You can read a paper outlining findings from the
seminars at www.philanthropycapital.org, along with NPC’s reports
on trusteeship, board matters and trusteeship.