OK to delegate?

Non-profit organisations depend heavily on volunteers to achieve their purposes. Non-profit board directors therefore have a built-in recognition of the need to delegate key aspects of the organisation’s operations to individual volunteers or groups of volunteers. Role confusion? As very few non-profit entities pay their directors, most of those people think of themselves as volunteers,… Continue reading OK to delegate?

Good and Bad Delegation

Experienced non-profit directors and managers understand that the key to effective volunteer engagement is relationship management. Having best practice policies and procedures, including a volunteer policy framework and instruments of delegation, may be necessary, but these measures are not sufficient to successfully engage your volunteer ‘workforce’. Engagement or buck-passing? Old school ‘carrot and stick’ approaches… Continue reading Good and Bad Delegation

Delegation to volunteers – handle with care

Delegation ‘Power‘ The power to delegate some part of the board’s authority or functions (other than ‘the power to delegate‘*), is one of the legitimate powers enshrined in most non-profit constitutions. Not being able to delegate ‘the power to delegate’ makes sense, as ultimate responsibility must remain with the governing board. In small to medium-sized… Continue reading Delegation to volunteers – handle with care

Avoiding Post-Leadership Letdown

NFP Volunteering – Part 3 ‘Relevance deprivation‘ is normally associated with retirement from paid work, but it can also be experienced by non-profit leaders when they finish their term of office. While talent pipeline and succession planning resources usually focus on identifying and developing your future leaders, they don’t necessarily recognise that the journey also… Continue reading Avoiding Post-Leadership Letdown

NFP Volunteer Engagement & Coordination

NFP Volunteering – Part 2 Part 1 in this series of posts on NFP Volunteering argued that succession planning in most non-profit organisations cannot be separated from volunteer training, development, and support. Given non-profits’ heavy reliance on their volunteer workforce it is important that they take care to coordinate their volunteer efforts and optimise their… Continue reading NFP Volunteer Engagement & Coordination

NFP Success(ion) Planning: Pipelines and Pathways

NFP Volunteering – Part 1 Identifying future leaders and supporting their development is a key dimension of ‘resource management’ in the ‘For-Purpose’ sector. ‘Talent Pipelines’ and ‘Pathways to Directorship’ are often referred to in the succession planning literature, alongside the expectation that a board skills matrix (or director competency framework) should be used to select… Continue reading NFP Success(ion) Planning: Pipelines and Pathways

Strategic Realism

There are many small non-profits which have no staff, or only part-time office support. These associations, clubs, and charities are almost entirely dependent on their volunteer workforce, both for governance, and for program and service delivery. Often, the same people who already give hours each week to their involvement with the organisation, not only approve… Continue reading Strategic Realism