Getting an education

When I started my graduate program, one of the things I loved was how clearly relevant the course were to me as a non-profit practitioner. When we studied questions about how non-profits related to their constituencies, or the legal issues surrounding their governance and types of activities, the relationship was clear and direct to the actual issues I'd faced as an executive director. It gave me a sense of confidence that I wasn't in a program of frou-frou academia; I was going to be learning about things that mattered to my daily professional life.

That trend has continued, but I'm struck with a new aspect of it this semester. I find that I am learning things that are not only relevant, but that significantly transform the way I think about my professional practice and my life as a citizen of my community. This realization became particularly forceful today, as I am working to complete a paper on the role of non-profit boards and their members. When I was dealing with the board of my former organization, I had pretty specific ideas of how boards should and should not operate, and what their relationship to the staff should be. These ideas were reinforced by experiences working with other boards in the past, by the advice of our donor organizations, and by the common best practice guidelines in the field. A major part of the reason I ended up leaving was that members of the board executive committee wanted to define the board's work in ways that seemed directly contrary to the best practice recommendations, and I didn't feel that I could support the changes they wanted to make.

I took these same ideas with me as I joined the boards of two community organizations this past fall. I wanted to use my experience - and the new knowledge I would be gaining in my studies - to help these boards become more professional and more effective. I knew that each organization and its board has particular conditions and characteristics, and that you can't just ram a "preferred" model into place; but still, I expected that the best way forward for these boards would look like the models I knew with only minor adaptations to local conditions. (In retrospect, for a girl who is so passionate about the necessity for organic localization in other aspects of public life, I find this especially ironic.)

I started my current research paper with the goal of delving into and defining non-profit board best practices, so I could present them with knowledgeable confidence to my colleagues. But what I am finding instead is that my own perspective is being transformed and expanded, to understand the common and recurring challenges of the traditional governance models. I'm also being introduced to alternative ways of thinking about and doing board work that make me have to revise my own rigid preconceptions. Normally, I hate being wrong :-) ... but in this case, I'm really digging it, because I can feel myself being stretched and can see all the ways that it will help me to become both a better board member and, if I ever go back to non-profit management, a much better senior executive. I love it when being challenged ends up being fun!